“Y’all are not okay.” Clay shook his head in disbelief. “Y’all have
never
been okay.”
“That ain’t a lie.” Wyatt sighed as he looked back to the parking lot. A few cars had pulled out of the parking lot, but Vaughn’s was still there despite last call being at three. “Maybe I can get him on something else. I saw him trying to buy scrubbing pads in the hardware store.”
“So?”
“They use ’em to smoke crack.”
“Never underestimate the creativity of addicts.” Clay snorted bitterly. “Some of the shit my mama used to do. Jesus.”
Wyatt fell back against the seat and took a long breath, searching for sanity. “How’d you know to come find me? What’d Tab say?”
“She called Melody when she discovered you were gone. I think she’s been having anxiety attacks behind your back. Terry must’ve suggested Mel, and they’ve been talking.”
“If seeing Vaughn gives Tabitha anxiety attacks, I can’t let him keep walking round Garnet.” Wyatt shook his head in denial. “It ain’t even ’bout revenge. How do I know he’s not gonna try and hurt her again? I let her down once; I can’t do it again.”
“You just told me Vaughn is smoking crack.” Clay let out a laugh. “Ain’t he on probation? Catch him for something else.”
“It ain’t that easy, Clay,” Wyatt barked at him. “I can’t just walk into his house and catch him. I need a fucking warrant. If I screw it up, they’ll let him off.”
“Look, buddy, you’re sheriff,” Clay said with another laugh. “If you can’t catch one drugged-out asshole who’s been breaking laws since he was old enough to walk, then maybe you need to find a new job.”
Wyatt stiffened at the insult, because he knew he was a good sheriff, but Vaughn was a surprisingly cunning criminal. Vaughn had been dodging him since Wyatt was first elected after his father’s death and had taken on the job mad at life. He was about to tell him off when he saw Vaughn come out of the bar.
Both he and Clay leaned forward, squinting past the fine sheen of snow on the windshield. Wyatt wanted him to be stumbling, but his stride was confident and steady as he walked up to his car and pulled his keys out of his pocket.
Wyatt had arrested more drunk drivers than any officer in the history of Garnet County. He knew a potential DUI when he saw one—Vaughn wasn’t it.
He waited until Vaughn turned onto the road and then flipped the keys in his ignition and pulled out after him.
“Wyatt—”
“Shut up, Clay.” Wyatt turned his lights on, and Clay grunted in disbelief beside him.
Wyatt was hoping he’d make a run for it. He wanted Vaughn to give him a reason to chase. He was banking on it, because pulling someone over without probable cause was a serious violation of their civil rights. A cop could go to jail for it, but as he told Clay, Vaughn was nothing if not cunning.
He turned down a small dead-end road, and Wyatt pulled up behind him when he stopped. Clay gave him a harsh, knowing look.
“You told me to find another way,” Wyatt said before his best friend could argue. “A DUI when he’s on probation will land him in a whole world of shit.”
“He didn’t look drunk to me.”
“But you don’t know that he isn’t,” Wyatt countered. “He did just walk out of a bar.”
“You can’t just pull someone over for walking out of a bar,” Clay argued with the authority of a man who spent most of his life living in a house full of cops and lawyers. “That’s all kinds of illegal.”
“It’s better than killing him, ain’t it?”
Clay hesitated before he held out his hand. “Gimme your gun.”
“You want me to do a traffic stop without my gun?” Wyatt laughed in disbelief. “No fucking way.”
“It’s the only way I’m letting you get out of the car. Otherwise Vaughn is gonna see me and you have it out in this vehicle.”
Wyatt narrowed his eyes at him. “Boy, what makes you think I can’t take you? I’m feeling pretty damn vindictive tonight.”
“Maybe you can…maybe you can’t.” Clay’s shrugged. “I’m feeling vindictive too. You aren’t the only one who cares for Tabitha. So try and get out with that gun, and let’s see who wins.”
“Fine.” Wyatt huffed and leaned over to his glove compartment. He pushed it, forcing it to fall open, showing Clay his 9 mm semiautomatic. “There you go.”
Clay eyed it, obviously recognizing Wyatt’s police-issue weapon. “Since when do you keep it in the glove compartment? I thought you locked it up after work.”
“I ain’t in uniform.” Wyatt gestured to himself. “Where else am I gonna put it? I can’t just toss a police-issue weapon on the seat.”
“Fine.” Clay gestured to Vaughn’s car in front of them. “Go scare him.”
“You ain’t gonna stop me?” Wyatt asked in surprise.
