Читать книгу Falling For The Deputy - Amy Frazier - Страница 8

THE TOP OF HIS HEAD was about to blow.

His mother had just called him—for the third time this morning—to ask if the reporter from the Western Carolina Sun had arrived in Applegate yet.

No.

Thank God.

Undeterred by his increasingly testy responses, Lily had insisted Mack bring the man or woman to supper at the farmhouse one night this week. For a nice down-home mix of business and pleasure, she’d said. That wasn’t going to happen. People, his mother chief among them, thought because Mack had joined AA and was back on the force, he was ready to rejoin the human race.

He wasn’t.

He still struggled to stay sober. Doing his job helped. Period.

To that end, Mack pulled his sheriff’s department cruiser to the side of the road behind a battered Yugo. He cast a glance over the wreck of a car. Primer paint in several hues covered all but one fender. The driver’s-side taillight was broken. Bumper stickers, some faded beyond legibility, littered the car’s sorry backside. Two caught his attention. The facts will set you free and Pray for peace; work for justice. Call him cynical, but it wasn’t that easy.

At first he’d thought the car was abandoned. It wasn’t unusual in the mountains, valleys and hollows of Colum County, North Carolina, to find stolen cars stripped and ditched by the side of an out-of-the-way road. But this Yugo—Mack doubted it would have appealed to a thief even in its heyday—had a current registration sticker on the plate. From his cruiser, he began a computer check.

As the door of the Yugo opened and the driver got out, Mack stopped mid-routine. Despite the glare of the midday sun, he instinctively ran a visual of the slender woman, who shaded her eyes with one hand. In the other she clutched a crumpled road map. She wore a button-up sweater that looked as if it had shrunk during washing, a faded ankle-length dress that had “church rummage sale” written all over it and black lace-up boots, the kind his great-granny used to wear. When she finally took her hand from her eyes, Mack saw she was young. And pretty.

He stepped out of the cruiser and approached her. “Can I help you?”

She smiled, and her fresh face framed by tousled strawberry-blond hair, made him think she’d never been disappointed in her entire life. “Is this the road to Applegate?”

“One of them.” He gave her car’s interior a cursory inspection. Books, notebooks and loose papers filled the back seat. She was probably a student at the college over in Brevard, although she looked too young to be even a freshman.

“One of them? Is that local humor?” Cocking her head to the side, she gazed directly at him. Mack blinked and discovered the proverbial shoe on the other foot. Usually he was the one who made other people uncomfortable because of his size and uniform.

But his presence didn’t faze this young woman in the least. She stood almost toe-to-toe with him, so close he could see a dusting of freckles across her nose, and waited patiently, with an air of innocence he found disconcerting.

He scowled. “Humor? No. I’m told I don’t have an ounce left in me.” To prove the point, he added, “Do you know your car has a broken taillight?”

“You should see the other guy.” She grinned wickedly, revealing perfect teeth. “Humor,” she explained.

“It’s not a laughing matter. I could write you up—”

“Oh, please, don’t,” she said as she might say no, thank you to a second helping of cake. “When I get to Applegate, I’ll get it fixed.”

Kids. Not a care in the world. Making it on looks and youth alone. Mack felt a jolt of envy. After what he’d seen and done half a world away, carefree would never be a mood ascribed to him again.

He ran his fingers over the broken plastic of the Yugo’s taillight. “See that you get this fixed. Take it to Mel’s on Main Street.” He turned to go. “And afterward, come to the sheriff’s office with the receipt. To show me you kept your word.”

“Yes, sir. If nothing else, I’m a woman of my word.”

Was he mistaken or was there a hint of sass under the show of respect? He looked back at her. Her gray eyes revealed nothing but a clear, ingenuous light. A kid. That was what she was. A wet-behind-the-ears kid cut loose from her mama’s apron strings.

“And I should ask for whom?” She squinted at his name tag, sounding suspiciously defiant.

“Deputy Sheriff Whittaker.” Without wasting any more time, he walked back to his patrol car.

“Deputy Whittaker?” Her voice, clear, high and musical, sailed through the air like birdsong on the spring breeze.

Reluctantly he turned to look at her again. “Yes?”

“You said this was one of the roads to Applegate, but am I headed in the right direction?”

Had he ever, even as a boy, exuded such a wide-eyed innocence?

“You’re…you’re headed in the right direction.” He took a step backward and bumped into his car’s grille. When she winced, he added hastily, “You can’t miss Mel’s repair shop. Right next to the county courthouse.”

