its concrete buildings and sidewalks had destroyed those things, just as prison had decimated his dignity. Goddamn bloodsucking reporters. He’d half wanted to use them as a tool to vent his case, since they’d sure as hell done a number on him years ago. But he wouldn’t give them the satisfaction.
And what could he say?
That he was bitter. That he hated the system that had failed him. That he despised the citizens who still stared at him as if he was guilty. That he wished he had a nice home to go to. Someone waiting on him. A family. A loving wife or lover. Anyone who cared about him. A future.
He didn’t.
In fact, going home meant facing the very people who’d condemned him. The neighbors and family who’d gossiped about his family, testified against his character, thrown him away and forgotten about him.
The ones who believed he was a murderer.
But he would face them, anyway. Because someone in Kudzu Hollow knew the truth about the Stanton slayings and had allowed him to take the fall.
One last glance at the columns of the courthouse and its stately presence, and he remembered all he’d learned in prison. Laws varied, depending on a person’s financial status. For the poor, the old adage “innocent until proven guilty” didn’t matter one iota. In fact, it was the opposite—you were guilty from the beginning, and nothing you said made a damn bit of difference. From the moment the sheriff had slapped handcuffs on him, Matt had been labeled a killer. Not one person in Kudzu Hollow had spoken up to defend him.
Then in prison…hell, everyone screamed they were innocent. He’d had a hard time telling the difference himself. He’d met men bad to the bone, some meaner and more depraved than he’d ever imagined. But other innocents like him, convicted by bad cops, seedy lawyers, piss-poor judges and shoddy crime scene techs, filled the cells, too. Trouble was, once the prisoners were all thrown in there together, fighting for survival took priority.
And they all became animals.
Sweat beaded his forehead at the memory of the acts he’d committed in the name of survival.
His life would never be the same. He’d lost his youth, and for a while his chance for an education, although the last few years he’d pulled himself together and had been studying the law. One day soon, he’d obtain his license and take the bar exam. Become a respectable citizen and prove to the world that it had been wrong about him. Maybe he’d even work with Willis to help free other innocents.
Matt’s chest squeezed, though, as he climbed into the lawyer’s black Cadillac. Now only one thing drove him—bittersweet revenge on the man responsible.
If only he knew his identity.
That fateful night raced back as Willis drove through Nashville, Matt’s mind wandering back in time as the sea of cars and traffic noises swirled around him.
Fifteen years ago, he’d been up to no good, stealing tires from the junkyard, when he’d spotted that little Stanton girl running for her life. Hell, he’d felt sorry for the kid. They’d both grown up in the trailer park that backed up to the junkyard. He knew the kind of life she had. Had heard folks in town gossiping that her mother liked the men, that if she wasn’t married she’d be shacked up in one of Talulah’s Red Row trailers making money on her back. And some said that she did spend her days there with her legs spread wide, entertaining customer after customer while her old man sold car parts and pedaled junk for a living. And Matt had finally learned that was true, although he wasn’t proud of the way he’d found out.
Old man Stanton had beat his wife. They were white trash just like his family. Ivy had been such a puny little thing, with bundles of curly blond hair and those big green eyes that he hated to think of her big-bellied father taking his fists to her. The poor kid didn’t have enough meat or muscle on her to fend off a spider, much less a drunk, two-hundred-pound, pissed old fart who wreaked of whiskey and a bad temper.
When Matt had seen all that blood on her hands and shirt, the devil had climbed inside him. He’d wanted to kill her bastard daddy. Teach him to pound on somebody his own size. And he had gone to the trailer, the one with the torn, yellowed curtains, the broken-down swing set and the beer cans smashed against the porch.
But he hadn’t killed anyone.
No, her mother had been dead when he arrived. A vicious slaying, as if animals had been at it. Matt had damn near lost his dinner seeing all the blood on the floor, like a fucking river. And her daddy had been found later, buried beneath the kudzu, his body slashed and bloody, his face carved as if an animal had ripped him apart.
Not that Matt’s pleas of innocence had mattered.
The sheriff had found his boot prints, his damn fingerprints on the doorknob, and he’d been railroaded to jail for the crime, anyway.
Craving fresh air, and suddenly claustrophobic as prison memories assaulted him, Matt cranked down the window, uncaring that the air that assaulted him was tainted with smog and exhaust fumes. It spelled freedom.
He was thirty-one now. Thirty-one with nowhere to go, nothing to do, and not a soul in the world who gave a damn that he was out. Thirty-one and so damn scarred inside and out that no sane woman would ever want him.
All because he’d had a tender streak for a little girl who hadn’t bothered to show up at his trial and defend him.
Damn fool. That’s what he was. What he’d always been.
But never again.
The sun warmed his face as Willis wove through the heavy rush hour traffic. Matt dragged his mind from the depths of despair where he’d lived for so long, and tried to soak up the changes in the city. New businesses and skyscrapers had cropped up on every corner, rising toward the heavens. Car horns and humming motors of SUVs and minivans whizzing by bombarded him, as did the loud machinery on a construction site. The sight of modern vehicles, the styles so different from fifteen years ago, reminded him of all that he’d missed.
“How about a motel on the outskirts of the city?” Willis asked. “There’s a used car lot across the street, and a motor vehicle place a few blocks away so you can renew your driver’s license tomorrow.”
Matt nodded. “Sounds good.” Willis pulled into a Motel 6 and cut the engine. Matt turned to him, forever grateful. “Thank you for all you did for me, Abram.”
A smile lifted the older man’s lips. “Just don’t make me regret it.”
Matt’s gaze met his, and he nodded. He just hoped he could keep that promise.
Willis handed him an envelope. “Here’s some cash from your account and a credit card. I’ll let you know when the state compensation comes in. It won’t be near enough, but it should help you get started.”
Matt accepted the envelope. “Thanks again.” He shook Abram’s hand, then climbed out, smiling at the fact that he could step outside alone. Then he went inside and registered. A few minutes later, he walked across the street to the Wal-Mart, bought a couple of pairs of jeans and T-shirts, along with some toiletries—all mundane tasks that felt so liberating. Like a kid, excitement stirred inside him as he stopped at the Burger King and ordered a couple of Whoppers and fries. He grabbed the bag, inhaling the smell of fast food with a grin, then walked to the convenience store on the corner, bought a six-pack of beer and headed back to the motel for his celebration.
