The Accused (53 page)

The little card that had been caught by Will had let the FBI know, with certainty, where the attack would take place.

What Will would learn—along with the rest of the world—was that the man with one leg would be captured on the steps of the Court's outer courtyard, before even reaching the front doors. FBI agents would drag him immediately into the back of a sealed decontamination vehicle and lock him in. There he would detonate the device—killing only himself.

That is what Will, Fiona, and the world would discover.

But as the little group of friends gathered at the small country graveside service for Colonel Marlowe, something else occupied their minds. They thought about his bravery…and wished they could have said farewell to his body…but it was a closed casket. They found it disappointing that there was no military honor guard—except the BATCOM unit led by Master Sergeant Rockwell. The sergeant seemed strangely detached.

Fiona had been teary-eyed, but she started to sob gently when Rockwell walked over to Will and placed the folded flag from the coffin in his hands. After receiving that honor, Will put his arm tightly around Fiona, thinking about the battle account he had looked up before the funeral. The book of Joshua recorded the second battle of Ai as a successful ambush against the unsuspecting enemy—who had been drawn out from their ancient fortress and into the open. Only…in that battle, Joshua, the commander, had survived.

It would be several months before Will would again consider the fate of his client—and his friend—Colonel Caleb Marlowe. It was on a Saturday.

Will and Fiona had been working around the house. That morning Will had caught the news on the television—including the oil deal struck between Russia and the United States. That did not stop Warren Mullburn from becoming the world's wealthiest man with his Mexico project…though it did take a few billion dollars off his profit margin.

Will greeted the news with a different perspective. The intruder who had threatened Fiona had never been linked to Mullburn. But no one could convince Will that the billionaire had not been the sinister force behind it.

Afternoon came, and he was still thinking about that, and about Fiona's safety, and about the mystery of both forgiveness and punishment for evildoers, when he took the winding walk down the hill that would bring him to their mailbox at the road. It was a bright, beautiful day. The mountaintops, off in the hazy distance, were drenched in sunlight.

At the mailbox, Will reached in and pulled out a few magazines. And bills—always the bills.

Fiona was up on the porch, looking out for her husband. She spotted him and waved and threw him a big, exaggerated kiss that he couldn't miss.

Then Fiona saw Will looking, without moving, at something in the pile of mail. She was too far away to know that Will was looking at a postcard. Or to know why he read it, then reread it, and then read it again. But that was when Will felt a lump in his throat. And he looked up into the sky, and laughed out loud, and wiped his eyes with his knuckle.

The front of the postcard was a simple picture of the American flag. It had been mailed from Istanbul, Turkey, five days after the funeral.

The postcard bore no note—except for a Bible verse. As he had read it, Will had swallowed hard and then smiled as he understood its coded message.

It was Second Corinthians chapter four, verse twelve.

“So death works in us, but life in you.”

Will would wonder, long after that postcard, when he would ever hear from Caleb Marlowe again.

CUSTODY OF THE STATE—

Book 2 in the Chambers of Justice Series

“I loved this book! I didn't think I could possibly enjoy another book as much as I did Craig Parshall's first novel,
The Resurrection File.
But I simply couldn't put
Custody of the State
down!”

—Diane S. Passno

Executive Vice President, Focus on the Family

Veiled Threats…

False Allegations…

Corruption in High Places…

It Couldn't Happen Here…

Mary Sue Fellows, a young mother from rural Georgia, and Joe, her farmer husband, are suspected of having committed the unthinkable against their own child.

Having fled from the law to protect her little boy and shield her imprisoned husband, Mary Sue makes a desperate call to attorney Will Chambers. Reluctantly, Will agrees to take on their defense—and soon he's plunged into a vortex of small-town secrets and big-time corruption.

Struggling to keep justice from miscarrying—and straining to keep the relationship with the woman he loves from disintegrating—the attorney must oppose a government system that seems bent on destroying the Fellows family. Soon Will is forced to ask for himself,
Does God really protect us from evil?
—as intimidation, backroom maneuvering, and the looming shadow of a national threat push him into his own dangerous encounter…with the custody of the state.

“This is not only a great mystery, but also a deeply moving, redemptive book.…Although few novels make it into Hollywood movies, this is one that deserves translation to the big screen. Bravo!”

—Ted Baehr

Chairman of the Christian Film & Television Commission and publisher of MOVIEGUIDE®