She fluttered her fingers next to her head, a half-wave, half-salute that made him think she might be mocking him.

Settling behind the wheel of the cruiser, he waited for her to be on her way. That was his excuse. Actually he’d have liked to sit on the side of the road indefinitely. Do nothing more than watch the wrens gather materials for their nests. But in an hour he had an appointment back at headquarters with that reporter from the Sun.

Another reason for the headache that originated at the base of his skull and pounded a path to his temples.

In a PR move to show the county residents how far the newly rehabilitated department had come, Sheriff Garrett McQuire had requested the newspaper interview. Mack saw the need. His boss and longtime buddy had worked ceaselessly, cleaning up the mess the former sheriff Easley and his cronies had left behind. What Mack hadn’t foreseen was that Garrett would take off on his honeymoon and leave Mack with the reporter. He suspected the sheriff saw the handover of responsibilities as part of his deputy’s personal rehabilitation. If Mack didn’t owe Garrett so much—both as a boss and as a buddy, he would’ve rescheduled.

Instead, he put the patrol car in gear and headed back to town. If he was going through with this, he needed to be the first on-site for the appointment. He didn’t need a member of the press waiting, unsupervised.

THE YUGO BUCKED IN complaint as Chloe drove in second gear down Applegate’s Main Street. Squinting against the sunlight, she searched for Mel’s repair shop. Ah, there was the domed courthouse and, in its shadow, a two-bay cinder block garage with kudzu creeping up one side. She parked in front, then pulled on the stubborn emergency brake. Reaching into the back seat, she grabbed a pad of paper to jot down a few notes and capture her first impression of Deputy Whittaker.

Thirty-something, he was handsome—the uniform automatically did that for a guy. Strong jaw. A nose that could have been considered classically Roman if the deputy hadn’t broken it. An old sports injury? From the barred and bolted look in Whittaker’s dark brown eyes, Chloe had an instinctive feeling he’d reveal nothing he didn’t want known. Either about his job or himself. If she had anything to do with him this week, he might prove problematic. A difficult lock resisting the pick.

The Colum County Sheriff’s Department. Now there lay a potentially rewarding project. Her first feature story. Her first byline. A tiny shiver ran through her as she anticipated the opportunity. Hastily she wrote, “Deputy Whittaker. Humorless. Stickler for details,” before tossing the notepad onto the passenger seat.

She wrestled with the door of the Yugo. “Honestly, you are one more act of resistance away from the scrap heap,” she warned the mutinous vehicle when she managed to break free. She kicked the door shut behind her.

At the garage’s first bay, she gingerly stepped around a pick up to approach the bottom half of a coverall-clad mechanic leaning well under the truck’s raised hood.

“Mr. Mel?” she inquired with well-practiced Southern deference. “Deputy Whittaker sent me.”

“Mr. Mel! Now that’s a hoot!” The top half of the technician popped into view.

Chloe immediately recognized her error.

The person in the coveralls would never be mistaken for a man. She had wild red hair caught up in a bandanna, a movie-star smile and classically feminine features, not to mention a voluptuous body. But the woman’s voice belonged to the racetrack pit or smoke-filled juke joints. Chloe didn’t even hazard a guess at her age.

The mechanic stuck her greasy hands on her hips. “So the deputy sent you over to see Mr. Mel. Maybe his sense of humor’s finally coming back.”

“It was my mistake. He said to pull into Mel’s auto repair. I jumped to conclusions. Sorry. That’s not my style.”

“Well, I’m Mel. Short for Melody. My mama was hoping for a girlie-girl.” She rolled her big blue eyes. “But grease monkeys defy gender, honey. Come on in the office. I’m due a break.” She wiped her hands on a rag.

Chloe followed the woman into a cramped room no bigger than a utility closet.

“Coffee?” Mel raised a half-full pot from the automatic coffeemaker perched on a packing crate. “Nectar of the goddess.”

“Please.”

“You’re new in town.” The woman handed Chloe a mug of sludge-black liquid.

“I’m a newspaper reporter for the Western Carolina Sun,” she replied, taking a sip of the bitter brew and noting the three-year-old SPCA calendar hanging on the wall.

“A reporter?” Mel paused, coffeepot in midair. The energy in the room shifted from positive to unnervingly negative.

