Sandra Brown - The Witness

THE WITNESS

By: Sandra Brown

Synopsis:

After Kendall Keaton pulls herself and her baby out of a wrecked car, a mixture of courage and terror gets her to the top of a ravine, where she flags down help. But she doesn't dare give the hospital her real name or the true identity of the car's injured driver. She tells them only that he is her husband. And as quickly as she can, she starts to plan their escape. Kendall's nightmare began when she came to Prosper, South

Carolina, to be the best public defender the county ever had. She quickly fell in love with Prosper's most eligible bachelor, and after a whirlwind courtship had a fairy-tale perfect wedding. Her father-in-law made her feel like part of the family, the kind of close, loving family she had always dreamed could be hers. When she became pregnant,

Kendall's happiness seemed complete. She never suspected that coming to

Prosper had plunged her into the midst of a chilling conspiracy of bigotry and hate or that she had become a player in an abhorrent deception. Soon Kendall starts losing cases she should have won. She feels surrounded by whispers and secrets, fear, and frightened eyes.

Finally Kendall becomes a witness to a horrifying crime. With shocking clarity she realizes she has misjudged the people around her. Worst of all, she has confused the happiness she wanted so badly with the nightmare she is now forced to endure-a precarious existence that will keep her on the run until justice prevails in Prosperand until her child is safe.

Prologue

The infant's mouth sucked at his mother's breast.

"He seems like a real happy baby," the nurse observed. "Somehow you can just tell whether or not a baby's contented.

I'd say that one is."

Kendall managed only a weak smile. She could barely form a coherent thought, much less engage in conversation. Her mind was still trying to absorb the fact that she and her child had survived the accident.

In the examination room of the hospital's emergency wing, a sheer yellow curtain provided patients with a minimum of privacy from the corridor.

Next to the white metal cabinets that stored bandages, syringes, and splints was a stainless steel sink.

Kendall sat on a padded table in the center of the cubicle cradling her baby son in her arms.

"How old is he?" the nurse asked.

"Three months."

"Only three months? He's a big one!"

"He's very healthy."

"What'd you say his name is?"

"Kevin."

The nurse smiled down at them, then shook her head in wonder and awe.

"It's a miracle that you two walked away from that wreck. Must've been awful for you, honey. Weren't you scared half out of your wits?"

The accident had happened too quickly for fear to register.

The car was practically on top of the felled tree before it became visible through the downpour. The passenger in the front seat had shouted a warning, and the driver had sharply cut the steering wheel and stomped on the brake, but it had been too late.

Once the tires lost traction on the wet pavement, the car went into a

-degree spin that propelled it off the road and across the soft, narrow shoulder. It leveled the inadequate barricade. From there, it was a matter of physics and gravity.

Kendall recalled the sounds as the car plunged down the heavily vegetated ravine. Tree limbs scraped off pains, peeled away the rubber nick guards, and knocked off hubcaps. Windows shattered. The car's chassis was brutalized by boulders and tree stumps. Oddly, no one inside the car uttered a sound.

She supposed resignation had rendered them silent.

Although she'd anticipated the inevitable final crash, the impact of the car hitting the massive pine tree that blocked its path was incredible.

Inertia forced the rear wheels off the ground. When the car crashed down again, it landed with the graceless, solid thud of a mortally wounded buffalo, then seemed to emit a wheezing death rattle.

In the backseat, strapped in by seat belt and shoulder harness, Kendall had survived. And even though the car was precariously perched on the steep slope, she had managed to get out of the wreckage with Kevin in her arms.

"That's rugged country out there," the nurse observed.

"How in the world did you climb out of that ravine?"

It hadn't been easy.

She'd known that the climb back up to the road would be difficult, but she'd underestimated the physical effort it required.

protecting Kevin in the process had made it doubly tough.

The terrain wasn't sympathetic; the weather was downright hostile. The ground was a mush of humus and mud. Covering it was a tangled blanket of undergrowth interspersed with jutting rocks. The wind-driven rain was falling almost horizontally, and in minutes she was soaked to the skin.

The muscles of her arms, legs, and back began to burn with fatigue and strain before she had covered a third of the distance.

Her exposed skin had been gouged, scraped, cut, bruised, and lashed. At several points she had thought it was futile and longed to surrender, to stop and sleep until the elements claimed albeit lives.

But the survival instinct was stronger than that lulling temptation, so she kept going. Using vines and boulders for handgrips and footholds, she had pulled herself up until she finally reached the road, where she began walking to seek help.

She had been on the verge of delirium when a pair of head lights appeared through the rain. Relief and exhaustion over came her. Rather than run toward the car, she had collapsed to her knees on the center stripe of the narrow country road, waiting for the car to reach her.

Her rescuer was a garrulous woman on her way to a Wednesday night prayer meeting. She drove Kendall to the nearest house and notified the authorities of the accident. It amazed Kendall to learn later that she had walked only a mile from the site of the accident. It had seemed like ten.

She and Kevin had been transported by ambulance to the nearest community hospital, where they were given thorough examinations Kevin was uninjured. He had been nursing when the car plunged over the cliff.

Acting on instinct, Ken dall had clutched him to her breast and bent forward before the shoulder harness caught and held. Her body had protected him.

Her numerous cuts and scrapes were painful but superficial.

Splinters of glass had been picked out of her arms individually, an uncomfortable and time-consuming process but insignificant when compared to what she might have suffered. Her wounds were treated with a local antiseptic; she had declined a painkiller because she was breast-feeding.

Besides, now that they had been rescued and medically treated, she had to figure out how to sneak away. Sedated, she would be unable to think straight. In order to plan another disappearance, she needed a clear head.

"Is it okay if the deputy sheriff comes in now?"

"Sheriff?" Kendall repeated. The nurse's question had jarred her from her musings.

"He's been waiting to talk to you ever since they brought you in. He's got to go over the official stuff with you."

"Oh. Of course. Ask him to come in."

Having nursed his fill, Kevin was now sleeping peacefully.

Kendall pulled together the hospital tunic that she had been given after stripping off her wet, dirty, bloody clothes and taking a hot shower.

At a signal from the nurse, the local lawman stepped through the curtain and nodded in greeting. "How're you doin', ma'am? Y'all okay?" He politely removed his hat and looked at her with concern.

"We're fine, I think." She cleared her throat and tried for more conviction. "We're fine."

"I'd say y'all're real lucky to be alive and all in one piece, ma'am."

"I agree."

"Easy to see how it happened, what with that felled tree lying across the road and all. Lightning got it. Broke it clean off at ground level. Been storming 'round here for days. Seems like the rain ain't never gonna quit. Floodin' all over the region. Ain't no wonder to me that gingham Creek sucked your car clean out of sight."