The ride to Central Station downtown was a short one, particularly at that hour, but Grace looked worse than ever when she got there. The lights were fluorescent and bright, and she looked almost green as they put her in a holding cell where she waited until a burly male officer walked into the room and looked her over.

“Are you Grace Adams?” he asked curtly, and she only nodded. She felt as though she was going to faint or throw up again. Maybe she would die. That was all she had wanted anyway. Dying would be fine. Her life was a nightmare. “Yes or no?” he asked, shouting at her.

“Yes, I am.”

“Your father just died at the hospital. We're arresting you for murder.” He read her her rights, dropped some papers into the hands of a female officer who had walked in just behind him. And then, without another word, he left the room, with a heavy clang of the metal door that sealed them into the cell where she had been waiting. There was a moment's silence, and then the female officer told her to strip all her clothes off. To Grace, it was all like a very bad movie.

“Why?” Grace said hoarsely.

“Strip search,” the officer explained, as Grace slowly began undressing, with shaking fingers. The entire process was utterly humiliating. And after that, they took fingerprints, and did mug shots.

“Heavy rap,” another female officer said coldly as she handed Grace a paper towel to wipe the ink off her fingers, “How old are you?” she asked casually, as Grace looked at her. She was still trying to absorb what they had told her. She had killed him. He was dead. It was over.

“Seventeen.”

“Bad luck for you. You can be tried as an adult for murder in Illinois if you're over thirteen. If they find you guilty, you pull down at least fourteen, fifteen years. Death penalty too. You're in the big leagues now, baby.” Nothing seemed real to Grace as her hands were cuffed behind her back and she was led from the room. And five minutes later, she was in a cell with four other women, and an open toilet that reeked of urine and human waste. The place was noisy and filthy, and all of the women in her cell were lying on bare mattresses and covered with blankets. Two were awake, but no one was talking. No one said a word as she was uncuffed, handed a blanket, and went to sit on the only unoccupied bunk in the small cell.

She looked around her in disbelief. It had come to this. But there had been no other way out. She couldn't take it anymore. She'd had to do it … she hadn't meant to … hadn't planned it … but now that she had, she wasn't even sorry. It was her life or his. She would have just as soon died, but it hadn't happened that way. It had just happened, without intent or plan. She had had no choice. She had killed him.





Chapter 2

Grace lay on the thin mattress all night, barely feeling the sharp metal coils beneath her. She didn't feel anything. She wasn't shaking anymore. She just lay there. Thinking. She had no family anymore. No one. No parents. No friends. She wondered what would happen to her, would she be found guilty of murder? Would she get the death penalty? She couldn't forget what the booking officer had told her. She was being charged as an adult, and accused of murder. Maybe the death penalty was the price she had to pay. And if it was, she'd pay it. At least he could never touch her again, he couldn't hurt her anymore. Her four years of hell at his hands were over.

“Grace Adams?” a voice called out her name just after seven o'clock in the morning. She'd been there for three hours by then, and she hadn't slept all night, but she didn't feel as disembodied as she had the night before. She knew what was happening. She remembered shooting her father. And she knew he had died, and why. She knew that better than anything else. And she wasn't sorry.

She was escorted to a small dingy room with heavy locked doors at either end. They put her in it without explanation. There was a table, four chairs, and a bright light overhead. She stood there, and five minutes later, the door at the other end of the room opened. A tall blond woman walked in. She looked cool as she glanced at Grace, and waited for a moment as she watched her. She didn't smile, she didn't say anything, she just observed Grace for a long moment. And Grace said nothing to her, she stayed at the far end of the room, looking like a young doe about to bolt from the room, except she couldn't. She was in a cage. She was quiet, but afraid. And even in her jeans and T-shirt, there was a quiet dignity about her. There was an unmistakable quality about her, as though she had suffered and come far, paid a high price for her freedom, and felt it was worth it. It wasn't anger one sensed about her, it was a long-suffering kind of patience. She had seen too much in her short years, life and death, and betrayal, and it showed in her eyes. Molly York saw it the moment she looked at Grace, and she was touched by the raw pain she saw there.

