Page 21 of Target Acquired

His instant response relaxed something inside her. “Okay, good. Now that we have that resolved, I’ll say this. While we’ve known each other forever, I wouldn’t call us friends. You hung out with my brothers in the summers when we stayed with my grandmother, and I did my own thing. I’ll admit to a teenage crush but was also aware enough that you didn’t think twice about me.”

“I wouldn’t say that,” he muttered.

She frowned. “What?”

“Nothing. Go on.”

“All you guys talked about was law enforcement, and when you weren’t talking about it, you were role-playing it. I just wanted to join in.”

He raised a brow. “Is that why you—”

“Joined SWAT? No. Not really. I’m sure that had some influence in my decision to do what I do, but mostly it’s because—” She bit her lip, not sure she wanted to get that personal.

“Because?”

“It really doesn’t matter.”

“It does to me.”

He sounded like it really did. “Because of my dad. Because of the way he raised us. From the time my mother died until I put a stop to it, he pitted my brothers and me against each other. There was always some kind of competition to win. Or lose. And, truthfully, because of the smear on his name. It nearly destroyed him, and I had a front-row seat to it. When he learned he was going to be accused of stealing evidence from the evidence room, he nearly lost it.”

“So that rumor is true?”

“Yes.”

“But charges were never pressed.”

“No.” She shot him a sideways glance. “But he was never declared innocent either, just that there wasn’t enough evidence to bring charges, not because it was proved he didn’t do it. The damage was done.” The day of the car accident that had left her father with a broken spine and a chip on his shoulder the size of Texas had been the worst day of her life. It had also been the day her mother was ripped from her life at the tender age of fourteen. Her father had run a stop sign and smashed into another vehicle. The other car had been stolen and the driver was never found. “Dad swears he had nothing to do with that missing evidence, that he was framed.”

“You believe him?”

She swallowed and looked out the window. “I don’t know what to believe. And it kills me to say that.” But it was something she’d secretly been investigating since she’d earned access to the database of cases. “I’ve searched and I just can’t find any evidence one way or the other. He ran the stop sign, hit another car, and my mother died. The evidence he supposedly stole was never found, but the man the evidence would have put away for good, Shady Talbot, was released and went on to kill someone. And my father continues to have a black mark on his name.”

“I’m so sorry, Kenz.”

“I am too, but you know what?” She drew in a deep breath. “Let’s leave the past in the past and enjoy the day. What do you say?”

“I say that’s a great idea.”

They climbed out of his 4Runner, and after stretching, she looked at him. “How many miles? Ten?”

“Ten?”

“Too many?”

“You’re quite the jokester, aren’t you?” She raised a brow and he frowned. “Uh, how many miles do you normally run?”

“Depends on what I feel like at the time.” She shrugged. “We don’t have to set a number, we can just go until you need to stop.”

He blinked. “Until I need to—” He chuckled. “That sounds like a challenge.”

“Nah, not at all.”

“Right.”

Kenzie smiled, wondering if she should warn him she’d been training for months for an Olympic triathlon. She smothered a chuckle.

“What’s so funny?” he asked.