Laura stared angrily through the screen door at Sheriff Rucker. A slew of his deputies leaned against their cars behind him. He had made sure she could get a good view of every last one of them.
“What’s this little gathering, Laura?” Sheriff Rucker asked.
Laura divided her attention between the sheriff and one of his deputies who was showing special interest toward her cat, Crawley. “Just people I invited over.”
“What for?”
“Just to come over.”
“You upset about something, Laura?”
She chuckled. “Am I upset about something?”
“I’m just not feeling that welcome—” The sheriff abruptly stopped talking when he saw Otis Royal appear behind Laura.
“Stan.”
Rucker worked up a phony smile. “What brings you to our bend in the mountains, Sheriff Royal?”
“Not here as Sheriff Royal. Just visiting an old friend.”
“Old friend?” Rucker said. “I had no idea you knew Laura.”
Otis moved past Laura, stepped out on the front stoop, and counted the deputies. “You expecting some trouble, Stan?”
Rucker turned to quickly survey his men and then turned back. “You can never be too careful.” Dani stepped into his line of sight behind Laura. “This how you handle your crew, Otis? I call you to let you know that one of your deputies is stepping on some toes, and you come up here to step on the whole goddamned foot?”
“Well,” Otis said, sticking his hands in his back pockets and stretching out his back, “I come up here to clear up some confusion. I figured we could put some notions to bed and ease my deputy’s mind if we just come up here and sort through some details with Laura. By the way, have you ever had any of Laura’s coffee? A coffeehouse could not brew it up any better.” He turned to Laura. “Laura, would you mind if Stan here had a cup of your coffee? I was just telling him how good it is.”
“That backwoods country bumpkin shit might fly in Baptist Flats, Otis, but I ain’t buying it,” Rucker said. “I take personal offense to you conducting your own interviews with my witnesses.”
“Witnesses to what?” Dani asked stepping up to the door. “You closed Laura’s case. All these cases have been closed.”
“You don’t know what in the hell is going on here,” Rucker snapped. “You ain’t got no business in my town, talking to my people.”
“Let’s all just hold on,” Otis said. “Now, I will admit we may have crossed a line coming up this way, Stan, and if it will ease your mind a bit, we’ll be on our way soon enough. We’ll just finish up our coffee and drive on out of here.”
Rucker worked his snarl into a grin. “We’ll just wait out here until you do.”
“Suit yourself.” Otis turned to go back inside, but stopped. “You mind me asking how you knew we was here?”
Rucker smirked. “I got eyes and ears all over this county, Otis. There ain’t nothing that gets by me.”