After Midnight Read Online Free PDF Page A

three computer flash requests and several cajoling phone calls, she assured Jess the avionics kit had been shipped from the depot by overnight express. She also promised to track it via the computer and notify Jess immediately if it looked like it wouldn’t make the promised nine a.m. delivery.
    Only now, with the sun hanging low and the bay a patchwork quilt of aquamarine and emerald and deep lapis below the causeway, did Jess think about food. She’d downed a Krispy Kreme maple-glaze cruller for breakfast and skipped lunch. Hungry for chargrilled amberjack, she turned right off the bridge instead of left. A short drive past high-rise condos and snowy beaches topped with waving sea oats brought her to Pampano Joe’s.
    This late in the evening, the popular eatery was jammed with both locals and tourists. A smoky-voiced jazz singer crooned from the loudspeakers as Jess claimed a stool at the bar to wait for a table. The wooden shutters were raised, the windows open to the brisk evening breeze of the Gulf of Mexico.
    Idly, Jess sipped a tall, frosted glass of iced tea and watched couples stroll hand-in-hand along the sugar-white sand. The tea went down strong and sweet and cold enough to make the breeze feel comfortable. The feeling that she’d failed to reach Ed Babcock didn’t go down at all.
    So Jess was in no mood for company when someone asked if the stool beside hers was taken. Even less when the lazy drawl registered and she looked up to find Sheriff Paxton planted squarely between her and the nearest exit.

     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     

Chapter Three
     
     
    Jess’s first impulse was to say yes, the stool next to hers was taken. Her second was to down the last of her tea and depart the premises. Still wired from her demanding day, the last thing she needed was this sudden, jagged jolt to her nerves.
    With a conscious effort of will, she subdued the impulse to flee. Pride wouldn’t let her run. Not this time. Not ever again. Indicating the seat next to her with a careless nod, she shrugged.
    “Help yourself.”
    Her distinct lack of enthusiasm raised a gleam in Paxton’s aquamarine eyes. “Thanks.”
    He slid onto to the stool with an easy grace and hooked one loafer heel over a rung. From the look of them, the loafers were handcrafted and expensive. As was his suit. The charcoal gray slacks molded trim hips. The well-cut jacket draped his broad shoulders with a touch of elegance. He’d discarded his red tie, one end of which dangled from his suit pocket, and popped the top buttons on his pale blue shirt, but the impression was still one of sophistication.
    He didn’t miss her quick inventory. Jess had the uneasy feeling he didn’t miss much of anything.
    “I was at a meeting of Florida law enforcement agencies over at Pensacola,” he said in answer to the question she hadn’t asked. “Thought I’d grab something to eat before leaving the bright lights of down county.”
    “Down county?”
    “According to the old timers, Walton County’s developed a severe case of split personality. Up around the county seat of DeFuniak Springs, it’s still old timber, Victorian homes, and Confederate flags. Since the tourist boom, down county is now all golf resorts, high rise condos, and Yankee snow birds.”
    “With the bay keeping both cultures well separated.”
    “Exactly.” Signaling to the bartender, he ordered a beer. “You probably got a taste of the separation when you lived here as a kid.”
    He let it drop so casually, anyone else might have been fooled into thinking he was just making conversation. Jess knew better.
    “Did you run a background check on me, sheriff?”
    “Standard procedure, colonel.”
    “Find anything interesting?”
    “Several things, as a matter of fact.”
    She considered not taking the bait, but the need to know overcame her reluctance to continue the conversation. “Like what?”
    “Like the fact that you pulled two tours in the