Making It Right (Most Likely To #3)

“Yeah,” she said, standing up. “I was, too.” Without more, she placed her ear protection on and moved in, leaving Gill behind.

Later, when they’d moved to the ARs, Gill took a space beside her and took over the instruction.

The man was distracting. When he called her on a lack of concentration, she focused and went through the paces of becoming more familiar with a weapon she hardly ever shot. Problem was, this gun was available to most anyone out there who had the money. Unfortunately, law enforcement in rural Oregon didn’t think she needed one enough to put it in her budget. Once she started shooting it, however, she made a note to lobby the deciding parties to change their stance. Even without the use of the scope, the gun was a dream.

Gill stood behind her when she shot, a pair of binoculars in his hands. The targets were as close as one hundred yards out and as far out as three. Hitting the mark wasn’t easy, and it took more concentration than would work in any real-life uses.

Once she’d squeezed the trigger, she’d wait to hear him call out if she hit, if the shot was high, or if it was too low.

“High and to the right,” he told her.

She adjusted.

“Too low.”

Another breath, her eye peering down the barrel at the sights, she missed her target again.

“Lean into that gun, Sheriff,” Gill called behind her.

She squeezed.

“Closer.” Gill stood behind her, his chest pressed into her back, his face close to hers. “Get closer to the weapon.”

He moved away far enough to not be hit by the casing as it exited the chamber.

She didn’t need him to tell her she hit her target. So did the next six shots.

When she pulled the clip and sat back, Gill was smiling. “A couple hundred more hits and I might consider you efficient.”

She’d argue with him if he wasn’t telling the truth.

He waved one of her trio over. “You’re up, Lenny.”

By lunch, she was already tired . . . and they hadn’t even started the hand-to-hand yet.





Chapter Six




Shauna met Jo during lunch. “How was the first half of your day?” she asked, sitting with her sandwich and soda.

“Intense.” Jo moved her tray over to give her room.

“Gill said you’re a pretty good shot.”

Jo couldn’t stop her eyes from searching the man out in the crowd. He sat with a few instructors.

“Did he?”

“Hey, that’s high praise, coming from him.”

“He’s an intense guy.” Gill took that moment to feel the weight of her stare. He met her eyes and didn’t flinch.

Shauna glanced over her shoulder and back. “Well, look at that.”

From across the room, Gill appeared to laugh before moving his attention to the people he was with.

“Look at what?” Jo picked up her sandwich and attempted to focus.

“He’s single,” Shauna said, a smirk covering her face.

“Who’s single?”

“Gill . . .”

Jo felt her face flush. “Did I ask?”

“Your eyes did.”

So did the rest of her, but Jo kept that to herself. “Not interested,” she said.

“Liar! But I’ll let it go. We haven’t had a chance to really talk since last fall. How is everything in River Bend?”

Jo was happy to change the subject. “Quiet.”

“That’s a good thing.”

“Considering all the excitement in the past couple years, yeah. It’s also a little unnerving.”

Shauna shifted in her seat. “I don’t like sitting idle either. A place like River Bend would grow cobwebs on my feet in no time.”

“Yeah, that’s why I’m here. My badge feels like a target or a noose.” The words escaped her mouth before she could retract them.

“Target I get . . . but noose?”

Jo wasn’t one to really talk about her emotional stress on the job, but if there was anyone who might understand, it was someone who carried a badge of her own. “Some kids inherit their family business . . . auto shops, plumbers . . . even a restaurant. I somehow managed to inherit a badge. Not the path I thought I’d find myself.”

“You don’t like it.”

Jo gave up on her lunch, pushed it aside. “I’d like it more if it wasn’t such a marriage to an entire town. I’m more of a play the field woman, commitment phobic. Watching out over the same street, the same neighbors week after week, year after year, makes me feel old.”

Shauna shrugged. “Then why do it?”

Jo thought of the flag that hung over her fireplace. The one that had been draped over her father’s casket at his funeral. “I need to finish what I started.”

“What am I missing, Jo?”

“This summer will be the ten-year anniversary of my father’s death.”

“And?”

Instead of coming out and telling Agent Burton every thought, every fear . . . Jo asked, “How many men or women in uniform ‘accidentally’ shoot themselves with their own weapons?”

Shauna laughed as if it was a joke, but then her face lost her smile. “Wait, didn’t the investigating officers determine your father accidentally shot himself?”

“That’s what the report said.” Jo left her thoughts open.

“You don’t believe it.”

“My father was a smart cop . . . an avid hunter, and a man who respected his weapons more than any marksman here. I believe my father accidentally killed himself about as much as I believe you can out arm wrestle your partner.” Jo’s eyes moved to where Gill had been a few moments before.

He wasn’t there now.

“So you became a cop to get answers.”

Jo set both arms on the table and leaned forward. “I became a cop because it was what my father would have wanted. I followed his steps in River Bend to find the truth.”

“And what have you found after all these years?”

She released a painful sigh. “That my father led a very boring and unfulfilling life. The only dirt on the man was what I created when I was a teenager.”

“Sounds depressing,” Shauna said.

“Sounds like bull. My father was a good-looking guy. More than one single woman in town tried to get his attention that I remember, but he didn’t bite. Not that I found out about.”

“Maybe he went out of town for that part of his life.”

Yeah, she’d thought about that more than once. Even Waterville didn’t bring up any hits when she’d asked around.

“Where do you go when you want to let loose?”

Once again Jo found her gaze rolling over the room in search of Viking Man. “Anywhere but River Bend.”

“Seems to me you need to start looking in Anywhere, USA, instead of River Bend.”

Jo glanced at her watch when the other students started to get up and clear their lunch trays.

“Well, this is about as far from River Bend as I can get without leaving the country.”

They both stood and moved their half-eaten lunches to the garbage.

“I’d be happy to look over the reports on your father’s death. Not sure if I can help, but I’m willing.”

Jo smiled. “I’d like that.”