Page 80 of The Rookie's Second Chance

I floored the accelerator, pushing the cruiser to its limits. The winding roads blurred past me, each turn taken with a precision honed from years of driving these routes. But today, each curve felt like an eternity, each mile a marathon.

As the station came into view, my heart was hammering in my chest. I pulled into the parking lot, barely slowing down before I killed the engine. My hands were shaking, the adrenaline coursing through my veins.

"Come on, think, Jake," I muttered, trying to piece together Mandy's plan. Where would she take Kayla? What was her endgame?

I knew I had to act fast. Every second counted, and I couldn't afford to waste any. With a deep breath, I prepared to face whatever lay ahead, the situation bearing down on me. Kayla's life might depend on what I did next.

I got out of the car, determination steeling my resolve as I headed towards the station, ready to piece together the clues and find Kayla before it was too late.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

KAYLA

As I delved deeper into Mandy's history, the pieces began to fall into place. The sealed records I managed to access were a goldmine. Mandy, born Amanda Kilkenny, was a person of interest in both Garrett's disappearance and the unidentified body case where Officer Kilkenny, her father, was the lead. But there were no arrests, no charges, just a string of interviews, and then... nothing. It was as if she'd been wiped clean from the cases, her involvement just a ghostly echo.

I kept digging, finding her birth certificate with Kilkenny clearly written as her last name. Yet, when she enrolled in college, she was Amanda Pennington. The change of name was deliberate, a way to distance herself from her father, or perhaps a deeper, more sinister reason.

Her connection with Jude was vague, scattered across social media with limited interaction. They appeared close in some photos, almost intimately so, but then there would be long stretches of no contact, no acknowledgment of each other's existence.

As I was piecing together her college life, trying to find the link between her, Jude, and Garrett, my phone rang, jolting me from my focus. I glanced at the caller ID – it was an unknown number. My heart skipped a beat. This could be the call that shed light on all the shadows Mandy had cast.

I answered, my voice steady but my mind racing. "This is Detective Green."

The call was from an officer in Key West PD. Their voice was somber, weighed down by the news they had to deliver. They had conducted a wellness check on the Kilkenny residence, and what they found was a scene straight out of a horror story.

The Kilkennys and their nephew had been found dead, their bodies in a state of advanced decomposition, suggesting they had been lying there for months. The officer detailed the scene – signs of a struggle, the positioning of the bodies, the nature of their injuries. It was a gruesome tableau.

As the officer spoke, I scribbled notes, trying to make sense of the chaos. The injuries, as they were described, bore a striking resemblance to those found on the unidentified body from the John Doe case – the one Officer Kilkenny had been in charge of. The similarities were too much to be a coincidence.

The officer mentioned they had tried to contact the next of kin, the Kilkennys' daughter, but to no avail. Mandy. They couldn’t reach her. My mind raced with possibilities – was Mandy the perpetrator or another victim?

I thanked the officer for their information as I hung up.

If Mandy was behind all of this, she had orchestrated a complex web of deception and violence. But why? What was her endgame? And if she wasn’t, then who was pulling the strings?

I pondered the possibility that Mandy knew Jude was the stalker and had killed him to protect Lexi. But that theory crumbled under recent evidence – the letters, the threats, they all continued long after Jude would have been dead.

I knew I had to talk to Jake to share what I had found.

I texted him and spent the next half hour staring at the blank screen. I couldn't shake the feeling that something was off. Taking a deep breath, I went to the chief's office, determined to get the ball rolling on an arrest warrant.

"chief, we need to talk," I said as I entered his office. His eyes met mine, instantly registering the seriousness in my tone.

"What's going on, Kayla?" he asked, setting aside his paperwork.

I explained everything – the deaths in Key West, the connection to Mandy, the similarities in the injuries. The chief listened intently, his expression growing graver with each detail.

"Jesus, Kayla," he muttered, reaching for his phone. "I'm calling this in. We need warrants, now."

I nodded, feeling a surge of adrenaline. "I'll get all the info printed off. We need to be ready."

As I turned to leave, my phone buzzed. It was a text from Jake. My heart skipped a beat as I read his message.

"Kayla, I found something BIG. Meet me at the ranch ASAP."

"Why not the station?" I texted back, my fingers trembling slightly. "This is official now."

His response came quickly, "It's way bigger than we thought. But you have to come FAST."

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