That described me to a tee.

For the next hour, I used my astute legal mind to go over my current situation. I started off by compiling a detailed damage a.s.sessment on a legal pad. I began scratching down notes under happy headings like "Friends I'd Lose" (pretty much all of them). "Likely Legal Ramifications" (firm would fire me and I'd lose my license to practice law). Then I wrote, "Statute of Limitations for Manslaughter"(?) and "Emma" (in family services?).

I had my reading gla.s.ses on the edge of my nose and was flipping through my trusty McKinney's when I suddenly pushed the gla.s.ses up on my forehead and slammed the law book shut.

Because there was actually another option.

It was nuts. Absolutely insane. Not to mention an outrageously long shot. Of course it was. Insanity and long shots went together in my life like Ben and Jerry.

What if I did switch cases with my friend Mary Ann? I thought. What if I took Harris's case?

I could stay on top of it. Maybe I could even figure out a way to free Harris without dismantling my life and especially Emma's. Harris didn't do it, right? I knew that. Therefore, there had to be something in his case, some overlooked detail, that proved it. It was just a matter of finding it and bringing it before the court.

"Down in Key West" came a tiny dissenting voice.

Right. I knew there was a rub. I'd have to consult with Harris's lawyer, who lived in the last place I wanted to go.

Just the thought of setting foot in that beautiful, dangerous place again made me want to swallow a handful of Xanax.

I sat there for a little while on the horns of my dilemma.

Choice A: finally face up to my buried past.

Choice B: lie my a.s.s off and try to continue the con that was my life.

It was no choice at all.

I'd have to figure it out, I decided. Key West was a big town. Sort of. I could just lie low. Maybe Peter wasn't even living in the area after seventeen years.

I lifted my cell phone. It felt like it suddenly weighed twenty pounds. I spun down to Mary Ann's number before I could change my mind.

"What?" Mary Ann said sharply.

"I've been thinking. Let's trade cases," I said.

"For real?" she said ecstatically now. "Are you sure?"

I wasn't sure of anything, but I had to do it anyway.

"Say yes before I change my mind," I said.

"Yes," Mary Ann said. "See? I knew you were a good friend. I'll help Emma with her SAT, whatever you need, I promise. Just remember, no backsies."

"No backsies," I agreed, biting the inside of my cheek.

Chapter 61.

AS I DID WITH each of my long-shot plans, I arranged my newest one with gusto.

By the next morning, I'd managed to nail down everything. The flight to Key West, the hotel, the car to the airport. Emma was happily surprised to find out she'd be spending the next week at her best friend Gabby's town house in Brooklyn. The only thing left to do was swing by my office on the way to Kennedy to pick up Harris's case file, which Mary Ann had messengered over.

Then all I had left to do was try not to get killed by Peter as I saved a man from execution.

In a week's time.

"Piece of cake," I mumbled as I rolled my bag into the kitchen.

Em was listening to her iPod and drumming a pencil against her open trig book in front of a bowl of Cap'n Crunch. I stole a spoonful as I e-mailed Harris's lawyer, a man named Charles Baylor, to tell him I was coming down.

I winced when I turned on the kitchen laptop and opened Internet Explorer. In "History," I found searches for "Bloom Family" and even "County Wicklow," the place I'd said Emma's fictional dad was from.

Great! Another headache. What timing. As if my in-box weren't currently full of disaster. The tape I'd made before Emma's party had only whetted her appet.i.te for more, I realized. More juggling. I was getting it from all sides at once. Leave my secret ident.i.ty alone! I felt like yelling.

"Mom, I've been meaning to ask you," Emma said, taking back the spoon. "Why don't I look more like my dad?"

That was one of my biggest worries. That Emma might notice that Aidan Beck was fair instead of black Irish like Peter.

"I have no idea," I said cheerfully, making it up as I went along. "I do know you have his good nature and his laugh."

