The Runaway Daughter

It was enough.

It had to be.

“ARE YOU TELLING ME you want a lady sheriff?” Deputy Martin Rhodes asked with a sideways glance. “You’ve got to be kidding!”

“Would that be so bad?” Tony ducked his head farther into his locker.

It was a little after three o’clock; he and Martin were rolling off their morning shift, and all the man wanted to talk about was their chief deputy.

Perfect.

“Angie’s a good cop.” Tony kept his mind focused on the job, and only the job. “Everybody knows that. She’s been chief for three years now.”

“Yeah, but that’s with your brother overseeing things.” Martin was practically pouting. An alarming sight on the burly man, who looked better suited for a career in professional wrestling than small-town law enforcement. “Eric is old-school, like I hear your daddy was. Laid back, until he has to bust some balls. Then he’s the point guy you want leading the charge. Angie… Well, you know how she is.”

Tony’s grunt said he didn’t know a thing about their chief deputy, which was the God’s-honest truth. He fished in his locker for street clothes to replace the sweaty uniform he’d shucked off. Not even interested in a shower before he dressed and left, he stripped down to his boxers and let the frustration of all he and his riding partner hadn’t accomplished that day wash over him. Drugs were leaking into Oakwood and the surrounding county. From where, the department wasn’t sure yet. But they had damn well better figure it out.

Their sleepy little corner of Georgia had the unfortunate distinction of being strategically located on a major north-south interstate running from the Carolinas down through Florida. A convenient crossroads, as it turned out, through which producers of the latest narcotic commodity of choice could network with southeastern buyers and dealers.

Crystal meth—inexpensive and instantly addictive—had wormed a filthy trail through Oakwood over the last year. And each of the nine deputies in the department was committed to finding the dealers and their runners before any more damage was done. Before any more people were hurt. Just last month, the town’s first drive-by shooting had resulted in an unknown man riddled with bullets and left to die on a street corner not two blocks from the Oakwood Youth Center. No ID. No one came forward to claim the body. No clue to who’d killed him.

Tony had been on duty since six, after a near-sleepless night, hunting a mobile drug lab one of Martin’s contacts had fingered as a sure-thing tip. Only the lab had vanished before they’d gotten there, leaving Tony and Martin roaming dirt roads on the outskirts of town, searching for an unmarked four-wheel-drive SUV with a trailer attached. They’d found nothing for their efforts but rising July temperatures and more questions. Like how the local drug network always managed to stay one step ahead of the department.

And if trudging through mosquitoes and steamy weather hadn’t been bad enough, his partner’s relentless preoccupation with Angie’s bid to become the next sheriff kept veering into downright uncomfortable territory.

“You know she’s not right for the job.” Martin could make a bulldog look wishy-washy. “I don’t care if she’s the mayor’s pet project, or if she and Eric are friends. He’s got no business pushing for her election, when—”

“My brother’s not pushing for anything.” Tony slammed his locker shut. Catching his friend’s shock at his uncharacteristic outburst, he shrugged and rifled through his duffel bag. “The people in town will make up their own minds when they vote. And Angie will have the city council to answer to if she’s elected. That’s a month down the road. Why get your panties in a wad about it now?”

Right back atcha, Rivers.

Defending Angie to anyone in the department was stupid. The woman could take care of herself. Yeah, she wanted this election badly. But there was no crime in that, even if she did seem downright desperate lately.

Desperate.

An image from last night barreled into him. An instant replay of Angie, all soft brown hair, hot green eyes and desperation, pushing away from the sexiest kiss he’d ever been on the receiving end of. The look on her face had hinted that he could be the center of her world. He could be what she wanted most. The answer to whatever she was searching for so desperately.

He swallowed a curse. Angie had made it clear anything beyond friendship and strictly business was a nonstarter. Obsessing about memories of how good they were together was pointless.

Thank God!

No more wondering what made her tick. No more circling the woman, looking for a way in like a teenager on hormone overload. It was time to shrug off Martin’s nonsense and thoughts of Angie and drive his tired ass home.

“This town’s not ready for a woman sheriff,” his partner insisted. “Not that woman, anyway. The department’s not ready. I don’t care how nice the legs are under those man-pants she always wears.”

