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Chapter One
“No, hey, Edgar, youcan’t park there,” I called to Edgar Murphy, an old dairy farmer who’s been retired from farming for well over twenty years now, as he pulled up in front of the Rockmount High School in his rattletrap Ford pickup. “This is a no parking zone and look down here!” I pointed at the fire hydrant I stood next to.
“What?” Edgar shouted, parked, and slowly extricated himself from his truck. “I come for the town meeting Mayor Milquetoast announced in the paper.” I snickered under my breath. Everyone called our mayor that even though they knew full well his name was Bradley Milkhouse. “When did that fire hydrant get put there?”
“Oh, about 1940 I’d guess,” I replied, reaching up to push my hat back on my head, glad for the gentle fall breeze. This year, November in the hills of Pennsylvania had arrived on a warm rustle of falling leaves. I feared it would go out on the back of a wintry gust, as it so often did. Edgar shuffled up to me, his “Eat Corn” ball cap frayed along the brim. “Edgar, you can’t park here. Also, while we’re talking real nicely, I think I explained to you that you cannot drive your farm truck around.”
“Why not? She’s a good runner. I bought her when Doris had our last boy, Timmy. Nope, that’s not right. Timmy sold that to me after his first boy was born. Yep, that’s right. Angus, his name is, married that Stottlemeyer gal from over in the holler.”
I nodded along as he relayed the history of his grandchild’s marriage. The parking lot was filling up rapidly. It seemed most folks were eager to hear what this big and exciting news was that our mayor had crowed about in the weekly Rockmount Gazette. A rather large part of being in law enforcement in an incredibly small town was being patient. “...then she had a baby girl. Named that poor child some damned foolish name from some dragon show. No one can pronounce that baby’s name. Well, guess she ain’t exactly a baby no more.”
“Edgar, as much as I’d love to stand here and chat, you need to move your truck in case of a fire. Also, when you drive home, make this the last trip you take that truck off the farm. It hasn’t been inspected since Clinton was in office.” I pointed at the sun-bleached PA inspection sticker clinging, miraculously, to the interior lower left of the windshield.
“That’s a dumb rule. I bet the current president come up with that law. Nothing wrong with that truck, Stillman.”
“I’m sure she’s a good truck but she’s not safe.” I shifted from one foot to the other, my sight touching on the families circling up the drive to enter the high school. My deputy was at the front door talking to the sister of a girl he was dating. “I don’t want to have to ticket you.”
“Fine, I’ll leave her home next time but it’s too far for me to walk what with my gout,” he informed me.
“Okay, you give Teddy your keys at the door and tell him Sheriff King wants him to move your truck around the back. Watch that curb.” I took his thin arm to aid him up to the sidewalk.
“You’re a good man, Stillman, even if you are light in the loafers.”
Off he toddled. I ran a hand over my beard, wondering, not for the first time, if the old folks in this county sat around making up terms for gays. I’d heard them all during my twenty years here, more frequently during my last ten or so, after I had come out. There had been some upset when the voters heard I was gay, but after the initial shock, they’d come to realize that even though I dated men, I was one hell of a law enforcement officer.
A few people had rebelled strongly, but over the years—and my winning every election overwhelmingly—the haters had stopped being so vocal. They were still around, but they’d shut their mouths. For the most part. Most were not willing to go toe-to-toe with me over my sexuality. Some people said that I was intimidating. Good. My chunky frame and height had served me well over the years with those who wanted to push the pansy sheriff. Trust me, most didn’t push too hard or too far. The only thing that pushed me steadily was Paul Whittle’s damn bull. That bastard and I had a long history, one that usually ended up with me hauling my beefy ass over a fence at breakneck speed while Milford visited all his neighbors up and down Whittle Fork Road. It had been a month. The son-of-a-bitch was due to break out and wreak havoc on people’s yards any day now.
I kept an eye on Edgar until he reached the front doors. Teddy spoke with him and then glanced at me. I nodded. My deputy smiled at the old gent and then jogged away from the sprawling stone-and-mortar building that housed grades seven through twelve toward me.
“Hey, so now we’re valet parking?” he asked, waving at the Armstrongs, who were creeping by with their four kids in the back of their burgundy minivan. Town meetings were big occurrences in Rockmount, especially when the city council was being so secretive.
“You’ll learn that being a small-town cop means doing all kinds of things they didn’t teach you at the police academy. I’ve had to help a cow give birth on more than one occasion,” I tossed out, enjoying seeing his bright blue eyes widen. “Valet parking is a breeze compared to being shoulder deep in a Hereford.”
“Yeah, that’s a hard no from me,” he countered and jogged around the old truck, taking a moment to point at the expired inspection sticker.
