Gray Mountain by John Grisham Page A

had a lot of rough friends in the meth business. She was afraid of these people. They had cash and they would arrange for his bail any moment now. Once free, Randy would almost certainly track her down. He was furious that she had finally called the police and had him arrested. But he knew the sheriff well and they wouldn’t keep him in jail. He would beat her until she dropped the assault charges. She went through a pile of tissues as she sobbed her way through the story.
    Occasionally, Samantha would scribble important questions such as “Where am I?” And “What am I doing here?”
    Phoebe was afraid to go back to their rented home. Her three children were being hidden by an aunt in Kentucky. She was told by a deputy that Randy was scheduled to be in court sometime on Monday. He could even be there right now getting his bond set by the judge, and once it’s set his buddies will plop down the cash and he’ll walk. “You gotta help me,” Phoebe said over and over. “He’ll kill me.”
    “No he won’t,” Annette said with an odd sense of confidence. Judging from Phoebe’s tears, looks of fear, and body language, Samantha agreed with her and suspected Randy might show up any moment and start trouble. Annette, though, seemed perfectly unbothered by that possibility.
    She’s been here before a hundred times, Samantha thought.
    Annette said, “Samantha, go online and check the court docket.”She rattled off the Web site for Noland County’s government listings, and the intern was quick to open her laptop, start the search, and for a moment ignore Phoebe and her emotions.
    “I have to get a divorce,” Phoebe was saying. “There’s no way I’ll go back there.”
    “Okay, we’ll file for divorce tomorrow and get an injunction to keep him away from you.”
    “What’s an injunction?”
    “It’s an order from the court, and if he violates it he’ll really anger the judge, who’ll throw him back in jail.”
    This made her smile, but just for a second. She said, “I gotta leave town. I can’t stay here. He’ll get stoned again and forget the injunction and the judge and come after me. They gotta keep him locked up for a while. Can they do that?”
    “What’s he charged with, Samantha?” Annette asked.
    “Malicious wounding,” she said just as she found the case online. “Due in court this afternoon at 1:00. No bail has been set.”
    “Malicious wounding? What did he hit you with?”
    The tears poured instantly and Phoebe wiped her cheeks with the back of her hand. “He had a gun, a pistol we keep in a drawer in the kitchen, unloaded because of the kids, but the bullets are on top of the refrigerator, just in case, you know. We were fighting and yelling and he pulled out the pistol like he was about to load it and I suppose finish me off. I tried to grab it and he hit me on the side of the head with the butt of it. Then it dropped to the floor and he slapped me around with his hands. I got out of the house, ran next door, and called the cops.”
    Annette calmly raised a hand to stop her. “That’s the malicious part—the use of a weapon.” She looked at Phoebe and Samantha as she said this, to enlighten both of them. “In Virginia, the sentence can be from five to twenty years, depending on the circumstances—weapon, injury, etc.” Samantha was once again taking furious notes. She had heard some of this in law school, so many years ago.
    Annette continued, “Now, Phoebe, we can expect your husband to say that you went for the gun first, that you hit him and soon, and he might even try to press charges against you. How would you respond to this?”
    “This guy is eight inches taller and a hundred pounds heavier. No one in their right mind would believe I picked a fight with him. The cops, if they tell the truth, will say he was drunk and out of his mind. He even wrestled with them until they Tasered his big ass.”
    Annette smiled, satisfied. She glanced at her watch, opened a file, and