Vin Stone left the courthouse feeling good. The inquest had turned out as well as could be expected, maybe even better, and now he was on his way home. Time to get back to a normal life after six months of disruption and uncertainty.
Vin was a good walker. Thirty or forty blocks were nothing to him. When he was in the zone, he could catch all the traffic lights without breaking stride. He knew the city well and had an instinctive sense of how long it would take him to walk anywhere. In the clean spring air, he couldn't think of much that would be better.
Things were back to normal. Life was good. Then he met the red haired girl. More accurately, she ran into him and knocked his life back off the rails. Vin Stone wasn't looking for trouble that fine spring day, but it must have been looking for him.