Hidden Witness by Shirlee McCoy

Author:Shirlee McCoy
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2020-05-06T20:56:35+00:00

EIGHT

Annalise had been through a lot in her life. She’d spent her childhood watching her mother be mistreated by men who had taken advantage of her kindness and her fragile mental state. She had spent her tween and teenage years helping run the home, making sure bills were paid, and doing everything she could to make certain her mother was okay. College had been years of working odd jobs and long hours, commuting back and forth to school because she didn’t want to leave her mother. She knew her mother would be okay on her own, but the bond between them had been forged through years of taking a combined stand against the unfairness of the world and of life. She would have stayed home during law school if she could have, but it had been too far, and her mother had insisted she pursue her dreams.

If Anna had known the outcome of leaving, she wouldn’t have gone. Just like if she had known Gabe was a lying, cheating hypocrite, she wouldn’t have married him. She certainly would have changed the outcome the day of the shooting, if she had known that the car rounding the street corner contained an assassin.

Life had taught her that she had no control. She should have used that to fuel her determination to enjoy the moments she had, to live every day with joy and enthusiasm. She should have taken vacations and gone shopping with girlfriends instead of working on cases that she had already spent dozens of hours prepping for.

She should have bought the house in the country she and her mother had once dreamed of. The quiet property with the fenced yard and room for a dog and cat and chickens.

Instead, she had made sure her life was carefully structured. Predictable. Ordered. Organized. Mondays were for laundry. Tuesdays and Thursdays for working out at the gym. She ran five days a week. Six if she didn’t have court on Monday morning. She paid her bills on the same day every month. She ate out once a week, got together with girlfriends after church on the third Sunday of every month.

And now, she was going to die in an icy field, far away from friends that she hadn’t spent nearly enough time with. No family. No husband. No children. Not even a pet to mourn her passing.

She swallowed down grief that she had no business feeling.

She’d had a good life. A great one. Even with all the struggles and heartaches, she had always had blessings to be thankful for. If she had things she was sorry for, they were her own doing.

And, if she could go back, if she could change things, she would.

She gripped the dashboard as the SUV bounced across snow-covered grass, powered up a slippery hill and fishtailed onto the highway.

“Maybe you should slow down,” she managed to say through gritted teeth.

“We lost them in the field. I want to put some distance between us and any patrol cars that

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