The Deputy's Witness

Caleb wanted to argue but knew he couldn’t.

The sheriff seemed to realize he’d made a good point. He grinned. “And, hey, look on the bright side. Air-conditioning!”

* * *

ALYSSA WAS ANGRY. She was nervous too, but mostly angry.

Standing outside the county courthouse, she was dressed in her best and ready to finally testify against what locals had dubbed the “Storm Chasers.”

After the gunfire died down a year ago, she’d thought the terror was over. She’d focused on moving past that day and trying for a happier existence because of it. But then the nightmares had started. In them she’d seen the dark eyes of Dupree Slater, the taller gunman, hungry for violence, peering down at her. No regard for life. Especially not hers. Thinking of him and his only living partner left, Anna Kim, she still felt a flood of fear beating against her mental dam of calm. That dam didn’t always hold, despite the fact that both Dupree and Anna had been in custody for a year, but today she needed it to keep its place.

She shook her head, trying to physically get rid of the way Dupree’s dark eyes seemed to try to eat her whole.

But then, just as quickly, thinking of him led to the image of his partner, a man named Kevin Bates, lying dead on the floor a few feet from her. Farther away one of the bank tellers, Larissa Colt, and a local patron, Carl Redford, lying in their own pools of blood. Gunned down before the deputies could save them. They’d all been so afraid. The fear lingered to this day.

And just like that, Alyssa’s familiar fear was replaced with anger.

Alyssa hadn’t known Larissa well and she hadn’t met Carl officially, but she knew that they had been good people. Their deaths had been senseless and cruel. Both had rocked the community.

Alyssa took a deep breath and righted the purse on her shoulder. She was here for them, for herself and for Carpenter as a whole. Justice needed to be had. And it was now or never.

She walked through the double doors into the courthouse, knowing she was early but ready to get it over with. Her mind was tearing through a hundred different thoughts, trying to find a happy one to stave off her growing anxiety. So much so that she lost focus on what was right in front of her.

“Hey,” a man said. The voice was deep and even and snapped her out of her own thoughts. She turned her attention to a man standing next to the set of metal detectors that visitors had to pass through to get into the courtroom. Alyssa did a double take.

His Riker County Sheriff’s Department uniform and the belt lined with cuffs and a holster for his service weapon gave him away as a courtroom deputy. However, his job designation wasn’t what made her mentally hiccup.

The first word that clawed itself out of her mind was hot. It was such a quick, unexpected thought that heat began to crawl up her neck.

With a tan complexion that reminded her of caramel, green eyes rimmed with gold, golden hair that looked ripe for twisting with her finger and a jaw that had been chiseled straight from a statue, the deputy wasn’t what she’d expected to see in the courthouse. Or in Carpenter. Let alone addressing her directly.

“Excuse me?” she said lamely, hoping he hadn’t somehow heard her thoughts.

In turn the deputy didn’t seem to be distracted by her looks, to her slight disappointment, but was motioning to her purse with no real enthusiasm. She looked down at it, confused, until he explained.

“I need to look inside it before you can go into the courtroom.”

The heat crawling up her neck made its way into her cheeks. She was half-certain she could boil water if you put a pot of it against her skin. It had been a long time since she’d blushed with such intensity, as if she were some schoolgirl.

“Oh yeah, sorry about that.” She handed him the purse, fumbling a little in the middle, and watched as he opened and inspected the inside of it.

Alyssa averted her eyes to the doors a few feet from her. The deputy might have been unexpectedly attractive, but one look at those doors and that novelty was being replaced with nerves again.

“Are there a lot of people in there yet?” she asked the lone deputy.

He looked up from her purse, seemingly okay with it, and passed it back to her. He nodded. “More than I thought would show up this early. But I think a lot of them just came for the show.”

There was distaste in his words and she agreed with it. Small towns equaled big reactions to anomalous events. Good, bad or otherwise. Plus, somehow the robbery felt intimate to her. An experience no one understood unless it had happened to them. She could understand the loved ones of those who had been inside the bank, but for the people who showed up for the basic need for gossip, she held no love.

Alyssa took her purse back and inhaled a big breath. She started to walk forward but found her feet hesitating.

“Dupree Slater isn’t in there yet, right?” she asked just to make sure. The deputy’s golden brows drew in together. “He was one of the gunmen.”

The man who survived, she wanted to add.

“No. He won’t be escorted in until the beginning of the trial.”

Alyssa exhaled. At least she had a few more minutes to collect herself before she saw her own personal nightmare in person again.

“Are you a family or friend of his?” the deputy asked. “Of Slater’s?”

Alyssa felt her face draw in, eyes narrowing into angry slits, before the heat of anger began to burn beneath her breast. Without giving her mind permission, she thought again of what had happened in the bank. Like a movie scene left on repeat. The spot on her back began to burn in unison with fresh anger, as if it had been lit on fire and she was forced to bear the flames.

No, she didn’t want to be associated with Dupree Slater ever. Not as his friend. Not as his family. And most certainly not as his victim. That thought alone put a little more bite into her response than she’d meant.

“I am not a part of his family and certainly not his friend,” she almost hissed. “I’m here to testify against him.”

She didn’t wait for the deputy to respond. In fact, she didn’t even look for his reaction. Instead she pitched her head up high and marched into the courtroom. Ready to get the Storm Chasers and the damage they’d done out of her life. She wanted to move on and leave that nightmare behind.

No.

She needed to.

Chapter Three (#udafacf7d-430d-5ea5-b5da-91df5756006b)

Caleb was perplexed. Not a word he often thought about but one that fit the bill as he watched the courtroom doors shut behind the woman. He’d been at the courthouse since it opened, and she had been, by far, the most interesting part of his Monday. And he doubted she even meant to be interesting.

The analytical side of his brain, the skills in reading body language and social interactions that he liked to think he’d honed through his career, had locked on to her expression, trying to read her. To figure her out.

She had run a gauntlet of emotions across her face in the span of less than a minute. Fear, concern, anger, defiance and something he hadn’t been able to pin down. A mystery element that snagged his attention. Then, as quickly as she’d shown up, she was gone. In her wake a taste of vulnerability that had intrigued him even more.

Who was she?

And why did he want to know?

“Was that Alyssa?”

Caleb spun around. He was surprised to see an older man dressed in a suit standing so close. Caleb hadn’t heard him walk up. Leave it to a beautiful woman to break his focus so quickly. Though, if he was being honest, that hadn’t happened in a long time.

It was Caleb’s turn to say “Excuse me?”

The man pointed to the doors. “The woman you were just talking to, was it Alyssa Garner?”

“I didn’t catch a name,” Caleb admitted.

“Oh, I thought you two knew each other. I saw you talking when I walked in.”

Caleb wondered why the man cared but still explained. “I asked if she was a family or friend of Slater’s, one of the gunmen from the robbery.”