Free 3 Men and a Body by Stephanie Bond Page B

giving
    me the silent treatment.”
    “Oh.”
    “She’s got a thing for you.”
    “I kind of picked up on that. How long wil she make you
    suffer?”
    Carlotta gave him a teasing smile. “I guess that depends on
    how this weekend goes.”
    He grinned widely, but the moment was broken by the
    sound of her phone ringing again. She reached for it. “I
    hope she doesn’t keep doing this.” But when she glanced
    at the display screen, she scowled. J. Terry. She didn’t
    want to answer. But on the chance that he had news
    concerning her father’s fingerprints, she murmured,
    “Excuse me,” to Coop and flipped open the phone.
    “Hel o?”
    “It’s Jack.”
    “Uh-huh.”
    “Good morning to you, too.”
    “What do you want, Jack?”
    Coop turned his head toward her, a frown tugging on his
    mouth before he looked back to the road.
    “I feel lousy about the other day,” Jack said. “You know I
    don’t want anything bad to happen to Wesley…or to you.”
    He was extending an olive branch, but she didn’t want to
    let him get close again. Not when he might be bringing her
    father back from Florida. “You were just doing your job,”
    she said tightly. “Besides, Wesley is okay.”
    “My hands were tied.”
    “Wel , Liz is probably into that.”
    An exasperated sigh sounded on the line. “I seem to
    remember you tying a pretty decent square knot from
    your bedpost to my ankle.”
    “I’m hanging up now.”
    “Carlotta—”
    She flipped the phone closed and tucked it back into her
    purse.
    Coop looked over at her. “How’s Jack?”
    “Same. An asshole.”
    He pursed his mouth. “The two of you seem to have some
    kind of love-hate thing going on.”
    “Not love,” she said, shaking her finger. “Believe me.”
    “Okay.” He shifted in his seat. “Wesley said that Jack has
    reopened your father’s case?”
    “The D.A. had the case reopened, but he assigned it to
    Jack.”
    “Tough spot for Jack,” Coop ventured.
    “He doesn’t seem to think so. He’s enjoying it. He’s
    determined to find my father and drag him back to
    Atlanta.”
    “How do you feel about that?”
    “About my father being captured? I’m not sure.” She
    hesitated, then said, “But I think Jack is underestimating
    him.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “My father is intelligent…clever.”
    “I assumed so. How else could he have eluded capture all
    these years?”
    Carlotta pressed her lips together, wavering. She stared at
    Coop’s profile. She could trust him to keep a confidence,
    and she was desperate to share the secret she’d been
    harboring. “Coop, my father came to see me.”
    He pivoted his head, his eyes wide. “Recently?”
    “Yes. It turns out he was at my funeral after all, in
    disguise.”
    “You’re kidding! The cops were everywhere.”
    Carlotta wanted to respond, but a movement in the back
    of the van caught her eye. From behind the mesh
    partition, a sheet-covered body was rising from the floor
    of the van. Her eyes watered and her heart seized with
    terror. She pointed, gasping. At last her vocal cords rallied
    and a scream exploded from her throat.

    10
    Carlotta screamed, straining against her seat belt, pointing
    a shaking finger at the sheet-covered body rising in the
    back of the van.
    “What the hell?” Coop swerved, then pul ed the vehicle
    onto the shoulder of the interstate and brought it to a
    bumpy halt. He flipped on the hazard lights, then jumped
    and ran around to the back. With her broken arm, Carlotta
    moved more slowly, but stil opened the door, jumped
    down and picked her way through the grass, her heart
    pounding. She rounded the corner just as Coop yanked the
    tangled sheet from the body struggling underneath it.
    Wesley sat on top of the flattened gurney, glaring at her,
    his hair in disarray.
    “Dad came to see you and you didn’t tel me?”
    “Whoa,” Coop said, holding up his hands. “What’s going
    on? How did you get back here?”
    Wes shrugged. “I was in the