Erik trudged up the steps to the second floor, his hands balling in and out of fists. It was a risk confronting Sheriff Gilbert like that, but he’d had no choice. He wanted to help any way he could, but he also wanted to see where things stood in terms of his job. And Erik had come away from it with the realization there was a good chance he wouldn’t have his job much longer.
The sheriff hadn’t said as much, but Erik was able to read between the lines. He wondered if it would be better for him to resign before he was fired. In that case, he wouldn’t be able to stay in Alden.
Being a deputy was what and who he was. He couldn’t see himself doing anything else. Which meant he would need to move away and try to find work in law enforcement elsewhere. Only he was pretty sure that even if he resigned, word would make it to whoever considered him elsewhere for a job of what had happened in Alden: Erik on his knees half-naked with a woman who killed two ICE agents when the police raided the apartment.
His eyes focused on the door across from his as he walked down the hallway. A notice from the police had been taped on the jamb between the door and the doorframe. The apartment wasn’t a crime scene, but the police wanted to make sure nothing was disturbed in case they needed to return at a later date. As far as Erik knew, the whole place had been searched—as well as his apartment, upon his approval—but there was always the chance they would need to check back again.
Erik shut his eyes, shook his head. He needed to forget about it. Needed to think of anything else except what happened today.
But of course he couldn’t do that. The more he tried to think about something else, he immediately thought about Jen or whoever the fuck she was aiming the shotgun at him and ordering him out of the bedroom.
He opened his eyes again, took a breath, and glanced once more at the door before turning to his own door, the apartment key in his hand.
He inserted the key into the lock but paused, stood staring at his door for a beat before slowly turning and taking in the door across the hallway again.
The notice from the police—it was sliced vertically, right along the doorframe. With the door closed the way it was, it looked almost perfect, like it hadn’t been touched. But from this angle, it didn’t look right.
Erik quietly pulled the key back out from the lock. He took a step toward the door. Got close enough to verify that, yes, the notice had been sliced.
He took another step forward.
Leaned in so that his ear was barely touching the door.
He couldn’t hear anything inside, but that didn’t mean much. Maybe whoever sliced the notice had entered the apartment and had already left. Or maybe they were still inside and had heard him and gone silent. Maybe somebody was standing on the other side of the door right now, looking at him through the peephole, a gun leveled at his chest.
Erik moved without thinking.
Knowing that he didn’t have time to retrieve his gun from inside his apartment—not his department-issued pistol, which he’d turned in earlier today, but his personal Glock—he stepped to the side as he turned the doorknob and shoved the door open.
He stood with his shoulder against the wall, holding his breath, waiting for a gunshot or for somebody to come running through the doorway.
Nothing.
He waited another beat, listening to the silence, when he realized that the door should have been locked.
Call Sheriff Gilbert. That’s what he should do. Call it in and have the proper authorities come take care of it, but he thought maybe this was a way he could redeem himself. If there was somebody in the apartment and he managed to detain them, wouldn’t that mean something? At the very least, he wouldn’t lose his job.
Five seconds had passed since he opened the door, and so far nothing had happened. Down the hallway, the volume on Mr. Hobbs’s television was turned up louder than it should be this time of night. Erik thought about calling out—“It’s the police!”—but decided to play this a different way.
Taking another breath, he stepped forward and entered the apartment, reaching out in one fluid motion to flick on the light switch—
Which did nothing.
The apartment remained dark.
Erik paused again, suddenly nervous, the confidence he’d felt only seconds ago having vanished, and he decided to retreat, hurry into his apartment to retrieve the Glock and call Sheriff Gilbert, when he sensed motion behind him.
He spun to his left and instinctively ducked, swinging his fist in an uppercut, skin brushing against heavy fabric for just an instant before the person behind him sidestepped the follow through and then Erik felt a heavy elbow snap down on the back of his neck. He stumbled away but immediately lurched back at his attacker, pushing the person into the wall, and he had the sense the person was big, tall and strong, and while Erik himself was tall and strong, this man had a good sixty pounds on him, much of it muscle, and before Erik knew it, his legs were swept out from under him and he fell hard, landing on his back, his head knocking on the floor. He tried to roll away, to scramble to his feet, but the man was on top of him, and suddenly Erik felt cold metal pressed to the side of his head as a deep voice whispered.
“Don’t fucking move.”