So Wright (The Wrights 1)

The boys sat on the steps and played with toy cars. Jen bounced Joshua on her knee.

“Maybe I shouldn’t have suspended her,” Jack admitted aloud for the first time. “It just cast doubt on her character. Maybe we could have just kept it quiet until we had more concrete evidence.”

“Even Klein thought we had enough to have her questioned by police. That would have cast more suspicion.”

That didn’t make Jack feel any better. He’d been holding out hope that something Miranda said could have shed light on his doubt and cleared it up. But all she’d done was deny it, which wasn’t conclusive either way.

“I think you were right the other day,” Jack said. “About the gray areas. I think that’s where I’m going to find the truth.”

Jen’s phone rang. She looked at the face. “The office. I called out today. They’ve been calling me nonstop for either work stuff or gossip.”

Jack let her conversation fade into the background. Tried to wipe the hurt look on Miranda’s face from his mind. But like trying to clean oil with water, it refused to disappear.

“Really.” The heaviness of Jen’s word pulled Jack’s focus into the present. “How did you hear that?”

After sounds of understanding and a little more small talk, Jen disconnected.

When she stayed oddly silent, Jack asked, “What was that about?”

“Nothing.” She turned Joshua to face her and made googly eyes at him until he smiled. “Just more gossip.”

“What did they say?”

“It’s not important. You did the best thing you could do, Jack.”

“Jen.”

She cut an annoyed look at him, then relented. “Someone heard she lost her investor. I don’t know what that means. Dad said the veterans’ project was almost done.”

Jack’s stomach dropped. He squeezed his eyes closed and muttered, “Fuck me.”

“Uncle Jack—” Jacob said.

“I know, I know.” He covered his eyes and groaned. Fuck, fuck, fuck. This was like the meeting of a helicopter and a surface-to-air missile, a fiery, spinning clusterfuck. He looked at Jen. “Where’d they hear it?”

“Someone at her Warrior Homes project knows someone at Pinnacle.”

“Effing construction workers. Worse than a bunch of high school girls.”

His phone dinged with an incoming email from Klein’s assistant, with files attached.

Jack pushed to his feet and retreated into the house. He had work to do. Work more meaningful than anything he’d done in a long time.

29

Miranda eked out the last two feet of welding wire along the connection of one storage container to another, creating a double-wide space of sixteen feet the length of the forty-five-foot metal box.

This would make a nice open living space for someone. A veteran who’d given up his nice, normal, comfortable life to go off and fight in a war that ultimately allowed Miranda and every other American to live their own best life.

She released her torch and pushed back her face shield, trying to feel good about that. But it was hard to feel good about anything right now.

“Where have you been staying?”

The voice made her startle. She swiveled toward Marty with a scowl. “Don’t do that. You scared me.”

“Then we’re even. How do you think I feel when you don’t come home for two days after your world implodes?”

She exhaled and rolled her eyes. “I texted you.”