Just a Little Series (Parts 1 - 4) by Tracie Puckett Read Free Book Online Page B

the questions I’d been
thinking, he pulled his hand from mine and repositioned
himself.
    “What do you say we hit the road?”
    Jilted by his sudden change of heart, I
nodded and readjusted.
    “So,” he pulled out on the road to start our
morning shift, “what’s next in your line of questioning?”
    I looked down to the tear-soaked notebook
sitting in my lap and opened it up to an earmarked page.
    Just as Matt had observed, the page was full
of barely legible scribbles… and dozens of tiny hearts. There were
still so many questions I wanted to ask him, so much more I wanted
to learn, but I didn’t know where to begin. At what point were my
questions crossing the line of professionalism? And at what point
would he read into my curiosity and refuse to answer?
    Feeling as though it was best to keep my
inquiries as closely related to the job as possible, I scanned the
list and stopped at a question halfway down the page.
    I poised the pen over the paper and asked,
“Officer Reibeck, in your time on the force, have you ever suffered
a serious injury?”
    “Once,” he admitted, his tone laced with
humor.
    “The scar?” I hoped I’d finally hear the
story he’d seemed reluctant to share earlier.
    “No, not the scar,” he said, definitely. “I
was shot.”
    “ Shot ?” I asked with wide eyes. My
mind raced to find the right question to ask next, but my
imagination ran wild with scenarios. Shot during an arrest? A drug
bust gone wrong?
    Who?
    Where?
    Why?
    I took a deep breath to help calm myself.
“Care to elaborate on the circumstances surrounding the
shooting?”
    “Certainly,” he turned onto Main. “Went to
the shooting range last year with a couple of buddies. We were
halfway through target practice, and your Uncle Charlie cracked a
joke about Bruno. I lost sight of where we were, what we were
doing, and my finger slipped on the trigger.”
    “You shot yourself ?”
    “Right in the foot.”
    “And that’s why they call you Trigger?”
    We shared a laugh, and as we turned on to
Linden Avenue, a strange sensation settled in the pit of my
stomach.
    Luke was opening up to me, and not because
he had to; because he wanted to.
    And as I watched him appreciatively from the
passenger’s seat, it was the look in his soft, brown eyes as he
threw me a sideways glance that made me wonder if maybe Lucas
Reibeck had developed feelings for me.
    And maybe, just maybe... I wasn’t the only
one experiencing what Luke had so lovingly labeled just a little
crush .
     
     

 
     

    Just a Little Series | Part 2
     
     

CHAPTER ONE
     
    Wednesday, September 12 | 4:00 a.m.
    “Up and at ‘em, Little,” Luke’s voice rang
through my ears. He ripped the sheets from my bed and flipped on
the lights. “You’ll have plenty of time to sleep when you’re dead.
Now get up.”
    I rolled over and checked the clock.
    4:00 a.m., just as I’d suspected.
    I buried my face in the pillow and prayed my
pink satin pajamas would be enough to keep me warm. Whether he
liked it or not, I was sleeping in. And I didn’t need the sheets, a
dark room, or even privacy. I could sleep in even the roughest
conditions. The joke was on him.
    “Don’t even think about it,” he stomped to
the side of the bed. He tucked his arms under my body and pulled me
up. He swung my legs over the bedside and backed away with heavy
steps. “You have five minutes. Use them wisely.”And with that, Luke
marched out of my bedroom and closed the door behind him.
    I let my weary eyes wander across the room,
and it didn’t take but a second before I noticed the white sports
bra and shorts I’d laid out the night before.
    Right —our run.
    With ten hours to go before completing my
job-shadowing requirement for the Oakland High School senior
project, my Uncle Charlie suggested I forget about patrolling the
streets and start living the lifestyle required of any man, or in
my case, woman, in uniform.
    To me, that meant sitting around the Oakland
PD break room