Chapter 7

The grand jury was set for the twenty-eighth. Which gave Celeste Whitmore nineteen days. I underestimated what a cornered woman does with nineteen days. It started small. Our parish permits got "flagged for review." Our lumber supplier stopped delivering on Tuesdays. Two of my crew got calls from a "licensing investigator" asking whether Elena Hart had ever signed drawings without a license. (I hadn't. Ruth had quietly kept my exam eligibility alive for four years, filing extensions herself,...