Renegade (Tin Star K9 Series Book 1) by Jodi Burnett (literature books to read .txt) 📗

thought she could be a murderer. I was right about him all along. I can’t trust him. He knows nothing about loyalty. “I’m calling my lawyer.” Caitlyn reached inside her purse and snatched out her cell phone, punching at numbers on the screen. She spoke to her attorney, filling him in on all the details she knew so far. “I won’t. Okay. I’ll see you this afternoon.”

Colt parked behind the Sheriff’s office and escorted her inside through the back door, but Caitlyn didn’t care about her privacy. She was too mad.

“I told you to let me handle it!” The sheriff’s back was to them as they came in. He hung up the phone and turned to face them. “Well, Ms. Reed. I’m interested in how you’ll try to explain this evidence away.”

“I don’t have anything to explain. But you do.”

Colt touched her shoulder. “Can I put your things in a locker?” Caitlyn thrust her bag at him and he secured them for her. He then walked her to the jail cell and opened the door. “I’m sorry, Caitlyn.” He said without looking her in the eye.

“Whatever, Colt. I knew I couldn’t trust you.” Her pulse beat war drums inside her skull.

Colt looked at her then, pain pulsing around his pupils. “You can trust me, Catie. I promise I’ll be by your side through this whole thing. No matter what we find.” He stared into her eyes, which only enraged the flames of fury inside her head.

Caitlyn sat down on the cot and rested her face in her hands. She ran over what Colt had said this morning. They have the slug that killed Wendy and its casing. The casing has my fingerprint on it—of course. And the bullet was fired from my gun… Caitlyn gnawed on the lower corner of her lip as she thought. Distracted, she jumped to her feet. “Colt, you need to let the vet know I’m here. Please, find out what he has to say about Renegade.”

Colt made the call to the veterinarian on his way out the door. Catie returned to her position on the cot, allowing her mind to wander once again through all the evidence that she knew about the murder. There were so many things they still didn’t know. She tried to focus on those, but Sheriff Tackett approached the jail cell.

“I think your brother is in on this too, somehow. Before long, we’ll have the both of you sent to prison for murder. You can’t get away with this kind of thing in my county.” Caitlyn glared at him as he walked over to the front door, reached for his hat and left.

Before long, Colt returned. He tried to smile, but failed. “Dr. Moore says he’d like to run a few more tests on Renegade. He’s agreed to keep him at the clinic until you can pick him up. Whenever that is.” He cast his gaze to the floor.

Caitlyn stood and gripped the bars of the cell. “Colt, look at me.” Slowly, he raised his eyes to meet hers. “I did not have anything to do with Wendy’s murder. There are too many holes in this case. Yesterday, after you left my place, I found another threat written in red marker on my bathroom sink. Whoever wrote it left a dead squirrel in my sink.” She gripped a bar and pushed her forehead against it. “Someone slit my truck tire, left me two threatening notes, and a dead squirrel. Someone attacked me in my home. Someone wants me to stop investigating. That same someone is the real murderer.”

“I agree with you. But the evidence… The Sheriff has enough to hold you this time, Catie. He thinks your attacker is your partner, trying to scare you into staying quiet.”

“Oh, come on! There is other evidence and you have to weigh all of it equally!” She kicked at the door. “You say I can trust you. Okay, then I need you to get more information. I won’t be able to do it, being stuck in here.” Colt considered her but said nothing, so she continued. “First, you have to find out what happened when Jim took Wendy down to Sundance to that motel. Did she check in? Did Jim leave right away? Did he take her somewhere else? What did he do? If he left her there, where did he go? And can someone give him an alibi?” Caitlyn paced the floor in the cell as she spoke.

“I’ll go down there and look into it. But the other big question is, where was Dylan?”

Caitlyn glared at him. “Dylan has an alibi—he just doesn’t want to reveal the person he was with at this point. He will if he has to.”

“And you believe him?”

“Without a doubt.” Caitlyn resumed her pacing. “Someone has left me two threatening notes and attacked me and Renegade in my home. Why? Who was it? I think the answers to those questions are pivotal in this case, Colt. We can’t forget them.” She glowered at him and slowly, he nodded.

“That is true, but you have to be honest with yourself too, Catie. It could be Dylan.”

“Are you kidding me?” It was a good thing there were bars between them, or she might have slapped him upside the head.

“No, when I saw him yesterday, he was favoring his arm. Could that be because Renegade bit him?”

His implication made her angry, but she wasn’t one to turn away from evidence. Even the impossible to explain fact that her gun was the one that killed Wendy. She thought hard. “No, Dylan was at my house yesterday afternoon. He mentioned something about his shoulder hurting, but he said he’d taken a fall from his horse. He was wearing a T-shirt, and there were no bite marks that I could see. Whoever attacked me is going to have some serious torn flesh and bruising on their arm.”

Colt took a step closer. “Well, that’s something, then. Yesterday, we both noticed that Jim seemed injured, and also,