Sugar and Spite by G. A. McKevett Read Free Book Online

affecting his personality. Spending time with Lieutenant Jeffries was no afternoon in the park playing Frisbee and barbecuing ribs.
    “Well, we see who came out on top of the pack,” Savannah muttered under her breath. “The beta male jackal himself.”
    Dirk shot her a look that told her he understood the reference. Everyone knew that although Lieutenant Jeffries spent half his time exploiting his limited authority and making life unpleasant for his underlings, he spent the other half applying his puckered kisser to the seat of Chief Norman Hillquist’s trousers. Jeffries wanted to be chief of police of San Carmelita when he grew up someday; Hillquist wanted to be mayor. Watching them interact with each other, the city council members, and everyone else with money or influence was nauseating for less ambitious people like Savannah, Dirk, and the other cops who were just trying to stay alive and do a decent job.
    Jeffries gave Savannah a curt nod and pulled a chair up to the head of the table. He sat down and rested his elbows on the table, folding his fingers in a judicious pose.
    “So, I get top-notch service,” Dirk said, not bothering to hide his sarcastic tone. “You’re going to squeeze me personally, huh?”
    Savannah winced inwardly. Dirk seemed to have a gift for making a bad situation worse. “Diplomacy” wasn’t a commonly used word in his personal lexicon.
    Jeffries fixed him with cold gray eyes that would have cut through a man with less chutzpah than Dirk Coulter. “We take officer-involved shootings very seriously in this department, Sergeant. I don’t have to tell you that.”
    “Especially in an election year when the chief’s trying to bump up to mayor and you’re trying to fill his spot, huh? Don’t want any bad PR for the department right now.” Dirk leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his barrel chest—the picture of defiance. Savannah longed to reach over and slap some sense into him. This wasn’t the time to be cute.
    Jeffries’s eyes narrowed and his mouth pulled into a tight line. “Election or no, there’s never a good time for a cop to blow away his ex-wife,” he said smoothly, with a deadly lack of inflection. “It’s almost always frowned upon by the local citizenry. Especially the female population.”
    “And that’s more than half the voters.”
    Savannah couldn’t stand it. She kicked him under the table and landed a solid one on his shin. He winced, but dropped a bit of the tough-guy facade. “I didn’t kill her, Lieutenant,” he said with a convincing degree of sincerity. “I know it looks bad, my trailer, my gun… her being my ex, but it was an intruder.”
    “The intruder you wrestled with and disarmed… as in, you had your gun in your hand, but he still got away?”
    “My hands were wet, and I dropped my weapon. And I hesitated a couple of seconds to check on Pol—the victim… and he ran out the door. I chased him, but it was dark and… well…” He shrugged. “I’m not happy about it, but that’s the way it went down.”
    “Uh-huh.” Jeffries stood and began to pace the floor behind Dirk. It was a move designed to make the interviewee feel intimidated, having questions fired from behind by an unseen interrogator. Savannah had seen Dirk use it many times. She was surprised that Jeffries would use it on a veteran.
    Jeffries stroked his chin thoughtfully. She didn’t like the arrogant, assured look on his face. The expression was a common one for him, but all the more disturbing, considering her friend’s rear end was in the wringer. And it appeared Jeffries was the one turning the crank. “And nobody saw this mysterious intruder running around outside,” he continued. “They didn’t see anyone outside except you, that is. Naked.”
    Dirk’s face flushed angrily. “I was in the shower when I heard the shot. I came out of the bathroom and found my ex-wife bleeding all over the floor. What I was—or wasn’t—wearing at the