Page 52 of Claimed By the Deputies

I pause and look over my shoulder, surprised by what I’m hearing. She catches my raised eyebrow and shakes her head.

“It’s in the past,” she replies with wide eyes and blushing cheeks. “Let’s get this done and over with, Sheriff. We need Jade’s intel like yesterday.”

“Sure,” I mutter, fumbling through my keys until I find the right one. “Rise and shine, Mr. Jade. Your lawyer comes bearing good news,” I say as I unlock the cell door.

I walk in, immediately stopping Tassia and Dobrosky from taking a single step forward, thrusting my arm out.

“What is it?” Dobrosky asks.

Tassia’s head pokes over my shoulder. “Don’t!” I warn her, but it’s too late.

“Oh, shit,” she gasps and jumps back.

The sight before me is beyond gruesome. Someone slit Jade’s throat from ear to ear. Everything is red except for his eyes, which are wide open and milky white.

“My God!” Dobrosky exclaims when he finally sees his client, dead on the floor in a pool of his own blood. “How the hell did this happen?”

“We can rule out suicide,” I mutter.

The entire precinct comes to life as my voice patches through the main channel on my radio. “Lock it all down!” I shout into the receiver. “No one in or out. Code Black! I need Mitch and Tyler down here, right now! We’ve got a prisoner down. DOA. Call the ME.”

Boots thunder above us while I take another look at the holding cell.

“There’s no murder weapon. The killer must’ve taken it,” I say, then send more orders through the radio. “Get the forensics unit down here now!”

I put the radio away, then turn around to face a pale Dobrosky and an even paler Tassia. Every instinct I have screams at me to run out and find the fucker who dared defile my station like this, but I am even more disturbed by the fact that this horrific event even occurred.

“Somebody really wanted him quiet,” Tassia mumbles, covering her mouth with both hands as tears spring to her beautiful eyes. She seems so fragile and vulnerable all of a sudden. This was supposed to be a safe place. “They silenced him, didn’t they?”

“Most likely,” I reply with a heavy sigh. “They had eyes on us. They knew he was about to talk.”

“Sheriff, you’ve got a leak in your department,” Dobrosky grimly declares. “The DA isn’t going to like this, and you know this will bring Internal Affairs into the conversation.”

“Not to mention the mayor’s office,” I mutter. “Hamilton will be chomping at the bit to exert some kind of oversight into this investigation. Shit.”

“Hamilton is responsible for this,” Tassia says.

I gently take her by the shoulders. She’s shaking like a leaf. I have an urge to hold her tight, but I can’t do that with Dobrosky present. In a matter of seconds, this whole basement will be flooded with deputies and crime scene techs. All I can do is squeeze her shoulders in a bid to reassure her.

“We don’t know exactly who did what. We can’t jump to conclusions just yet. It will bias the way we handle this investigation going forward,” I kindly remind her.

She lowers her gaze. “He was a murderer, but still, that’s an awful way to go.”

“Plus, we really needed his intel,” I add, choosing pragmatism over everything else. This certainly puts an unpleasant dent in our progress.

With Jade dead, that only leaves Stuart, and we’ve already drained that poor sap of every bit of useful information he had to give, aside from his burner phone. It doesn’t look good, and something tells me it’s about to get worse.

We poked a hornet’s nest, and they’re starting to poke back.

12

TASSIA

It feels like a century has passed since the statements and interviews, the flashing lights and crime scene tape. Internal Affairs, the District Attorney, even some of the mayor’s staff flooded the sheriff’s station demanding answers. To call it a shit storm would be an understatement.

Night finds us back at Lucas’s cabin, exhausted and quiet. Lucas and I are sitting on the sofa next to each other, watching the orange flames roar in the fireplace. I can hear Mitch and Tyler in the kitchen talking while they put a quick dinner together.

“I’m still queasy. I don’t think I have much of an appetite,” I mutter.

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