J.A. Jance's Ali Reynolds Mysteries 3-Book Boxed Set, Volume 2: Trial by Fire, Fatal Error, Left for Dead Read Online Free PDF

arrival.
    The previous Monday, when Gordon Maxwell had introduced her at the staff meeting, Ali had assumed that the surly greeting she had received from Holly Mesina, the clerk in the outer office, had been an aberration. A week and a day later, Ali understood that Dave’s reaction was the exception, while Holly Mesina’s was the rule.
    During the remainder of the week Ali had followed Sheriff Maxwell on his round of duties around the office as well as out in the community. She had also visited the various substations scattered around the huge county. At each stop along the way, Ali had grown accustomed to the idea that departmental employees would put on their happy faces with her as long as the sheriff was present, but the moment Maxwell’s back was turned and the boss was out of earshot, their skin-deep civility toward Ali vanished.
    Their reactions made her position in the culture of the Yavapai County Sheriff’s Department blatantly clear—Ali Reynolds was the ultimate outsider.
    Sort of like what happened to Haley Marsh when she first showed up at Mingus Union High School, Ali thought ruefully. Of course, there’s a difference. I could quit. Haley couldn’t.
    Ali had told her father that very thing the previous afternoon toward the end of a Memorial Day cookout at Chris and Athena’s house, where the newlyweds had marked the six-month anniversary of their wedding by hosting a shakedown test hamburger fry on Chris’s new gas barbecue.
    “So how are things?” Bob Larson had asked his daughter as the two of them sat on the small patio next to the driveway, enjoying the afternoon sun. “You look glum—not at all your usual self. Is it work?”
    Ali nodded. “Don’t tell Mom,” she said.
    “I don’t have to,” Bob observed cheerfully. “I’m pretty sure she already knows.”
    “Great,” Ali muttered. “I suppose that means I’ll get the third degree from her, too.”
    “Not necessarily,” Bob said. “How about if you tell me and I tell her? What’s going on?”
    “It turns out your daughter is a pawn, caught between two feuding unions. When I walk into a room—it doesn’t matter if it’s the break room, an office, or a lobby—people simply stop talking. When I try to interact with them, they answer direct questions only. The other day somebody left a paper Burger King crown on the seat of my desk down at Village of Oak Creek, and on Friday, when I drove up to Ash Fork and Seligman to introduce myself to the folks up there, someone let the air out of three of my tires.”
    “So the people you have to work with all think you’re stuck-up, and as far as the tires are concerned, no one saw a thing,” Bob said. “Right?”
    “Right,” Ali agreed.
    “So how many more of these introductory substation visits do you have to do?”
    “I have to drive down to Congress tomorrow. That’s it.”
    Just then Athena had emerged from the house carrying a pitcher of iced tea. “Refills, anybody?” she asked.
    Athena, an Iraq war veteran, had returned from her national guard deployment minus two limbs—her right arm below the elbow and her right leg below the knee. She had become amazingly proficient at using her two high-tech prosthetic limbs, but she had also made great progress on becoming a lefty. She wielded the full pitcher without any problems or spills.
    Ali’s father waited until Athena went back inside before he spoke again. “What those guys are doing is hazing you.”
    Ali laughed. “Do you think?”
    “And they’re watching to see how you react.”
    “Correct.”
    “So don’t give them the satisfaction,” Bob said. “Besides, you know what your aunt Evie would say.”
    For years, until her death from a massive stroke, Ali’s aunt Evie, Edie Larson’s twin sister, had been partners with Ali’s parents in the Sugarloaf Cafe, a restaurant started originally by Ali’s grandmother. Aunt Evie had always been considered the wild one in the family. She had also been one of the