James raised a hand in a wave as they came up the steps to the doorway where Caroline and Royal stood. “I let Shep leave school for this meeting on the promise that I’d get to come along.”

“Why is that?”

“You and I have some things to work though. I’m sorry, Caroline. I failed you in a lot of ways, and I don’t know if you can get past it. But I hope so. I’d like you to give me a chance, and I’d also like to come in and hear what Shane Chase has to say.”

Caroline took a deep breath and stepped from the way, motioning them into the house. “There’s coffee in the kitchen. Shep, show him where it’s at. Shane’s pulling up to the house now.” She waved his way and they all went inside.

Royal watched her. His usually confident Caroline was nervous. There were chinks in her normally self-assured armor of confidence. He wanted to comfort her, but it was clear she was holding on by her fingernails.

They all settled around the kitchen table.

“We served the warrant, like I said.” Shane sipped his coffee. “And he freaking ran. We chased him and brought his butt back to his apartment where they were doing the search. Hicks didn’t want to go back inside, and when we got into the living room, I knew why.”

“Why do I want to cringe before I even know?”

“The whole room was papered with pictures of you, Caroline. Newspaper articles you wrote going back as far as your first year in college. And the pictures he took from your apartment were up on the wall too.”

“There’s your link.”

Royal’s stomach bottomed out. He leaned a little closer, bumping his thigh to hers.

“Yes, there’s our link on the stalking, and as we’re all standing there in his living room, he knows it. So we take him back to the station in Porter and, I shit you not, I turn on the recorder, introduce myself and the other officer in the room and he just starts talking. He starts confessing. He’d been obsessed with your mother. In the search they found some of what we think is the hair taken from her at the scene. He had pictures of her too. Polaroids usually shot from what looks like a dumpster at the back of the diner. Stacks of them he had in a box with a locket necklace that had pictures of Enrique and you guys in it.”

“My mother had a locket. It had their wedding picture and then a tiny department-store picture of me and Mindy holding baby Shep. It was white gold with rose-gold accents. I think it had little diamond chips in it. Nothing flashy.”

“That’s what we found. Anyway she was nice to him, he said, but she always turned him down. So he waited for your father to make a run to the bank as the diner cleaned up and readied for the next day. Hicks came in when your mother was alone and he killed her. He described the kind of knife. It’s what killed her. He never knew Joyce Marie saw him. But he heard you on the radio, and then he saw you on television because he keeps up on you, what you’re doing, where you’re going. So he listened to that radio show, and it enraged him. And then the television. He knew you had to go and he had plans to kill you. He wrote them down in a notebook and he also told them to us.”

“Why? Why would he tell you all this? This guy should be savvy. He’s done some time. He should know the drill.”

“Right? So there I am, I can’t figure that out. I’m poking around, asking him questions trying to figure it out when he tries to make a deal to keep us from putting him back inside. Turns out he’s ripped off a local drug dealer who has a lot of associates doing time. Hicks panicked, and then he lost his control and confessed to try to save himself. He’s seriously scared of this dealer he screwed over. So much he didn’t even make a fuss about moving to Petal. Figured his attorney would fight it just to slow things down. Guess Petal’s lack of drug lords in the cells was a better option than fighting because once he got himself a lawyer, no one said a thing about it.”

“Pity.”

Shane sighed. “So there you go. He confessed. On tape. There’s so much evidence in his apartment I had nightmares. He definitely needs to be off the streets. We have his journals, which he stashed in a friend’s garage with all his boxes of trophies, while he did time. There are other victims. I’m sure of it. The state folks are already looking at it, and since he’s moved around across several states, the federal people are too. Your father, Enrique Mendoza, did not kill your mother, Bianca Mendoza. Please count on my help when you go through the process to clear him posthumously. I’m deeply sorry that shoddy investigation by a racist incompetent let the man who killed walk free, and an innocent man spent thirteen years in prison on death row. I’m sorry Petal PD had any part of it.”

“You helped solve it. You can’t own what the other guy did, as people tell me so often. You made it right because your department has the integrity his lacked. Thank you.”

“The prosecutor will call you about interviewing you and getting evidence from you. He’s interested in seeing your files that you put together.”

She got up and brought him out a huge three-ring binder and then a smaller one. “I have them copied in bulk.”

They walked Shane to the door and he drove away.

Shep sat at the table, his hands clasped tightly. “You did it.”

“I’m not even sure how to put it all into words.” She smiled at Shep and he got up to hug her. “But I’m glad you were here to hear it with me.”

Shep sat again as uncertainty rose from where her grandfather sat.