“From scaring him?” Clay let out a barking laugh. “Fuck, no. Scare the shit out of him. You act like I don’t hate him as much as you do.”
“That works.” Wyatt grabbed a pair of handcuffs he kept in the glove compartment as backup. Then he reached down to the floorboard and picked up his jacket before opening his door. “If I smell it on him, I’m gonna arrest him. You’ll be riding with us back to the station.”
Clay folded his arms over his chest and glared at Vaughn’s car. “Sounds good to me, but just know if you do something stupid, I will stop you. I got six championship belts that say the concussion you’ll get this time is gonna be a lot worse than it was when we were fourteen.”
“Whatever,” Wyatt said dismissively as he got out of the car. It wasn’t like he hadn’t had several dozen concussions courtesy of Clay Powers since then.
He pulled on his jacket, walking slowly to the car as he took a deep breath and fought to keep his composure. When he got to the car, Vaughn rolled down the window. His eyes were narrowed in suspicion. The anxiousness throbbing off of him was palpable.
“License and registration.”
“You don’t know who I am?” Vaughn asked in false bravado, though Wyatt could hear the nerves in his voice. “Why do you need my license?”
“License and registration,” Wyatt repeated as he arched an eyebrow at him.
“Fine.” Vaughn reached over to the glove compartment and made unhurried work of finding his registration. Then he grabbed his wallet from the seat next to him and pulled out his license. He handed them over to Wyatt. “Can you tell me why I’m being stopped?”
Wyatt took them and made the actual attempt to look at the information before he said, “Have you been drinking tonight, Mr. Davis?”
“I had two beers. That’s it.”
Wyatt stepped back. “I’m gonna have to ask you to step out of the vehicle.”
“This is bullshit!” Vaughn snapped. “I was driving the speed limit. I wasn’t swerving. You’re not even in uniform. You’re stopping me for something else.”
“What? Are you scared she talks in her sleep?” Wyatt narrowed his eyes at Vaughn, holding his gaze for one long moment before he said, “She does, by the way. In case you were wondering. Now step out of the vehicle.”
Vaughn just looked up at him, his face pale and splotched with fear. His breathing fell noticeably shallow, but he didn’t talk. He just opened the door slowly, making it obvious the last thing in the world he wanted to do was get out.
If Wyatt’s goal was to scare him, it obviously worked.
He didn’t see the gun until Vaughn jerked it out from where he had it hiding underneath his thigh. The flash of silver glowed in the night. It was a wild, desperate action done by a man who’d probably been packing heat since the moment he saw Wyatt with Tabitha in the hardware store.
Wyatt moved before he made a conscious decision to do it, and two gunshots rang out. Wyatt’s stomach jolted with a sharp sear of pain that ripped around to his back, but he didn’t bother looking down as the ring of shots fired still buzzed in his ears.
Instead he kept the .45 he had hidden in the back of his jeans pointed at Vaughn, who was sprawled out on the pavement, obviously in shock over what just happened.
“Let me see your hands!” he growled in his most intimidating sheriff’s voice. “Now, Davis!”
“You fucking shot me!” Vaughn clutched at his chest, where a large stain of blood was spreading out over his yellow T-shirt.
“And I will shoot you again, motherfucker,” Wyatt promised as he eyed Vaughn’s gun on the ground. “Gimme a reason!”
Despite the gunshot wound, Vaughn Davis threw his hands up.
“What the fuck?” Clay shouted as he came running over.
“He pulled a gun on me.” Wyatt gestured to Vaughn’s gun. “Didn’t you hear the second shot?”
Clay turned to him wildly. “Did he get you?”
“I need you to put in a call to dispatch right now.” Wyatt tilted his head toward his car. “Get an ambulance and backup out here.”
“I don’t even know how to work the damn thing.”
“Use your cell phone, asshole. Dial 9-1-1!”
Clay stood there staring at him, and then he glanced down to Vaughn still bleeding on the ground. “You sure you want me to make this call?”
Wyatt made a stuttering sound of shock, because he knew what Clay was suggesting. They were alone on this road. Wyatt hadn’t called in the stop. They could end it if they wanted. He remembered hearing once that a true friend would help you hide a body. He just never expected to actually test that theory with Clay.
“Make the call,” Wyatt said before he could change his mind. “Now.”
Clay pulled out his phone while Wyatt stood there shaking. His stomach was hurting so bad he was worried he was going to double over and puke on his shoes, but he didn’t give in to the urge to glance down and look for damage. He just kept his eyes on Vaughn, whose breathing was hard and raspy. Vaughn’s hands shook, but he didn’t move.
