Chapter 5: Grace
She agreed to meet us that afternoon.
Her office was on the fourth floor of a narrow building downtown, the kind of place that looked unremarkable from the street and felt entirely deliberate once you were inside.
No reception desk.
A single assistant who showed us to a room with a long table, two windows, and a whiteboard covered in names and dates that someone had partially erased.
Grace Ellison was younger than I expected.
Early forties, dark hair pulled back, a yellow legal pad already open in front of her.
She stood when we came in, shook my hand first.
"You must be the wife," she said.
Not unkindly.
Directly.
"I'm the victim," I said.
"The wife is recent."
Something shifted in her expression.
Respect, maybe.
"Sit down," she said.
We sat.
Richard placed a folder on the table — a copy of everything from the tuxedo pocket, plus additional pages I hadn't seen yet.
Grace didn't open it.
She already knew what was in it.
"How much has he told you?" she asked me.
"Enough to understand what Carter Hale did.
Not enough to understand why it's taken two years to do anything about it."
Grace looked at Richard briefly.
Then back to me.
"Because until four weeks ago, we had no direct witness willing to go on record.
Richard's account puts him at the scene before the police arrived, which is valuable — but Hale's defense would immediately question why he waited two years to come forward.
We needed something else."
"And four weeks ago you found it."
"Four weeks ago, Donna Marsh called me."
I went still.
"She saw a piece I published in a legal journal," Grace continued.
"A general article about hit-and-run cases in rural counties and the pattern of under-prosecution.
She recognized the road.
She recognized the description of the vehicle.
She had kept her own notes." Grace tapped the legal pad.
"Her notes and Richard's overlap on fourteen separate points."
"That's enough?"
"It's enough to open a formal complaint with the judicial conduct board.
It's enough to compel a review of the original accident reports.
And if the review goes where I believe it will go — it's enough to refer the matter to the state attorney's office for criminal investigation."
Richard let out a slow breath beside me.
I kept my eyes on Grace.
"What does Hale know?" I asked.
"That's the question." She set down her pen.
"He's a careful man.
He's been on the bench long enough to know how these things move.
If he's heard anything — and men like him usually do — he may already be taking steps."
"What kind of steps?"
"Pressure.
On witnesses.
On anyone connected to the case." She paused.
"On Richard."
I turned to look at my husband.
His face was very still.
"Has anyone contacted you?" I asked him.
"In the last few weeks.
Anyone unusual.
Anyone asking questions."
He didn't answer immediately.
That was answer enough.
"Richard."
"There was a man," he said.
"Outside the hospital.
Three weeks ago.
He said he was a journalist.
He asked me about a patient from two years ago.
He knew your name."
The room went quiet.
May you like
Grace picked up her pen.
"Describe him," she said.
