Girl Jacked Read Online Free PDF Page B

Collins would have to be informed. That would lead to the inevitable disclosure that Michelle had been his foster sister. He knew the department policy. Anything involving a family member was treated as a conflict of interest and he would not be allowed anywhere near this end of the investigation.
    The longer I stay off the radar screen the better.
    He had a 'get out of jail free card' he intended to play if Collins did catch him. Michelle was his ‘foster sister’, but technically, she was not a relative even if Jack viewed her that way.
    He also didn’t want Sheriff Collins to think he was grandstanding either and go off the charts batty again.
    The reason Jack transferred to Darrington County's Sheriff’s Department was partly due to Sheriff Collins. He thought he would work well with the former Air Force captain. Instead, Collins had written Jack up before his first month on the job and then placed him on late night traffic detail for ninety days. That was after Jack solved a John Doe case.
    A hiker found a body but animals had eaten most of it. The John Doe’s head was missing, leaving no dental records. It was assigned to Detective Flynn, but he didn’t pay attention to the only real clue they had which was the tattoo on the guy’s arm – crossed swords over a four-leaf clover. There was nothing on it in the police database. Jack on his own started hunting one local tattoo parlor after another until he came up with the name of the guy, Tommy O’Neil, a local with a drug problem.
    Instead of promoting him, Collins blasted him up and down about grandstanding instead of acting as a ‘member of the team’. He insisted that Jack would have gotten all the credit if he had gone to Flynn instead of going out on his own.
    The thing Collins didn’t understand was, Jack didn’t care about who got the credit. Jack just wanted to help.
    This time he hoped there would be nothing to make to Sheriff Collins’ ears anyway.
    Michelle is safe and sound lying on some beach in California…
    Jack decided to start and check with Michelle’s last address. She might have a roommate or a neighbor whom she told more details of where she was going.
    Because they were going to the college, he decided to dress the part. He shaved close and styled his hair. There were a few civilian shirts hanging in the closet, so he selected a casual collared one that was a little loose. Jack was muscular and intimidating. He had stayed in excellent shape since the army. Still, he would be dealing with college girls and wanted to appear approachable. A nice pair of slacks and shoes completed the ensemble.
    While he appraised his appearance in the mirror, his smile faded.
    Was this what normal was?
    The man in the mirror was normal and normal seemed so strange to him.
    Jack turned back to his mental checklist. It had many holes.
    Replacement . He still struggled to remember her real name. For some reason, he thought she didn’t like it. Every time he tried to think of it, he could picture her as a little ten-year-old kid, looking perturbed. She was already upset enough so he wasn’t about to ask her what it was, especially if she disliked it.
    Gina. If I’m around when she comes back, there will be an epic fight no matter what I do. She could show or not show. If she stays away for a couple of days, then there’s the possibility she’ll try to work things out and come back. If she shows up today, it will be to get her stuff, and then she’ll be gone, permanently.
    Jack hoped it would be the latter. He thought about hiding anything valuable, but anything of value he had hidden long before Gina. He locked the important papers in the safe, but he kept copies in the back of the sofa. He didn’t trust anyone anymore.
    Great life.
    He thought about the gun in the safe.
    I don’t need it. I won’t take it.
    He carried himself differently when he had his gun. It was like ‘a tell’ in poker. People seemed to sense he was a cop when he carried it,