Simple Genius (Sean King & Michelle Maxwell 3)

He hesitated.

“My name is Michelle. Michelle Maxwell.”

“Are you really a cop?”

“Used to work for the Secret Service. Guarded the vice president for a while.”

“For real?” Now he sounded like a teenager. An awed teenager.

“Yep.”

“And you’re a cop now?”

“Well, I used to be. I’m actually a private investigator now. But I still act like a cop sometimes. Now what’s your name? I told you mine.”

“Tyler, Tyler Wingo,” he said.

“Okay, Tyler Wingo, that’s a good start. Now let’s go to my car, get in and—” She glanced behind him but had no time to say anything.

Sean grabbed Tyler from behind, knocked the pistol from his grip, kicked it away, and twirled him around.

Staggering, Tyler started to run off again, but Sean clamped a hand around his wrist. At six-two and more than two hundred pounds, he had the size to keep the kid from going anywhere.

“Let me go!” yelled Tyler.

“Sean, it’s okay,” said Michelle. “Let him go.”

Sean reluctantly released his grip, bent down, and picked up the gun. He looked at it. “What the hell is this?”

“A German Mauser,” said Tyler, scowling up at him.

“Without a trigger,” pointed out Michelle. “Saw that in the

headlights. Makes it a little hard to use as a weapon unless you throw it at somebody.”

Sean checked the gun’s magazine. “Empty,” he said.

“Tyler was just going to tell me where he lives so we can drive him there,” said Michelle.

“Tyler?” said Sean.

“Tyler Wingo,” said Tyler sulkily. “And you better not have damaged my dad’s gun. It’s a collectible.”

Sean slipped the gun into his waistband. “Which made it pretty dumb to run around in the rain with it,” he pointed out.

Tyler didn’t answer him. He looked at Michelle. “Can you just give me a lift home?”

“Yes we can,” she said. “And maybe on the way you can tell us what happened.”

“I already told you, there’s nothing you can do.”

“You’re right, there is absolutely nothing we can do if you don’t tell us anything,” replied Michelle.

“Can we go get in the truck?” said Sean. “Or the only place we’ll be going is a hospital where they can treat us for pneumonia. Unless the lightning kills us first since we are in the middle of a forest,” he added, as another thrust of lightning precipitated a deafening crack of thunder.

They got back to the Cruiser where Sean had parked it off the road, after getting ahead of them on the other side of the woods.

There were some blankets in the back cargo area. Michelle grabbed three of these and handed one to Tyler, who draped it around his shoulder. She handed another one to Sean and wrapped the last one around herself.