Certainty

A woman serving on a high-profile jury finds that doubt casts a long shadow in this suspenseful short story by the New York Times bestselling author of The Last Thing He Told Me.

Recently unemployed, struggling in a marriage rocked by infertility, Cora is desperately clinging to her desire to see the best in people. Then she receives a jury summons for the murder trial of Dr. Preston Becker.

The powerful pharmaceutical executive stands accused of running down two young girls on a rainy night in a busy New York intersection. At first, the case seems straightforward. The victims’ father was investigating Becker’s company, and their mother’s devastating testimony leaves little doubt that lives were shattered.

But as the trial advances, easy answers recede. Competing accounts carry conflicting truths. Was the crash a calculated act or a terrible accident? And why does every witness reveal new shades of gray?

Sequestered with eleven strangers, eleven different views of the elusive facts, Cora reaches the limits of certainty. She must confront the unsettling realization that all the evidence in the world is not enough to truly understand another person.