a contingency fee agreement. Sam scanned them quickly. The claims bill was basically a request by Felton for twenty million dollars from the Florida legislature for his wrongful incarceration. The contingency fee agreement was an agreement to give Jack Tobin one-third of whatever he got from the legislature on the claims bill.
So that’s how Tobin does it, he thought to himself. He puts himself out to the public as this great human being, and then he makes his money on the back end if he’s successful. What a slimy son of a bitch. Then he started laughing to himself thinking about all the money Tobin had lost when Felton killed again. It was a morbid laugh since Felton’s victim had been his own daughter. Serves the prick right. He makes his money getting maggots like this set free, it’s only fair that he should get fucked good once in a while. He probably wanted to kill Felton himself. Too late, Tobin, Danni beat you to it.
Wait a minute! Now he knew who the tall man was who had been banging on Danni’s door. Tobin! He started putting the pieces together. Tobin killed Felton. Danni never would have left the scene.
Jeffries made his other big discovery while he was kneeling on the ground stuffing the papers back into the knapsack. There was a gun in the grass right next to Felton’s right hand. He picked it up, careful not to smudge any fingerprints that might be on the handle, and looked it over. It was a small 22 caliber Ruger. Almost missed it, Sam thought to himself. Must be slipping.
He didn’t realize how much he had slipped until he heard the moan. He looked down at the body and saw Felton make a jerking motion with his head and right arm. He’d never checked for a pulse! He looked up at the blue sky leaking through the tall pines. “Thank you, God,” he whispered.
Felton moaned again. He opened his eyes and looked at Sam, apparently not focusing too well. “Help me,” he whispered to the man whose daughter and wife he had so brutally murdered.
Sam grabbed his head and jerked it toward him so that his face and Felton’s were almost touching. “Look at me, fuckface! You killed my wife and daughter. You’re asking the wrong person for help.”
Felton did look at him. Sam could see the recognition in his eyes—the fear. He was so thankful for this moment.
“I had to,” Felton whispered. “No control.”
“Well then, you’ll understand what I have to do—for my wife, my daughter, and all those other people you murdered—you piece of shit. I only wish I had more time.”
There was a good-sized rock off to Sam’s right. He reached for it and slid it in place under Felton’s head.
“I hope this hurts real bad,” he said just before he smashed the man’s head on the rock over and over again. Blood oozed out and started leeching into the dirt and the grass, and the little life that had been there clearly left Felton’s body. Still, Sam didn’t stop until he heard the sirens in the distance—and something else: leaves rustling in the woods. Somebody was coming from the direction of Danni’s house.
He stood up quickly then, taking off the rubber gloves and stuffing them into his pants pockets as he moved, fielded the binoculars, and looked through the trees. Danni and Tobin were running toward him.
Sam picked up the revolver off the ground where he had laid it while he attended to Felton, held it in the palm of his hand and looked at it for several seconds as he continued to listen to Danni and Jack rustling through the woods, getting closer and closer. Then he smiled to himself as he placed the gun in his inside jacket pocket.
“Stop!” Sam yelled to Danni and Jack, putting his hand up when they were about twenty feet away. “I’ve got a dead body here. It’s Felton.”
Danni and Jack both stopped for a moment.
“We know,” Danni said. “At least, we knew Felton was shot. We didn’t know he was dead.”
“How did you know?” Sam asked.
“I shot him,” Jack said.
Just then the sirens stopped.
“I want you two to stay right there. This is a crime scene and my forensics team is going to be here in a moment.”
The team arrived at the scene a few minutes later: three men and two women, accompanied by two male homicide detectives. The forensics people didn’t need any direction. They saw the dead