Forgiveness is her favorite weapon.

Rebecca Hale always takes off her cross before she gets into the truck.

Afterward she puts it back on, fixes her lipstick in his mirror, and drives to lunch with her daughter.

She is the most loved woman in Charleston: a widow with burn-scarred palms, the founder of a shelter for battered women, a voice a million listeners trust.

Her husband, Thomas, has found her red notebook: four powerful men, four sums of money, four small crosses.

And Rebecca knows.

So she forgives him. Then her church starts praying for his jealousy.

His prison is built of prayer meetings, casseroles and immigration forms. One word from her, afraid, and all of Charleston will see a monster in him.

The last man in her life, she says, just left one night.

His mother still puts up flyers.