"Get over here," he ordered. "Right now."
Chloe opened her mouth but could not make sound come out. She had obeyed that tone for most of her adolescence, and her body expected the same response now. Jack turned just enough to let her see his face. He said nothing, but the question in his eyes was unmistakable: what do you want to do?
"No," Chloe managed at last.
The word came out thin. Richard stared at her, then let out a disbelieving laugh. He looked around at the men standing beside the motorcycles and seemed to register for the first time how many of them there were. His hand moved toward his holster. Jack lifted one empty palm where the deputy could see it.
"Deputy Croft," Jack said evenly, "keep your hand where we can see it. Nobody here is trying to hurt you. We need to talk about Dominic Hayes."
Richard stopped. His flashlight beam moved off Chloe's face and landed on the old Shovelhead. For one fraction of a second, he looked less like a man pursuing a runaway and more like someone who had just recognized a nightmare from which he had believed himself safe.
Richard knew the name. Chloe saw it in the sudden slackening of his mouth, in the way his eyes moved toward the rusted tank and then snapped back to Jack's face. He had been furious when he stepped out of the SUV. Now he looked calculating, as if a decision had appeared before him and every possible answer led somewhere dangerous. His hand remained close to the weapon on his belt.
"I don't know what you're talking about," Richard said. "I'm here for my stepdaughter. She's mentally unstable, and you're interfering with a lawful welfare check."
Chloe flinched at the familiar phrase. Mentally unstable was what Richard called her whenever she protested, the diagnosis he liked to make without anyone having examined her. He used it to turn her fear into evidence against her. Jack glanced back at her, then returned his attention to the deputy. "She's nineteen," he said. "She's told you she doesn't want to go with you."
"She's living under my roof," Richard snapped. "And she's stolen property from my home. I've got every right to bring her in."
"Then call somebody outside your department and explain it," Jack replied. "Tell them what she took. You can start with the old wrench she's holding."
Richard stared at the tool as if noticing it for the first time. "That belonged to her father," he said, then seemed to realize he had confirmed Jack's point rather than his own. "It was in my house. That makes it evidence."
"Evidence of what?" Chloe heard herself ask. The words surprised her. "That I kept something Dad gave me before you met us?"
Richard's gaze sharpened. "Keep talking like that and see what happens when we're back in the trailer."