She screamed as officers placed her in the car.
“I didn’t kill my sister!”
Howard stood on the lawn.
Watching.
Not helping.
Not protesting.
Watching.
I saw the footage on television.
And for one moment, Denise looked directly at the cameras.
Her face wasn’t angry.
It was desperate.
Then she shouted:
“ASK HOWARD WHAT HE GAVE ME!”
The officers pushed her into the cruiser.
Howard turned and went inside.
And suddenly I remembered the security video.
Howard running from our house.
Denise chasing him.
Howard pushing something into her hands.
Denise throwing it onto the ground.
Maybe a metal can.
Maybe the object carrying her fingerprints.
My blood ran cold.
Denise wasn’t only a suspect.
She might have been framed.
CHAPTER 6 — THE WOMAN I HATED TOLD ME THE ONE THING THAT SAVED US
I never imagined I would voluntarily visit Denise in jail.
Yet forty-eight hours later, I sat behind a glass partition watching her enter in a gray uniform.
