A PERFECT RENDEZVOUS

I Hate....

Katherine slammed on her brakes and brought her car to a screeching stop in front of Harry's house, cursing when she saw a bicycle in the front yard, which meant Harry was tutoring. Leaving her purse in the car, she ran up the sidewalk, opened the front door without knocking, and walked into the dining room where Harry was seated at the table with three little boys. "Harry, I have to talk to you," she said breathlessly, "in the living room."

Laying his reading primer aside, Harry smiled at his students and said, "Willie, keep reading aloud. I'll be right back." Sensing that something exciting was going on, Willie Jenkins read until Harry was out of hearing, then he grinned at his two companions. "Something's up," he told them lowering his gravelly voice to a whisper, leaning sideways in his chair for a better view of the living room.

Johnny Everett looked over his shoulder as he turned his wheelchair sideways, peering in the same direction, Tim Wimple, whose right leg had been amputated at the knee, swiveled his own wheelchair into place and nodded. "Somethin' big, I'll bet."

Appointing himself as moderator and spy, Willie tiptoed to the doorway. "Miss Cahill's turning on the television set..." he told them over his shoulder, then he turned back to the living room.

"Katherine?" Harry said shakily, sensing that his friend's tense face and the way she was frantically searching for a particular television channel both had something to do with Zayn. "Don't do this to me! Tell me what's happened! It's Zayn, isn't it? Is it bad?"

Shaking her head, Katherine stepped back from the set. "It's all over the newscasts. They're interrupting the regular programs to announce it. NBC said they'd have a videotape of it to show at four-thirty." She glanced at her watch. "That's right now."

"What is it!" Harry burst out.

"It's good news," Katherine said with an anguished laugh. "Or it's bad, depending on how you take it. Harry, he's—"

She broke off and pointed to the set as the announcer said they were interrupting their regularly scheduled programming for a special news bulletin. Tom Brokaw's face appeared on the screen. "Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen," he said. "One hour ago, in Amarillo, Texas, Zayn Malik was released from Amarillo State Penitentiary, where he was serving a forty-five-year sentence for the murder of his wife, actress Rachel Evans. Malik's lawyers obtained his release as a result of a formal statement provided by Emily McDaniels, who costarred with Malik, Evans, and Tony Austin in Destiny."

Without realizing it, Harry reached for Katherine's hand, squeezing it in a death grip as Brokaw continued, "NBC has learned that Miss McDaniels's statement apparently contained sworn testimony that two days ago, her father, George McDaniels, confessed to her that he had murdered Rachel Evans and actor Tony Austin, who was found dead in his Los Angeles home last month."

A moan of pleasure, of torment, and of crushing guilt, tore from Harry's chest. He grabbed at the back of a chair with both hands to hold him upright as the screen switched to the gates of Amarillo State Penitentiary and he saw Zayn walking out, clad in a dark suit and tie, escorted through the rain to a waiting limousine, while Brokaw said, "Malik left prison a free man, accompanied by his California attorneys. Waiting for him in the limousine was his long-time friend, industrialist Liam Payne, whose unswerving faith in Malik's innocence has been no secret from the media or the authorities. Also standing on the sidelines was a young woman with a familiar face, though her famous dimples weren't in evidence at this moment. From the looks of this videotape, it's clear that she didn't expect to be seen but had come to assure herself of Malik's safe release." Harry watched as Liam walked swiftly toward the limo then stopped, looking off to his left, where Emily McDaniels was standing beneath an umbrella with her husband, her face a mask of sorrow. For a moment Zayn stood there, looking at her, then he slowly walked over to her.