Well, hell.

“The lady’s legs aren’t any of your business.” Some things even an easygoing guy couldn’t let slide. Tony laced his sneakers so tight, it was a wonder he could still feel his toes. “Angie’s pulled her weight around here, and then some, for as long as my brother. Gender’s got nothing to do with being sheriff, unless your problem’s with women on the force in general.”

“I’m not the one with the problem.” Martin’s face reddened. “It’s our chief deputy who’s got herself a problem. Sure Angie’s climbed her way to the top. Hell, she’s a regular poster child for equal opportunity. And she’s an okay cop, when she’s not distracted by press conferences with the mayor, or brown-nosing your brother. But being in charge takes more than that pair of balls she’s been trying to grow. She’s burned a lot of bridges, and she’s been promoted over a lot of good men who were in line before her. Every time the mayor shakes her hand and treats her like one of his family, she’s taking credit for the hard work of every other deputy in the department. And a lot of us don’t appreciate it. That ain’t going to change because she charms herself a new title.”

Tony could only stare. Angie took her commitment to protecting the citizens of Oakwood as seriously as any of the men. She was in law enforcement to serve her fellow citizens, not just to build a career. And she was working around the clock like the rest of the deputies, fighting to stomp out the drugs ripping at their small-town world. Yet the resentment toward her from a handful of the men grew stronger by the day.

Martin nodded as his words sunk in. “Your brother and the mayor’s influence might get her elected. But it’s a whole different ball game after that. If the woman isn’t careful, she’ll look for someone to watch her back one day, and there might not be anyone lining up to do the job.”

“That’s the most ignorant load of bullshit I’ve ever heard.” Tony pushed himself off the bench. The nasty feelings brewing inside him since leaving the Eight Ball alone last night boiled over. “Angie Carter’s the finest cop in this county. She’d take a bullet for your sorry ass without blinking an eye, though at the moment I can’t think of a single good reason why.”

He stepped forward. The several inches in height he had on Martin crowded the heavier man against the lockers.

“I don’t ever want to hear you or anyone else threaten not to cover her back, you hear me?”

“What’s wrong with you, man?” Martin used his forearm to shove some distance between them. “I didn’t mean nothin’. Besides, why are you so determined to defend her all of a sudden? You’re downright cagey every time her name comes up. I even heard a rumor you and Carter might have something goin’—”

“Don’t finish that sentence.” Tony realized he was pointing a finger in his friend’s face. Overreacting to a wad of harmless, locker room griping at the end of a long, hot morning.

All because he’d felt like pounding something for weeks.

“Problem, boys?”

Eric rounded the row of lockers closest to them.

“No problem,” Tony and Martin said in unison, neither breaking eye contact. Neither moving a muscle.

Eric cleared his throat, a nonverbal bid for their undivided attention. Tony blinked first, fed up with the whole scene. When the hell had he started caring so much what anyone thought about anything? He grabbed his duffel bag from where he’d dropped it beneath the bench, and headed for the door.

“I was just leaving,” he mumbled as he strode past his brother.

They were having a special dinner at home that night, and he needed a couple hours of sleep before he could manage another round of everything’s okay. It was a send-off of sorts. Eric and his new bride were heading for New York in the morning—on a belated honeymoon and to scout out places to live while their nineteen-year-old daughter attended NYU.

Tony’s family was moving away. Evaporating. Only a year after his spunky, long-lost niece and sister-in-law had dropped back into their lives, and then undergone delicate, lifesaving surgeries. In another month, two at the most, they’d be gone.

He found himself scouting the deserted hallway for something to kick.

The over-the-top impulse had him chuckling to himself. Damn, man, you’re losing it. Suck it up and cut the melodrama.

Eric, Carrinne and Maggie deserved whatever happiness they could grab. No way was he standing in their way, even if he was already missing them like hell.

He felt Eric’s stare track him as he walked away. He’d only made it halfway down the hall when he heard footsteps approach from behind.

“Hold up,” his brother called.

Tony hefted his duffel higher and kept moving.

“I said hold up.” Eric grabbed Tony’s arm and yanked him around.

“Not now, okay!”

The look on Eric’s face insisted that now was exactly when it was going to be.