“Sheriff McQuire suggested we do an article on his revamped department,” Chloe explained, trying to establish credibility. “I have my first interview with him in a few minutes.”

“That’ll be difficult, seeing as he’s on his honeymoon.” Mel’s chuckle swelled to a roar. She slapped her thigh, spilling coffee on the cracked linoleum floor. “I bet he did that deliberately.”

Chloe clenched her mug in both hands, hoping the heat would defuse her rising irritation. “And the reason would be?”

“Even though, as sheriff, Garrett would recognize the need for positive PR, personally, he and journalists aren’t on the best of terms after they hounded his wife.” Mel thumped the pot back on the coffeemaker’s heating ring. “Made the whole town miserable. You’d have to be living under a rock not to know about it.”

Okay. The runaway heiress. But…“I wasn’t part of that feeding frenzy.” No, she’d been stuck on the garden-club beat.

Mel raised one eyebrow.

“So—” in the face of this woman’s disbelief, Chloe forged ahead “—who’s left to handle my interview?”

“While Garrett’s gone, Mack’s in charge.”

“Mack?”

“Deputy Whittaker.”

Interesting. The lock in need of a pick.

“The guy who sent you here for…what?” Mel prodded.

“Yes. My car’s broken taillight. The deputy ran into me outside town. Didn’t cite me on condition I see you.”

“I gotta say this new department’s been good for my business.”

“Do you have an arrangement?” Chloe blurted out. She fumbled in her pocket for her notepad, then realized she’d left it in the Yugo. She’d heard of small towns adding to their coffers with overzealous ticketing or costly kick-back repairs that targeted motorists passing through.

Mel dropped a rag on the spilled coffee. As she bent over to wipe it up, she uttered a terse no. When she stood again, the sparkle had gone from her eyes. “I merely meant this particular crew adheres strictly to the law.”

“So what’s Deputy Whittaker like?” Chloe asked, struggling to reconnect.

Mel tossed the coffee-soaked rag into a bin by the door. “Let’s look at that taillight,” she said, all business now.

If this was the level of Applegate respect, cooperation and disclosure that Chloe could expect, she had her work cut out for her.

MACK LEFT THE DOOR to the sheriff’s office open. A symbolic gesture. Let the reporter see the department had nothing whatsoever to hide.

He placed his Stetson on a rack behind the door, then sat on the edge of the desk, feeling edgy himself. His headache had subsided to a dull throb. He relished the law-and-order part of his job, not the public relations. He examined his watch. Twice.

Garrett and he had talked about how they wanted the new Colum County Sheriff’s Department’s story told. To that end, they’d hoped to get a reporter without an agenda, who’d write an unbiased story that would accurately portray both the danger and the drudgery of rural law enforcement. They’d agreed the article shouldn’t be about individuals, but about the team.

Thinking about the fishbowl position he was now in, Mack’s muscles went rigid. The pencil he gripped snapped in two.

“Surely, the prospect of meeting with me can’t generate that much tension.”

He jerked his head up to see the young woman who drove the battered Yugo, standing in the office doorway, carrying an enormous backpack. He chucked the ruined pencil in the trash, then stood. “Did you get your car fixed?”

“Mel says I can pick it up this afternoon before she closes.”

“Is that going to throw your schedule off?” He didn’t really want to know. He was trying to be…human. Approachable. Practicing for that reporter. “Work? School?”

“No.” The kid stepped into the room. “I was planning to stay the week, anyway. At June Parker’s bed and breakfast. While I take care of my assignment.”

“Let me guess. Appalachian folkways.” The professors at Brevard College often sent their students to do field work in Colum County.

“No. I’ve come to see you. Well, Sheriff McQuire, but I understand you’re the one in charge at the moment.”

“I am. What can I do for you?”

She extended her hand. “I’m Chloe Atherton. Reporter for the Western Carolina Sun. I have an appointment.”

He inhaled sharply. My head. Ignoring her outstretched hand, Mack walked around the desk and glared at the sheriff’s calendar. He deliberately placed the tips of his fingers on Garrett’s illegible handwriting next to today’s date. Gave himself a couple of seconds to absorb it.

This kid was the reporter?

“You could have told me who you were back by the roadside,” he said at last, looking up.

“You could have told me Mel was a woman.” She plunked her battered backpack on the floor, then perched on the chair opposite his desk. “Can we begin?” Without waiting for his reply, she pulled various items from the backpack.

He remained standing, the desk solidly between them. “Ms. Atherton, how long have you been a newspaper reporter?”