Wyatt’s gaze finally lowered to the wound he’d caused, and he knew instinctively it was too close to Vaughn’s shoulder to be lethal. It wasn’t a great shot, but he had done it on pure instinct, and it was center mass. Good enough.
Clay stopped speaking on the cell phone and barked, “Are you shot, Wyatt? They need to know this shit!”
“I don’t know!” Wyatt shouted back. Vaughn lifted his head curiously, and Wyatt stepped closer. “Don’t get your hopes up. I’m surely alive enough to shoot you again, Davis. Don’t even think ’bout trying me, ’cause I ain’t missing the next time.”
“You didn’t miss
this
time.” Vaughn grunted in pain.
“Yeah, I did.” Wyatt shook his head. The bad shot really was disappointing. “Hey!” he shouted when Vaughn tried to reach for his chest again. “Keep your hands where I can see them!”
Adam got there ahead of the ambulance, his police sirens announcing his arrival long before he pulled up. The blue and red lit up the night. The screech of police tires against asphalt was noticeable before Adam came bursting out of his cruiser with his gun drawn. The pain in Wyatt’s stomach made him nervous enough to wait for backup, but Adam was his best deputy. He stepped back, letting Adam secure the gun and then handcuff Vaughn, who bitched about the rough treatment badly enough that Wyatt knew he wasn’t going to die.
Then Adam backed up a few steps. He had his gun drawn as they stood there waiting for the ambulance. “You okay, Sheriff? They said you might be shot.”
Wyatt lowered his gun with the realization he still had it trained on Vaughn and met Adam’s hazel gaze that stood out starkly against his dark skin. He could see the million questions swirling in them, but Wyatt knew he would never ask.
He couldn’t ask.
Any officer had a right to legal counsel before he talked about a shooting. Wyatt was still in raw shock, but he couldn’t deny the pain that was still ripping through his waist and going into the small of his back. “I don’t know.”
“Don’t you think you ought to figure that out?” Adam raised his eyebrows and then made a point to look Wyatt over. “You look fine to me.”
Wyatt pulled up his shirt, looking at his stomach in confusion when he found nothing but healthy skin. “He missed.”
“Looks like it.” Adam nodded. “That shit scared me near to death. Why’d you think you got shot?”
Wyatt shook his head, wondering if he’d finally lost touch of reality. He looked to Clay, who was leaning back against Wyatt’s car. He was scowling in concern, his large arms folded over his chest, but he let Adam do his job without getting in the way.
Wyatt was still pondering it when the radio at Adam’s hip crackled.
“EMS requesting medevac 10-18 at 415 Lark Street, 4A. Thirty-four-year-old, thirty-eight-week-pregnant female in labor distress.”
“That’s my sister’s address.” Wyatt turned to Adam in horror and then touched his stomach when the realization hit him. “It’s Jules!”
“Shit.” Adam looked at Vaughn on the ground and to the gun still in Wyatt’s hand. Then he gestured with his gun to the car. “Well, go! I got this.”
Wyatt went to leave but then turned back and handed his gun over to Adam. “You need it for evidence.”
“Oh hell, Sheriff.” Adam looked at the gun in his hand like it was toxic.
“Take it,” Wyatt said firmly despite the heartbeat thundering in his ears. “Then call the DOJ. This is your crime scene, Adam. Do the job you’re paid to do.”
Adam took the gun.
Wyatt didn’t even look back as he ran for the car. Clay was already behind the wheel, and Wyatt decided to let him drive as he jerked open the passenger side door. “EMS just requested a medevac 10-18 for Jules!”
“What does that mean?” Clay asked frantically as he started the car. “I heard you say the call was for Jules, but—”
“It means the paramedics just called in a helicopter. It’s a fucking emergency!” Wyatt shouted as he reached over and turned on the lights and sirens. “Drive!”
“Are we going to Jules’s house?”
“No, we’re going to Mercy.” Wyatt pulled open his glove compartment and grabbed his phone, seeing that he had missed twenty-four calls. “Oh, shit, Clay! I had my phone off. What if they tried to call me first—”
“Just call Romeo!”
Wyatt dialed his brother-in-law, but there was no answer. “He’s not answering!”
“Try it again.”
“No, I’m calling Tino.” Wyatt searched through his contacts for Tino’s number, deciding right then he knew way too many fucking people. “I’m gonna fucking puke.”
Clay looked at him, his eyes wide. “The sick vibe’s that bad?”