Chapter Seven
Tom Aldrich leaned on the hood of his patrol car and watched a bright red dawn crawl its way over the Cascades to spill a blood-like sheen over the bay.
Red sky at morning, sailor take warning, he thought.
Two sailboats in the bay shifted at anchor to accommodate the morning breeze. His radio squawked.
A yellow sportfishing boat with Fishkiller on the side roared from the boat haven toward the mouth of the bay. Three bundled-up figures huddled in the cockpit and one waved toward Tom. Tom gave his brother the finger, shook his head, and opened his car door.
“Lucky bastards,” he said to no one.
“Sixteen?” the radio said.
Tom keyed his mike. “Sixteen.”
“Sheriff requests your assistance with traffic at the hot-rod shindig at the fairgrounds. Check-in starts in twenty minutes.”
He watched his brother cut the power at mid-channel. All three figures scrambled to get lines in the water. Tom sighed.
“Roger, on my way.”
Dispatch continued, “Tom, you-know-who called. She has a color demo going until at least ten tonight. Says come in quiet if you’re coming over.”
“Roger,” Tom said. “And hello to everybody out there in scannerland.”
Dispatch laughed and clicked twice.
Tom clicked back and did a quick drum roll on his steering wheel. He tossed his hat onto the passenger seat and headed for the fairgrounds. He passed the new skate park where Marie’s son James practiced rails with his backpack on.
The kid’s pretty good, he thought. Glad he’s at the park. I’d have to ticket him in the street. He tapped the horn and waved, but James didn’t look up.
Tom and his brother were raised by a single mom, and he remembered his resentment when she first started dating. He’d bulldozed one of her dates through the screen door and off the front porch when the man didn’t take Tom’s mother’s “No” for an answer. He’d promised himself to be patient with Marie’s kids. Lucy seemed to like him, but James was set on being a hard-ass. The kid would probably grow out of it, but the baseball bat incident indicated that it wouldn’t be any time soon.