Chapters (78)
- Cover
- Title Page
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- Prologue
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Forty
- Forty-One
- Forty-Two
- Forty-Three
- Forty-Four
- Forty-Five
- Forty-Six
- Forty-Seven
- Forty-Eight
- Forty-Nine
- Fifty
- Fifty-One
- Fifty-Two
- Fifty-Three
- Fifty-Four
- Fifty-Five
- Fifty-Six
- Fifty-Seven
- Fifty-Eight
- Fifty-Nine
- Sixty
- Sixty-One
- Sixty-Two
- Sixty-Three
- Sixty-Four
- Sixty-Five
- Sixty-Six
- Sixty-Seven
- Sixty-Eight
- Acknowledgments
- Discover More
- About the Author
- Also by Owen Laukkanen
Ty drove a little farther. Fumbled in his breast pocket for a packet of smokes, shook one out, and offered Shelby the pack. She waved him off. Put her feet up on the dash as he lit the smoke.
“You’re working at the cop shop, that right?” he said as the lights of Clallam Bay appeared around a bend in the highway. “With Kirby and his boys.”
She nodded. “That’s right.”
“That Kirby, he’s sure doing well for himself. New truck, new boat. They must pay those deputies a damn fortune.”
Shelby didn’t say anything. Wondered if Ty Winslow was gaming her, or if he was really that stupid that he hadn’t caught on.
“They pay you that good?” Ty continued. “Answering phones and whatnot? Seems like that whole detachment’s straight swimming in cash.”
No, Shelby thought. No, they certainly do not pay me that good. In fact, Shelby was pretty sure Kirby Harwood believed she was mentally deficient; otherwise, how could he believe she didn’t know what he was doing? Sure, he carried on all secret and suspicious, dragging the boys into his office when he wanted to talk business, but Shelby wasn’t dumb. She’d figured it out, quick. And as she sat in Ty Winslow’s passenger seat, listening to him gush about Kirby Harwood’s new truck, Shelby realized she’d been waiting for the right time to do something with what she knew.
She’d been waiting for some way to get hers.
“It isn’t a county paycheck,” she said, cutting Ty off in the middle of some spiel about a 6.2-liter V-8 engine. “Surely you got to know that, don’t you?”
Ty glanced over at her again. Didn’t say anything. Kept driving, through Clallam Bay and out the other side, working his jaw like he was thinking about how to answer.
“Yeah,” he said finally. “I reckon I did.”
* * *
Shelby Walker leaned down and scratched Lucy’s belly some more.
“From there, it was pretty straightforward,” she told Jess. “Your man had his boat, and I knew how to tell when Kirby had a shipment coming through. We put it together, and presto, voilà.…” She drained her glass again. Set it down hard. “It was supposed to be easy, the way we had it planned.”
“But it wasn’t,” Jess said.
“Oh, it was easy. Kirby got the call, and I texted Ty it was on. We messed with Kirby’s boat so he couldn’t go out, and Ty went in his place. From what Ty said, everything happened perfectly. He got the package, hid it away. All that was left was to convince Kirby to deal, and that’s the part that got fucked up, and I still don’t know why. Ty was dead before he could give me an answer.”