One Chance: A Thrilling Christian Fiction Mystery Romance Read Online Free PDF Page B

I'm going to need a little help with this one , she admitted.
    She didn't expect the answer to fall on her immediately and it didn't. It took a little over half an hour.
    She was sitting at her desk trying to clear her mind, thinking about just going home to relax for the rest of her day off. She really should go home and be with Doug. Maybe talking it through with him again would bring out some other detail that they both were overlooking
    She couldn't go home just yet, though. Days off or no days off, she had to see this through all the way. What she had tried to put off yesterday was now a weight for her to carry today.
    I'm sorry, Lord , she said silently, for trying to put this off, for trying to make it go away somehow. I will do my best, now, as I should have done before.
    The truth of the matter was, that someone must have seen something. It was time to go knocking on doors. She did it all the time with other cases. And it usually worked out that in a town where everyone knew everything about their neighbors, it was just a matter of talking to the right person.
    So the comforts of home would have to wait.
    She took the time to get back into her uniform and put on her duty belt. The weight of it settled comfortably on her hips. After so many years it was almost part of her persona now. She used most of the equipment on it on a regular basis. Handcuffs, flashlight holder, utility knife, and so on. But it had been a long, long time since she'd had to pull her service weapon, a Sigma .40 caliber automatic handgun. The strength she depended on to do her work didn't come from that.
    It came from God.
    She decided lunch could wait, even if her stomach had started growling at her. It was already after noon now. Waiting a little bit longer wouldn't kill her.
    The first thing Penelope wanted to do was take a look at the crime scene. She drove to the east end of Main Street where her only choice was to turn either right or left onto the County road. The Last Chance Tavern was on the right corner. On the left was nothing but trees. Directly in front of her across the intersection were more trees and an overgrown lot where a house used to stand.
    That house.
    She could almost see the ghostly image of it before she pushed it back down deep. After all this time, she really would have thought she'd be over that, but she wasn't, and she didn't have time for that pain right now.
    Penelope turned left and drove about a quarter of a mile to the scene of the assault. This stretch of the County road wasn't traveled much during the week, and on the weekend it was eerily silent. Pete lived with his only sister not much further down the road. Theirs was the only house out here for a long way.
    She parked on the side of the road and stepped out into the mid-afternoon sunshine. After giving the road and the shoulders on both sides a good look, she found nothing more than what was in the investigators report.
    She decided to pay a visit to Pete's sister, Patty.
    Patty was Pete's older sister. She had never married and had lived in this same house now for most of her life. Pete had moved in with her a few years back. The resemblance between them was obvious, which was to say Patty was a very handsome woman.
    In response to Penelope's questions Patty explained that she hadn't expected Pete to come home the night of the attack at all, but when she heard him on the road crying out for help she went running to see what had happened and found him crawling down the roadside, all banged up. She'd never forget it. No, she hadn't heard anything before that. Yes, she called the Sheriff's Office right away, and the phone had rung through to the Florida Highway Patrol when there had been no one at the Sheriff's Office to answer.
    Penelope thanked her and promised to find out what had happened and who had done this to her brother.
    "I know who did this, Penelope," Patty said to her with a level stare. "We all do. Now you do your job."
    She had nothing she