Deadliest of Sins by Sallie Bissell Page B

the guy in the parking lot. He died three days later, after which Sligo charged him with manslaughter. His lawyer got him off with some idiotic ‘gay panic’ defense.”
    â€œGay panic?”
    Mary nodded. “Claimed Honeycutt believed some obscure Bible verse that said if you’re even touched by a homosexual, then you’ll go to hell along with the homosexual.”
    â€œAnd the jury bought that?”
    â€œApparently. The prosecutor was too much of a rookie to wiggle out of it. The DA may have set her up, too. Come election day, he won’t look like a gay-rights activist.”
    Galloway gave a low whistle. “So I’d better not pat Honeycutt’s ass, huh?”
    â€œI wouldn’t if I were you.” Mary took a sip of beer. “What did you find out about my little kid?”
    â€œAfter you left I pulled the phone records on Ralph Gudger’s landline. They did get a call from a cell phone about the same time the kid claims to have heard from his sister.”
    â€œOh, yeah?”
    â€œYeah. But it’s from a stolen cell with a 704-999 exchange—that’s Mecklenburg County.”
    â€œCharlotte,” said Mary.
    â€œExactly where the boyfriend is from, according to Crump. Did the sister sound like she was in trouble when she called?”
    â€œThe boy said so, but I think he was scared his stepfather would catch him on the telephone. This Gudger character sounds like a real Nazi.”
    â€œWell, that pretty much corroborates what Crump told us,” said Victor. “The girl’s miserable at home, hates her stepfather, so she gets her boyfriend to pick her up as she’s on her way home from a babysitting gig. She leaves her car running, hops in with him, and off they go. She probably felt bad and called home to let her mother know she was still alive. Instead of her mom, she gets her psycho brother.”
    â€œBut why would she tell her brother that she’s in trouble?” Mary asked. “Why didn’t she take her purse and her babysitting money? Has anybody questioned the boyfriend? The little brother says he doesn’t exist.”
    â€œCrump said it was probably an Internet romance she hadn’t told anyone about.” Galloway shrugged. “It sounds like the girl was determined to leave the stepfather and just took the first way out that came along.” He gave a bitter laugh. “I honestly think that after assault weapons and drunk drivers, the most hazardous thing to your health is your own family.”
    â€œYou might be right.” Mary scooped up some cheese on a nacho chip. “Tomorrow I’ll call the boy and tell him that his sister was calling from Charlotte, probably just to let them know she was still alive.”

Eleven
    Chase grubbed the poison ivy long past sunset, pulling the green vines off the fence, hacking at the roots with a pickax, all the while thinking he’d managed to screw everything up again. Though he’d managed to hang up the phone and run to the bathroom before Gudger came inside, he had a bad feeling that the ex-cop suspected something.
    â€œWhat are you up to in there, boy?” Gudger had demanded, pounding on the bathroom door.
    â€œI had to go to the bathroom,” Chase cried.
    â€œHaven’t you heard of pissing in the woods?”
    â€œIt’s not piss.” Chase crouched on the toilet, shaking. “It’s the other.”
    â€œYou can do that in the woods, too, Olive Oyl.”
    Chase held his breath, wondering if Gudger was going to open the door and throw him off the john, but his footsteps thumped down the hall and into the bedroom. Chase waited a moment, flushed the toilet for show, then scampered back up to the poison ivy.
    Now he sat by the fence in the growing dark, arms and legs aching, hiding until his mother returned home from work. Over the course of the afternoon he’d been tortured by the notion that Gudger had