Freeze Before Burning by Nikki Stern

Author:Nikki Stern [Stern, Nikki]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: mystery_ suspense_ female_ sleuth_ crime_ novel, classic, mystery, suspense, thriller, female, sleuth, crime, novel, protagonist, sebook, action, adventure
ISBN: 9780999548776
Publisher: Ruthenia Press
Published: 2021-12-20T06:00:00+00:00

Chapter 21

Sam left Detective Sergeant Mills and headed into heavy traffic she scarcely noticed. She followed the GPS directions with a part of her mind and let the rest analyze what she’d just learned. Or what she hadn’t learned.

Shell casings pointed to a shooter to the right of the podium and a couple of rows back had gotten off most, if not all the shots. Arthur Randolph. The report confirmed forty-five shots, fourteen of which hit a target. One-third seemed like a high percentage for an inexperienced shooter. Randolph had engaged in recreational shooting as a boy, so he wasn’t a complete novice.

Both she and the best man had seen the man in the brown suit, and both had seen the gun. Who brings a gun to a wedding? An assassin or maybe a bodyguard. Would her father have hired someone to protect the guests? If so, the guy had failed. He got his gun out, but he didn’t manage to stop the shooting.

She suddenly needed to talk with Terry. She punched in his number and held her breath. When he answered on the second ring, she could feel the tension in the back of her neck ease.

“Hey, Tate, you caught me between the supervisor me and the student me.”

“Guess that means I get plain old you. How’s your day been?”

“The usual. Saving civilization by day, studying my ass off at night. We’ve got a serial killer running around Wyoming, of all places. Some new players are taking the place of the drug runners we shut down in Florida last year. One of my field agents quit. On the other hand, I got an A on an important paper.”

“Way to bury the story,” she exclaimed. “Congratulations.”

“It all helps,” he said. “So, how’s it going for you? Where are you, by the way? In a car?”

“Yes. It’s been a long day.”

“Do you have time to tell me?”

“Given the volume of traffic on 495, I do. Bright and early, I walked into Manhattan South, where Ron Zielinski immediately offered me a consulting contract. Part-time, one week at a time, stipend.”

“That’s great,” Terry replied. “Wait, isn’t it?”

“Depends on whether you believe someone can go from liability to asset in the space of a few days.”

“I’ve seen it happen,” Terry said. “Did you accept?”

“I did.”

“For what it’s worth, I think you did the right thing. Your work is acknowledged, you have a degree of protection as an NYPD adjunct, and you can shorten your vacation by a couple of days if it’s not working out. You could check with Tanner, although I assume what you do with your own time is your business. Definitely forget about the role of politics in all this.”

“Pretty much what Lopez said.”

“I like her. What else?”

“I worked online alongside a smart young tech officer and a couple of detectives, one who likes me and one who doesn’t, to gather info on our chat room participants.”

Terry grunted. “First of all, hard to believe anyone doesn’t like you. Second, I won’t ask you how you got information on anonymous people chatting on a website.

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