Page 113 of Protecting What's Mine

“Yes, you do,” she agreed, walking with him toward the door.

“Just keep me on this side of stupid, okay?”

“Will do. What in the hell is that?”

Kelly went from calm, cool, and collected to coldly furious in the blink of an eye.

Linc followed her gaze to Mack’s SUV parked next to the building. A team of nervous-looking garage employees stood by with scrubbing implements while the sheriff and Deputy Tahir took pictures.

“HORE” was clumsily sprayed across the hood in white, drippy spray paint.

“Hore? Ohhhhh. Shit,” Kelly said.

But Linc was already crossing the parking lot.

“Kersh!” he snapped.

A skinny man with a fresh bandage on his arm and a giant sponge in one hand looked up, eyes widening.

Kelly grabbed onto the back of Linc’s shirt as he plowed forward.

“Easy, cowboy,” she said, digging her heels into the asphalt.

It slowed him down, but it didn’t stop him.

Abner Kersh held up his hands. “I didn’t have nothing to do with this,” he insisted. “It was like this when we got in this morning.”

Linc grabbed the man by the front of his coveralls. “Who did this?”

“Calm down, chief,” Ty ordered, stepping between them. “Abner was the one who called it in.”

“I wouldn’t do this,” Abner said adamantly. “I swear I wouldn’t. Shorty, you gotta believe me,” he said to his boss, a short, round man with thick dark hair and a blue bandana.

Linc wasn’t sure if the man was more afraid of him or his boss.

“I know, Ab,” Shorty said, laying a hand on his shoulder. “I’ll vouch for him, chief. He’s one of my best. He wouldn’t jeopardize his job like that. Plus, the guy knows how to spell.”

“I do. There’s a ‘w,’” Abner said, nodding fiercely.

Linc forced himself to relax. But Kelly, knowing him as well as she did, maintained a grip on his shirt.

“Me ’n’ the doc have an understanding. It wasn’t me,” he said more calmly.

He believed him, and wouldn’t Mackenzie get a kick out of that? But there were still questions to be answered. “Then who was it?” he demanded.

Kersh looked at his feet. “Dunno.”

Ty shot Linc a look. They all knew who. Abner’s brother, Jethro, was an illiterate asshole who carried grudges for years at a time. He’d thrown punches over offenses committed twenty years ago.

“If your brother is responsible, we’ll find out,” Deputy Tahir said.

“I don’t know who did it,” Kersh said in a less-than-convincing tone. He fidgeted with the bandage on his arm. “But maybe some of us noticed a can of spray paint behind the dumpster. Maybe it’s evidence.” He shrugged and stared down at the cracked asphalt.

“I didn’t let anyone touch it in case there were fingerprints,” Shorty said, leading the way.

Linc and Abner stayed where they were, facing each other.

“You convey a message to your family,” Linc said. “Dr. O’Neil is off-limits.”