Page 27 of Jonah’s Lure

He arrived at the office at 8:55 a.m. Ninety minutes later than usual, though he’d been awake since 5 a.m.

The habit of nine years, bent but not broken. He wasn’t going to let this morning take that too.

He sat in his truck for a moment first, looking at the building he’d walked into nearly every working day for almost a decade. The flag above the entrance moved in the cold morning air. Through the front window he could see Jeanine at the desk, head down, not looking out.

He got out and went in.

Jeanine looked up. She held his gaze longer than she had on Friday—long enough that it cost her something, long enough for him to understand she was choosing to do it rather than look away. Her eyes were reddened at the edges. She’d been crying—or close to it—at some point this morning.

“Morning, Jeanine,” he said.

Her throat moved. “Morning, Sheriff.”

He hung his jacket on the hook and walked to the conference room.

Commander Kovak stood when he came in. She’d driven from Augusta rather than send a representative, and he noted that without commenting on it. She was silver-haired and known for her upright character. Beside her, the documentation sat in a neat folder on the table.

Miguel stood to one side of the room. Not at the table—off to the side, notebook in his hand, positioned to be present without being at the center. He looked at Angus when he came in and didn’t look away.

Kovak spoke first.

“I didn’t expect to see you across this desk again, Sheriff Reid.” She paused. “Certainly not like this.”

“Neither did I,” Angus said.

Her expression shifted—not sympathy exactly, but something more deliberate than that. The acknowledgment of a woman who had read the file and understood that what she was looking at was not simple.

She walked him through the documentation—the formal terms of the leave, the review conditions, the reinstatement process. She spoke clearly, without padding, and he listened and signed where required, saying nothing beyond what was necessary.

Then she nodded to him.

He unclipped his badge.

It was a small object. He'd done this once before—handed it over, felt the belt where it had been, walked out of a building without it. He'd told himself then that it was just metal. That the work was what mattered, not the emblem of it. He still believed that. But as he lifted it away from his belt, feeling its absence before he'd even set it down, he understood that believing a thing and living inside it were two different exercises entirely.

He set it on the table.

His weapon followed. Then, his credentials folder.

The room was very quiet.

Miguel’s pen had been moving across his notebook. It stopped.

Kovak gathered the items carefully and placed them in her folder. She looked at Angus with the directness of a woman who believed in doing hard things properly. “The review will be conducted fairly. You have my word.”

“I know it will.” He meant it. That was exactly what made it so hard to swallow—a fair process applied to manufactured evidence produced the same result as a corrupt one.

He shook her hand. He turned to leave.

And then stopped.

He looked at Miguel. At the notebook and pen still in his hand, the careful neutral expression on Miguel’s face that had held steady for nine days and was held even tighter now in this room.

“Nine years,” Angus said. His voice came out level, though he had to hold it there. “You know what I’m capable of. You know what I’m not.”

Miguel’s jaw tightened. A small movement, visible only because Angus knew his face well enough to read such subtle movements.

“A young man is missing. He’s been missing for nine days.” He stopped. Drew a breath. “Come on, Miguel. You know me. You know I’m not capable of this. Why would I do this?”