Chapter 7
Seven
Cole
"I swear to fuckin' god, Charlie," I snap, exasperated beyond even my ability to mask. "Sit the fuck down and shut the fuck up before I throw your mean old ass in jail."
Charlie's bone-white caterpillar eyebrows shoot up. "Ooooh, lookie-here. Somebody done found his dick." When I reach for my cuffs, he holds up his hands and backs away from me. "Alright, alright. I'm kiddin', Baby Mannix."
He's called me that since I was a green deputy, and it still bothers me, although I'm careful not to show it, most of the time.
Today, my emotions are too on edge. I get in Charlie's face and let him see the full force of my anger.
"Charlie Hollis, do not fucking test me, old man.
Not today. Unless you—" and here, I turn my glare onto Bea as well, “and I mean both of you, quit the infernal goddamn ruckus, I will put your asses in jail and make up charges to keep you there.
Do you understand? The next time I get a call out to this address because the two of you are kickin' the shit out of each other, you will be arrested. Do not test me on this. Are we clear?"
They both nod, wide-eyed and shocked. "Crystal, Sheriff," Bea says, suddenly sweet as sugar. "We'll be perfect little lambs."
"See to it," I bark. "Trust me when I tell you that you do not want to see me again."
I push past Deputy Mosely, who's as wide-eyed as the Hollises. "Let's go, Mosely."
Mosely wipes his nose on his sleeve, and I have to literally bite the inside of my cheek to stop myself from yelling at him for it. "Yessir."
Mosely is a brand new deputy, just barely twenty-one.
He's trying to grow a goatee, and it's scraggly and stupid, and makes him look younger than he is, but I bite that back, too.
He's a good kid who listens and watches more than he speaks, which is an excellent quality.
He was just gearing up for his shift when I blew through the station to grab keys for my cruiser, so I hauled him along with me for backup—Hollis has been known to take a swing at deputies before, if he's cranked enough.
Fortunately, the blow-up this morning was just a run-of-the-mill argument and not a drunk fistfight. Those two are just fucking impossible.
Mosely makes for the passenger seat. "Mosely," I call. "Take the wheel."
"But I don't know where I'm going, sir," he says; Mosely is a transplant from St. Ignace.
"No shit. How else do you think you're gonna learn?" I slide into the passenger seat, leaving him no choice but to get into the driver's seat.
I guide him up through town, weaving through quiet, sleepy neighborhoods, skirting downtown to cruise the busier roads east of town where the mall and industrial areas are.
I let him stop a teenage driver for going twenty-five over the limit, but I made him write it for the next tier down since it was the kid’s only offense, and he was crying.
We give a woman a warning about turning on red at an intersection where it’s prohibited—because it’s an intersection where people used to get hit at least once a week due to the limited visibility of oncoming traffic.
Finally, I point out Big Joe's, a coffeeshop and bakery on Division a couple blocks east of the station; it's a frequent stop for deputies, for the obvious reasons, but also because you can sit in the lot facing the road and sip your coffee and wait for someone to blast down Division going seventy; Division Boulevard has four lanes going in each direction, and with a fifty-five miles per hour speed limit, people tend to treat it like a freeway.
But really, it's for the excellent coffee Big Joe makes, not to mention his handcrafted donuts, Danishes, croissants, pain au chocolates, and other bad-for-you-but-delicious treats.
I grab us a couple coffees and one of Big Joe's "deputy specials", which is a box of day-olds from the previous day; you never know what's in the box, which is part of the fun. He gives it to us for free because I insist that my deputies pay for the coffee.
We sit and sip and munch, and eventually Mosely gets the courage to talk to me.
"So, uh…I hear you're a second-generation sheriff, huh?" Mosely is short and barrel-chested, of Asian descent, and has the jacked build of an experienced lifter.
"Yep," I answer. "My father was the sheriff when I was a kid, until he died when I was in the academy."
"Sorry to hear he died," Mosely says. "Can I ask what happened?"
I sigh, wishing I'd left off that part. "Car accident."
"Sucks."
"Yes, it does."
"My dad was murdered when I was twelve," he says, as casually as if reciting Lion's stats.
"No shit? I'm sorry to hear it. They catch who did it?"
He shakes his head. "It's why I'm a cop.
