Page 36 of The Wrong Side of the Law

“If you run away, Francis Edwin Wilson Junior, then the bail bondsman comes and he takes this house away from me. Because he will own it. And then I will be homeless.”

He’s far too shocked to be angry about the slap. Good.

“But Mom-”

“Your mother is flatbroke, Francis! Your mother pissed away every single penny that our father left us!Thatis why I dropped out of college.Thatis why I have a job now—making absolutelyshitmoney by the way—so that we can keep this house, and so that you get to have a meal every now and then!”

Margaret’s indignation has finally overcome her good sense.

“Emily Wilson, you shut your lying mouth! Francis, don’t listen to her! She’s… she’s…” Margaret’s voice wavers.

I don’t even look at my stepmother. I keep my eyes locked dead on my brother’s face.

“Margaret, so help me God, if you try and pull that fake heart-attack crap again, I’m not calling an ambulance. I’ll let you stay on the floor.”

“Mom?” Francis’ worry is written plain on his face as he looks past me to his mother, but I can’t tell if it’s for her or for himself. “Is that true? Were you really going to let me run like that, knowing that Emily would have lost her home because of me?”

I turn to look at her myself, and it takes every scrap of self-control I have left not to slapher, too. Is she really this stupid? Or has her brain been frozen as stiff as her face by the injections?

Without giving her a chance to say anything at all, I hustle her out of the room and slam the door.

“I didn’t know, I swear,” Francis says, coming towards me and taking my hands in his again.

“I believe you,” I say. “I do. And I believe you about the drugs, too. Otherwise I wouldn’t have been willing to risk the house like that.”

“I won’t let you down,” he says, swallowing hard. “I won’t. But what are we going to do? No. What amIgoing to do?”

“You’re going to stay right here,” I tell him. “You’re going to face this head on, and we’re going to clear your name. If you run, that’s going to be a lot harder. And if I think you’re going to run, Iwillcall the court and tell them you’re planning to jump bail, and you’ll go back to jail until your trial.”

I almost feel bad about the threat when I see the look of fear that crosses his face.

“I don’t want to go back there.” Francis shudders. “That one night was all I needed to know that I don’teverland in jail. Let alone prison.”

“Rough night?”

“Yeah,” he says. “Those two guys, the drunks? They looked homeless?”

“I saw them, yeah.” I smile wryly. “I smelled them, too.”

“Me too,” he says, wrinkling his nose. “And it got worse after you left. And once they found out my name is Francis…” My brother’s face shows real fear, now. “Em, I don’t think I want to be Francis in prison. Frank, maybe. That sounds… I dunno, tougher? Maybe?”

“You’re not going to prison, Francis,” I tell him. “Oh, sorry. I meantFrank. You’re innocent.”

“You believe me?” he asks. “I mean, for real, you believe me?”

“Yes. I do.”

The look of relief on my brother’s face is heartbreaking. I’m pretty sure it would behisheart that broke, though, if I told him that my reason for believing him doesn’t lie in blind trust or sisterly love. The sad truth is that my baby brother has led such a sheltered life that he’d have no idea how even to become a drug mule.

Please, God. Give Gabriel Cooper something to work with on Robert Ferry. My brother will get eaten alive in prison.

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