Plain Outsider. Alison Stone

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СКАЧАТЬ first hints of pink and purple pushed into the black night sky as she drove toward Robin Nest. The only homes out this way belonged to the Amish. Perhaps a young Amish boy had been sneaking home after a night of shenanigans. A lot of the Amish youth went to Sunday singings and for some, the fun stretched into the early morning with unsuspecting parents who might glance outside at the most inopportune time and mistake their son for an intruder.

      But that raised the question: Who called the sheriff? The Amish preferred not to deal with law enforcement. And there was the issue of a phone, but even Becky realized that some Amish were adapting to the modern world by allowing phones and cell phones in a limited capacity. Like a landline in a barn or a cell phone strictly for work purposes. She doubted she’d be seeing an Amish family sitting around the table at the diner in town all staring at their cell phones anytime soon. A bit of a slippery slope, all the same.

      As Becky’s patrol car crested the hill, the headlights from an oncoming car blinded her. Instinctively, she jammed on the brakes as the approaching car veered into her lane. She gripped the wheel tightly and braced for impact, a prayer crossing her lips.

      The tires skidded on the pavement. She swerved. The patrol car careened off the road and plowed into the nearby field, stalks of corn slapping at her windshield, her entire body jostling. The vehicle finally came to a hard stop and her seat belt dug into her chest. She let out a breath on a whoosh and slumped into the leather seat. She pried her fingers from the steering wheel and thanked God she was in one piece.

      She contacted dispatch with her current predicament, then released the seat belt. She pushed open the door against the corn stalks. With heightened awareness, she stepped out into the field, her boots sinking into the soft soil. Her first concern was the other driver. Had he had a medical issue? Was he drunk?

      The night air smelled thick, the combination of rich soil and burned rubber. She squinted against the glare of the red and blue patrol lights.

      Plodding through the soil, she pushed the cornstalks out of the way. The other vehicle had stopped, positioned across the road, its extinguished headlights pointed toward her. A shadow of a figure sat motionless in the driver’s seat.

       Is he watching me?

      “Hello, are you okay?” she called, nerve endings prickling to life. Where was her backup?

      The headlights flipped on and her hand instinctively came up to block the bright beams trained on her.

      “Turn your headlights off, sir.” She cocked her head, straining to see past the blinding lights.

      The high beams flashed on and she jerked her head back. What in the world?

      Her other hand hovered over her gun. You’ve got this. You’re trained for this. She took a step back. Crops didn’t exactly provide protection, but they could provide a hiding place if necessary.

      “Step out of your car,” she ordered, keeping her tone authoritative and even, like she had practiced. Becky was jacked up on adrenaline from nearly getting hit head-on, but the mood had shifted from apprehension to determination. She had a job to do.

      The man was watching her. Toying with her. She planted her feet in the soil, ready to draw her gun. Her legs felt like jelly, but she ignored the sensation. Nerves came with the job. She had been trained to fire a gun and hit a target. She had never shot another human being and prayed tonight wouldn’t change that.

      “Out of your car now!” she ordered, feeling her entire body tense.

      The engine of the car fired to life, the sound rumbling through her chest. The tires spun, spewing the acrid smell of burned rubber. She fought back a cough, keeping her sharpened attention on the vehicle. The tires gained purchase and the car backed up, stopped abruptly, then raced down the road, back in the direction it had come.

      Becky’s shoulders sagged and she drew in a few deep breaths. Staring toward the vehicle, she waited a moment, anticipating another drive-by. The early-morning chirping of birds seeped into her consciousness before she allowed herself to let down her guard. He’s gone. She strode back to the patrol car and flipped off the flashing lights. She pressed her shoulder radio and said, “ETA on the tow truck?”

      “Five minutes,” the dispatcher asked. “Everything okay?”

      “Yeah,” she said, a not-exactly truthful reply, but a necessary one. A person couldn’t show weakness on this job. Not if they wanted to be seen as competent.

      Becky gave the dispatcher what limited information she had on the car that ran her off the road. Maybe they’d pull him over, figure out what his problem was.

      Becky leaned against the trunk of her patrol car and ran a hand across her clenched jaw. She didn’t know who ran her off the road, but she suspected he had known exactly who his target was.

       Her.

      * * *

      This wasn’t exactly how Becky had envisioned her first shift back at work. The tow truck driver insisted he could drop her off in front of the sheriff’s station before taking the vehicle to the repair shop to make sure mud from her off-roading adventure wasn’t clogging anything up. She was pretty sure he had been more specific with some technical terms, but she had tuned him out after the second time he appeared to be hitting on her. Like that never happened before: a guy hitting on a female sheriff’s deputy.

       Sorry, not interested.

      “Stop. I’m going to get out here,” Becky said, growing impatient as he debated with himself whether he’d be able to weave the tow truck through the narrow parking lot adjacent to the employee entrance.

      “No problem.” The young man stopped and gave her a silent stare while she scooted out of the cab. Her foot didn’t reach the ground and she almost missed the running board, which would have added insult to injury. It wasn’t exactly a good shift when a deputy returned with her patrol car trailing behind her.

      She didn’t bother giving the tow truck driver instructions because she suspected her boss already had. After determining that his deputy was okay and that the call on Robin Nest was a false alarm, the sheriff had instructed her to report to his office the minute she returned.

      On solid ground, Becky smoothed out her uniform shirt. She watched as the tow truck lumbered away, its engine chugging as the sun poked over the horizon. The day shift deputies had started to arrive.

       Just great.

      Becky might have been imagining it, but several seemed to give her the side eye as they strolled toward the employee entrance, and she suspected it had nothing to do with her going four-wheeling in the cornfields with a patrol car.

      She sighed heavily. She had hoped her first day back on patrol was going to be a smooth transition after a rough week. Apparently not.

      Fighting the urge to fidget with the cuffs of her sleeves, she approached the entrance. She had wanted to go straight home, take a hot bath and get some solid sleep. But she had strict instructions to report to the sheriff.

      Becky walked at a steady pace. She squared her shoulders, determined to prove to anyone who might be judging her that she was confident and self-assured, despite the mud caked up in the wheel wells of her vehicle. She frowned, realizing her driving abilities weren’t the only thing her СКАЧАТЬ