Honor by Janet Dailey Read Free Book Online

position and looked up at him. “You don’t know Christine. Everybody loves her and she never gives up.” She paused. “I know exactly what she’d tell me. It’s like I can hear her voice. Make the freakin’ call, Kenz, get it out of the way. ”
    “Right,” Linc said.
    Kenzie gave a ragged sigh. “Maybe I’ll do it from her apartment. Mrs. Corelli asked me to go over there and look for Christine’s insurance documents and health records. She’s sure the SKC human resources department is going to want something they don’t have. Bureaucracy. I hate it. But I have to do something to help or I’ll go nuts.”
    Linc took a few seconds to reply. Kenzie waited, glancing again at the messages on her wall.
    “Go,” he said simply. “It’ll help you, too.”
    “Hang on,” she replied. “Incoming. Haven’t heard from her in a while.” A new message appeared at the end of the ones she’d been scanning. “My friend Donna.”
    He looked at her inquiringly.
    Kenzie’s expression was brighter when she glanced up again. “She’s a surgical nurse at an overseas base hospital. Wicked sense of humor. I need a shot of that.” Her hands hovered over the keyboard. “Do you mind?”
    Linc tsked. “You going to remember the call? And don’t forget about meeting Mike Warren, by the way.”
    “Oh, him. Yes. No. I won’t.” Distracted, she glanced down at the message from the nurse as Linc read over her shoulder.
     
Did you hear about Frank Branigan?
     
    “No, I didn’t,” Kenzie said out loud, turning to look at Linc. “Okay. I know you want to know who Frank Branigan is.”
    “Not really.”
    She clicked around on her page and located a photo of a grinning, handsome soldier in camo fatigues and a maroon beret with his unit’s insignia on the front. “That’s him.”
    Somehow, Linc didn’t feel reassured.
    “The army sent Frank to Big Dawg to train as a K9 handler before he was deployed to Afghanistan last year.”
    “Whoa. Back it up. Who or what is Big Dawg?”
    Kenzie smiled faintly. “He’s my boss. Guess I never told you his nickname. Also known as Jim Biggers.”
    “That I remember.”
    “He’s a Gulf War vet, married, six kids.”
    “More than I needed to know, but okay.”
    She tapped at a photo on her page. “And that’s Jim.”
    Linc noticed that Big Dawg was fit but somewhat thick in the middle, and going gray. Pretty wife firmly attached. Good, he thought.
    Kenzie went back to the previous subject. “Anyway, Frank’s an experienced K9 handler. He was heading out to his second deployment to Afghanistan and I got him up to speed with a new dog. Chili.”
    Linc nodded, letting her chatter away.
    “They clicked right away. A true team from day one.”
    So the handsome soldier was a dog lover. And rugged. On the front lines too. The kind of guy who’d probably punch Linc in the arm and call him Desk Boy. Linc wasn’t seeing a reason to like Frank Branigan.
    He glanced at the clock in the living room. “Do you want to answer Donna before you get going?”
    “Yes. I really do.”
    Her eyes widened when she looked back at the screen. Another message from Donna had popped up under the first one.
     
So sad. I cried when I heard.
     
    Kenzie sat straight up and typed a question at top speed.
     
What happened?
     
    Her friend responded almost instantly.
     
He died in Kandahar. Routine patrol. Ambush.
     
    Kenzie gasped and rocked back in her chair. Linc felt ashamed of himself. His work for the army kept him away from the front lines, but he had the utmost respect for the soldiers who were doing the actual fighting in Afghanistan and elsewhere. The province of Kandahar was notoriously dangerous. He looked away from the photo of Frank Branigan.
    Tears welled in Kenzie’s eyes as she began to type again. One word.
     
How?
     
    There was a pause, not long. The reply was blunt.
     
Shot in the chest.
     
    Kenzie glanced up at Linc with fierce puzzlement, then back at the screen. She