Page 55 of Cold Case Discovery

Granted, it didn’t look like he’d killed anyone, either, but she didn’t know what to think about his ability to do that anymore. So she told him. Flat out.

She knelt next to him, looked him straight in the eye. Not because she wanted to soften the blow, whatever blow it would be, but because she wanted to watch every last inch of his reaction. “Dad’s dead, Ry.”

She watched as Ry’s expression drooped and his entire face blanched. There was no shifty discomfort, no guilt, just straight-up shock. “Dead? He shouldn’t be...” Ry swallowed. “You saw him? Dead? You’re sure he’s dead?”

“Yes.”

“But...” Ry shook his head. He looked up at Jack, then back at Chloe right in front of him. Some little war played out over his expression, but she had seen Ry guilty enough times to know none of it was guilt. She’d seen him lie enough times to know what he was working through wasn’t a lie.

“Chloe, you have to get out of here.” He said it seriously, urgently, leaning forward. “I’ve got it handled, okay? But you’ve got to go. She’ll...”

She?It made Chloe think of what Hart had said: a woman had called for help. A woman was involved. Did this connect to Hart more than their father? But Ry didn’t say anything, just trailed off.

So she leaned forward too, got in his face. “Who, Ry?”

He shook his head vehemently, his eyes wide and worried. “I can’t tell you, Chlo. Please.Please. Save yourself. Just let me go. There’s no way it works out if you don’t get out of here. Fast.” He was so earnest, and yes, Ry was a good liar when he wanted to be, but she saw something like genuine fear in his gaze.

Like he actually was trying to protect her. She leaned back a little, his fear sparking her own. Ry trying to be noble felt more worrisome than anything else that had happened today.

She reached out, gripped his shoulder tightly. Hoping some kind of connection would get through all...whatever this was. There was always this wall between them, and she needed to scale it. His attitude, his refusals. Hurdles he refused to acknowledge. But she had to get through to him somehow. “You need to be straight with me. For once. Damn it, Ry. For once, tell me what the hell is going on.”

He leaned forward, so close that their noses were almost touching while she held on to his shoulder. When he spoke, he enunciated each word clearly, his eyes a maze of fear and determination she’d never seen in him before.

“I can’t tell you, Chloe.”

“Good boy,” a female voice said, and Chloe dropped Ry’s shoulder, whirling as best she could on her knees. Jack had also turned and had his gun out and pointed at the voice—but there was more than one woman standing around them. And they all had their own guns, trained at each of them.

Chloe stared at the trio in utter disbelief. It had been so long since she’d seen the woman with a gun pointed at Jack, she only recognized her because she saw so much of her own face in the woman.

Her mother.

The one with a gun trained on Chloe herself was also familiar. She’d had an off-again, on-again relationship with her father when Chloe was a teen. Sarah, if Chloe remembered correctly. It had been a volatile enough relationship that Chloe had once had to mop up the woman’s bloody nose. She’d been fifteen at the time, maybe? The third woman, with a gun pointed square at Ry, looked vaguely familiar, but Chloe couldn’t place her. Maybe another one of her father’s girlfriend’s? She was on the young side, so maybe one of Ry’s?

Either way, Chloe didn’t know what on earth to make of any of it. She looked at Jack. He had his sheriff’s face on and was unreadable, gun held calmly and relaxed, pointed at Chloe’s mother. But it was three guns to one.

“I’d put the gun down, Deputy,” Jen Rogers said, smirking at Jack. “Or it’s going to get real bloody, real quick.”

“It’sSheriffthese days, Jen.” Because of course Jack had had dealings with her mother when he’d been a deputy for the county years ago. Why wouldn’t he have?

“Well,Sheriff, put the gun down, or I start shooting.”

Chapter Eighteen

Jack didn’t immediately drop the weapon. If any of the women really wanted to shoot, they could have done it before drawing anyone’s attention. They could have killed them all, then and there, because he and Chloe had been so intent on Ry.

A mistake. His own. But he couldn’t worry about how he’d failed just yet. He had to get them out of this first.

“Sarah?” Jen—Chloe’s mother—said, her gaze never leaving Jack’s. “If he doesn’t put the gun on the ground by the time I count to three, shoot her,” she said, clearly referring to Chloe. “To kill.”

Jack knew it wasn’t a bluff. Part experience, part the look in Jen’s eyes. He held his hands up in mock surrender, or maybetemporary surrenderwas a better term. Slowly, he crouched and gently laid the gun in front of him.

Just as slowly, he straightened.

“Courtney? Collect his gun.”

The third gunman—someone Jack felt like he vaguely recognized, probably from run-ins with the law—scurried over and picked up his gun. Jack could have stopped her, but he was afraid it would prompt Jen or Sarah to start shooting.

Maybe they didn’t want to take them all out, but he wouldn’t put it past Jen.

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