“I think I’m the one doing the interviewing.” There was a defiant tilt to her chin. “But if it will make you feel more comfortable…no, I’m not thirteen years old.”

He’d been thinking more like seventeen.

“I’m twenty-six,” she offered, lining up a notebook, a pencil, a small tape recorder and what appeared to be an expensive Nikon camera on the metal desk. As if the space were hers to do with as she pleased. “How old are you?”

He frowned. “Do you need to know?”

“My newspaper still requires ages.”

“Thirty-five,” he said, suddenly feeling ten years older. “But this article isn’t supposed to be about me.”

“Maybe not, but you’re my first interview.”

Damn. Although she looked like a teenager, she handled herself with the equanimity of a pro.

“I can give you an hour today,” he allowed. “We can use the time to work up a schedule for the rest of the week.”

“Only an hour? I’d hoped—”

He raised his hand to cut her off. “Can that car of yours withstand a week’s worth of cruising these roads?”

“I intend to ride with you.”

He rubbed his forehead as the headache came roaring out of retirement. “I don’t think so.”

“Deputy Whittaker, this article was Sheriff McQuire’s idea. He contacted my paper. He suggested a human-interest story on a week in the life of a sheriff’s department. I wouldn’t get much of an idea of what the job entailed if I were to follow several car lengths behind you, would I?”

“I doubt Garrett—Sheriff McQuire—had a ride-along in mind. Liability issues—”

She flipped through her notebook. “I’ve done my homework. Ah, here it is. Sheriff McQuire encourages public-safety interns from the college. They ride in the cruisers. I’ll ride in the cruiser.”

“He didn’t tell me—”

“Call him.”

“He’s on his honeymoon.”

Victorious, she dropped the notebook in her lap, crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair. “Then it’s settled. You’ll have to take my word for it. I’ve already kept my word once by having that taillight fixed.”

She wasn’t riding with him. He wouldn’t argue now, but he’d sure as tomorrow think of some excuse not to have this reporter dogging his every move. Hell, he’d only recently begun talking to his fellow deputies. Had Garrett really planned this? Could Mack get someone in the county health department to sanction the sheriff for practicing psychology without a license?

“Now…” She was scribbling something on her notepad. “One way we might approach the article is from the perspective of the evolution of a rural office. I noticed a huge vacation community—Ryder’s Ridge?—as I was entering town. And another new year-round subdivision closer to town. Surely progress, if you want to call it that, has changed the complexion of the county. Changed your job.”

Putting aside for a moment the problem of her riding with him, he stared hard at her. It had taken her only a few minutes to get to the root of the department’s problems. Sheriff Easley hadn’t been able or willing to move into the twenty-first century. Of course, the problem was more complicated than what she’d picked up on, but she’d come very close to the mark. Not too shabby for a green reporter.

“Deputy Whittaker? How’s my assessment?”

“Rapid growth is a major issue,” he grudgingly replied.

She wrote something down. “I have an idea about the who, the what, the where and the when. Now all I need is the why.” She licked the tip of her pencil. “Why did Sheriff McQuire call in the media? Is this an election year? Does he need to look good in the polls?”

Mack didn’t like questions that began innocuously but packed a hidden sting. “Sheriff McQuire wants you to write about the department. Not about him. Not about me. Not about any of the other deputies. Not as individuals, but as a team. Doing what we’re supposed to do. Our job is to protect and serve.”

He came around the desk, then leaned forward until his face was within inches of hers. “Now, let me ask you a few questions. Do you have something to prove? Is this assignment a stepping-stone to bigger and better assignments? Would your boss be happier with solid reporting or with some trumped-up exposé?”

Chloe reacted to his deliberate intimidation by inhaling sharply and sitting back in her seat until her spine pressed against the hard molded plastic. What had lit a fire under Deputy Whittaker? Did he interact with all reporters this way, or did he have a problem with female reporters specifically? She made a mental note to find out the number of women in the department and how they were treated.

“Let me rephrase the question,” she replied. She’d get to any prejudices he might have later. When she caught him in an unguarded moment. “Why would the sheriff want an outsider poking about the department? Why not issue a press release? In any event, why do you think your day-to-day operations would be of interest to the general public?”

“Why would the public be interested in how we run the department?” he asked, his expression growing darker. “Did you skip your junior-high classes on local government?”

