This Is My America(48)

“I’ll need to review the entire case transcript,” Steve says. “Do you have that?”

“Our first attorney requested it, but he didn’t leave us with everything. Now, if we want them again, we need to file and pay for it.”

“I’ll take care of that. Hopefully they’ll be cooperative and not delay us.”

“They can do that?” I ask.

“Do you have an hour, Tracy? I can ask a couple of questions to orient myself?” Steve switches topics.

I look to Dean, worried we might miss our window with Chris, but also torn because Daddy needs my help.

Steve takes my silence as agreement. “Good.” He pulls out a notebook and a small recorder. “During the Touric interview, you mentioned there are new suspects that Galveston County Police haven’t looked into.”

“About that.” A pang of guilt hits me. How exactly do I tell Steve the truth?



Steve studies my face. “No suspects, then. That was for the television?”

“I wanted to get Innocence X’s attention.” I look down, ashamed.

“I knew it!” Steve snaps his fingers. “I used it anyway to make my argument to make this case a priority.”

I blush. He knew I was lying.

“Who do you think killed the Davidsons? Is there a remote possibility Jackson Ridges was involved? I’ll have to clear that aspect first, question the family so I know where to focus.”

I rub my forehead. I don’t want to be part of dragging the Ridges family to benefit Daddy. Mrs. Ridges has been torn apart, and Quincy’s life has been much harder than ours. I can’t question them. It would be a betrayal. I turn my back to hide my queasy feeling.

I look out the window, searching for a distraction. A glint catches my eye, light reflecting off glass. A guy parked in a white SUV across the street watches us through binoculars. He’s in direct line of sight of the loft’s window. Spying on us.

“Someone’s watching us,” I say.

Dean moves next to me as Steve drops his file and waves us away from the window.

“I saw him yesterday, too, when I was heading to your workshop.” Steve closes the blinds. “He could be looking for Jamal—an undercover cop.”

We head toward the door as Steve takes the exit to the outside stairwell and down to the street. The guy drops his binoculars and peels out, almost sideswiping another car.



I whip my phone out and snap some shots. The SUV veers toward the highway exit.

What exactly are we up against? A sinking feeling tugs in my stomach.

“I snapped some photos, might have caught the plates,” I say when Steve returns.

“I’ll get someone on these plates.” Steve calls Innocence X headquarters. “If it’s not a cop, it could be one of our organization’s adversaries. In order to get a retrial, we often start by seeing if there was an error made by the prosecution or the defense attorney. Sometimes our investigation finds something beyond an error, something criminal: lies; coercion; a judge with a certain reputation. Locals usually don’t get too worried this early. Some people think we’re martyrs willing to burn down the whole justice system because one person might be innocent. But an outsider—”

“Sabotage?” I ask.

“Perhaps an organization dead set on increasing the private prison system. Building more prisons requires more prisoners, and Texas was the first state to adopt private prisons. Texas continues to have the highest incarceration rate in the United States in those private for-profit prisons. One prisoner can mean twenty thousand dollars a year. Bodies mean dollars. Over three billion dollars a year. Think. It’s big business. Innocence X threatens their profits.”



“How will we know which one he is?” I ask.

“They’ll make themselves known. Proving someone’s innocent stirs up trouble.”

“Like how?” Dean steps closer to me.

“A crime was committed. Somebody did it. And if it wasn’t your dad…Then there are the prosecutors who don’t want their cases being turned over, the judges, and the police. No one wants to believe they sentenced an innocent man to death.”

I shake my head. Unable to believe that anyone would try to stop me from saving Daddy, from exposing the truth. But the same might be true for Jamal. Jamal is silent about what happened. He’s only said he didn’t do it, and that I need to stay away from the Pike. Jamal was there; he must know who harmed Angela and left her for dead from a head injury, from what the newspapers are saying. This might be why Jamal is on the run.

I know what Steve’s getting at. This won’t be a fairy-tale ending. At least not until we pass through the eye of the storm.

I reach for my purse and grab Angela’s phone, but I keep the micro SD card to myself. Whoever is watching us might be the same person who killed Angela. I hand the phone over to Steve for advice. His eyebrows raise, puzzled.

“A few days after Angela was murdered, I went out by the Pike. I found Angela’s phone. I didn’t turn it in because I ran into some officers and they threatened to charge me with trespassing. They had me by gunpoint. I froze. I didn’t want them to think I was messing with evidence, so I kept it.”



Dean stays silent, but the tips of his ears are red. He’s mad I kept this from him. I’ve kept a lot from him lately.