Big Pickle: A Secret Boss Romantic Comedy - JJ Knight Page 0,61

voice gets my attention. I duck my head back in the car. Jason has left his phone on his seat. I pick it up.

“We’re okay,” I say to the woman. “The police are here.” I end the call and shove Jason’s phone in my jeans pocket.

The police cars have raced down the alley, but a third one arrives at the far end.

The woman is trapped. Jason hangs out near the back door of the deli, well away from the woman or the cops. I press my hand to my heart, thankful he’s out of range of whatever might happen.

I head across the street. The police cars stop on either side of the woman. She drops to her knees.

One of the officers jumps out. “Hands up!” he orders the woman.

The woman lifts her arms in the air, and I let out a long breath.

They got her.

By the time we walk up, the woman is already handcuffed.

“Are you the one who called this in?” the officer asks. “Stay back.”

“We did,” Jason says.

“Who’s the owner?” The man’s face lights up red and blue from the lights.

“His name is Jace Pickle,” I say. “I’m the manager.” I avoid looking at the woman on the ground, surrounded by two other officers.

The man nods and jots something in a notebook.

“Will you take her in?” Jason asks. While he talks to the officer, I pull out my phone and find Jace’s number in my contacts. He needs to know what’s happened.

I initiate the call, and immediately, my pocket buzzes.

It’s Jason’s cell.

Jason turns to me right as I pull out his phone.

And there it is, right in front of me. My name on the caller ID.

On Jason’s phone.

Which is apparently Jace Pickle’s phone.

The ground falls away from my feet. I can’t find my bearings, and I stumble against the wall of the building. Everything falls into place. Why Jason knows everything. Why he’s here. Grammy. The bread. His condo.

“Nova? You okay?” Jason strides up, spotting the two phones. His face contorts. “Nova, let me explain.”

“Is it true? You’re Jace Pickle?”

He holds out his hands. “I needed to get answers.”

I fling his phone at him. It lands on the ground with a crunch. “He’s the owner,” I tell the officer. “He can handle this.”

I turn away.

“Nova!” he calls.

I don’t hear anything he says after that because as soon as I’m three steps away, I run.

29

Jace

I’m not sure what to do. The officer keeps asking me questions. I can’t go after Nova right now.

The woman sits on the ground, the colored lights flashing over the alley.

“So, does she work for you?” the officer asks.

“She’s not a current employee. But she’s either worked for me before, or she knows someone who did, because she had the keys and the combination to my safe.”

The officer stills his pen. “Are you saying she was able to just walk into your place of business?”

“Someone’s been stealing for months. We did an internal investigation to see if it was someone within the organization and determined it was not. We put an alarm on the back door to catch who was getting in. We also have camera footage.”

“So, is it your intent to press charges against this woman?”

“Absolutely,” I say. “We marked the bills in the safe tonight. They’re probably on her.”

Another officer takes a small knapsack from the woman. “Should I search this?”

“We’ll let them handle it down at the station,” the man says. “And what is your name again?”

“Jason Packwood,” I say. “I’m known as Jace Pickle to match the name of the chain.”

This will take some time to unravel. We’ll need legal documents proving who I am.

“Can you come down to the station?”

“Let me call my lawyer,” I say. “I guess I can meet you down there?”

He nods. We’ll take her and book her.”

He heads over to the officers surrounding the woman.

I pick up my phone from the ground. The screen is cracked. Figures. It still functions, thankfully, because I have to call Audra. I don’t know who our lawyer is, just that we have one.

I walk in through the back door of the deli. I’ll have to lock up here. I don’t know if Nova is going to come in tomorrow. If she’s going to quit. I may have to run the deli by myself for a while.

Frankly, I don’t know where to go from here.

I wake up late the next morning. I spent hours down at the police station and, normally, I wake up either with Nova or with a text

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