Emma, no dummy, frowned at my utter bulls.h.i.+t. "Why do I get the feeling that you don't want me to find out about him?" she said.

I had to struggle to keep from pulling my hair out. "Do I give you that impression?" I said.

"Whatev," Emma mumbled, fat tears suddenly springing into her big blue eyes.

I knew that Em was just being a sixteen-year-old girl, a ball of hormone-charged emotion. But I couldn't let her do this. I couldn't afford it, and neither could she. What the heck was I supposed to say? Sorry to have to tell you this, kid, but your dad's a psychopathic killer, and I'm a pathological liar?

Instead, I used my secret weapon.

I dropped my keys loudly on the countertop, collapsed onto the island stool, and started crying myself. "I wish I could make your life make more sense, but I can't," I said, sobbing.

"I'm sorry, Mom," Em finally said, coming around to embrace me. "You don't think I know what you've done for me, but I really do. I'll stop freaking you out with all this stuff."

"No, I'm sorry. You could look up your Irish roots, just not right now, OK? You have college prep and so many other things on your plate. When I get back, we'll rent The Quiet Man. And eat Lucky Charms for breakfast. I hear they're magically delicious."

My iPhone rang as Emma hugged me again. It was a number I didn't recognize. Terrific. What now?

"h.e.l.lo?"

"Hi, this is Carl Fouhy from Exonerate NYC. Is this Nina Bloom?"

"Yes, Carl. What's up?"

"Since you've got the Justin Harris case now, I thought it would be a good idea for you to meet Harris's mother." Mary Ann must have called him, I surmised. No backsies indeed. "What's your schedule looking like?"

"Real tight, Carl. I'm actually on the ten o'clock flight to Florida," I said.

"Could you come by Rockefeller Center before you leave? Justin's case is making big news now. The Today show is doing a piece on it this morning, and we're actually out here right now, protesting. Trying to get some national publicity."

The Today show? Publicity? That would really help my fly-below-the-radar strategy.

A fist-sized ball of fear suddenly clenched in my stomach. I knew I shouldn't have done this. Taking this case on had been a mistake.

"Nina? You still there? I know it's a crunch, but I feel it's really imperative that you meet."

I couldn't think of an excuse. I'd have to figure it out. If I was asked to get anywhere near a camera, I'd just refuse and walk away. Run away, if it came to that.

"Um, OK, I guess," I said, checking my watch. "But only for a minute. Give me half an hour."

Chapter 62.

"AND FOUR, THREE, TWO," said some wimpy bald guy all in black and wearing a headset. He pointed at the ma.s.sive high-tech television studio camera beside him as its red light came on.

"And we're back," Al Roker said, reading off the teleprompter screen mounted beneath the saucer-sized bluish lens of the camera. "We're concluding our three-part series today on Florida's Jump Killer execution by talking to a family member of one of the alleged victims."

Sitting on the couch across from America's weatherman, wearing jeans and a light blue cashmere sweater, Peter Fournier smiled. Behind him outside the Rockefeller Plaza studio window, a crowd of people were waving signs. This was the reason Peter had traveled up from Key West to New York for the weekend.

"Peter Fournier's wife was only twenty-three years old," Roker continued, "when she was believed to have crossed paths with Justin Harris. Mr. Fournier, a Key West, Florida, police officer, is the head of the victims' rights group for the Jump Killer's victims. Good morning, Mr. Fournier. Has Harris actually admitted to murdering your young wife, Jeanine?"

"No," Peter said sadly. "He has not, Al. He maintains his innocence not only in the case of my wife's death, but even of the Foster girl, for which he was convicted."

Peter took a breath as the glossy eye of the camera stayed on him.

"That's why I, and all the other families, are gratified that the execution is finally going to take place next week. This man needs to pay for his crimes, and on Friday night, G.o.d willing, that's exactly what he'll do."

Al nodded. "I can't imagine your pain, but it's long been debated whether capital punishment actually helps the victim's family. What's your take on that?"

