Bounty (Walk the Right Road) Read Free Page B

isn’t my case.”
    “Okay,” Casey snapped, and Diane realized she’d pushed too hard. Now Casey was irritated, too. Casey disconnected, and Diane stared at her cell phone, unable to stop the flood of guilt drowning her conscience, the waves of regret pounding her over and over. For the first time, the door she had firmly slammed on all her secrets had been cracked open.

Chapter 4
    “Thanks for driving, Sam. I probably shouldn’t get behind the wheel right now, especially after you poured all those beers down my throat.” She couldn’t look at Sam as he drove her in the black pickup truck he and Marcie kept parked at the ferry terminal for when they came over from their small island.
    “Oh, I figured you needed it. Besides, I’m not letting you get behind the wheel right now.” He rested his hand on the wheel and was holding himself in a way that let Diane know all too well that he was considering something. The question of what he was thinking worried her.
    After four beers, though, she was possibly jumping to conclusions, reading more into a situation than was necessary, even though it didn’t feel like it. She couldn’t shake the notion that Sam thought less of her, even though he said he didn’t. There was something different about him. She just couldn’t put her finger on it. He pulled into a drive-through in town.
    “What are you doing, Sam? Hungry or something?” she asked.
    He rolled down his window and ordered two coffees and a cheeseburger. After he had paid, he passed the bag to Diane and set the coffees in the cup holders before pulling back into traffic. “Eat your burger, Diane. Drink the coffee so you’re somewhat sober by the time we get there.”
    “Sam, I’m not hungry, but thanks for the coffee.”
    He gestured toward the bag. “Take it out and eat it. You need to have something in your stomach. You’re such a lightweight with your drinking, and I also know that what you told me is only the tip of what you’ve been hanging on to. When you drink, you talk too much. I don’t know how to help you with this, Diane. I need you to tell me what to do.”
    The last thing she wanted to do was give anyone a point by point of what she needed. She didn’t have a clue whether she was coming or going or what the hell to do, except she was damn sure, as shoved the burger in her mouth and chased it down with a swallow of the steaming dark coffee, that she’d shared far too much with Sam.
    “Thanks for this, it’s all I needed,” she said, her cheek puffed out, chewing as she shoved the rest of the burger into her mouth. For a minute, she thought he was relieved, and she prayed he’d forget everything as he pulled into the hospital parking lot, just outside the morgue and the coroner’s office.
    “Shall we?” Sam took his coffee with him, and she followed along with her own, feeling the sobering effect from the food as it settled like lead in her stomach. He pressed the elevator button, and Diane swallowed the rest of her coffee and pulled a piece of mint gum from her pocket, hoping Casey wouldn’t pick up the scent of beer. Diane had a reputation to preserve, and being drunk on the job was something that could haunt a cop forever. She’d slipped up big time this morning. Hell, she’d been slipping ever since she got the call and details of the body on the road. But she was determined to pull it together now and show everyone she was just fine, somehow shaking the spotlight that had been focused on her since her irrational freak-out at the crime scene. It was a sobering experience, reliving her reaction to Casey, to Sam, when her tightly glued lips had been pried open, revealing just the tip of her deep dark past. How stupid. If only she could go back, she’d do so many things differently.
    “I’m fine, Sam, really. Thanks again for this, by the way.” She shook the empty cup and shoved her hand in her jean pocket, touching a couple coins and rubbing them together. She bounced