Page 75 of Out to Get Her
“At least wait for the eye!” he shouted at her back.
But it was too late.
Samantha was already headed back into the storm.
ChapterTwenty-Four
“You did not just drive herein a hurricane.”
Trey stood in the doorway with a flashlight in hand as he frowned at her rain-and-wind-matted hair and pajamas. She hadn’t even realized she was wearing her knit pants with the llamas on them when she’d run out of the house.
“Technically, it’s only a tiny hurricane at the coast,” she said with all the confidence of a weather forecaster. “These are just tropical storm wind bands.”
Once the eyewall got closer, that would be another story. But she planned to be out of here and back home again before then.
He narrowed his eyes, unamused by the technicality. “You really do have a death wish, don’t you?”
“Nope, not even a little bit,” she said. “That’s why I’m here. You were telling me who hates me enough to slash my tires. I figure knowing who has it out for me could keep me alive longer.”
“I don’t know if that was urgent enough information for a trip out in this storm.” He stepped aside and held the door open, catching it with both hands as a gust threatened to slam it against the wall. “Hurry up and get inside, before my mom comes out here.”
“Ooh, I want to meet your mom. And your dad, too. Unless they’ll hate me.” Erin chuckled nervously as she stepped inside the dark house. She was picking up on Trey’s storm anxiety, and her speech pacing was showing it. “Never mind. Everyone hates me. But I’m used to it. Can I meet them?”
“One, they’re both reading in the bedroom, and I’m not bothering them. Two, not everyone hates you. And three, no, you don’t want to meet them.” He closed the door behind her. “If Mom catches you out in this storm, she won’t let you leave until it passes. I have half a mind to do the same.”
Erin wiped her wet bangs from her face. “I’ll run home as soon as you finish telling me who you saw.”
He frowned again. “If I tell you, you have to promise to go back home. Immediately. Before this hurricane or storm or whatever gets any worse.”
“Fine,” she said. “I promise. Just tell me who it was that you saw by my car that day.”
Trey hesitated, then said, “Dustin.”
“Dustin? As in Dustin the cop? That Dustin?”
“That’s the one,” Trey said.
“Well, the station’s near where I parked.” She remembered Samantha walking to her car and going back to work nearby. “If I parked near a police station, it would make sense there would be cops around.”
“Around,” Trey said. “Not standing beside your car and looking around. At the time, I thought maybe he got a new car. That’s how close he was to it.”
It didn’t make any sense. Sure, she had a bad track record around here, and she never met a cop who wasn’t suspicious of her, but why would Samantha’s coworker slash her tire?
Erin didn’t even know the guy. He was a couple of years younger than her, and she’d only met him for the first time when he’d come to the house to collect those prescriptions as evidence.
Then Erin remembered what Samantha had said before she’d left.
The chief needs help finding something.
Were the prescriptions missing?
If Dustin lost them, then maybe Samantha wasn’t protecting her exorher cousin. Maybe she couldn’t tell Erin what was going on because it involved another cop.
Whether she was protecting him or just trying to keep everything above board until they figured out what was going on, it still didn’t make sense.
“Why would he slash my tire?”
Even if the guy was involved in covering up the murder or something, what did that have to do with her?