“No. I happen to have loved—”

“Let me spell it out for you.” The muscles in his jaw twitched as he leaned back against the desk. “The history of this office—this public-safety office—goes back to England and the days of Robin Hood. The sheriff’s an elected official, the highest law-enforcement official in the county. Entrusted with keeping the peace.”

“The point being?” It was her turn to bridle. She’d never liked lectures. And she didn’t like overbearing men.

“The point…” He tapped her notepad with his index finger. “If the electorate has the sense they were born with, they better damn well want to know how we’re carrying out our duties.” As his voice rose, he accidentally knocked a stack of file folders off a tall cabinet onto the floor. He ignored the mess.

Heavens. If this was the deputy in charge, what was the sheriff like? Chloe refused to be daunted. If the truth be told, his civic ardor excited her. Electrified the room. What good was a career if you weren’t passionate about it?

She crossed her legs, sat up straight and met the deputy’s fierce expression. His eyes weren’t merely dark brown, they were hickory-nut-brown, she noticed. And hard. “Then we’d better back up. The sheriff said y’all had turned the office around. What was the problem?”

He remained immobile for several moments, staring at her. The information had to be public record. Narrowing his eyes, he appeared to come to a decision.

“Five years ago,” he began with great deliberation, “Zach Taylor sold four hundred acres of prime land to a real-estate developer who, in turn, built two complexes—year-round executive homes and expensive vacation homes. Those complexes attracted hundreds of families to Applegate. The population of Colum County soared.”

“Bringing new problems to your department.”

“It wasn’t our—Sheriff McQuire’s—department at the time.”

“But there were problems.”

“Yes. But I think Sheriff McQuire intended that you concentrate on the present, not the past.”

That wasn’t how the media worked, but she knew to choose her battles. “How have things changed?” She tuned into his body language as she waited.

He began to pace the cramped quarters, stepping over the spilled folders. “For one thing, we now run things strictly by the book.”

Chloe took down his words without comment. There would be time enough to determine if the new sheriff ran an honest department. Believe only what you see, what you can prove, her mother, a scientist, always said.

She raised her head. “And for another?”

“For another, we’ve brought the department into the computer age.”

Suppressing an urge to yawn, she bet her next paycheck her readers couldn’t care less about the sheriff’s computers. But the personnel might be a different issue. Take this particular deputy, for instance. Confrontational. Ardent. Protective. But what, exactly, was he protecting? She’d find out soon enough.

“What about the sheriff’s staff?” she asked.

“What about us?”

“What makes you different from the last batch?”

He flinched. “We’re handpicked—”

“Not elected like the sheriff?”

“No, but—”

“Mack!” Another deputy stuck her head through the office doorway. “You’re wanted at the high school. Stat.”

As Deputy Whittaker reached for his Stetson, Chloe stuffed her pencil, notebook and camera in her backpack, then activated her pocket tape recorder. When the two deputies left, Chloe trotted along right behind, observing every move, picking up every word.

“What’s the story?” Whittaker asked.

“Rival groups again,” the second deputy answered. Her name tag read Breckinridge. “Same old beef. This time someone pulled a knife.”

“Do we have anyone out there?”

“McMillan and Sooner answered the call. The kids are being held in the school cafeteria until you and the parents get there. Most of them are from The Program. That’s why Principal Cox called for you.”

Chloe didn’t understand everything they were saying. She hoped the recorder was picking it up, allowing her to get clarification later. This was the kind of eye-witness involvement she’d anticipated, the kind that would lead to a compelling story. Her pulse raced.

Deputy Breckinridge halted at the big double doors leading to the parking lot, but Chloe slipped outside behind Whittaker. He didn’t acknowledge her presence.

When he got to his cruiser, she automatically went to the passenger door.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he barked across the roof.

“I’m working my story.”

“Today’s interview is finished.” Abruptly he got into the driver’s side and slammed the door. She opened the passenger door and climbed in, slamming her door for good measure.

“Get out.” By his tone of voice, he meant business.

So did she. “Drive.”

He glared at her.

“While you’re driving,” she added, “you can explain the history of this altercation.”

Muttering under his breath, he turned the key in the ignition. As he pulled the patrol car out of the parking lot, she could feel the anger radiating off him.

“I’m not going to waste time arguing with you.” The veins corded and pulsed along his temple. “When we get back, though, I’m calling the Sun to request your replacement.”

He wouldn’t dare. But in case he did, she hunkered down in her seat and prepared to defend her right to be there.