They didn't even really fuckin' look. He owned a dry-cleaning business.
He…" Mosely shakes his head again. "Couple of kids broke in after close, thinking it'd be empty, probably.
Took the cash from the drawer. Dad surprised them, and they shot him.
There were witnesses and there was footage, but the fuckin' local yokel assholes just…
didn't care. He was just another nobody.
" He pulls at the epicanthic folds of his eyes, accentuating their narrowness.
"Just some dead Chinese dude.” He drops his hands with a disgusted scoff. “Who gives a fuck, right?”
I frown. "That's bullshit, Mosely. I'm sorry.
I hope you know that shit will not happen around here.
I hired you for a reason, you know." Before he can answer, I finish for him.
"It's not about diversity for the sake of it, but so everyone in my community feels represented.
You hear about shit like that, you tell me. Got it?"
He nods. "Got it, sir. And I will, trust." He sighs.
"I was angry for a long, long time. But then my gym teacher, of all people, pulled me aside one day and said I could waste my life and my energy being angry about it, or I could do something to change things, even a little bit, for the better.
So I got my degree in criminal justice and applied all over the state. "
"Why here?" I ask. "Why Three Rivers?"
"Funny how you didn't ask me that in the interviews," he says, grinning.
"To be honest, sir, I liked you. You seem…
genuine. And, um…I talked to some of the other guys and they said you go on patrol and you take calls.
You don't just do the desk shit. You actually care about the community.
" He sips coffee. "I wanted that—the community aspect.
I'm not in it for the action, or I'd have taken a job in Detroit or Lansing or something.
I want to be a cop to make a difference in people's lives. Make them feel safe."
"And do the job right, unlike those racist assholes wherever that was."
"St. Louis. After he was killed, Mom got a job up in St. Ignace."
"From one saint to another, eh?"
Mosely snickers. "Never thought of that. That is funny."
I let out a breath. "Look, I'm not usually that pissy," I say.
"That call, back there, I mean. The Hollises.
We get calls about those two fighting literally once a week.
And to be honest, I've got some personal shit weighing on me today, and I…
" I groan. "I didn't respond well. Charlie is an asshole, flat-out.
He hated my father, and he hates me. The sheriff before me, Beasley, was a sexist fuck who turned a blind eye to most domestic abuse because he was that kind of asshole himself.
But Dad didn't let it fly, and neither do I, so he hates us. "
Mosely frowns. "I thought your dad was the sheriff before you?"
"Nope. He died when I was in the academy. Beasley was next in line, and he got the job. I worked under him for eight years before I took the star away from him."
I see Mosely's expression shift as questions percolate. "If Beasley was an asshole and next in line, I'd be asking questions about your dad's death. Maybe I'm outta line, but—"
"Oh no, you're not." I try to bite my tongue, but I can't. "Fact of the matter is, my father's death has always been suspicious to me. I just don't have a single lick of proof."
"You have a theory?"
I nod. "Oh yeah. But theories without proof are about as much use as a screen door on a submarine."
"You know, sir," Mosely says slowly and thoughtfully, after a moment, "when I was studying criminal justice at MSU, one of my profs told me I should be a detective.
I have great investigative instincts, she said.
If you want, I can take a look at things.
Sometimes a fresh pair of eyes can see stuff you may be overlooking just through too much familiarity. "
I hesitate. "Beasley is old and retired and lives in a retirement home now, but he still has a lot of friends you don't want to piss off.
So, I'll let you look at what I've got, but you can't go asking questions of every Tom, Dick, and Harry in town.
Not without me, at least." I look at Mosely.
"I wouldn't hate the fresh eyes, if I'm honest. I've been beating my head against the wall about it for years.
I have asked around, but…well, few people even know there's any question about the circumstances of his death, and I can't risk tipping Beasley off.
The man is a nasty piece of work, even at eighty. "
Mosely nods thoughtfully. "I understand that.
Similar situation back in St. Louis with the cops who refused to investigate Dad's death.
Before I took this job, I actually went back there and did some digging.
Turns out the cops assigned to Dad's murder had a rep for pulling that shit.
They were known to take bribes, and there was evidence that they were involved in even shadier shit than simple grift. "
"You're here, though, not there," I point out.