Undercover Love (The Women of Manatee Bay, Book 2) Read Online Free PDF Page A

leaned against the edge of his desk, setting the phone on a pile of paperwork. Reports he needed to turn into the police chief tomorrow. Not that it would matter if it was on time. The chief wasn’t known for being efficient in the office. Or on the streets.
    That would change soon enough. Grant shouldn’t feel any guilt over the choices he’d recently made to straighten this police department up, but nevertheless, a deep regret rolled inside him.
    He squashed the feeling and focused on Charlie. “What’s up?”
    Charlie’s mustache twitched as cigarette smoke plumed slowly toward the ceiling.
    “Dude, it smells like a furnace in here. You need to smoke outside.” Thirty years on the force didn’t give Charlie license to stink up the work space. Grant shuffled the papers on his desk, catching sight of the circled date on his calendar. That was a meeting he didn't look forward to.
    “I’m onto something.”
    Grant stilled, thoughts tripping away from tomorrow’s appointment. “Yeah?”
    He knew Charlie’s tone. The older officer might bug Grant with silly stuff, but the man had been a cop long enough to have learned how to go with his gut. And Charlie’s gut was rarely wrong.
    Charlie ground the cigarette in the ashtray beside him and stood. “I left my clothes on the bed, my cigs in the sink.” He looked up, the skin beneath his eyes sootier than usual. “She left me, Grant. Just a little note on a table, stained with spilled coffee.”
    Grant crossed his arms, frowning. “You text me when I’m off shift to tell me Angel is gone?”
    “Had to talk to someone.”
    “If you want advice, I’m the wrong guy.” He rubbed the back of his neck. It wasn’t that he didn’t feel for Charlie. The poor man had been besotted by his girlfriend since they’d met at a bar two weeks ago. But Grant didn’t have woman troubles. Women liked him and he liked them. For awhile. Then he moved on. As far as he remembered, no woman had ever left him.
    Which made him the worst guy to ask for advice. He shifted against the desk, feeling like he should say something but not knowing what.
    Charlie scratched his chin with tobacco-stained fingers. “Forty years of dealing with females and I thought she was different. The one.” When Grant didn’t say anything Charlie let loose a rusty laugh. “Aw, you’re right. Talking to you is like asking a camel if he’s ever felt snow.”
    “She’ll come back.” That was helpful, right?
    “I don’t know where she is.”
    Grant grunted. “Maybe you ought to marry her.” There, that was good advice. The Bible encouraged marriage, right? Sound theology from in Grant's way of thinking. Maybe his mother wouldn’t have given him to the government if she’d had a husband to help raise her little boy.
    Charlie shrugged. “Two weeks isn’t long enough for marriage.” His face cleared. “I guess this means I’m free to ask Miss Jane out.”
    “I’m going home.” Rolling his eyes, Grant grabbed his phone and walked to the door. “See ya.” He was only too glad to get back out in the fresh air.
    “Wait there, son.”
    Grant paused at the door. Charlie met him there, keen gaze fixing on him.
    “Something’s going down. I can sense it.”
    “One of your feelings again?”
    “In my bones. There’s crooked people in Manatee Bay.”
    “Crooked people everywhere.” Grant hiked a chin to the left, toward the west section of town. “Slasher’s been busy.”
    “Up to no good, as usual. It’d be nice if someone just shot that dealer and saved this city some trouble.” Charlie scratched at his bristly chin.
    Manatee Bay had been a fairly peaceful place until a few years ago when John Welch, AKA Slasher, started doing business near the river. One of the silliest street names Grant had ever heard, but it was accurate. Welch had a reputation for bloodying up dealers who didn’t make their quotas. Still, Grant blanched at Charlie’s implication the criminal should be killed in