“I’m aware. Just pull it around back.” I could give old Jasper a citation, but why would I do that? He was an old, old man who thought he was getting something over on the sheriff. Maybe it made him recall his youth. Rumor was that the Murphy boys were quite the firecrackers way back when. He was the only one left out of the five wild Murphys, so as long as the truck wasn’t too much of a hazard, I could turn a blind eye. There were more important hills to die on, at least for me. My deputy, fresh out of my alma mater, had yet to learn to chill the hell out. Not every infraction required the hammer of the law to fall down on a person. He’d learn. Life and policing ran at a slower pace in a rural community.
I waved a few cars past the front of the high school, then when it was closer to time for the town hall, I moseyed inside, stopping to chat with Camryn Daniels, who owned the sporting goods store in town. He and I had hit it right off when I’d first arrived. He had been a wrestler in college, just as I had been through high school and also for Drexel when I was there studying criminal justice. Go Dragons!
“Any clue what this big news is?” Camryn asked as we made our way to the auditorium.
“Nope, but knowing Bradley, it’s something that’s going to be a major pain in my ass,” I replied, which got a knowing nod from Camryn.
The last time Bradley had summoned the town to an unscheduled meeting, it had been to announce that he’d invited a traveling circus to perform at the fairgrounds. A circus. With elephants. Of course, this was about fifteen years ago when people weren’t as attuned to the plight of captive elephants. All was well until someone forgot to tether the elephant and it went for a stroll down Main Street, blithely knocking down streetlamps and crushing our cute little redwood planters. Yep, that was a hoot. Then there was the time when he thought having a wild animal park would be a major boon to tourism. Which, sure, probably, but if he thought trying to corral a placid, old elephant was bad, just wait until the mountain lion they wanted as part of the park’s attractions broke loose. Or the buffalo. Or the baboons. I’d fought that one hard, and finally, clarity had won the day. Fucking baboons. I could just imagine the bedlam of a herd of fucking baboons in the movie theater.
“Bradley is a moron,” Camryn whispered before taking a seat next to his wife, Peggy. Couldn’t argue with that. How he was voted in time and again was one of those unsolved mysteries. He did have charm. I would give him that. Perhaps that was why the good people of Rockmount liked having him in charge.
I smiled at Peggy and made my way to the stage. I wasn’t on the council as it would be a conflict of interest, obviously, but I did like to hang out in case things got heated. And sometimes the voters got pretty hot under the collar at these things. Especially since raising taxes was on the docket and seeing how the mayor had been catty about the news he was sharing...it was just better to hang out and be seen looking growly. Taking a spot at the corner of the stage, I sat down with a sigh of relief. It had been a long day and my feet were tired of carrying around my two hundred twenty pounds. I shrugged out of my winter coat, draped it over the back of my folding chair, and then crossed my arms over my tan uniform shirt. My badge glinted in the bright lights shining down on us. Bradley liked the spotlight. I could do without it personally.
Several members of the council were already seated, our mayor waiting backstage to make an entrance. He did that. All the time. Politicians. Go figure.
When the auditorium was full, Bradley made his entrance. He was a tall man, pleasant enough to look at with his blond hair and blue eyes. I preferred my men darker, but I wasn’t dating the mayor. He was too ambitious for me and far too straight. I’d fallen in love with a man who had grandiose dreams once. I was content being a small-town sheriff and had no desire to see my name in lights or hear the applause of the masses. Helping out where I could while keeping the streets safe was good enough for me.
“Okay, everyone, if you could simmer down,” Bradley said, grinning out at the townsfolk who, to my sight, were sitting on their hands. “I know we’re all excited to get to the big news, but we have to do things by the book.”
And so we sat through all the blah-blah-blah of opening up a town hall. My deputy had returned, sneaking down the aisle to plant himself in a chair beside Melinda Pinkham, his new steady gal. Did kids do that anymore? Go steady? Probably not. Man, I age myself more and more every day. Wriggling down a few inches to get my weight off my tailbone, I stifled a yawn as my sight flickered over the stage. We had a small council compared to some larger towns. Just four members plus the mayor. Kevin Decamp was the president, Jane Arnold the secretary/treasurer, Joe Fahey the solicitor, and Owen Dyer was the fourth member newly elected just this past year. Owen ran the feed mill and was quite the catch. He’d never been married and after I came out, the rumors swirled that we were a thing. Nope, we were not.
Owen liked women just fine, and he was just a confirmed bachelor. Couldn’t hold that against him. I was too, it seemed. Not really by choice exactly. The dating pool in this neck of the woods was kind of limited. Actually, it was non-existent for a man of my age and life station. Not that I was unhappy. But the long, cold winter nights would be a lot less cold if my bed had someone else in it. As that was unlikely to happen despite what all the love gurus on daytime talk shows claimed—I was not at all sure romance could strike at any age—I was content. That was enough, surely. Many people wished to be as satisfied with their existence as I was. Who needed all the drama that came with a relationship? I’d pass even though I yearned for a warm body to curl up next to when the snow blew around my little home.
