Finlay Donovan Jumps the Gun (Finlay Donovan, #3)(57)

Sorry. Had an emergency. I’ll be back in the morning. See if Nick can take you.

My laugh was almost hysterical, and probably a little drunk. I shielded my face from the rain with my sleeve, pushing up on my toes to peer out over the parking lot. Sure enough, my sister’s car was nowhere in sight. My arm fell away from my face as I did a double take at the rows of retired police cars.

The training cruisers … Wade kept the keys in his top right desk drawer.

“I think I can get us a car,” I said. “Can you find us a uniform? You know, like the sweatshirts and hats the instructors have been wearing?”

“Where am I supposed to find one of those?” Vero asked.

“Try the locker room or the laundry. We just need something official. Something a cop here would wear. And make sure it’s warm,” I said as she turned to go. I had a feeling it was going to be a very long night.





CHAPTER 21


I wasn’t sure what I had expected when I’d scanned the card key I’d stolen from the metal box in the cabinet of the faculty lounge, but the soft click of the lock releasing still took me by surprise. The air inside Wade’s office smelled faintly of stale tobacco. A pale glow filtered through the window to the shooting range where a light had been left on in one of the stalls. A paper target dotted with tightly packed holes hung below it like a ghost.

“Hello?” I called out, just in case I wasn’t alone, my mind already spinning a story to explain what I was doing here with a stolen key at three in the morning. My voice echoed back to me as I tiptoed through the office. I checked the corners of the room for cameras, but the only ones I remembered seeing the day before had been inside the shooting range, directed toward the stalls. I crept toward Wade’s desk and slid open his top right desk drawer. Rummaging under a can of chewing tobacco, a soft pack of Marlboros, some notepads, and a lighter, I found a handful of key rings at the bottom.

The key chains had all been labeled with a permanent marker. I squinted at the makes, models, and years, looking for the oldest one. Hopefully no one would notice if a well-worn training sedan came back with a near-empty tank of gas or a little extra road grime.

I chose a set of keys and hurried to the exit.

As I reached for the door handle, I paused, certain I’d caught a trace of cigarette smoke in the air. I glanced back at Wade’s office, then through the window into the shooting range at the lone paper target. With a shudder, I slipped the keys in my pocket and closed the door behind me.



* * *



Thirty minutes later, I was freezing my butt off in a beat-up, geriatric training cruiser behind the shooting range. Sleet spattered the windshield and an icy draft seeped through the vents, but I was too afraid to turn on the engine for fear that someone might notice the exhaust.

I jumped at a knock on my window. A dark coat with an FCPD insignia filled the frame, the gold name badge pinned to the front obscured by the layer of ice on the glass. The officer hiked up his belt and knocked again.

Shit.

I rolled down the window, struggling to come up with a reason for being here as the officer ducked to peer inside.

“Vero?” Her name burst from my mouth on a held breath.

She scowled at the interior of the sedan as freezing rain bounced off the shoulders of a police coat that was at least two sizes too large for her. She opened my door and held her hand out for the keys. “This is the last time I let you pick our stolen car. This thing is a junker. I’ll be shocked if it starts.”

“At least if we wreck this one, we won’t have to kill anyone to pay it off.”

“Again … not our fault.”

“Never mind the car. Where did you get that uniform?”

“Borrowed it from Tyrese,” she said, blinking away sleet and gesturing impatiently for me to get out. “Don’t worry. He won’t miss it.”

“What do you mean, you borrowed it? How is he not going to miss his uniform? You’re wearing his badge, Vero!”

She arched up on her toes, picking a wedgie out of her ass. “Can we please get on with it? My uniform is getting wet, and these polyester pants are chafing the hell out of my lady bits. Ty’s boxers kept falling down so I took the damn things off.”

“Why were you wearing his underwear?” I sputtered.

“Because he was wearing mine.” She rolled her eyes as if the answer should have been obvious. “Move over,” she said, shouldering me aside. I contorted myself over the center console, sliding into the passenger seat as Vero got in and shut the door.

I gaped at her bagging sleeves as she started the car. “Do I even want to know?”

“It was easy. I showed up at Ty’s room with the bottle of Jack Daniel’s and told him I really wanted to see him in my panties. Next thing you know, we were swapping clothes.”

“Are you crazy! What if he reports you?”

“Believe me, he’s not going to say a word about this to anyone.”

“How can you be sure?”

She held her hands in front of the vents and adjusted the dials. “You really think he wants to tell his partner he woke up handcuffed to his bed, wearing nothing but a push-up bra and a lacy pink thong? Don’t worry,” she said as I buried my head in my hands, “I left him the key. It just might take him awhile to find it. And I promised to send him a lewd picture of me in his uniform if he let me hold on to it for a while.”