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I lean across the table, forcing Sean to meet my gaze. “You can’t keep pulling stunts like this. You’re not in juvenile court anymore. The consequences are real.”
“I don’t care,” he insists.
“We can win this suppression hearing. It’s a slam dunk. Do you know how often that happens?”
He raises one shoulder and lets it fall.
“Never.” I shrug out of my suit jacket and attempt to hand it to him. “So, let me win this case, okay? We’ll get the marijuana possession charge thrown out and—”
He rolls his eyes at my jacket. “I’m not wearing that.”
I take a deep breath and count to five. He’s deliberately trying my patience—and it’s working. But wadding up my jacket and chucking it at his head won’t do either of us any good. “If you leave this room wearing that shirt, the judge will hold you in contempt. He may even send you to jail. And it won’t help us if he’s mad during the hearing.”
Sean puffs out his chest. “I don’t care. I’m taking a stand. Pot is a plant. Several states have already legalized it and—”
“And Georgia isn’t one of them,” I point out.
“Yet,” he says.
“Yet,” I concede. “Which is why you’ve been charged with a crime.”
“I’m taking a stand,” he says again, “and you can forget about the hearing. I’m pleading guilty.”
With a sigh, I put my arms back into the sleeves of my jacket. “To be clear, I’ve informed you that the search warrant granted the officer permission to look in your home for a stolen four-wheeler—which he didn’t find. Searching your backpack exceeded the scope of the warrant. He should never have found your stash.”
He shrugs. “It’s just a stupid misdemeanor.”
“Even a misdemeanor can hurt your chances of going to college or getting a good job.”
His shoulders slump. “I’m not going to college. I barely graduated from high school.”
“Only because you never went to class,” I say, throwing my hands up in frustration. “You’re a smart kid. If you care so much about legalizing marijuana, take a stand—but do it thelegalway. Educate yourself. Join an advocacy group. Write to your politicians. Run for office someday.”
He blinks in surprise. “You really think I could run for office someday?”
Once again, my heart aches for this kid. He was born into a life of privilege, has been given every material possession that a young man could want for, but has no sense of self-worth.
And then it occurs to me.I know how to save this kid.
“I think you can do anything you set your mind to,” I tell him honestly. “But right now, I need to make a phone call.” Pulling my phone from my pants pocket, I punch in the number for Friendly PD’s Chief of Police.
Coop answers on the first ring. His voice is as gruff as always. “Coop speaking.”
“Coop, it’s Bishop. I—”
“Hazel told you, eh?”
Hazel?Hearing her name temporarily stuns me. It takes a beat for the pistons in my brain to start firing again. When I can choke out words, I manage to ask, “Told me what?”
Coop grunts out a few monosyllables. “Oh. Um. Erm.”
The chief’s never been a man of many words, but this is the first time I’ve ever heard him struggle to string together a sentence. A niggle of worry starts to prickle at the back of my neck. “Is something wrong with Hazel?”
Coop mutters something under his breath. I strain to hear the words. “She’ll recover…eventually.”
“Recover?” My heart stutters to a halt and I feel the blood drain from my face. “What happened?”
Sean’s eyes grow wide with concern. He mouths, “Everything okay?” His concern is proof that he’s a good kid at heart.
