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André narrowed his eyes at his senior dispatcher. “You play a wicked game, Carol.”
She smiled and straightened her back, clearly knowing she’d achieved a checkmate.
Carol stood up, automatically smoothing her skirt. “I’ll let Nick know you want to speak with him before everything is official.”
André watched her leave his office and wondered what else the day had in store for him. Probably it was a phalanx of news vans. He and the mayor had already discussed making a statement, but that would happen tomorrow after Ethan Moore arrived.
The rest of the day felt like he was in the eye of a hurricane. André spent it at his desk doing his best to get through the stack of paperwork he’d been avoiding, the high point being when he managed to find a few dollars left in the budget to send Deputies Cooper and Trent to a basic course on evidence collection. He was constantly shocked at how little training his deputies had, yet they were expected to be professionals.
Things were happening outside his office, he knew. But nothing that directly affected him—because Carol would have said something—or the station, or the new open cases that were about to change everything. Sometime around five, Carol poked her head in and said she was going home but had the pager with her.
“Ned Barker hasn’t been by yet, FYI. And Nick said he can come in next week to talk to you and start training if you give him the thumbs-up. He and Martin are picking up some equipment for the cabins tomorrow.”
André mumbled a response that had Carol nodding and disappearing, and soon enough, he was the only one in the building. Was he really hiring Nick Waugh for the dispatch position? Apparently so.
What was he going to do without Carol to run everything? He had no idea. With that thought, he dove back into the shrinking stack of paperwork, bribing himself with the promise of dinner at the Donkey. It was chili night, he remembered. The thought of Magnus’s chili and cornbread had him refocusing on the work in front of him.
Minutes after Carol departed, Ned Barker showed up.
“Here’s the mail, Chief,” he announced in an irritatingly cheerful manner. Like the mail delivery was the highlight of André’s day. Today Ned’s long gray hair was pulled back into a ponytail, and he had a hat jammed on his head.
“Thank you,” said André, holding out his hand for that day’s stack. He was constantly surprised by just how much mail the station received.
“There’s weather out there for sure. Wind is up. It’s going to get nasty around here. But you know, the mail must go through.”
Nodding, André began flipping through the stack of envelopes, hoping to encourage Ned to leave. The man was known to talk, but Carol usually protected André from him.
“Well, I guess I should get going. You must be busy.”
“Have a good evening, Ned.”
“You too. ‘Neither rain, nor snow, nor sleet, nor hail shall keep the postmen from their appointed rounds,’” Ned quoted as he slowly made his way out of André’s office.
André breathed a sigh of relief when he heard the front door close. He even got up from behind his desk and strolled out to the lobby, making sure Ned was gone. He couldn’t put his finger on what it was about Ned that bothered him. Was it the odd, small-town hokey way he had of speaking? Or maybe it was just André. He was swamped and stressed. Everything bothered him.
Would he have been more aware of his surroundings when he left the station an hour or so later if he hadn’t spent the afternoon in a bureaucratic fever dream?
Likely not.
The shot took André completely by surprise. Not that he hadn’t been shot at before, but not since leaving the Marshals Service. In fact, it wasn’t until the second thunk against the cement facia of the police station caused an errant chip to fly off and slice his cheek that he comprehended what was happening.
Finally reacting, André threw himself to the ground and automatically scrabbled for his radio, but he didn’t hit the button, not wanting to alert the shooter to his location. Heart pounding, he waited for the next shot. It never came. His heart skittered against his ribs as blood dripped down his injured cheek.
What the fuck was happening?
The sun had set hours ago, and the streetlights around the parking lot had kept André from seeing any flash of gunfire. He thought the shot had come from across the back of the parking lot but wasn’t sure.
As he lay as still and flat as possible, partially submerged in a mud puddle with freezing cold water seeping through his clothing, André contemplated his life choices. At this very moment, he regretted them. After a few minutes passed and no more shots came, he risked the radio.
“It’s fine,” André said irritably. “It’s just a scratch. I don’t need to go to the ER, much less get in an ambulance.”
Lani Cooper stared at him, hands on her hips. She’d arrived just minutes after André called. Deputy Trent was “on his way.”
“Sir—”
“I hate being called sir. If you keep it up, I’m going to ma’am you.”
Lani scowled. “How can you joke in a situation like this? Someone shot at you!”
