Gathering Dark, Candice Fox [inspirational books for students .TXT] 📗

this was all an act, an office joke gone wrong. That any minute someone was going to push through the crowd and put their arms around her and tell her everything was okay, that she was still a part of this team, that she wasn’t the enemy in their midst. But the person who pushed through the crowd was Captain Whitton, and there wasn’t anything friendly about his expression.

“Sanchez,” Whitton said. “Let’s talk in my office. Now.”

Jessica sat in her captain’s office, thinking about how Andrew Whitton was a man stamped out of the mold of leadership in the Los Angeles Police Department. He was tall, serious, grave. Emotionless slate-gray eyes and broad shoulders constructed specifically for carrying the weight of responsibility, shoulders that looked dramatically stooped at solemn police funerals and old but powerful when he worked them alongside the boys at the station gym. On his desk sat a picture of his wife, Karen, curly-haired and eager-eyed in colorful spectacles, and their three sons, all cops. Sailing shots dominated the other frames.

“It’s decision time,” the boss said as he sat down. It was probably always time for something like that in Captain Whitton’s life. A decision. A recommendation. A request. A determination. Things that required paperwork and stamps. “You taking the house or not?”

“I’ve known about this goddamn house for exactly forty-eight hours,” Jessica said. Her tone was dead. “In that time I was injured on the job and I killed a man.”

“Sure. And I don’t want you to think I don’t care about that.” Whitton held up a placating hand. “My understanding is that a union rep and one of our health people came and saw you at the hospital straight after. You’ve got your trauma leave paperwork taken care of, haven’t you?”

“They did. I do.”

“Good. Then Internal Affairs Group will set a date with you about the officer-involved shooting. So the process of dealing with your injuries and the events related to the shooting have started,” Whitton said. “You used your gun. They have to look into it. And aside from offering you my condolences, and my full support as your captain, mentor, and friend, all of that has nothing to do with me. What isn’t being handled yet is the potential shitstorm that’s going to come from this whole thing with the Beauvoir inheritance.”

Jessica pinched the bridge of her nose. An ache was spreading through her face, backward across the top of her skull. She thought about viruses again. If only she had been more careful, more discreet. But the phone call she’d received from Rachel Beauvoir in the locker room two mornings earlier had left her so stunned she’d repeated the conversation to a woman she barely knew, Fiona Hardy from the Firearms training section, who was standing nearby in a towel. From there, the news had spread.

“A couple of guys from patrol said you were there yesterday,” the captain said.

“Yeah, I went to look at the house.” Jessica shifted in her chair. “I went directly from the hospital. Is that what’s happening now? Patrols are doing sweeps to see if I’m hanging around?”

“They’re curious,” he said. “Wouldn’t you be?”

“No,” Jessica said. “What other officers in this precinct do with their personal time is none of my fucking business.”

“Hanging around the house sure makes it look as if you’re taking it.”

“A man left it to me in his will,” Jessica snapped. “His dying wish was that I have it. The very least I could do is go look at it, see the gesture in person.”

“But you’d been to the house a million times during—”

“Did you bring me in here just to bust my balls?”

The captain leaned back in his chair and looked Jessica over. She could see him reminding himself that this wasn’t her doing, that she was the victim, at least of the fallout of the inheritance.

“You must be tempted, surely,” the captain said. “It’s twelve million dollars.”

“Every time I hear about this place the property value has gone up. There must be an oil spring underneath it that nobody told me about.”

“Here’s how it is, Sanchez. The truth.” The captain glanced at the door as though to make sure it was closed. “You deserve all the recognition you can get on the Silver Lake case. I know Wallert slacked on that investigation.”

Jessica remained silent.

“Wallert’s promotion to detective was an overestimation of his character. A decision made before my time,” Whitton said carefully. “And I expect you not to repeat that outside this office.”

Jessica still said nothing.

“I feel as though I should make it perfectly clear what’s at stake here.” The captain opened a drawer beside him.

“I know what’s at stake, Captain,” Jessica sighed.

“And it’s my responsibility to confirm that, officially.”

Jessica slumped in her chair. As she had done many times throughout their time together as detective and captain, Jessica sat in Whitton’s office and watched while he traced a finger under the words in a battered copy of the Los Angeles Police Department Policies of the Personnel Department handbook.

“If you were to accept the house in Brentwood as a reward from Mr. Beauvoir in exchange for your work on his daughter’s case,” Whitton began, finding his place in the text, “you could be disciplined under section 33.2.” He read, “‘Misconduct, on or off the job, seriously reflecting on city employees or employment,’ whereby ‘employees must perform their duties in a manner that earns and maintains the trust and respect of their supervisors, other employees, and the public.’ Your offense would be ‘Accepting favors or gratuities for services required on the job.’”

“Uh-huh,” Jessica said.

“You could alternatively be disciplined under ‘Fraud, dishonesty, theft, or falsification of records,’ whereby ‘employees must demonstrate personal integrity and honesty both in securing employment and in the performance of duties.’” He paused for effect, his finger resting on the page. “Here, Jessica, you’d come under soliciting, accepting, or offering a bribe. That’s an immediate discharge.”

“There was no talk of the house being offered to me by Mr. Beauvoir