Page 11 of Justice for JoElla

He could almost hear flames crackling on her skin when she answered. “In case we have a fallen first responder to honor.”

That could be Landon. Brandon had never really given that a lot of thought before, but it was something to think about. If anything happened to his brother, he’d want the utmost respect paid.

By the time he got back to Landon and Jerrica’s, Brandon was thinking hard about his new opportunities. He had a chance to make a difference. Was he up to the challenge?

Did he have a choice?

* * *

Two weeks.They’d knocked on doors, made calls, followed leads. They’d had maybe half a dozen reports of sightings, but so far, there’d been no hard proof that Warmuth and Josie were out there anywhere. Had he taken her somewhere and killed them both? One of the alleged sightings had been in southern Indiana right across the river from Louisville. Roy knew the sheriff over there and he’d gotten permission for JoElla and Mick to go in for some interviews, but nothing really came of them. They’d also looked at some video footage from a few convenience stores where clerks had reported they thought they’d seen one or both of them, but the footage was so poor that neither JoElla nor Mick could say for sure who they were seeing. Every turn they made cycled back on itself, and every door they opened seemed to close in their faces.

“Got a minute?”

JoElla nodded. “Sure.”

“I need to stop at the firehouse and see a buddy of mine. Won’t take long. I owe him some money?lost a bet, damn it,” Mick said and laughed.

“No problem. I’ll wait in the car.” He pulled to the curb and got out, leaving JoElla sitting in the cruiser. She fiddled with the radio for a minute, then gave up and sat there, thinking about all the leads they’d followed and all the failures they’d swallowed. There was movement, and she looked up.

Three guys stepped out of the truck bay. One of them was a firefighter, but she didn’t know his name. The other two were EMTs, and she squinted a little as she looked at all three of them standing there, shooting the shit. The firefighter and one of the EMTs… They were obviously twins. Their haircuts were different, and the firefighter was a bit more buff, but they certainly looked alike. The dome light popped on as Mick opened the door and slid behind the steering wheel. “Sorry. At least he and I are square now,” he said as he started the cruiser.

“S’okay. Hey, do you know those guys?”

“Yeah. Firefighter is LandonFox. They call him Hose.”

“Why?”

“I have no idea. I’m sure it’s a humiliating story. Usually is. The other two are EMTs. One is BenParker. The other is BrandonFox, Landon’s brother.”

“Oh! A firefighter and an EMT, twin brothers. That’s an interesting combination.”

Mick snickered. “Oh, it’sreallyinteresting. There’s quite the story there. Not Landon; he’s a straight arrow. Got a sweet little wife and a cute baby boy. But Brandon… Yeah. Quite the story.”

“Really? Do you know it?”

“Well, it starts out with him being a pompous asshole and ends with some nurse barging into a surgical suite while he had a patient open on the table. She wrecked his marriage, got him fired from the hospital, and the licensure board has suspended his license for a year.”

“Ayear? Holy hell!”

“Yeah, and get this. His dad is the chief of staff at the hospital. That didn’t help him one damn bit. They set his ass out on the curb anyway.”

“Wait. You said ‘wrecked his marriage?’ Was he?”

“Fucking the nurse? From what we all heard, yeah. Absolutely. They said it was quite a scene?anda bunch of medical students from UofL were in the observation bay watching! Wish I could’ve sold tickets to that!”

“You would’ve made a fortune, that’s for sure,” JoElla said but, unlike Mick, she didn’t laugh. She knew how that felt, to be humiliated and left adrift. Did she want anything to do with him? Hell no. He was a cheater just like fuckstick Lance, but she could definitely relate.

Mick’s voice cut through her ruminations. “Want me to introduce you?”

“Hell no.” A down-on-his-luck cheater? JoElla might’ve wanted a man in her life, but definitely notthatman. He was trouble.

Gorgeous trouble, but trouble all the same.

Chapter 3

“Oh,come on. It won’t break you. I’m buying,” Landon said as he slammed his locker shut.

“I should probably?”

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