Garden of Evil Read Online Free

Pete’s sake, Lottie, he’s rewriting the Bible!”
    â€œI know men with hobbies a whole lot worse.”
    I tidied my desk, snatched up my purse, then noticed a nagging signal flashing in the corner of my computer screen, a message, the wire story Tubbs had sent. I hit the key and scrolled through it.
    FLA. LAWMAN KILLED, SUSPECT AT LARGE
    Veteran Sheriff T. Rupert “Buddy” Braacom, 54, top lawman in this rural citrus and farming county for more than 21 years, was shot to death Thursday, apparently by a prisoner who escaped from the sheriff’s office in the small county Jail annex in Live Oak.
    Brascom may have been slain with his own service revolver, according to Deputy S. L. Weech, who discovered the body. The sheriff’s weapon was missing, along with his wallet, badge and his Chevrolet Blazer.In his last communication with a dispatcher, the sheriff had indicated he had a woman in custody and was proceeding to the annex.
    The prisoner has not been identified. A trucker who knew Brascom later reported seeing the sheriff’s white Blazer southbound on I-96, driven by a young woman in her late teens or early twenties. The Florida Bureau of Law Enforcement and deputies set up roadblocks and launched an immediate manhunt.
    Sheriff Brascom is survived by his wife, Lugene, four adult children and two grandchildren. Funeral arrangements are incomplete. He is the fifth Florida police officer killed in the fine of duty this year.
    I read it twice, questions flooding my mind. Was he wearing a vest? Where was he hit, and why was her identity unknown if he had arrested her? Cop killers are rarely female. When they are, they rarely get away. Who are you? I wondered. Where are you? What’s your story?

Two
    W E FOUND A SMALL TABLE IN THE DARK AND crowded back room at the 1800 Club and ordered drinks.
    â€œGot a picture?” Lottie’s bright red hair was long, wild, and unruly. She wore blue jeans, hand-tooled leather cowboy boots, and an L. L. Bean cotton shirt.
    â€œPicture?” I asked.
    â€œDamn straight, of that Bible-writing bridegroom, the one you’re ’sposed to marry. He a stud muffin?”
    â€œNo picture, but I seriously doubt he’s a stud muffin and don’t plan to find out.” I complained at length about Tubbs’s hacking my story, then asked about Lottie’s ex.
    Her freckled face drew into a frown. “Guess I jist let it git me down.” She jabbed at the ice in her newly arrived drink with a stirrer. “The man never changes. Every coupla years he decides that, doggone, I was the true love of his life! Keeps insistin’ we were meant to be together.”
    â€œNice,” I said. “Considering how most men feel about ex-wives, that should be an ego boost. Why are you bummed?”
    She inhaled the first sip of her frozen margarita, closed her eyes, licked her lips, and sighed. “Cuz sometimes I’m afraid he’s right, and if he is, jist shoot me now. With a man like him, you haul ass and don’t look back.”
    â€œMaybe he’s changed. Some people do, you know.”
    She shook her head vigorously. “He’s the back end of bad luck. Can’t settle down. Always off on some new crusade, some new adventure. Feels like fun at first, but it gits old fast. Ain’t no future in reliving the past. We git together, it always ends the same way, like the battle of the Alamo, with jist as many casualties. He’s wild; a-course that’s his most excitin’ feature. Known each other all our lives but, like Peter Pan, he never grew up. Wasn’t easy, gettin’ over that man,” she said, eyes sad. “I’ll be go-to-helled if I’m gonna do it agin. Speaking of men, when will yours be back in town?”
    â€œNext week.” I smiled. Miami Homicide Captain Kendall McDonald was attending a ten-week management seminar in Washington, D.C. Our on-and-off romance was on and red hot