Down in storage, Lilly looked at the photo Gibson had given her, then at the files she'd pulled from the open case box. She glanced up to see her partner, Detective Scotty Valens, walking towards her.

"So why's James looking into this cold job?" Scotty asked.

"Not a cold job, a closed one." Lilly said. "Molly Driscoll, forty-six, found shot to death in the bar she owned." She looked over a photo of Molly's body at the scene. "Ballistics matched the bullet to a gun registered to her husband Paul Driscoll. Never found the gun, but they zeroed in on him as a suspect pretty quick."

"What else they got on him?"

"Paul wasn't getting much work, the bar was struggling. Money was tight. A lot of testimony they were arguing about it."

Scotty shrugged. "That's nothing."

"He also bought a two hundred thousand dollar insurance policy on his wife less than a year before the murder."

Scotty raised his eyebrows. "That don't look too good."

"No sign of forced entry." Lilly continued, reading the report. "Nothing missing besides the gun, so it wasn't a robbery."

"So someone she knew."

"Witnesses put him at the bar earlier that night. No one to corroborate his alibi." Lilly turned to another page. "Says he took a plea deal after he found out his daughter Gina was set to testify against him at the trial."

"Be tough to get twelve strangers to believe you when your own daughter won't."

Lilly nodded solemnly.

"Not really anything to reopen the case on." Scotty said.

"I know, but I wanna know what James' interest in this case is. It might help knowing more about it."

Scotty shrugged. "Maybe he knew the vic, the doer."

Lilly shook her head. "They grew up in different neighborhoods. Gibson said the husband's doing twenty years at Rockford. James did his time at Frackville."

"Maybe we wanna look into both sides,"

Lilly nodded. "I'll start with James' brother Lonnie."

"I thought Gibson already talked to him."

"Just don't wanna leave any stone unturned. Maybe he'll have something to say."

Scotty looked away with a smirk. "I'm sure James would be glad to know you're taking such an interest in him."

Lilly just rolled her eyes.

"How you doin', Lonnie?" Lilly said, shaking his hand as she and Kat walked into his house. Lonnie looked pretty much the same since Lilly had last seen him. He was still well-dressed and sporting a noticeable scar on the right side of his face, a leftover from a fight he'd had with James years ago.

Lonnie Gable shrugged. "Well enough, I guess. Got married again. Think this one might actually stick."

"So you put James up in a place after he got out?" Lilly asked.

"Yeah." Lonnie said. "Covered half the rent, helped him find a job. I know the guy's given me a lotta grief over the years, but he's still family. It's not easy to just forget that."

"I know the feeling." Lilly said.

"And you haven't heard from him in the last few days?" Kat asked.

"Well, I got work, a wife." Lonnie sighed. "Plus I uhhh... started going to AA meetings recently. Don't have a lot of time to check in on him everyday."

"Did James ever mention the names Molly or Paul Driscoll?" Kat continued.

Lonnie shook his head. "No, nothing like that. Actually he wasn't saying much of anything. It was like he was depressed for at first. He just sat in his apartment, never went anywhere. He missed a meeting with his P.O. early on. I had to smooth things over with that guy. It wasn't easy."

"You and James ever get into it?" Lilly asked, glancing at Lonnie's scar.

Lonnie shook his head again. "No, it wasn't like before. I mean I thought somebody'd be happy get out early, but with James, it was like someone took the wind out of his sails..."

("Rain" - Creed)

James finally opened the door after Lonnie knocked a second time.

"Your phone's off the hook." Lonnie said.

James nodded. "Yeah, I... I didn't want to be bothered."

Lonnie walked in, looking at James' bed-head and five o'clock shadow. "You been sleeping all day? It's after three."

James shrugged passively. "I just didn't feel like getting up."

"You missed a meeting with your P.O." Lonnie said with a frown. "I managed to reschedule, kept him from doing anything rash, but this guy can send you back. You don't want to let him down."

James slumped down into a kitchen chair. "Whatever."

"Look, I'm trying to help you, but you gotta work with me here!"

James was quiet for a moment, then looked up at Lonnie's scar. "I never said I was sorry about that." He said, gesturing to it.

Lonnie sighed and shook his head. "Look, you wanna come over, have dinner with us?"

James kept looking at Lonnie, then lowered his head again. "No, I'm fine here."

"I don't get it." Lonnie said. "I thought most guys in there dream of getting out, getting a second chance."

James looked up again with a frown. "Yeah, most of them do."

"Yeah, but you earned another shot, and it's like you don't care one way or another."

James got up from the chair and walked back towards his bedroom. "I didn't earn anything."

Lonnie closed his eyes and sighed...

"I didn't know what to say." Lonnie said. "He was just stuck in a rut."

