Free The Highway by C. J. Box Page A

(and defense attorneys) alleged, he invented new corners to cut. Although his work resulted in a firefight that brought a serial pedophile down, his methods—including the appearance of his uncle Jeter brandishing a ten-gauge shotgun—got him thrown off the force.
    Given his reputation, most Montana LEOs were surprised when he landed a job as investigator at the Lewis and Clark County Sheriff’s Department. Stories of his carousing rivaled stories of witness intimidation, brutality, and tampering with crime scenes. But again, his results were inspiring. Two years before—after being suspended for shooting the county coroner in what was later deemed an accident—Cody came to the conclusion that a serial murderer responsible for the death of his AA sponsor was on a multiday wilderness horseback trip in Yellowstone Park. So was his estranged son, Justin.
    Without authorization or backup, Cody had recruited an old-time wilderness guide and ridden into Yellowstone in a fury. When it was all over, bodies littered the trees and two large-scale conspiracies were brought to light, including one that involved the department. Cody had reconciled with his son and convinced his ex-wife to move back to Montana. Rather than prosecute his subordinate, Tubman—under pressure—had supported Cody. But he’d bided his time until he could pull the trigger.
    Cassie realized now she’d ended up as the one holding the gun.
    *   *   *
    After the bartender delivered the drinks—a plastic cup of cheap Merlot for Cassie and an amber shot and a pint of beer for Cody—Cassie handed the man her credit card.
    “Cash only,” he said, but without the attitude from before. She dug into her purse and handed over her only twenty and he went to make change.
    “Run a tab,” Cody called after him. The bartender nodded.
    “Can we talk about this,” she asked Cody insistently, “or should I just go home? This isn’t much fun for me, you know. I know about you,” she said, gesturing toward the drinks on the table. “I know you’ve been clean and sober for three years. I know that’s why your wife and son moved back. Everybody in the department warned me about you when I got hired. How you’d show up drunk in the morning, how you’d insult anybody who crossed your path. How you bent the rules when you wanted to. But I also heard you were the best investigator around and you’d cleaned up your act. I wanted to learn from you. I wanted to work with the best.”
    “If you wanted to work with the best,” he said, “why’d you sneak around behind my back and fuck up my career? Hmmm?”
    She wasn’t sure how to answer, except to say Tubman had ordered her to follow him. It wasn’t like she could refuse …
    “Bullshit,” Cody said, cutting her off. “You could have handled it a dozen ways if you had any … balls . I understand you’re bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and you’re eager to please. But you haven’t been around much. You don’t know how things work.”
    She sipped her wine. It was awful. She took a gulp. “What could I have done?” she said. “He gave me an order.”
    Cody rolled his eyes with disgust.
    “What?”
    He fixed his horrible smirk on her and held out a hand and started counting the fingers on it with the other. “One, you could have said you lost me when I drove out of town. Two, you could have accidentally deleted the shots after you took them. Three,” he said, making sure she noted he was extending his middle finger toward her, “you could have told Tubman to fuck himself and send somebody else, because partners don’t rat on partners. Four, you could have begged off at the last minute. Said your son was sick or your mom fell down and broke her hip. Some kind of bullshit that would stick. And five, we could have worked it together so we still got the bad guy which, last I looked, was what I thought we were supposed to do out here.”
    She held her tongue because she could tell he wasn’t