The Lucky One Read Free Page A

if it turned out to be lost. Worse, discovered with a card full of nudie pictures. His dad was a stickler for protocol and responsibility.
    By then, a few minutes had passed. In the distance, he heard the throaty roar of an engine fire up. He assumed the coeds were leaving; only briefly did he consider what they might be thinking when they noticed his cruiser was still there. He had other issues on his mind.
    The camera was gone.
    Not lost.
Gone.
And the damn thing sure as hell didn’t walk off on its own. No way the girls had found it, either. Which meant Thigh-bolt had been playing him all along.
Thigh-bolt. Playing. Him.
Unbelievable. He knew the guy had been acting too slick, too
I Know What You Did Last Summer.
    No way was he getting away with that. No grimy, hippie, dog-talking freak was ever going to show up Keith Clayton. Not in this life, anyway.
    He pushed through branches heading back to the road, figuring he’d catch up to Logan
Thigh-bolt
and have a little look-see. And that was just for starters. More than that would follow; that much was certain. Guy plays him? That just wasn’t done. Not in this town, anyway. He didn’t give a damn about the dog, either. Dog gets upset? Bye, bye, doggie. Simple as that. German shepherds were weapons—there wasn’t a court in the land where that wouldn’t stand up.
    First things first, though. Find Thibault. Get the camera. Then figure out the next step.
    It was only then, while approaching his cruiser, that he realized both his rear tires were flat.
    “What did you say your name was?”
    Thibault leaned across the front seat of the Jeep a few minutes later, talking over the roar of the wind. “Logan Thibault.” He thumbed over his shoulder. “And this is Zeus.”
    Zeus was in the back of the Jeep, tongue out, nose lifted to the wind as the Jeep sped toward the highway.
    “Beautiful dog. I’m Amy. And this is Jennifer and Lori.”
    Thibault glanced over his shoulder. “Hi.”
    “Hey.”
    They seemed distracted. Not surprising, Thibault thought, considering what they’d been through. “I appreciate the ride.”
    “No big deal. And you said you’re going to Hampton?”
    “If it’s not too far.”
    “It’s right on the way.”
    After leaving the logging road and taking care of a couple of things, Thibault had edged back to the road just as the girls were pulling out. He’d held out his thumb, thankful that Zeus was with him, and they’d pulled over almost immediately.
    Sometimes things work out just like they’re supposed to.
    Though he pretended otherwise, he’d actually seen the three of them earlier that morning as they’d come in—he’d camped just over the ridge from the beach—but had given them the privacy they deserved as soon as they’d started to disrobe. To his mind, what they were doing fell into the “no harm, no foul” category; aside from him, they were completely alone out here, and he had no intention of hanging around to stare. Who cared if they took their clothes off or, for that matter, dressed up in chicken costumes? It wasn’t any of his business, and he’d intended to keep it that way—until he saw the deputy driving up the road in a Hampton County Sheriff’s Department car.
    He got a good look at the deputy through the windshield, and there was something
wrong
about the guy’s expression. Hard to say what it was, exactly, and he didn’t pause to analyze it. He turned around, cutting through the forest, and arrived in time to see the deputy checking the disk in his camera before quietly shutting the door of his cruiser. He watched him slink off toward the ridge. Thibault knew full well that the deputy could have been working officially, but he looked the way Zeus did when he was waiting for a piece of beef jerky. A little too excited about the whole thing.
    Thibault had Zeus stay where he was, kept enough distance so the deputy wouldn’t hear him, and the rest of the plan had come together spontaneously after that. He