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called
True Crime
. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if by some miracle she can help me prove there was someone else in the house that night?”
    “Molly, let go of it. Please.”
    A moment of silence followed. When she spoke again, the tone of Molly’s voice had changed. “I knew I shouldn’t have expected you to understand. But that’s okay. ‘Bye.”
    Philip Matthews felt as well as heard the click in his ear. As he lowered the receiver, he remembered how, years ago, a Green Beret captain had cooperated with a writer who he thought would prove he was innocent of murdering his wife and children, only to have the writer later emerge as his chief accuser.
    He walked to the window. His office was situated in Lower Manhattan’s Battery Park and overlooked New York ’s Upper Bay and the Statue of Liberty.
    Molly, if I’d been prosecuting you, I’d have convicted you of deliberate murder, he told himself. This program will destroy you if that reporter starts digging; what she’ll find is that you got off easy.
    Oh God, he thought, why can’t she just
admit
she was under terrible stress and lost control that night?

7
    Molly found it difficult to believe that she finally was home, harder still to realize she’d been away over five and a half years. When she’d first gotten there, Molly had waited until Philip’s car disappeared down the road before she opened her purse and took out the key that would unlock her house.
    The front door was handsome dark mahogany with a stained-glass side panel. Once inside she’d dropped her bag, closed the door, and in a reflex gesture, pushed her heel down on the floor bolt. Then she’d walked slowly through every room of the house, running her hand along the back of the couch in the living room, touching her grandmother’s ornate silver tea service in the dining room while willing herself not to think of the prison dining room, the coarse plates, the meals that had been like ashes in her mouth. Everything seemed familiar; yet she couldn’t help feeling herself to be an intruder.
    She’d lingered at the door of the study, looking inside, still surprised that it was not exactly as Gary had known it, with its mahogany paneling and oversized furniture and the artifacts he’d so painstakingly acquired. The chintz sofa and love seat seemed out of place, intrusive, too feminine.
    Then Molly did what she’d dreamt of doing for five and a half years. She went upstairs to the master bedroom, undressed, reached into her closet for the fleecy robe she loved, went into the bathroom, and turned on the taps in the Jacuzzi.
    She’d lingered in the steaming, scented water while it foamed and swirled around her, washing over her skin until it felt clean again. She’d sighed in relief as tension began to seep from her bones and muscles. Then she’d taken a towel from the heated towel rack and wrapped herself in it, reveling in its warmth.
    After that she’d drawn the drapes and gone to bed. Lying there, she had closed her eyes, listening to the insistent rapping of the sleet against the windows; gradually she had fallen asleep, remembering all the nights when she’d promised herself that this moment would come, when once more she’d be in the privacy of her own room, under the down comforter, her head sinking into the softness of the pillow.
    It had been late afternoon when she awoke, and immediately she’d put on her robe and slippers and gone down to the kitchen. Tea and toast now, she’d thought. That will tide me over until dinner.
    Steaming tea cup in hand, she’d made the promised call to her parents: “I’m fine,” she’d said firmly. “Yes, it’s good to be home. No, I honestly need to be alone for a while. Not too long, but for a while.”
    Then she listened to the messages on the answering machine. Jenna Whitehall, her best friend, the only person other than her parents and Philip whom she’d allowed to visit her in prison, had left a message. She said she wanted to stop by