The Unwilling Witness — Teresa Holloway

Starting her fourth term as secretary and right-hand girl to influential State Senator Earl Allen, pretty Leslie Parks relished the chaotic bustle of activity preceding the Opening Day ceremonies that marked the beginning of the new legislative session. Powerful Senator Allen was chronically besieged by lobbyists, and one of Leslie's jobs was to greet representatives of all factions cordially and impartially. Nevertheless, hostilities occasionally erupted, as they did when she overheard a violent altercation between slick Mark Rollins and debonair Patrick Berry.

Leslie, however, had little time to mull over the reasons for the dispute, for hard on its heels came the urgent call from a hospital emergency ward. Sarah Parks, Leslie's headstrong teen-aged sister, had been critically injured in an automobile accident. A concerned Pat Berry volunteered to drive Leslie to the hospital and then stayed with her until Sarah was declared out of danger. Grateful for the stranger's warm kindness, Leslie was stunned to learn from Senator Allen that the unassuming Berry was a formidable giant in the mobile-home industry of the South.

This was startling information about the man with whom Leslie was already a little in love, but it dimmed in contrast to the horror of her next discovery, Mark Rollins, the very man with whom Pat has argued brutally, had been shot dead in the midst of the gala Opening Day festivities.