The coup de grâce for Luisa came three days before the trial when the invitations to Travis and Scarlette’s wedding arrived in the mail and Savannah got one. She was opening it as Luisa came home from the hairdresser. She recognized it immediately and snapped at Savannah.

“Where did you get that?” She acted as though she had stolen it or was opening someone else’s mail.

“It’s mine,” Savannah said, instantly sounding defensive. “It came in the mail. It had my name on it,” she said to the evil stepmother who tried to turn every day into a living hell for her and sometimes succeeded. Without her father to defend her constantly, Savannah’s life would have been miserable. He buffered everything for her, but now and then Luisa got the best of her anyway.

“They sent you an invitation to the wedding?” She looked horrified and snatched it from Savannah’s hand. She marched into Tom’s study with it five minutes later and waved it at him in fury. “I will not have her at our son’s wedding!” she said, trembling with rage as she faced him. “She doesn’t belong there. She’s not his full sister. And I won’t be humiliated at my own son’s wedding.” He understood quickly what had happened when he saw the invitation she was holding and shook his head.

“If she’s here when they get married, you can’t not have her at the wedding. She’s not going to sit home like Cinderella while the rest of us are there.”

“And if she’s not still here at the time of the wedding?” She didn’t want her coming back for it. She wanted her gone. Forever. And surely not coming back for a family event as important as this. Everyone who was anyone in South Carolina would be there, and from neighboring states.

“Then it’s up to Scarlette and Travis if they want to invite her. May I remind you that we’re not giving the wedding? Scarlette’s parents are. It’s entirely up to them.” He tried to sidestep it, but Luisa wouldn’t let him.

“Who put her on the list?”

“I have no idea,” he answered.

Luisa called Scarlette about it five minutes later and told her daughter-in-law in no uncertain terms that she didn’t want Savannah at their wedding.

“Mother Beaumont,” Scarlette said gently, “I don’t think that’s right. She’s Travis’s sister, and I like Savannah very much. There are going to be eight hundred guests at the reception, although only three hundred at the church. I don’t think it will hurt anyone to have her at our wedding.” Scarlette persisted, making it clear that she was not going to be rude to Savannah.

“It will hurt me!” Her future mother-in-law shouted into the phone. “And you wouldn’t want that, would you?” It was a clear warning shot across her bow.

“Of course not. I’ll seat her at the opposite end of the tent from you,” Scarlette reassured her, and Luisa hung up on her brusquely and was in a rage for the next two hours.

“Maybe I’ll be gone,” Savannah said quietly to her father a little later. “The trial should be over by then.”

“It would be fun for you to come to the wedding. Half of Charleston will be there. With eight hundred guests, you won’t be able to find anyone you know, if you want to. Luisa will calm down about it.” He reassured her, and tried not to look as upset as he was himself. Luisa was like a dog with a bone and just wouldn’t let go of it. She wanted Savannah out of their lives. It was a difficult position for a seventeen-year-old girl to be in, and even harder for him, constantly torn between his wife and his daughter. It was hurtful for Savannah and exhausting for him. Daisy tried to stay under the radar as much as possible.

Savannah spoke to her mother that night and mentioned the invitation to her, and Alexa startled her daughter when she said she had gotten an invitation to the wedding too.

“Would you go, Mom?” Savannah couldn’t imagine her going, not if Luisa would be there.

“No, sweetheart, I wouldn’t. But it was nice of them to ask me. You can go if you want to. I don’t think I should. Luisa would have a coronary, or she might poison my soup.” Savannah laughed at what she said.

“There will be eight hundred guests there. Dad says she’ll never even see us if we’re there.”

“I don’t want to make her uncomfortable, Savannah.”

“I know, Mom. But I’d like to go, and I’d rather go with you.”

“We’ll see. Let’s talk about it after the trial. I can’t think about it right now. Weddings are the last thing on my mind.” Alexa was going in a thousand directions at once.

She’d had another press conference that day, and the public defender had given one too. The PD insisted that this was all an unfortunate misunderstanding, of an innocent man who had been framed, and it would be cleared up at the trial. She said she had every confidence that Luke Quentin would walk free, as the innocent man he was.

She looked and sounded even crazier when Savannah saw it on TV later that day. Daisy was watching with her and looked confused. Savannah had the news on in her room now constantly. Her mother was on TV every day.

