to suffer any longer said aloud, “Yes, please. Please set me free.”
And with one quick, deep slice of the sharp blade, he ended their relationship.
Despite living in a new place, sleeping in a different bed, Jim had rested soundly. Thanks to prescription pain medication. It would have been easy to get addicted to the stuff years ago, and God knew he’d come shamefully close a couple of times. But if he’d fallen prey to drug addiction, he might as well have kissed his life good-bye. He was forty, with a couple of bad knees, unmarried, unattached, could barely make ends meet and had to struggle to sustain his father/son relationship with his only child. And here he was on this sunny, clear-blue-sky Thursday morning dreading starting a new job, one that anybody would see as a demotion for a guy who’d been a detective on the Memphis police force.
He parked his seen-better-days Chevy pickup truck in the area of the courthouse parking lot designated for the Adams County Sheriff’s Department. After getting out and locking the doors, he glanced around at the other vehicles and grunted. Then he chuckled to himself. Figures, he thought. There wasn’t another vehicle as old and dilapidated as his. One particular car caught his eye as did one SUV. The car was a late-model white Mustang convertible with the top down. Whoever owned the sporty little ride must have felt confident that it wasn’t going to rain today and that nobody would dare mess with his car. He figured the owner to be young—possibly thirty or less—and single. A guy who liked the way he felt when he was behind the wheel of a car other men envied. His guess was that a guy like that usually had a pretty, bosomy gal with him, a looker he could show off the way he did his car.
When Jim passed by the SUV, he’d noticed it because it was clean as a whistle, as if it had just been washed. He knew for a fact that it had rained in Adams Landing very recently, because of the mud puddles he’d seen driving in yesterday. Pausing for a couple of seconds, he looked inside the neat-as-a-pin black Jeep Cherokee. The carpet was clean; the seats and floorboards were void of any clutter, except for a closed black umbrella. Whoever owned this SUV was probably a neat freak, somebody who needed to control every aspect of his life, saw things in a linear way, needed his ducks in a row.
Admitting to himself that he was stalling, Jim ended his vehicle inspections and headed toward the side entrance that led into the north wing of the two-story building. Like so many other towns across America, especially in the South, the Adams County courthouse stood in the middle of town, like the center of a box, with streets crisscrossing in the four corners. The white columned entrance faced Main Street. Two large, age-worn statues of Alabama Civil War generals presided over the green lawn on either side of the brick walkway leading from the city sidewalk to the front veranda. The back of the courthouse faced Adams Street, directly across from the post office, which was flanked by Long’s Hardware and Adams Landing Dry Cleaners. The side-porch entrance to the sheriff’s department faced Washington, a tree-lined street boasting the local library on the corner of Main and Washington and the county jail on the corner of Washington and Adams. An antique shop and a radio station, both housed in old Victorian painted ladies, sat side by side between the library and the jail.
Taking a deep breath of fresh morning air, Jim squared his shoulders, opened the door and walked into a long, wood-floored hallway. The minute he entered the building, he saw the sign protruding sideways from atop the door frame of the first door on the right: SHERIFF. As he approached the office, he noted that the door stood open, as if inviting people to come inside and make themselves at home. He had no more than stepped over the threshold than an attractive young woman, in the typical brown and tan Alabama deputy uniform, walked toward him, a smile on her face and a cup of coffee in her hand. Slender and blonde. Not pretty, but cute. With short, bright pink fingernails.
“Hi, I’m Deputy Holly Burcham.” She transferred her coffee cup from her right to her left hand and held out her right hand to Jim.
He took her hand, shook it, and replied, “I’m Jim Norton.”
She smiled warmly. “Thought you were.” She glanced at the wall clock. Seven-forty-two. “You’re early.”
“I wanted to make a good impression,” he said, only halfway joking. “First day on the job and all.” He offered her a closed-mouth smile.
“Well, come on in and get a cup of coffee and meet a few people.”
Holly issued him not only a verbal invitation, but a physical one as well. She took his arm, smiled at him flirtatiously and hauled him over to the coffeemaker placed in a corner across from a large desk Jim assumed belonged to the sheriff’s secretary.
After Jim untangled himself from Holly, he removed a Styrofoam cup from a stack on the table, poured the coffee almost to the rim and took a sip. The brew was amazingly good.
“Lisa makes great coffee,” Holly said.
Jim’s gaze followed Holly’s as she looked directly at the small, attractive black woman who had just sat down behind the desk. She glanced up at Jim and smiled.
“Lisa, meet Jim Norton, our new chief deputy for the criminal investigative division,” Holly said. “Jim, this is Lisa Wiley, Bernie’s administrative assistant.”
When Lisa smiled, Jim noted how pretty she was. Probably close to forty. Ultrashort bronze red hair. Slender, small boned, with large black eyes and flawless tan skin.
“Welcome to Adams County,” Lisa said. “I hope you’ll like it here. I’m sure you’ll enjoy working with Bernie. She’s the best.”
“Thanks.” Jim took another sip of coffee. “Has the sheriff come in yet?” He glanced around at the workstation where the “road deputies” did their paperwork for their shifts. There were four deputies already here, and to a man they were sizing him up. He didn’t get any specific type of vibes from the officers, neither negative nor positive. He figured most of them would wait and see if the hotshot from Memphis turned out to be a regular guy or a smart-ass.
“Of course she’s here,” Lisa replied. “Bernie’s usually the first one in and the last one to leave. Let me tell her you’re here.”
Lisa rose from her desk, walked to the closed half-frosted glass door and knocked, then opened the door and announced, “Sheriff Granger, Captain Norton is here.”
Jim waited to be invited in, wanting to make sure he started this job off on the right foot. Working for a woman was a first for him, and since he wasn’t the most politically correct guy around, he wasn’t sure what would or wouldn’t offend a lady sheriff.
“Please send him in,” a feminine voice replied. He liked the sound of her voice. It wasn’t a little girl coo or a nasal whine or a deep, throaty warble. It was strong and commanding, yet Southern soft.
“Go right on in, Captain Norton.” Still smiling, Lisa stepped out of the doorway to allow him entrance.
The rank of captain wasn’t necessarily the norm for the position he’d taken here in Adams County, but for a lawman with fifteen years’ experience, it wasn’t unheard of by any means. Getting the rank and the pay that came with it had been one of Jim’s stipulations for taking this job. What no one knew was that he’d have taken the job regardless.
“Call me Jim,” he told the secretary as he headed for the open door of the sheriff’s office.
“Call me Lisa,” she said quietly as he passed by her.
When he entered the room, the woman behind the massive old wooden desk stood tall and straight, her gaze directed toward him.
“Please close the door and come on in,” she said.
He followed her instructions, then stood about four feet away from her, catercorner to her desk, and waited for her to proceed. They stared at each other for at least a minute.
So this was Sheriff Bernadette Granger. He wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting. Maybe someone older and tougher