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it would be soon.
    Lordy. They’d drum him right out of the party.
    I didn’t get the man. I truly didn’t. I’d watched him at a lot of debates by now, taking on Mary Lee. He was always serious, always listening. But a little too good to be true. And, of course, related to Senator Boyd Jackson. I’d sooner vote for him if he was related to an iguana. Stoney was often flanked in photographs by his mother— older sister to Boyd Jackson—and his female sidekick of the moment, usually a quiet woman with the color and personality of putty. Any other guy would have been labeled as gay for being forty-four years old and never married, but since all of North Carolina had met Stoney Maloney’s mother by now, everyone knew why the dude was still single. No one was willing to take her on as a mother-in-law.
    Rumor had it that Sandra Douglas Jackson was the one who really ran the family show and had long been the force behind her brother Boyd’s success as well. She was small and wiry, with a short-cropped cap of gray hair and a brittle gleam in her eyes. I’m not saying she was the type to run a concentration camp or anything, but I am saying she was the type never to hesitate. She knew what she wanted to do, and she knew what she wanted everyone else to do, and she wasn’t shy about letting the world know it. I’ve met thousands of women like her scattered throughout the South. She could have done a damn sight better job of running things than the men but had never had the chance. Sandy Jackson was Mary Lee without the money, the attractive exterior, or the opportunity. I didn’t know her and I didn’t want to. I had a feeling she was the reason why old Stoney was such a stiff.
    The call I had been expecting came just after I had showered, inspected my black roots in the mirror, and donned my favorite sheath dress for the day.
    “Casey?” Bill Butler said, his tone businesslike, “I need you downtown this afternoon for questioning. It’s official.” Translation: five assholes from the SBI were at his elbows, listening in.
    “No problem,” I said sweetly. “What time?”
    “Two o’clock?”
    “I’ll be there.”
    I called Mary Lee’s house the second I hung up and got her all-around-secretary, Peggy Francis, on the line. “It’s Casey,” I told her. “Should I come in or not?”
    “I don’t think so,” she told me. “The place is crawling with people. Party hacks, the whole campaign team, Hooter and his crew.”
    “What about Bradley?”
    “Not yet,” Peggy said, disapproval tight in her voice. “I tried reaching him through his office and they say he’s unreachable. Mary Lee has no idea where he is.”
    “What a creep,” I said for about the fiftieth time when it came to Mary Lee’s husband. And I’d only known him for a month. Peggy did not reply. “Let me speak to Mary Lee,” I demanded, hoping my forcefulness might get me through.
    “She’s busy.” It was an automatic reflex.
    “Tell her it’s me,” I promised confidently. “She’ll come to the phone.”
    It about knocked me over when she did. “What did you find out?” Mary Lee asked. She didn’t bother with hello. “Where’s Bradley?”
    “Hell if I know,” I told her, a little guilty I hadn’t done what she’d asked. But shoot, you’d think even the dirtiest dog would come crawling home, tail tucked under, once he found out his wife had been accused of murder.
    “He has to be somewhere. What’s his office say?”
    “That he’s unreachable.” Thank you Peggy Francis. “I’m working on it. In the meantime, I’ve been poking into Thornton’s background.”
    “I’m telling you, this is about me, not him.”
    “I think it’s about both of you,” I explained patiently. She had a bit of Louis the XIV in her.
    “If Bradley had anything to do with this, I’m killing him,” Mary Lee said.
    “Could you come up with another expression?” I reminded her.
    “Oh, yeah. Right. Listen, I have to go. We’re