After the wave of intense emotion subsided, Holt wasn’t sure what to do. In the process of telling Trish the truth about Calico, he’d forgotten her gift of the Bible and hadn’t thought to retrieve it when he got out of her car. Holt drove to a local discount retailer.
Going to the book section, he found multiple options for Bibles. He was holding one in his hand when a voice interrupted him.
“I like that translation,” a man said.
Holt turned and faced an older man with a full head of white hair standing behind him.
“And the study notes are good,” the man continued. “There’s even a section in the back where you can look up topics you’re interested in and read about them.”
“I’m sure that’s helpful,” Holt said, embarrassed that his private search had attracted public attention.
The man continued to look at Holt, who felt as vulnerable as a witness about to be impeached. He flipped to the end of the book, glanced down, and saw the word confess, followed by multiple references and a brief text.
“Yeah, this is probably the one I need,” he said. “Thanks.”
The man smiled as Holt moved away. On his way to the cash register, Holt grabbed a package of dog treats for Henry.
Trish didn’t look in her rearview mirror as she drove away from the church parking lot. How could she ever have considered entrusting her heart to a man like Holt Douglas? She never wanted to see him again.
Her anger grew and grew. Holt’s arrogance in daily prosecuting people for crimes not nearly as severe as what he’d done infuriated her. By the time she reached the sheriff’s office, she was about to explode. She stomped inside the building and plopped down in her cubicle.
Trish desperately needed to talk to someone and let off steam. But she couldn’t phone Sue Ann and say, “Oh, you’ll never guess the latest news about Holt Douglas. We spent the afternoon together, and he told me he’s guilty of a vehicular homicide that he’s covered up for ten years. And this is the real shocker: He has the remorse of a rock. It’s all water over the dam to him or something like that. I’m sure he expects me to keep it a secret so he won’t get embarrassed or lose his law license or go to jail or who knows what else since I’m only a lowly deputy, and he’s a big-shot lawyer.”
Her mother wasn’t an option, either. It would be double cruelty to force Marge to revisit her own devastating loss. And Keith. Daydreaming with him about building a house on Cockburn Road didn’t make him an intimate confidant about something like this. Trish ground her teeth. She’d never slapped a boy or man in her life, but if Holt appeared in front of her at that moment, she knew she would slap him as hard as she could. And it would be for his own good. Someone needed to knock some sense into him.
Trish went to the break room for a drink of water. She stood by the sink and drank a full glass in a few gulps. In addition to quenching her thirst, Trish hoped the water would cleanse her from the defilement she felt caused by the revelation of Holt’s past. She returned to her cubicle.
Still agitated, she forced herself to write an account of her attempt to locate and arrest Ricky. In writing the report she had to mention Holt, which caused the rage inside to flare up again. Even his brave action in leaving the car to confront the shotgun-wielding Jenkins now seemed like a self-exalting attempt at false penance.
Trish stopped in the middle of writing the report and put her head in her hands. Holt was making her miserable without being in the room.
“Deputy Carmichael,” a male voice interrupted her. “Are you okay?”
Trish looked up. It was Butch Clovis.
“Uh, yes, sir.”
“When you get a break, I need to see you in my office.”
“I can come now—”
“No, make it about thirty minutes. I just wanted to make sure you were on duty.”
The thought of meeting with Clovis doubled Trish’s level of stress. She struggled to complete the report. When she did, she printed out a hard copy and saved one on the computer.
Butch Clovis, as the senior detective in the department, had an office directly next to Sheriff Blackstone’s. The detective’s door was closed, and Trish knocked.
“Come in!” the detective barked.
Trish opened the door and peeked inside. “Is this a good time?” she asked. “Do I need to get a file?”
“No, have a seat.”
In the years she’d been with the sheriff’s office, Trish had only been in group meetings with Clovis. They’d never had a private meeting in his office.
“Tell me about earlier this afternoon,” Clovis said. “I heard the radio traffic between Deputy Watkins and the dispatcher.”
“That’s the report I was working on when you came by my cubicle.” Trish started to get up from her chair. “I’ll get it.”
“No,” Clovis said and held out his hand to stop her. “I want to hear directly from you. Why was Holt Douglas there?”
“I saw him coming out of Bishop Pennington’s church on my way to the location, and he volunteered to come with me. I was in my personal vehicle and thought it might be a good idea. I didn’t realize it was going to turn into a dangerous situation.”
