AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Just as the girl’s husband came running in, wild panic on the normally steady man’s face. Of course; that wife of his was his world.
As she should be.
Sol went back to work. Fighting the anger. The fury.
Nothing to see here. Just another day at the TSP.
They were all just fucking puppets anyway.
23
Jarrod stared at the evidence spread out on the table before him. It had been waiting for him in the special projects conference room that was controlled by three keys. He was trying to reorganize his thoughts. Focus again.
Instead of going hunting prematurely.
It had been one hell of a morning. Haldyn’s people were processing the vault and going over the security logs and videos and doing everything they could to isolate whoever the hell had locked A.J. in the weapons vault.
The intruder had knocked the guard out from behind, taken the guard’s security card, shoved A.J.—five months pregnant—against the door and taken her key card as well. He’d grabbed her shoulder and muscled her in front of him. Keeping his hand over her stomach and her back pressed to his front. Told her he’d kill her if she didn’t do exactly what she was told.
Hand caressing her stomach, taunting her with hurting her baby.
Enjoying her fear.
Bastard.
Jarrod wanted to find him and kick his ass.
A.J. said she’d not gotten even a single look at his face. The attacker had shoved her into the vault, forced her to the back, made her kneel facing the wall, and locked her in.
Then muscled the unconscious guard to the door, opened it again, shoved the guard in with A.J., and locked them in.
The guy had helped himself to whatever it was he had been after in the vault.
Then walked out without being stopped at all.
A.J.’s brother Mike was pissed. He prowled around the Major Crimes unit right now, doing what he could to find leads while they waited on forensics reports. Sean Callum, A.J.’s husband, had gone with his wife to the ER. That A.J. was pregnant, too, just made the fury all the stronger.
Jarrod was a man who needed to think. Daniel had assigned the case to Dodson and Fields. They were next up on the roster. It wasn’t Jarrod’s case. That didn’t mean he didn’t feel the burning urge to find that bastard.
He would never forget A.J.’s face when he’d found her in that vault.
She’d thought the guard was dying. And she’d been terrified. She looked up at Jarrod, recognized him, and hope had bloomed on her face.
He hadn’t thought about evidence. He’d just scooped her up and gotten her out of that damned vault. She’d been shaking apart in Jarrod’s arms. He’d felt her baby belly pressed against him when he’d carried her out of there.
What could have been lost in the damned building where she should have been safe.
Jarrod couldn’t get it out of his head.
She should have been safe there. If Wichita Falls hadn’t been screwing with the chief and McKellen using the budget and staffing, there would have been additional security and staff down there.
Had they been an hour earlier, it could have been Haldyn in there.
He was having a hard time forgetting that.
It was time to work. On the case in front of him.
For now. Until the call went out for Major Crimes to go hunting the bastard who had attacked A.J. and the guard. The guard—a man two years from retirement, with a wife, six kids, and four grandchildren. A man Jarrod liked and respected a great deal.
