38. Ledger
Ledger
I’ve been on pins and needles all day, and had to force myself to do my job. Leave Will to do his. I have to trust him. There had to be a reason he missed the first check-in today. But my gut tells me it’s something worse.
We’re nearing the end of the day, and Luke isn’t here. Maybe that means he’s talking to Will.
“Ledger?” Daisy calls.
“Yeah?” I call from my desk.
“Noah called off. He’s got the stomach flu,” Daisy says.
I groan. There goes my plan trying to convince Shiloh to stay the night.
“Great, let me get some dinner, and I’ll be back. Can you see if Calder will stay on for an extra hour?” I ask her.
“Yeah, no problem.”
I head out to the diner to grab dinner and can only hope that Shiloh is there.
Maybe I can convince her to come back to the station with me.
My plan to remind her why she’s worth loving has turned into more of a ‘how do I keep her safe and somehow stay a friend to her’, when all I want to is do beg her to love me back.
Right before I leave, Luke comes rushing into my office. Hat in his hand and hair all over the place.
“Talk,” I command.
I knew this was a bad idea. I should never have agreed to this.
“He missed the second check-in,” Luke says. He collapses into the chair in front of my desk. “I think they have him. They must have called his bluff,” Luke says.
I nod and take a deep breath. “I’ll call Lawrence. We’re moving up the timeline. We’re going in tomorrow.”
Luke nods. The bags under his eyes must have gotten bigger.
“We have no reason to believe they killed him. We need to operate under two assumptions. He couldn’t make contact because it was too risky.
Or he’s now their hostage. That being said.
We can’t go in guns blazing. We need a new plan.
That includes you getting some sleep. I can’t have you so tired that you can’t see straight.
Go home, try to sleep, and be back here in a few hours. ”
“No, I’m okay. I’ll have a cup of coffee and I can start pulling things together,” Luke says.
“That wasn’t a suggestion. It was an order, Luke. Go home, get some sleep.”
“Yeah, okay,” he mumbles and trudges out of my office.
It’s going to be a long night.
When I get back to the station, Calder is waiting, and Sidney is already here for the night shift for dispatch.
I got a twenty-minute nap played, with Dozer for a bit, and we’re back ready to settle in for hopefully a quiet night because I have a sting that normally would take two more days to coordinate, to pull together in a night.
“Thanks, Calder, have a nice night.”
“No problem, boss,” he says and saunters out.
I head to my office and do a bit more paperwork before I start out on patrol.
“Hey Sid, do you mind watching Dozer?”
“Not at all. Sam should be here in a few hours. He can help me take him out.”
“Thank you, let me know so we can switch.”
“Will do.”
I head out for my cruiser and start the long night. Usually, we have two on patrol and one in the station, but we’ve been spread thin, which means night shift is even thinner. We have deputies on call if we need them, but hopefully we won’t.
While I’m patrolling, I get Lawrence on the phone and explain the situation. He agrees to be here tomorrow morning. All I can do is hope and pray Will is okay, and he can hang on for another eight hours.
I start on the side of town my house sits in, weaving in and out of streets.
I head out of town and then turn around and go back through.
It’s quiet, like it always used to be, but I can’t shake the weird feeling.
It could simply be because I’m exhausted and need more than twenty minutes of sleep.
I take a sip of coffee and head towards Shiloh’s place.
At the very least, I can stake it out and keep an eye on her. Maybe I am a stalker.
She’s an eyewitness to a dangerous family, and in many cases, that usually means the witness is in danger. But she seems to believe she’s fine, and I don’t know how to get her to understand otherwise. Or maybe it’s because she’s scared to admit it.
I drive past her place, and everything is quiet, there’s nothing going on.
Then Sidney radios for a possible disturbance at Mrs. Thompson’s place.
We get a call from her a minimum of once a week.
Ever since Mr. Thompson passed, she’s been jumpy with everything.
She is around 82 years old, so I can’t really blame her, and I don’t doubt that she heard something, but she has a terrible habit of feeding the wildlife, which we constantly remind her not to, but she does it anyway.
So, nine times out of ten, it’s an animal digging through the trash, a moose, or some dog that got off its leash.
Heading west towards the center of town, I get to Mrs. Thompson’s house and look around before I get out. I radio in letting them know I’m there, and get out.
Mrs. Thompson throws the door open and waits for me to come up her stoop. “Mrs. Thompson, what seems to be the problem?” I ask her.
Her arms are wrapped tightly around herself, and her hair is in curlers wrapped in one of those scarf things. “Sheriff, I heard something in the backyard and I swear to you, it wasn’t a dog this time. It sounded much bigger.”
“Alright, Mrs. Thompson, why don’t you go back inside? I’ll go check it out and then I’ll meet you back here. Okay?”
She nods. “Be careful.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Mrs. Thompson closes the door, and I go around the corner of the house to the back. Sure enough, I hear movement. There’s no telling what it is.
Coming around the back corner of the house, I’m ready to draw, and then I see the half-ton animal stand up on its hind legs. Backing against the house, I peek around the corner again, and the bear digs through Mrs. Thompson’s garden.
I sigh and quietly come back around to the front of the house.
I radio into the station through my walkie on my vest for them to send Tom out, again.
The bear will either do his own thing and saunter off, or we’ll have to tranq him and then call the guys over at US Fish and Wildlife, and I’m really not in the mood.
Sidney radios back that she called him.
I knock on the front door, and Mrs. Thompson lets me in, and I shut the door behind me.
“Mrs. Thompson, please don’t tell me you’ve still been putting food out for the … animals.”
She shrugs sheepishly. “It’s that time of the year. They’re hungry.”
I sigh, squeezing the bridge of my nose.
“You’re right, Mrs. T, they are hungry, but that doesn’t mean we feed them.
You’ve attracted another bear, and he’s a big one.
So I need you to stay in the house, and please stop feeding them.
You know they’re bulking up for hibernation this time of year. We don’t need to help them.”
“Oh dear,” she says, hand on her chest.
“Yeah, so I called Tom. He’ll be here soon. I hope the bear will go off on its own, otherwise we’ll have to call Fish and Wildlife.”
“I’m sorry, Ledger, I adore all the animals and…” she trails off.
“It’s alright, Mrs. T, but please stop. We can’t have one of these bears finding food and hurting a kid or a pet.”
“Oh dear, I never thought about that. I’m so sorry,” she says.
I hear a car pull in and glance out the front window. Tom just pulled in.
“I need to get back out on patrol. Tom is here and he’ll take care of things.”
“Thank you, Ledger,” she says.
“No problem.” I tip my hat to her and leave.
On my way out, I wave to Tom.
“I’ll get rid of him … again,” Tom says.
“Thanks, Tom, and maybe remind her why feeding our wildlife doesn’t help them either.”
He groans. “No problem.”