“Isn’t that always a possibility?”
“Yes,” Trish admitted. “It is.”
“Douglas may be an assistant district attorney, but that doesn’t authorize you to have him on the scene of a possible arrest. That decision needs to be made by one of the detectives or the sheriff.”
Even after the recent drink of water, Trish’s mouth felt dry. “Yes, sir. I’m sorry. I can assure you it won’t happen again.”
“Do you realize you could be terminated over this?”
Trish tried to swallow but couldn’t. “I do now,” she said. “But I won’t make the same mistake again. It was a spur-of-the-moment decision.”
“Is that what you want me to tell the sheriff? That it was a spur-of-the-moment decision?”
“I don’t know,” Trish said, unable to keep the desperation from creeping into her voice.
The possibility of having to tell her mother that she’d been fired flashed through her mind.
“What can I do to keep that from happening?” she continued, her voice trembling.
Clovis leaned back in his chair. “Before I answer, I have another question for you. What is the extent of your interaction with Douglas? Be complete and don’t leave out anything.”
Trish quickly tried to calm down and organize her thoughts. “Well, for the past two years he’s been the liaison for my files with the district attorney’s office. At least once or twice a month I’m in court with him. If one of my defendants is arrested, he usually prosecutes the case.”
Clovis nodded. “Is that all?”
Trish tried to remember anything else. “The other day I asked him to give a man I knew in high school a break on the traffic ticket. It was a speeding charge, and I shouldn’t have stuck my nose into it, but—”
“Other than the speeding ticket for an old boyfriend, is there anything else?”
“He wasn’t a boyfriend,” Trish corrected. “He was on the football team, and I played basketball.”
Clovis continued to stare at Trish. As she grew more and more anxious, her ability to think diminished by the same degree. She struggled through a few more sentences. Finally, there was nothing left in her brain, and she simply shook her head.
“That’s all I can come up with.”
“That’s too bad.” Clovis tapped a folder that was lying on the corner of his desk. “Why did you pull the investigative file about Rex Meredith’s death for Douglas? Who authorized that?”
Trish felt her face flush. “No one. He asked me to do it so I did.”
“Why did he want it?”
Any loyalty Trish had to Holt was lying on the asphalt of the country store parking lot on the road into Paxton. She certainly wasn’t going to try to protect him if it might jeopardize her own job. She took a deep breath and told Clovis everything she could remember about Holt’s interest in Rex Meredith’s death. The only thing she left out was his suspicion about Clovis himself. She couldn’t think of a way to bring that up without sounding like she agreed with Holt’s theory. Clovis listened without asking questions or taking notes. The fact that he didn’t interrupt made Trish uneasy. If it was a technique the detective used to get people who felt guilty to say more than they intended, it worked. She kept jabbering after she really didn’t have anything else to add and was repeating herself.
“Last week we agreed that I wouldn’t help him anymore,” she said. “We haven’t talked about it since. His investigation didn’t come up this afternoon when we were in the car together.”
“Why did you stop helping him?”
The question caught Trish completely off guard. She hesitated.
“Are you refusing to tell me?” Clovis asked, a menacing tone creeping into his voice.
“No, no,” Trish replied. “There was a misunderstanding with Holt’s girlfriend. She thought he was romantically interested in me and broke off their relationship. Holt said we shouldn’t be seen together in public while he tried to patch things up with her.”
“Hmm,” Clovis grunted. “That’s not good.”
“You think Holt and Angelina ought to get back together?” Trish asked, mystified.
“Don’t be ridiculous.” Clovis looked directly at her. “You’re going to be my eyes and ears and report back to me what Douglas does next. If you’re not helping him with his investigation, that won’t be possible.”
“Why do you want to know what he’s—”
“Has Ralph Granger authorized Douglas to reopen an investigation?” Clovis interrupted.
“No, and I’m not sure I can convince him now to tell me what he’s found out.”
“You’d better figure out a way to make it happen. It’s going to take more than chasing down a few deadbeat dads for you to justify your continued employment here. Is that clear?”
Trish had to blink back tears. She managed to nod her head.
“Yes, sir.”
“And I don’t want to have to ask you for updates. I expect you to let me know. Immediately.”
“Yes, sir.”
“That’s all.” Clovis dismissed her with a wave of his hand.