“I'm Molly York,” she explained quietly. “I'm a psychiatrist. Do you know why I'm here?”

Grace shook her head, and didn't move an inch closer, as the two women stood at opposite sides of the room.

“Do you remember what happened last night?”

Grace nodded slowly.

“Why don't you sit down?” She pointed to the chairs, and they each took a seat on opposite sides of the table. Grace wasn't sure if the woman was sympathetic to her or not, but she was clearly not her friend, and she was obviously part of the police investigation, which meant that she was potentially someone who wanted to hurt her. But she wasn't going to lie to her. She would tell her the truth in answer to anything she asked, as long as she didn't ask too much about her father. That was nobody's business. She owed it to him not to expose him, and to her mother, not to embarrass them. What difference did it make now anyway? He was gone. It never occurred to her for an instant to ask for an attorney, or try to save herself. That just didn't matter.

“What do you remember about last night?” the psychiatrist asked carefully, watching her every move and expression.

“I shot my father.”

“Do you remember why?”

Grace hesitated before replying, and then said nothing.

“Were you angry at him? Had you been thinking about shooting him for a while?”

Grace shook her head very quickly. “I never thought about shooting him. I just found the gun in my hand. I don't even know how it got there. My mom used to keep it in her night table. She was sick for a long time, and she'd get scared sometimes if we were out, so she liked to have it. But she never used it.” She seemed very young and innocent as she explained it to the psychiatrist, but at first glance, she seemed neither insane, nor retarded, as the arresting officers had suggested. Nor did she seem dangerous. She seemed very polite and well brought up, and oddly self-possessed for someone who'd been through a shocking experience, had had no sleep at all, and was in a great deal of trouble.

“Was your father holding the gun? Did you fight over it? Did you try and take it from him?”

“No. I was holding it on him. I remember feeling it in my hand. And …” She didn't want to tell her that he had hit her. “Then I shot him.” She looked down at her hands then.

“Do you know why? Were you angry at him? Did he do something to you that made you angry? Did you have a fight?”

“No … well … sort of …” It was a fight … it was a fight for survival. … “I … it wasn't important.”

“It must have been very important,” the psychiatrist said pointedly. “Important enough to shoot him over it, Grace. Important enough to kill him. Let's be honest here. Had you ever shot a gun before?”

She shook her head, looking sad and tired. Maybe she should have done it years before, but then her mother would have been heartbroken. In her own sad way, she had loved him. “No. I never shot a gun before.”

“Why was last night different?”

“My mom died two days ago … three days ago now, I guess. Her funeral was yesterday.” She'd obviously been overwrought. But what were they fighting about? Molly York was intrigued by Grace as she watched her. She was hiding something, but she wasn't sure what. She wasn't sure if it was something damaging to herself, or her father. And it wasn't the psychiatrist's job to unearth the answers as to her innocence or guilt. But it was up to her to determine if the girl was sane or not, and knew what she was doing. But what had she been doing? And what was he doing that caused her to shoot him?

“Did you have a fight about your mom? Did she leave him some money, or something you wanted?”

Grace smiled at the question, looking too wise for her years, and not at all retarded. “I don't think she had anything to leave anyone. She never worked, and she didn't have anything. My dad made all the money. He's a lawyer … or … was …” she said calmly.

“Is he going to leave you something?”

“I don't know … maybe … I guess so …” She didn't know yet that if you commit murder, you cannot inherit from your victim. If she were to be found guilty, she would not inherit anything from her father. But that had never been her motive.

“So what did you two fight about?” Molly York was persistent, and Grace didn't trust her. She was much too pushy. There was a relentlessness about her questions, and a look of intelligence in her eyes that worried Grace. She would see too much, understand too much. And she had no right to know. It was no one's business what her father had done to her all these years, she didn't want anyone to know. Not even if saying it saved her. She didn't want the whole town to know what he had done to her. What would they think of them then, and of her, or her mother? It didn't bear thinking.