If You See Her Read Free Page A

see her yesterday.
    Sympathy, knowledge … and a grim acceptance. She was no longer in need of the medical services a hospital could provide. And they weren’t about to let her traipse away where they couldn’t keep her
secured
.
    In their eyes, she’d done something awful, and it was time she paid for it.
    But I didn’t do anything
.
    The sad, forlorn whine wanted to work its way free, but she swallowed it, shoved it down inside. She sure ashell wasn’t going to go meekly along with whatever they had in mind, but she was done with wringing her hands and moaning, too.
    She just needed to figure out what she
was
going to do …

CHAPTER
TWO
     
    B ORDERLINE PERSONALITY DISORDER .
    Suicidal
.
    History of violent behavior
.
    Manipulative
.
    “She can make a person believe whatever they need to believe.”
    Shit, there had to be some truth to that because some part of Remy was dead set on believing that she wasn’t what the facts were showing him.
    “She’s a very troubled young woman.”
    Troubled.
    Yes, Hope Carson would have to be a very troubled woman, he imagined.
    She’d slit her damn wrists, and apparently this wasn’t the first time she’d tried to take her life.
    “She’s tried to commit suicide before …”
    “… she doesn’t want help, won’t admit she needs it.”
    She’d tried to kill herself before. That knowledge left him both sick and furious.
    Damn it, quit thinking about this and just do your job
.
    Those words echoed through Remington Jennings’s mind as he walked down the long hallway. His shoesrang hollowly in the brightly lit hallway, echoing around him.
    It was a terribly lonely sound, he thought.
    Sheriff Dwight Nielson and Sergeant Keith Jennings were with him, as well as two more deputies. But for reasons that Remy couldn’t quite explain, he felt ridiculously alone in that moment.
    What in the hell was he doing?
    In front of him, the sheriff moved with brisk, economic motion. The man didn’t waste any movement, and he didn’t waste any words.
    Not even now.
    Why should he?
    Remy already knew every damn word that was going through the man’s mind.
    It was nearly word for word that same spiel Law Reilly had given him over the phone twenty-four hours earlier.
    Both men felt the same way—Hope Carson didn’t belong behind bars for the attack on Law, and the facts didn’t point to her killing Earl Prather, so they couldn’t put her away for that.
    His gut instinct agreed—none of it fit.
    It was just too fucking bad he couldn’t go with what his gut said.
    He had to go with what the facts said … facts that painted a very, very disturbing picture of Hope’s past, painted an image of a very, very disturbing woman.
    Those facts had her prints on the weapon that had been used to beat Reilly damn near to death, and then she’d tried to kill herself.
    Again.
    No … she didn’t belong behind bars, but she needed help.
    “She has violent tendencies. She’s very manipulative. When she doesn’t get her way, she becomes unstable
,
unpredictable. There is no telling what she might do to somebody she perceived as being in her way.”
    Remy thought of how Prather had died.
    It had been ugly.
    Messy.
    Painful.
    Had Prather gotten in her way?
    He thought back to that day on the square. Some kid had bumped into her, she’d tripped—stumbled. Knocked against a plant stand and sent the half-dead ficus to the ground, then Prather had bumped into her. She’d freaked out—definitely had a problem with people in uniform, there was no denying that.
    Timing-wise, he had Lena Riddle’s statement and receipts from their shopping trip. It didn’t play out. According to her, Hope had been with Lena most of the day, but still … something wasn’t right here, and he had to figure out what it was.
    Curious, he glanced at the back of Nielson’s head and asked, “How does she act around you?”
    “Quiet.” Nielson looked over his shoulder. “Doesn’t say much of anything. Even