State's Evidence: A Beverly Mendoza Legal Thriller by R. Barri Flowers

Perhaps in Alaska, where Joyce had spent her younger
years before the family relocated to Northern California.
    They lived in a violent world. There was no
getting around that. No matter where they went.
    “Do you know who did it?” Joyce asked.
    “No—not yet.” Stone stuck a meatball on his
fork and ate it.
    Joyce wanted more. He could read the hunger
for details in her eyes. “Where did it happen?”
    “Belle Park.”
    Joyce reacted with alarm. “We’ve taken the
kids there!” she said, as if having never considered such a place
could be dangerous. Or that their children could have just as
easily been murder victims.
    “I know,” Stone said, painfully aware that
there were no guarantees that their kids would always stay out of
harm’s way. No matter his desire to protect them and Joyce at all
costs.
    “May I be excused?” Carla said to no one in
particular.
    “You’ve hardly eaten any of your food,
honey.” Joyce set her fork down, as if for effect.
    Carla sneered. “I’ve eaten too much! I
have to keep my weight down to make the cheerleading squad next
semester.”
    “You will be too weak to do any cheerleading
if you don’t eat more,” argued Joyce.
    Stone looked at his slender daughter and
wondered if she was becoming anorexic. He saw no such problem with
his son who was bigger than most boys his age.
    “They’re never gonna pick you to be a
cheerleader!” Paco said cruelly, enjoying needling his older sister
every chance he got. “Cheerleaders have to be nice to look at, even
if they are super skinny !”
    “Mom! Dad!” Carla’s mouth hung open
disgustedly. “Will you tell that stupid twit to keep his silly
opinions to himself?”
    “Apologize to your sister, Paco!” Stone
ordered, if only to try to keep the peace for one meal.
    Paco wrinkled his nose. “Why should I? It’s
true! And she knows it—”
    “It is not!” Carla sprang from the table and
ran towards the stairs. “And I do not!” She added as a parting
shot.
    “Carla—” Joyce called out angrily.
    “Let her go,” Stone said on a breath. He
turned on his youngest son. His first thought was to verbally
assault him just as he had his sister. But he knew full well that
Paco really loved Carla and was merely having fun at her expense.
It was up to her to get past it. “Eat the rest of your food,” he
told him simply. “Then it’s off to bed.”
    Stone put one more load of spaghetti in his
mouth and got to his feet, suddenly having lost his appetite,
albeit for very different reasons. Joyce gave him a scathing look
as if he were suddenly the bad guy.
    “I’ll talk to her,” he promised, wondering
how they made it through the first two kids in one piece and would
someday have to deal with a house full of grandkids.
    At least their children were all still
healthy and alive. That was more than Adrienne Murray could
say.
    Someone had seen to that.
     

CHAPTER FOURTEEN
     
    The Suncrest Nursing Home was located in an
upscale retirement community in Wilameta County, just seven miles
from Eagles Landing. Beverly had chosen this facility after a long
search for a place that could properly care for her father, without
breaking the bank or being too far away to visit. It was a hard
decision to put him away, but a practical one. She was ill equipped
to take care of her nearly teenaged son and a father with
Alzheimer’s disease, while working full time as a prosecuting
attorney.
    Beverly’s father, Alberto Elizondo, was in
the courtyard when she and Jaime arrived. A nurse was supervising
them and seemed content to allow the patients to wander around in
the huge yard surrounded by geraniums and daisies, as if trying to
find themselves.
    “What should I say to him?” asked Jaime,
uncertainty creasing his brow.
    “Just talk to him as your grandfather,”
Beverly responded. “Even if he seems lost, he’ll appreciate
it.”
    Or so she hoped.
    They walked up to him. Alberto was staring
into space, as if waiting to be picked