"It's a bit of a transition, going back to a normal life after being locked up for a few years." Kat said.

"It was different than that somehow." Lonnie said. "It was like he felt like he didn't deserve it."

Lilly and Kat both nodded.

Lonnie looked down for a moment. "Look, there's one thing I didn't tell his P.O. At this point, I didn't think it would do James much good."

"What's that?" Lilly asked, looking concerned.

"A little over a week ago, James bought a bus ticket, went up to that prison up at Muncy."

"The women's facility." Kat said, looking puzzled.

Lonnie nodded, the disappointment showing on his face. "There's only one person I can think of him going to see up there."

Lilly shook her head. "Sherry."

Sitting in the prison visiting room, Sherry Stephens was a far cry from the upscale doctor's wife she'd been the six years earlier. Her hair had grown out somewhat and her lack of make up seemed to make the scowl on her face, directed at the Lilly and Scotty, even less pleasant.

"I don't know where James is," Sherry said plainly. "And frankly, I don't care."

"No love for your old ex?" Scotty asked, with a smirk.

"He's the only reason I'm in here." Sherry said. "I lost my life, my husband because of him."

"Actually, I think smothering an eighty year old woman might have something to do with it." Lilly said, with a condescending tone. "'For better or worse' doesn't usually cover murder."

"Did you just come here to gloat?" Sherry asked.

"We know James visited you here last week, Sherry." Scotty said. "What'd you talk about?"

"Nothing." Sherry said coldly. "Whatever he was looking for, he wasn't going to find it here with me..."

("Sober" - Pink)

Sherry glared at James through the window. James just swallowed awkwardly.

"So how are you getting along in here?" James asked, picking up the phone.

Sherry's eyes narrowed. "Are you seriously asking me that?"

"I heard your husband left." James said calmly. "I'm sorry."

"You got a lot of nerve acting like you give a damn." She said icily.

"I do." He continued. "Look, I know a lot's happened between us, but that doesn't mean I don't care."

"So you testified against me in court because you cared?"

James shook his head. "Look, Sherry, we both had to own up to what we did."

"Well I'm sure that sounds great coming from your side of the glass."

"What do you want me do, Sherry?" James asked, starting to sound frustrated.

"Short of dying a horrible death, I don't really care what you do."

"Look if you think I've been having it easy since I got out, you're wrong." James said. "I don't know why they let me out. I don't know what I'm supposed to do with the rest of my life. The only real friend I ever had's still locked up."

"We're not 'friends'!" Sherry said.

"I wasn't talking about you." He said seriously. "But I was still hoping we could make peace."

Sherry looked at him for a moment. "Well let me settle that question for you. As long as I'm in here and you're out there, there's not going to be any peace."

James looked down, lost in thought. He looked up a moment later, suddenly looking like a new man.

"You're right." He said, sounding surprised. "It's what I should've been doing all along,"

"What?" Sherry asked, confused.

"I gotta go. There's something I gotta do." James said. "Thanks."

"Go to hell, James." Sherry said, irritably.

James managed a wistful smile. "At least you finally said my name..."

"He just got up and left after that." Sherry said. "I don't what he was talking about."

Scotty leaned over to Lilly. "He said his only friend's still locked up. Think that might mean something?"

"Worth a look." Lilly said.

"Are we done?" Sherry asked impatiently.

"Yeah, we're done." Lilly said, nodding for the nearby guard to take her away. "You might wanna make sure you fluff your own pillows though."

Sherry gave Lilly an icy stare as the guard walked her out of the room.

"You still looking into James Hogan?" Lieutenant John Stillman asked warily as he and Detective Will Jeffries walked over to Lilly and Scotty's desks.

Lilly nodded. "Get this; we finally found the link between James and this case. That friend Sherry told us about, it was Paul Driscoll."

Stillman looked confused. "I thought he was up at Rockford."

Scotty nodded. "Yeah, now. But he served the first two years of his sentence at Frackville. Talked to a C.O. on James' cellblock. He said the two were real tight."

"Well that would explain why James' parole officer missed the connection." Jeffries said.

Stillman shook his head. "Still not enough to reopen a closed case. Doherty's never gonna sign off on this if that's all we got."

"It's not." Kat said, rushing into the office, holding a crumpled paper. "I just talked to Lonnie again. He went to check out James' place again, found this crumpled up under the bed." She handed Stillman the paper, who looked over the not written on it, while the other detectives looked over his shoulder.

Dear James,

I know you've been looking into the murder of Molly Driscoll. You'd better keep your nose out of things that don't concern you, or you'll pay.

"Somebody doesn't want him giving this case a second look." Kat said.

Scotty nodded. "Reason enough for us to give it one."

Lilly sighed uneasily. "We just better hope whoever wrote this hasn't made good on their threat."