The Deputy's Witness

It was like something was in the water in Carpenter, Alabama. As soon as the name left Caleb’s mouth, the man’s expression darkened. Unlike the woman, the man stayed on that emotion. If his skin had been lighter, Caleb would bet it would have been red from it. That was what rage did. Turned you raw. Caleb knew what that looked like—felt like too—and the man was suddenly waist-deep in it.

“You know, she had the same reaction,” Caleb had to point out. Again the cop side of his brain was piqued. He wished he’d done more research into the robbery other than reading the newspaper article the sheriff had given him. Then again, it wasn’t a necessity for him to research a case he wasn’t a part of. Especially since he’d get a recap from the future proceedings.

“You’ll find no love for that man in this town. Not after what they did. Not after what he did.” The man touched a spot on his chest. “You know, his partner, Anna Kim, shot me, and I still hate Dupree more.”

Caleb couldn’t stop his eyebrow from rising.

“You must be new to town,” the man guessed.

Caleb nodded and was given the man’s hand in return.

“I’m Robbie,” he said. “I was the security guard. A good lot of luck that did anybody. Less than a few seconds after they came in, I was down for the count. After I was shot they let me just lie there in my own blood, ignoring me as if I was some character in a video game or whatnot. They didn’t care if I lived or died. And I would’ve died had Alyssa there not been as crafty as she was.” He pointed at the courtroom doors.

“Crafty?”

“She hid her cell phone until one of the tellers could call 911 and then distracted the gunman on watch by coming to my aid.”

Robbie put his hand on his chest again and pushed.

“She kept me from bleeding out and got a front row view when the shooting started. She watched that...that man kill two people—two good people—in cold blood.”

“The paper said they died in the cross fire,” Caleb remembered.

Robbie looked disgusted.

“I don’t believe that for a second,” he said. “Dupree Slater is an evil sumbitch. Pure and simple. He wanted to kill us all and probably regrets he couldn’t get the job done.”

Caleb didn’t know what to say. In his career he’d seen what he thought of as pure evil. Slater, although Caleb knew he was in no way a good man, didn’t seem to fit his definition of it. He’d just been a man who’d robbed a bank and gotten in a shoot-out with the cops. He’d been a piss-poor shot and people had died because of it. If anything, his female partner had seemed like the worst of the two. It was common knowledge that the first thing she’d done was shoot the security guard in the chest, which apparently was the man standing in front of Caleb.

Maybe Robbie sensed Caleb’s thoughts.

“Not convinced he’s evil? You want to know something that they didn’t put in the paper? Something that was kept out to try to protect her privacy?” Robbie lowered his voice. A group of people could be seen milling outside the front glass double doors. The residents of Carpenter were downright punctual. Robbie waited until Caleb turned his gaze back to him. When he spoke, there was no denying his anger again. His rage. “When the shooting started, Alyssa Garner threw herself over me—someone who could have been dead any moment—to protect me. She could have run and tried to hide like the others, but no, she covered me up like she was indebted to me. Like I was a good friend or even family. And by some miracle she wasn’t hit in the process. But you want to know what happened after they surrendered?”

Caleb might not have known the woman named Alyssa past a minute ago, but he knew he wasn’t going to like the answer already.

Robbie nearly bit the words out. “Before anyone could stop him, Dupree Slater walked over to us and shot Alyssa right in the back.” He let that sink in. “Now, you tell me. What kind of man does that? What kind of man shoots an unarmed young woman who was just trying to save an old man like me in the back?”

“Not a good one,” Caleb answered. He was surprised at the anger growing in him. It wasn’t a good feeling. Not after what had happened back in Portland. He tried to distance himself from it, but then he pictured the woman who had stood before him only a few minutes beforehand.

Her light auburn hair had been pulled back, showing blue eyes, bright and clear and nice. They’d sized him up and then left him alone, traveling back to see what must have been the memory of Dupree Slater killing people before he’d tried to kill her too. He hadn’t been able to see if her smile lit up the rest of her expression. Dupree had stripped her of it simply by her recalling a memory.

Caleb now felt like he needed to apologize to her, which was absurd. He hadn’t known her name or what had happened when he asked about the bank robber.

Robbie, seemingly coming down off his emotional high, let out a long exhale. It dragged his body down. His expression softened. He gave Caleb a tired smile.

“You seem like a man who’s dealt with bad before,” he said, reaching out to pat Caleb on the shoulder.

The contact surprised and unsettled him. Another sentiment he wasn’t used to from the general public in Portland.

“But know that just because we’re a small community, it doesn’t mean we’re all good here either. There’s bad everywhere. Even in a small place like Carpenter.” The man gave another weak smile and then was gone.

Caleb went back to his job. He decided it best to keep his mouth shut as he manned the detector. Instead he tried to catalog everyone who walked into the courtroom with a new perspective. Now he felt a small connection to a case he hadn’t even bothered to research. It was irrational to feel involved, or, as his sister would say, maybe it was compassion attaching his thoughts to the woman named Alyssa. He’d never met her before and doubted he’d have a chance to talk to her ever again, but still he felt anger for what had happened to her. That feeling made him question every person who filed into the courtroom and his or her part in the robbery.

So when a man dressed in a suit wearing a pair of horn-rimmed glasses walked toward him and stopped just shy of the metal detector, Caleb was already trying to figure him out.

How did he fit into that day?

Had he been one of the hostages?

Had he known someone on the inside?

Or was he just there to gawk?

“Has it started yet?” the man asked, motioning to the closed doors.

Caleb shook his head. “Not yet.”

The man started to turn away.

“You aren’t going in?” Caleb asked after him, surprised.

“No, I’m only here to wait for a friend,” he said. “I’ll do that outside.”

The man smiled, adjusted his glasses and was out the front doors in a flash.

Caleb would later pinpoint that smile as the moment he knew something bad was about to happen. But in the present he would try to pretend everything was all right, dismissing the feeling in lieu of doing his job correctly. He’d already almost lost his career because he’d let himself get carried away once. Plus, like he’d told Robbie, he was new in town. That man, and his out-of-place smile, could have been one of the nicest locals he’d ever meet. Who was he to judge? Especially after what he’d done?

So he’d let his mind swim back to dry land and stood diligently at his post. This was just another job he had to do—and do well—to get back to where he should be. Back in Portland, away from small towns and their problems. Away from everyone knowing your name. Away from the humidity, droves of mosquitoes and copious amounts of sweet tea. He didn’t have time for distractions. He needed to focus on the end goal.

But then no sooner had he gotten the thought than the fire alarms started going off.

* * *

THE JUDGE WASN’T even in the room before Alyssa and the rest of the courtroom were being ushered outside.

Just when I was getting up my nerve, she thought in the middle of the group. Together they all created a blob of people talking loudly to one another, to the point where even her thoughts became muddled. She tried to look for someone in charge to ask them if it was a false alarm or if the fire was real but couldn’t see anyone other than her courtroom companions. At least there was a smiling one among them, looking right at her.

Robbie picked his way through the crowd to stop in front of her.

“It’s always something, isn’t it?” he greeted, motioning back to the building. The sirens screeched something awful. While Alyssa had been itching to get everything done with, she was at least thankful to be out of that noise. The beginnings of a tension headache were starting to swarm in the back of her head.

She snorted.

“We spent a year waiting for this day,” she said. “What’s a few more minutes?”

“Your optimism is always refreshing,” he said, knowing full well she’d been sarcastic.

She smiled up at him.