Carolina Blues Read Online Free

whose turn it was to empty the dishwasher or take out the trash. Jack had sympathized.
    Renee never let her sex or anything else stand in her way. But the truth was Jack had never really gotten over worrying about her. Sometimes an officer had to depend on sheer size to control a situation. Making a traffic stop on a dark road. Walking into a bar full of drunken rowdies. Jack still occasionally tangled with some asshole who figured he could take him.
    “I requested a dispatcher in the new budget. We’ll see what the town council says.” Jack looked at Luke. “Speaking of calls . . .”
    “Dora Abrams,” Luke said, referring to the call that had just come in. “She heard a noise under her house.”
    “What kind of noise?” Jack asked.
    “Like a banging. Water pipes maybe.”
    “Or a possum,” Hank said.
    “Or she just wants somebody out there to change her air filter again,” Jack said.
    “I’ll go take a look,” Luke said.
    In Jack’s old job, he would have suggested eighty-three-year-old Dora call a plumber. Or animal control. But small-town policing didn’t work like that.
    The islanders were an independent lot. When they had a problem, they were more inclined to take matters into their own hands than to call the police. As the new police chief, Jack had to earn their trust.
    Even if it meant crawling under Dora’s house again.
    “I’ve got it,” Jack said.
    “Let me know if you need backup,” Luke said. “Or a trap.”
    “You have a possum trap,” Jack said.
    “Sure,” Hank said, his drawl thickening. “Possum’s good eating. Mostly we just scoop ’em off the road with a shovel, but—”
    Jack’s expression must have betrayed some reaction, because Hank wheezed with laughter.
    “It’s a humane animal trap,” Luke said, grinning. “Kate bought it to catch Taylor’s cat.”
    Taylor was Luke’s daughter, the unexpected legacy of a high school girlfriend. Nice kid. She’d had a rough time before coming to live with the Fletchers a year ago.
    “How’s she doing?” Jack asked. “Taylor.”
    “She’s good. Well, she’s pissed at me right now because I won’t let her play Grand Theft Auto, but I told her that didn’t have anything to do with my being a cop.”
    “At least you’re home now,” Jack said.
    “Until you start working overtime,” Hank said. “And holidays.”
    Luke shrugged. “Beats being deployed. Plus, she’s pretty happy about Kate coming to live with us.”
    “Wait until she gets older,” Hank said. “That’s when the real trouble starts.”
    “I’ve already told her she’s not allowed to drink, date, or drive until she’s twenty-one.”
    Hank grunted. “Better make it thirty-five.”
    Jane was twenty-nine. Jack didn’t know much about their relationship except that Hank had raised his daughter alone and took her back in when her husband took off.
    Luke grinned. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
    He’d missed this, Jack realized. The camaraderie of a station house, the dumb-ass jokes, the bullshit. He missed Frank.
    His ex-partner.
    His right hand curled reflexively into a fist. His knuckles tingled with remembered pain.
    Shit.
    Slowly, he loosened his fingers. Shook his head.
    And went off to deal with somebody else’s problems.
    *   *   *
    A T THE END of another unproductive day, Lauren let herself in the front door of the Pirates’ Rest, a gorgeous two-and-a-half-story Craftsman built above the bay around the turn of the century. The Fletcher family had renovated the old house into a gracious bed-and-breakfast. The leaded glass transom threw bars of colored light on the faded William Morris carpet.
    Each of the eight guest rooms was decorated in the Arts and Crafts style and named after a pirate of the North Carolina coast. Lauren was staying in the William Kidd Room on the second floor, with a view of the water and easy access to the coffee-and-tea service set up in a converted wardrobe on the sunlit landing. Maybe she’d curl up in