Safe from Harm (Protect & Serve #2)(79)

“Hey, sweetie,” Abby said. “How’re you holding up?”

Elle groaned. “Been better. I was wondering if you could do me a favor.”

“You know I will,” Abby responded without hesitation. “What do you need?”

“I need you to give me a call as soon as Jeb Monroe leaves the department to head home.”

“Okay…” Abby replied, drawing out the word in her wariness. “Why?”

“Just want to keep track of his movements,” Elle said, flagging down the cabbie as he pulled into Mulaney’s parking lot. “I’ll explain it all later.”

“Should I tell Gabe you called?” Abby asked in a rush. “He’s in with Mac, but I can tell him when he comes out.”

Elle hesitated as she opened the cab door. If he knew what she was doing, he’d come racing out to the farm, probably just in time to confront Jeb. That’s the last thing he needed right then. She’d give him a call as soon as she had Janice safely in the cab and they were on their way back to the sheriff’s department. He’d definitely want to be there to listen in as Janice gave her statement.

“No,” she finally replied to Abby. “I’ll give him a call as soon as I can.”

Elle hung up and glanced at her phone as she got into the cab. Her battery was nearly dead. Her window of opportunity for getting Janice Monroe and her children to safety just got a little smaller.

Damn it!

“Miss? Where to?” the cab driver prompted.

Elle rattled off the address to the Monroe farm. She wasn’t surprised at all that she still remembered it. After looking through Derrick’s file so many times, searing every fact into her brain for the trial, she doubted she’d ever forget any of it. Even the parts she wished she could.





Chapter 22


Gabe sat in the chair in his father’s office, gripping the wooden arms so hard in his rage that his knuckles were white. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

Mac’s brows lifted in a look of slight disapproval. “Care to rephrase that?”

Gabe gave his father a defiant look. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me, sir?”

Mac jabbed his index finger at his son. “I’m not the enemy here, Son.”

Gabe took a moment to collect himself before he managed to grind out, “Judge Murray owes his entire career to your influence, and the one time you go to him for a favor, he tells you to piss off?”

“It’s an election year,” Mac muttered, rising from his chair and pacing over to his office window.

Gabe waited for the rest of an explanation for several moments before he realized that was all he was going to get. “This is bullshit,” he spat. “You know this, right? I didn’t do any of what Monroe is claiming.”

Mac gave him a terse nod without turning away from the window. “I know that, Gabriel. But it doesn’t matter a damn what I believe. My influence only goes so far in this county.”

“You wouldn’t have said that twenty years ago,” Gabe shot back.

At this, Mac did turn to give him a questioning look. “What the hell is that supposed to mean, young man?”

Gabe meant that twenty years ago, if someone had tried to pull this kind of shit on one of Mac’s deputies, Mac would’ve been paying the bastard a visit to make it clear he wasn’t about to let a move like that go unanswered. There was no way in hell he would’ve taken no for an answer.

“I’m just wondering who else might be worried about an election year,” Gabe admitted.

Mac’s normally stoic face went stormy. “You think I’d let you go down because I was worried about keeping my ass in this chair? You think I’d ever put my career over you boys?”

Gabe immediately felt like an ass. Only a few months earlier, he’d been defending the Old Man to Kyle with the same argument, knowing full well what lengths Mac would go to for family after having witnessed his unfaltering devotion to their mother in her illness. He’d sacrificed everything to try to save her life only to fail in the end.

The guilt didn’t end there. Mac had been forced to deplete the boys’ college funds to cover medical bills. Tom and Kyle had managed on scholarships and student loans. Gabe had gone to school part-time, working his way through. But Joe had joined the National Guard, and during one of his deployments, they’d nearly lost him. Gabe knew their father blamed himself to this day, berating himself for not providing better for his family. He saw it in his dad’s eyes every time he caught Mac looking at Joe.

The one time he’d worked up the nerve to ask his dad what was going through his head, he just got a terse, “It’d kill me, losing one of you boys.”

Finally, Gabe heaved a sigh. “Of course not, sir. I’m sorry. I just don’t know what the hell I’m gonna do.”

Mac came around to the front of his desk and sat on the corner, looking so much like a twenty-five-year-older version of Tom, Gabe had to suppress a grin.

Mac narrowed his eyes at Gabe for a long moment, then gave a nod as if coming to some decision. “You’re gonna man up, Gabriel, and keep your head high. And when we clear you of these bullshit charges, you’re gonna bring that son of a bitch down. Is that clear?”

Gabe gave a terse nod that mirrored his father’s. “Yes, sir.”