"Seventeen years ago, this person abducted my wife and killed her, and he doesn't even have the semblance of humanity to tell me where he dumped her body so I can have a proper funeral," Peter said calmly. "What do I do with that, Al? Forgive and forget? My pain and the pain of all of the victims' families will never go away. Dante said that h.e.l.l is the place where all forgotten things go. That's exactly where I want to put Harris. I just want him to be forgotten by me, by the other families, and by every other human being on this planet."

"What are your plans now?" Al wanted to know.

"I, and the other family members in our organization, have learned that death penalty opponents are scheduling protests, so we will be front-row center to make sure that our voice, and the voices of the people that Harris truly disenfranchised, are heard."

"Thank you, Mr. Fournier. I wish you well, sir," Al said. "Up next is Meredith with some money-saving travel tips."

Chapter 63.

MY AIRPORT CAR let me out in front of Rockefeller Center on the corner of Fifth and 50th and kept going. I'd asked the driver to go ahead to my Lexington Avenue office building to pick up the Harris case file and wait for me there. After my aggravating meet and greet with Harris's mom, I would hustle over to my office and, by some miracle, make my flight.

I spotted Fouhy standing in the crowd in front of the 10 Rock Center window where they taped the Today show.

Beside him, a large black woman wearing a YES WE DID ball cap was holding a large handwritten sign: FREE JUSTIN HARRIS!.

DON'T KILL MY SON!

"Mrs. Harris. Hi, I'm Nina Bloom," I said, coming through the crowd.

Mrs. Harris almost knocked me down as she barreled into me, wrapping her arms around me in a full embrace. She pressed her smiling face against my cheek. She seemed enthusiastic, strangely upbeat despite her son's predicament.

"Oh, she's a good one. I can feel it, Mr. Fouhy," she said in a honey-smooth Southern accent, her soft brown eyes staring hard into mine. "You're going to save my Justin."

"I'm going to, um, try," I said, eyeing Fouhy for help.

"Try won't do, Ms. Bloom," Mrs. Harris said, rapidly shaking her head at me. "Try won't do. You are going to do it, and that's an end to it. It's going to end with you. There's no other choice."

She released me and rummaged through the br.i.m.m.i.n.g Duane Reade bag beside her and showed me a picture. It was of a teenaged Justin in a drum major high school uniform. There was another one of him on a stage playing with the rest of an all-black marching band.

"That was at Carnegie Hall for a Wynton Marsalis tribute." She laughed as she stared at the photo. "All them lessons and practicin'. The neighbors used to call the police twice a month. That was the proudest moment of my life."

Then she placed something cold and metal into my hand. At first I thought it was a coin, but it was a military medal, a bronze octagon with a green, white, and blue ribbon.

"Justin earned this medal when he responded to a helicopter accident during his Ranger training. Last time I checked, serial killers don't go around pulling bodies from burning wreckage. You know, I used to believe in the system. That the truth would come out. But every day, it just got worse. I wish I knew the words to express how wrong this is, the legal terms and such. You're going to have to do it for me, Ms. Bloom."

Mrs. Harris let out a breath, trying to keep herself composed.

"That's why I needed to meet you. To try to make you feel what I know. So you can know Justin like I know Justin. He didn't do it. Justin isn't a monster. It's all lies. All of it. Justin was my best child, my nicest boy. His brother was the mean one. His brother would tussle with him. But Justin would never strike him back. He's incapable of hurting anyone."

"Ms. Bloom is going to do everything she can, Mrs. Harris. Now she really has a plane to catch," Carl Fouhy said gently.

"Wait, please," Mrs. Harris said, without taking her eyes off me. "Do you have a child, Ms. Bloom?"

"A daughter," I said.

"What's her name?" she said with a smile.

"Emma," I said, smiling back.

"What would you do if people had Emma and were about to kill her?"

"Everything I could," I answered immediately.