“Did he do it or didn’t he?” Daisy asked her.

“That’s up to the jury to decide. But he did it. Believe me. They’re going to convict him and send him to prison.”

“Then why did the other lady say he didn’t?”

“That’s her job. She has to defend him. And it’s my mom’s job to prove he did it.” Daisy nodded. She was getting daily lessons on the criminal justice system from Savannah. The judge had banned cameras in the courtroom, but once the trial started, it would be a madhouse in the hallways and on the courthouse steps.

The day the trial started, Savannah watched the news before she went to school. She watched it again in the cafeteria during her lunch break, and knowing that Savannah’s mother was the prosecutor, a crowd of students gathered around. Alexa had been surrounded by reporters before she went into the courthouse, but she didn’t stop. They would be doing jury selection for the next several days.

Arthur Lieberman, the judge in the case, was a stern-looking man in his fifties. He had short white hair, and eyes that took in everything in his courtroom. He was an ex-Marine and tolerated no nonsense. He hated the press, and he didn’t like attorneys, neither for the prosecution nor for the defense, who wasted his time with useless motions and frivolous objections. He called Alexa and Judy Dunning into his chambers at the beginning of the case, and gave them a sobering lecture and stern warnings about what he expected of them.

“I want no nonsense in my courtroom, counselors, no funny tricks, no playing with the jury in any way, no improper procedures. I’ve never had a trial overturned, there has never been a mistrial in my courtroom, and I don’t intend this one to be the first. Is that clear?” Both women nodded and said, “Yes, Your Honor,” like dutiful children. “You have a client to defend,” he said, looking at Judy, “and you have eighteen victims to prove the defendant is responsible for killing. There is no more serious matter than this one. I don’t want any irresponsible shenanigans in my courtroom, or histrionics or unnecessary drama. And watch what you say to the press!” he admonished and dismissed them summarily.

Jury selection began half an hour later and seemed endless. Alexa sat at the prosecutor’s table flanked by Jack Jones on one side and Sam Lawrence on the other.

Alexa had come to respect Sam as they prepared the trial. He was a nitpicker, about everything. But she discovered rapidly that he was right, and he had made her even more careful than she normally was. They had shared lunch at her desk many times in the past months. He was in his fifties, she knew he had been a widower for years and had devoted his entire life to the FBI. She knew that when they won the case, it would be in part due to his help. He hated Quentin, and the case, and was as determined to put him away as Jack and Alexa and the DA. That was his only goal, she realized early on, not trying to screw her over or take the case away from her, even if the regional FBI director would have liked to. Senior Special Agent Sam Lawrence wanted the best person to do the job, and to prosecute the case, and Alexa had his full support. He smiled as she sat down next to him, and jury selection began.

It was a long, exhausting process. A hundred potential jurors had been selected, after all those were dismissed who were pregnant, sick, couldn’t get away from their jobs, spoke no English, were taking care of dying relatives, and had been able to come up with convincing reasons to be excused. And Alexa knew that there would be many more with similar excuses amid the hundred who sat crowded into the courtroom, praying they’d be sent away. The judge explained to all of them that it would be a long case, that it involved multiple homicides, and that testimony and arguments would go on for many weeks or even more than a month. Those to whom that presented an undue hardship, or had medical conditions that prevented them from serving, were to identify themselves to the clerk of the court. He pointed him out, and within minutes, there was a line of about twenty people standing in front of the clerk. The other eighty sat waiting expectantly to be questioned by both attorneys to see if they would qualify or be dismissed. Among them were people of all races, ages, both sexes, all of whom looked like ordinary people and were, everything from doctors to housewives, teachers to mailmen to students, all sat staring expectantly at Judy and Alexa.

Luke Quentin had been quietly brought in as the process began, wearing a suit, and he was neither shackled nor cuffed. Since he had shown no signs of violence during the months in jail, awaiting trial, he was allowed to appear like a civilized person, and not in handcuffs and chains, so as not to unduly influence the jury or make him look more menacing, although they knew what he was there for. Alexa noticed when she glanced cursorily at him that he was wearing a brand-new white shirt. She did not meet his eyes, but saw that Judy smiled a reassuring smile at him when he came in, and patted his arm when he sat down. He looked calm and collected and anything but scared, as his eyes roved over the jury, as though he were planning to pick them himself. Technically, he had the right to question them too, but Alexa doubted he would.