Quentin nods slowly. “All right, then. You get to work on Devine. Just don’t get killed. You could go to a meeting like that expecting fat Will Devine and arrive to find Snake Knox waiting—like finding a timber rattler where you expect a box turtle.”

“We’ll be careful.”

“I’m guessing Ms. Butler there can take care of herself. Maybe she can take care of you, too.”

“Kiss my ass, Quentin.”

“Are we done?” he asks.

“You never got back to me about what Jewel Washington told me.”

“About Byrd’s deputies possibly tampering with evidence?”

“Yes! The hair and fiber evidence.”

Quentin turns up his palms. “Have you got me any proof?”

“No.”

“Then get out of my face and go find me some!”

“Jewel’s trying. But I’ve thought about it, and one thing seems clear. If those guys did any kind of tampering with hairs taken from the scene, the hairs had to be Caucasian.”

“Why?”

“Because that house would have been full of African-American hairs. From fifty different people, I’d bet. And Sheriff Byrd’s priority is nailing Dad. We know Dad was there, so what kind of tampering could those deputies have done?”

“I’m too tired to guess.”

“They’d have destroyed other Caucasian hairs found at the scene. There wouldn’t have been many, not in Cora Revels’s house. I’m guessing they got rid of some Caucasian hairs and, if necessary, replaced them with others, maybe even their own, which wouldn’t raise any red flags.”

“Why replace them?”

“Even in Billy Byrd’s sloppy operation, there might have been some written or photographic record of Caucasian hairs being found. Records Jewel had seen and would remember.”

Quentin’s eyes look a little brighter now. “They replaced hairs belonging to Snake Knox and Sonny Thornfield. That’s what you’re thinking?”

“If those bastards were in that house, they left trace evidence. Unless they wore hairnets, they would have left hairs at the scene.”

“Gray hairs,” said Quentin, grinning. “Maybe the deputies substituted their daddies’ hair for Knox’s and Thornfield’s.”

“Maybe so. But it certainly seems worth pursuing.”

Quentin nods noncommittally. “I’m going to see your father once more tonight. There’s a deputy there who’ll let me in. You met him when you were in the jail.” Quentin cuts his eyes at Serenity. “As a resident.”

“Are you going to talk to Dad about the hair and fiber stuff?”

“Yes. I’ll call you when I leave the jail. Now, get out of here. I’ve got a meeting to go to, thanks to you.”

“How about we give you an escort?” I ask, not joking at all.

Quentin shoos us toward the door. “Didn’t you hear what I said to Joe? This is brother to brother. No honkies allowed. Now if you want to send Miss Black Universe here with me for protection . . .”