The crowd spilled from the Jumpcity Court house, past the thick doric columns and down the broad steps, a buzzing swarm of humanity centering on the key figures of the drama that had played out in Judge Monahan's courtroom.

Smit Pritchett focused his narrow gaze on the navy blue Lincoln that awaited him at the curb and snapped off a staccato line of '' no comments'' to the frenzied press. Richard Kudrow, however, stopped his decent dead center on the steps.

Trouble was the word that came immediately to Rachel Roth as the press began to circle the defense attorney and his client. Like every other deputy in the sheriff's office, she had hoped against hope that Kudrow would fail in his attempt to get the ring thrown out as evidence. Thay had hoped Smith Pritchett would be the one crowing on the Courthouse steps.

Sargent Hooker's voice crackled over the portable radio. '' Greyson, Stone, Ander's, Roth, move in front of those god damn reporters. Establish some distance between the crowd and Kudrow and Renard before this turns into a god damn cluster fuck.''

Rachel edged her way between bodies, her hand resting on the butt of her baton, her eyes on Marcus Renard as Kedrow began to speak. He stood beside his attorney, looking uncomfortable with the attention being focused on him. He wasn't a man to draw notice. Quite, unassuming, an architect in the firm Bowen & Briggs. Not ugly, but not handsome. Thinning brown hair neatly combed and hazel eyes that seemed a bit to big for their sockets. He stood with his sholders stooped and his chest sunken, a younger shadow of his attorney. His mother stood on the step above him, a thin women with a startled expression and a mouth as tight and straight as a hyphen.

'' Some people will call this ruling a travisty of justice,'' Kudrow said lowdly. '' The only travisty of justice here has been perpitrated by the Jumpcity Sheriff's Department. Their Investigation of my client has been nothing short of harrassment. Two prier searches of Mr. Renards home produced nothing that might tie him to the murder of Pamela Butchon.''

'' Are you suggesting the Sheriff's Department compromissed evidence?'' A reporter called out.

'' Mr. Renard has been the victim of a narrow and fanatical investigation led by Detective Garfeild Logen. You all are aware of Logen's record from the New Orleans Police Department, of the reputation he brought with him to this fine city. Detective Logen allegedly found the ring in my clients home. Draw your own conclusions.''

As she elbowed past a television cameraman, Rachel could see Logen turned around and half a dozen steps down from Kudrow. The camera's focused on him hastily. His expression was a stone mask, his eyes hidden by a pair of mirrored sunglasses. A cigarette smoldered between his lips. His temper was a thing of ledgend. Rumors abounded throughtout the department that he was not quite sane. But who was in this department?

He said nothing in answer to Kudrow's insinuation, and yet the air between them seemed to thicken. Anticipation held the crowd's breath. Logen pulled the cigartte from his mouth and flung it to the ground, exhaling smoke through his nostrils. Rachel took a half a step toward Kudrow, her fingure curling around the grip of her baton. In the next heartbeat Logen was bounding up the steps- straight at Renard shouting, ''NO!''

'' He'll kill him!'' Someone shouted.

'' Logen!'' Hooker's voice boomed as the fat sargent lunged after him, grabbing at and missing the back of his shirt.

'' You killed her! You killed my baby girl!''

The anquished shouts tore from inside the throat of Hunter Davidson, Pamela Bichon's father, as he hurled himself down the steps at Renard, his eyes rolling, one arm swining madly, the other hand clutching a .45.

Logen knocked Renard aside with a beefy sholder, garbbing Davidson's wrist and shoving it upwards as the .45 barked out a shot and screams went up all around. Rachel hit Davidson from the right side, her much smaller body colliding with his just as Logen threw his weight from the left. Davidson's knee's buckled and they all went down in a tangle of arms and legs, grunting and shouting, bouncing hard down the steps, Rachel at the bottom of the heap. Her breath was pounded out of her as she hit the concrete steps with four hundred pounds of man onto of her.

'' He killed her!'' Hunter Davidson sobbed, his body going limp. '' He butchered my girl!''

Rachel wriggled out from under him and sat up, grimacing. All she could think was that no pysical pain could compare to what this man must have been enduring.

Swiping back the strands of dark hair that had pulled out of her ponytail, she gingerly brushed over the throbbing knot on the back of her head. Her finure tips came away sticky with blood.

'' Take this,'' Logen ordered in a low voice, thrusting Davidson's gun at Rachel butt-first. Frowning, he leaned down and put a hand on the man's sholder even as Richard Greyson snapped the cuffs on him. '' I'm sorry,'' he murmmered. '' I wish I coulda let you kill him.''

'' Rachel pushed to her feet and tried to straighten the bullet proff vest she wore beneath her shirt. Davidson was a good man. An honest, hardworking planter who had put his daughter through collage and walked her down the isle the day she married Donnie Bichon. Her murder had shattered him, and the subsequent lack of justice had driven him over the edge. And tonight Davidson would be sitting in jail while Marcus Renard slept in his own bed.

'' Roth!'' Hooker snapped irritably, suddenly looming over her, porcine and ugly. '' Gimmie that gun. Don't just stand there gawking. Get down to the cruiser and open the god damn doors.''

'' Yes sir.'' Not quite steedy on her feet, she started around the backside of the crowd.

With the danger past, the press was in full cry again, more frenzied than before. Renard's entourage had hustled off the steps. The focus was on Davidson now. Cameramen jolsted one another for shots of the despondent father. Microphones were thrust at Smith Pritchett.

'' Will you file charges?''

'' Will charges be file Mr. Pritchett?''

'' Pritchett, what kind of charges will be filed?''

Pritchett glared at them. '' That remains to be seen. Please back away and let the officers do their job.''

'' Davidson couldn't get justice in court, so he sought to take it himself. Do you feel responsible?''

'' We did our best with the evidence we had.''

'' Tainted evidence?''

'' I didn't gather it,'' he snapped, starting back up the steps towards the courthouse, his face as pink as a new sunburn.

Limping, Rachel descended the last of the steps and opened the back door of the cruiser sitting at the curb. Logen escorted the sobbing Davidson to the car,with Greyson and Hooker just behind them, and Victor Stone and Kori Andrew's flanking them. The crowd rushed along behind them and beside them like quests at a wedding seeing off the happy couple.

'' You gonna book him Logen?'' Hooker asked as Davidson disapered into the back seat.

'' The hell,'' Logen growled, slamming the door. '' He didn't commit the worst crime here today. Even if he would've killed the son of a bitch. Book him yourself.''

The belligrence brought the rise in colour the Hooker's face, but he said nothing a Logen crossed the street to the battered black ford 4x4, climbing in, and drove off in the opposite direction of the jailhouse.

The Sheriff would crew off his ass later., Rachel thought as she headed to her own raio car. But then a breach in the procedure was the least of Logen's worries, and, if anything Kudrow had said was true, the least of his sins.