Page 99 of Ride the Lightning
“Shouldn’t Ricky leave,” Avery asked. “You wanted Rocky and Felix to leave to protect your aunt’s job.”
“Hush, child. Can’t you see I’m injured? Besides,” Ricky said, pulling out a small silver badge. “The commissioner swore me in today as a Savannah police officer.”
“Isn’t that the same plastic badge they give to little kids when they visit schools?”
“You better take this one over your knee tonight, Jonah,” Ricky said before sauntering away. “Yoo-hoo, honey. I got injured in the takedown.”
“I’m telling Amos,” Jonah said. Ricky stuck his arm behind his back and flipped Jonah off.
Jonah tugged Avery into his arms and kissed him. “Let’s get this rope off your wrists. I want the paramedics to check you over too.”
“Wait,” Avery said suddenly. “Say it again, Jonah.”
“I want you.”
Adrenaline continued to pump through Jonah’s veins, but it wasn’t the only thing fueling his frenetic energy. Relief, elation, rage, love, and sorrow were powerful emotions warring for dominance inside him. Individually, they created impressive storm fronts. Together, they formed a superstorm that gave a person two options: seek shelter or ride the lightning.
Jonah was fucking tired of hiding.
“St. John,” Trexler called out before Jonah and Avery could slip out the door.
They had just wrapped up four hours of interviews, waiting, more interviews, and more waiting before Trexler finally cleared them to leave. Now he was stopping them again. Jonah bit back the groan and faced his supervisor.
“Sir?” he asked.
“About your resignation,” Trexler said. “I’m shredding it. I know I don’t deserve a second chance, but I’m asking for one anyway. I’m truly sorry for the way I treated you, and I’d like the opportunity to earn your trust and respect.” Jonah was struck speechless. Trexler extended his hand. “What do you say?”
Jonah shook his hand. “I accept, sir.”
“We’ll begin our fresh start next week. Both of you have earned the rest of the week off with pay.”
Trexler shook Avery’s hand also before returning to conduct more interviews.
“What just happened?” Avery asked as soon as they were inside Jonah’s car.
“You want to do this now?” Jonah asked, starting the engine.
“Yes, now. I’ve watched the two of you bicker and fight for eight months, and now you’re working secret missions together,” Avery said. “I have to know how it all unfolded.”
Jonah shifted the car in drive and headed for the exit. “I took a chance and called him last night. I told him about everything we’d uncovered and how it framed him as the fall guy for whatever was supposed to happen to me.”
Avery snorted. “I figured that part out for myself. What made you pick up the phone and trust him after the way he’s treated you?”
“When I realized how wrong I was about Charlie Malcolm, I started evaluating my other relationships. I started wondering how much of my antagonistic association with Trexler was real and how much of it Malcolm had engineered. I thought back to the day I asked Malcolm for permission to investigate Earl’s homicide. It was the only time Malcolm refused to intervene, and I knew there had to be a reason for it.”
“He killed Earl,” Avery said.
“Yes, but my gut told me there was more to the story. I set aside my differences with Trexler and evaluated the man on how he interacted with everyone else. He is a man known for his intellect and fairness, but his behavior toward me was the exact opposite. I never understood what provoked his hostility toward me. A pattern of behavior emerged. Every time Trexler would tear me down, Malcolm would go out of his way to build me back up. It got to the point where I started disobeying protocol and went directly to Malcolm with my problems or ideas. Then it hit me. Malcolm had purposefully engineered the volatile relationship between us.”
“Why?” Avery asked. “There was no way he could’ve predicted three years ago that you would’ve asked to reopen the Ison case.”
“True,” Jonah conceded. “Back in the warehouse, Malcolm insisted he is a good man who spent his life making up for the one terrible thing he did. Malcolm didn’t commit a singular crime. What about the stalking, blackmailing, and sexually assaulting Earl before killing him? Someone so devious and deranged doesn’t just change overnight. Plus, there were the crimes he committed against Bo Cahill thirteen years later. After getting away with the murder and cover-up, his urges to do other sinister things would’ve intensified, not lessened. He just got smarter about choosing his victims and inflicted emotional harm instead of physical, or at least in my case. I realized he’d turned Trexler into a weapon against me.”
“How’d the conversation with Trexler go?” Avery asked.
Jonah smiled. “Trexler hung up on me as soon as I told him why I was calling. I emailed him the proof you had found, and Trexler called me back immediately. He said, ‘I’m listening,’ and it was the opening I needed to lay it all out there for him. He told me that Malcolm was the one who encouraged him to come down hard on me, including the warning for insubordination and the subsequent suspension.”
“Malcolm is the one who ratted you out to Trexler, huh?”