Gone(6)

Maybe this family had just taken a trip, left in a hurry in a second vehicle. It didn’t feel like that, though.

He would give it the night. In the morning he’d have the deputies do an official welfare check. If everything looked the way it did now, they could get a warrant and search the house.

He got in the Chevy, gave the dark house one more look, and left.





SATURDAY





CHAPTER FIVE / Patrol Division


Deputy Peter King pulled up in the cruiser. Two men were beating the shit out of each other in the front yard. The first guy took the second guy’s head and slammed it into the mailbox. The second guy stumbled back from the blow, blood running from his scalp. Peter got out of the car, Deputy Althea Bruin exited the other side. They each took their batons and slid them back through loops in their belts as they stepped onto the grass.

“Traitor,” the first guy was saying. “Traitor son of a bitch.” Peter knew him. Terry Rafferty. Fifty years old and a notorious drinker and brawler. Rafferty had been in a biker gang in his younger days. Tattoos covered his hairy arms and his muscles bulged from years of carpentry and heavy lifting.

Peter put his hand out in a stop gesture as he neared. “Mr. Rafferty. I’m going to need you to calm down.”

Althea approached the second guy, John Hayes, a commercial truck driver. Peter knew him, too — he’d gone to school with Hayes. Hayes dropped to the ground and bent forward, took his head in both hands and moaned. The bashed mailbox listed to the side, door hanging open like a tongue.

They were on Hayes’ small parcel of land, where not much grew, including the grass. Hayes’ single-wide trailer was tucked back into the trees, swallowing it like it was some kind of bungalow in a jungle. Peter occasionally fantasized about living somewhere tropical, where you fished marlins not bass, and grown men weren’t beating each other up.

“Traitor,” Rafferty spat. He glowered at Hayes, ignoring the deputies.

Peter took another step. “I need you to put your hands on your head and get down on your knees, Mr. Rafferty.”

Rafferty’s eyes were bright blue. His big square jaw was pock-marked, his nose bent from a biker gang fight. His natural teeth had been knocked out in a motorcycle accident. Peter knew the story: after wrecking his bike, Rafferty had taken a car from a motorist who’d stopped to help, and driven himself to the hospital. They said he’d come in to the emergency room with blood spilling from his mouth, gum nerves raw.

He liked cops even less than he liked his false teeth. “Mind your business, King.”

Peter glanced at Althea. One more chance and then we pull them. He touched the grip of his sidearm.

“Mr. Rafferty,” Peter said, “we’ve just witnessed you assaulting this man. We are deputies of the Stock County Sheriff’s Department, and we’re asking you to get to the ground. Do it peacefully. I need to check you for weapons.”

“I ain’t got any weapons.”

“Just do this nice, and everybody wins.”

Rafferty stood defiant, his oil-stained shorts hanging from his waist. His face was beaded with perspiration. “Wins? No one wins.” He glared at Hayes, who got to his feet.

“Woah,” Althea said to Hayes. “Take it easy. Let’s stay right there, okay? What happened here, gentlemen?”

Hayes had blood pouring down the side of his nose. He lowered his head and charged Rafferty like a bull. Rafferty raised his fists.

Both deputies drew their weapons. The men grunted as they collided. They fell to the ground, kicking up the dry dirt. Hayes was no match for the larger Rafferty, who rolled over and pinned him.

“Stop!” Althea gave Peter another look which meant, what the hell are we going to do, shoot them?

There was a shout from the house. Peter saw a woman bang out the screen door — Hayes’ wife.

“Get her,” Peter said. Althea holstered her gun and intercepted the woman.

A crackle of static emanated from the cruiser as their unit was paged from dispatch. “SCS-14, Stock County . . .”

Talk about bad timing, Peter thought.

He tried to hear the radio over Hayes’ wife shouting. They wrestled in the dirt, Hayes trying to squirm out from underneath. Peter could hardly hear a damn word of the radio.

“Everybody, quiet!” he yelled.

He trotted to the car, listening as dispatch restated the announcement.

“. . . welfare check. Repeat: Family is Hutchinson and Lily Kemp, two daughters. Lily Kemp is an LPN, and is absent without leave from New Brighton Medical . . .”

Peter leaned against the vehicle, listening as dispatch rattled off a brief physical description. He recognized the name, Kemp, and felt his chest tighten. Althea watched him while trying to stay between the woman and the men. The woman’s lips pulled back in a snarl, spit flying with her words. “Get outta my way you black bitch,” she said.

There was a lightning crack of gunfire and everybody froze. The woman shut her yap and the men in the yard halted, their limbs tangled, a fist suspended in the air. Peter stood with his gun pointed at the sky. He’d fired off one round. Bad thing to do, and he knew it.

“Thea,” he said. “Let’s go.”

The men stared, their skirmish forgotten. Hayes’ wife glared with contempt. Althea stared at Peter in disbelief. Then she took a breath, and her posture sagged. She shook her head and walked toward her partner, telling him with a look that she wasn’t pleased.