No Honor Among Thieves: An Ali Reynolds Novella (Kindle Single) Read Online Free PDF Page B

have been traveling on Highway 92 between the hours of midnight and three A.M. to contact the sheriff’s office, especially if they happened to spot anything out of the ordinary.
    In the briefing, Chief Deputy Hadlock said the truck was carrying “contraband” of some kind and declined to discuss the nature of said goods. But that’s just him. He may still be playing the old “refuse to confirm nor deny” game, but I’m convinced that the stolen goods in question are LEGO sets.
    Stay tuned and keep in mind that you heard it here first.
    “I suspect Ms. Shackleford here most likely isn’t one of the local sheriff’s favorite people,” Ali observed when she finished reading the blog post. “There’s some obvious animosity here, and someone who publishes unsubstantiated rumors is liable to be blackballed from the room.”
    “Which means you should probably have a little chat with Ms. Shackleford when you’re down there,” B. said. “After all, I’m not the kind of person who turns up my nose at unsubstantiated rumors.”
    “You’re going there?” Stu asked. “To Bisbee?”
    “No,” B. said. “You are—you and Ali. There’s likely to be a tech component to all this. If so, I’m hoping you can glean as much information from that as possible.”
    “But I already told you,” Stu said. “It’s more than a five-hour drive from here.”
    “We won’t be driving,” Ali said. “B. called Heli-Pros. Our aircraft is already out in the parking lot, ready to go.”
    “A chartered helicopter?” Stu said, sounding alarmed. “You expect me to get on a helicopter? I don’t do helicopters. I weigh too much, and I know too much about gravity.”
    “Stu, we need you to do this,” B. reasoned. “LEGO is an important client, and we need to do whatever’s necessary to learn what we can about what’s happened.”
    “Not if it means I have to ride in a helicopter,” Stu said determinedly, shaking his head. “I won’t go.”
    “Please,” Ali begged. “We need you on the ground to sort things out.”
    “Send Cami,” Stu said. “She can do everything I can do . . . well, almost everything. And if something turns up that stumps her, as long as she has my tool kit and a video camera, I can walk her through whatever needs to be done”
    Stu reached under his desk and pulled out a worn leather bag that TV’s Marcus Welby, MD, might have dragged along with him on house calls back in the sixties.
    “Trust me,” he said, handing the bag over to Cami. “Most everything you need is in there, except for the RFID reader itself. My cloner’s in there, too, by the way.”
    “Really?” Cami said, brightening. “You’re going to turn me loose with your cloner?”
    Ali knew the cloner to be a piece of specialized cell phone duplicating equipment that Stu had never before allowed out of his personal possession.
    “I’m pretty sure you’re trustworthy,” Stu said. “In fact, I’m sure of it.”
    After Stu’s ringing endorsement of Cami’s capabilities, Ali realized that both she and B. had been overruled and outmaneuvered.
    “So much for not being able to give a haircut over the phone,” she said with a grin in B.’s direction. “I guess they’re possible these days after all. All right, Cami,” she added, turning to the young woman. “I guess that other club sandwich belongs to you. Wheels up in five.”
    •   •   •
    Right around five thirty, with the horizon slowly brightening in the east, Dave Hollicker sought out Joanna and shook an evidence bag in front of her face. “Hey, boss,” he said gleefully, “we’ve got some.”
    “Some what?” Joanna echoed. “Bullets, I hope.”
    “Yup. Five so far, and we’ll probably find more.”
    “What kind of bullets?”
    “They’re 7.62 NATO rounds,” Dave answered. “That means we’re most likely looking for an AK-47.”
    “That news doesn’t exactly make me feel warm and fuzzy,” Joanna told him.
    “Me