Midnight Run Read Online Free PDF Page B

convicted, the only way he could help himself was to operate through the proper legal channels.
    But as she rationalized and reasoned through everything that had been said and done, something nagged at her. Something obscure and uncomfortable that had lodged like a fist in her chest. Landis had never been overly intuitive. She preferred dealing with facts. Tangibles. Gut instinct never entered the picture when it came to drawing conclusions or making decisions. But even as she denied the possibility of Jack’s innocence, she knew something wasn’t right. He was one of the most intelligent people she’d ever known. If all he’d wanted was his freedom, he would have fled to Mexico or Canada. He wouldn’t have come to her knowing she blamed him for Evan’s death. It didn’t make sense for him to risk his life in a daring prison escape only to jeopardize it by coming to her.
    Landis stopped pacing and looked toward the cabin, aware that her heart was beating too fast, that her palms were wet despite the cold. What was taking the deputy so blasted long?
    Too impatient to wait any longer, she changed direction and started for the door. Jack might be desperate, but he wasn’t crazy enough to get into a physical confrontation with a cop. Surely the deputy had the situation under control, didn’t he?
    Her pulse kicked when she stepped on to the porch. The front door stood open. Shadows ebbed and flowed within. As familiar as the cabin was to her, it now seemed menacing. Moving closer, she stopped and peered inside.
    “He must have run out the back.”
    Barely suppressing a scream, Landis spun. The deputy stood a few feet behind her. She was about to give him a piece of her mind for scaring the daylights out of her when his words registered.
    “Gone?” she cried. “That can’t be. He was right there on the kitchen floor.” Jack had to be there. He’d been unconscious when she left. He was in no condition to get up and walk away.
    Not bothering to wait for a response, she whirled and darted through the door. Her boots cracked sharply against the pine floorboards as she ran to the kitchen. The room was just as she’d left it, less one unconscious man. She stared dumbly at the floor where a single drop of blood was the only sign he’d ever been there.
    “A set of footprints leads to the road,” the deputy said. “Looks like he cut his hand on that pane. I found blood in the snow.”
    Landis watched the deputy saunter to the French door where the pane had been broken. Shards of glass sparkled like broken diamonds on the floor.
    “Did you get a look at him, ma’am?”
    She met his gaze, her mind speeding through the ramifications of the question. He was a large man with sandy hair and a handlebar mustache. He appeared capable and professional in his sheriff’s department jacket and ostrich boots. But she’d noticed the aggressive glint in his eyes. She’d seen that glint before and knew well the difference between a lawman who enjoyed his work and a cop with an ego to sate and an itchy trigger finger to boot.
    “No,” she answered, thinking she knew how Pandora must have felt after opening that blasted box.
    She answered the rest of his questions truthfully, but without the kind of details that would have made his job easy. No, the intruder hadn’t stolen anything. She hadn’t seen a gun. No, he hadn’t harmed or threatened her in any way. Even her description of him came out vague.
    It wasn’t that she didn’t want the police to find Jack. She did. He’d murdered her brother and deserved to spend the rest of his life in prison. Landis just didn’t want this deputy going after Jack half-cocked. She believed in justice, not vengeance.
    Discomfort washed over her when she realized her other motives weren’t quite as noble. If she identified Jack, her name would be plastered on the front page of every newspaper in Utah. Their past relationship would be sensationalized. The first major victory of her career