Chapter 18

Erica’s initial EMT training was complete by the time Christmas break arrived. She was nervous as she took the written test to get certified by the National Registry of Emergency Medical Technicians. It was not an easy test and all her classmates were also anxious about it. That was followed by the skills test, which was even more nerve-wracking because mistakes in those procedures meant an instructor might say, with a grave voice, “Your patient just died.”

Sixteen percent of the class failed one or the other of those tests, and would have to retake it later.

Erica, happily, passed, and when she went home between that semester and the coming one, in which she’d start her studies to become a paramedic, she was proud to proclaim that she was officially an EMT.

“If you have a heart attack while you’re on top of me I know what to do,” she teased her Uncle.

It was a season in which most people are happy and hopeful. The twins were home again, too, and they were hopeful that they’d get to spend more time with their dark-skinned lover.

Things, as they say, went pear-shaped, however, and the season was almost ruined for two families.

It would be a white Christmas, with snow falling on Christmas Eve. Veronica’s attitude about her parents had changed significantly while she was at the Academy. She had finished her basic training program and stood proudly at graduation, when her badge was pinned onto her dress uniform. Her parents had been there and her dad had been beaming with pride. She was slated for additional SWAT sniper training, before she’d go to the field services division of the patrol. She had not yet been assigned to a particular zone. That decision would be made after she (successfully ... or not) completed her SWAT training.

Now, she viewed herself as an adult, who could make her own decisions and who did not need an excuse to go see her best friend on Christmas Eve. Her parents didn’t quite see it in the same vein. They were interested in where her first duty station would be. She didn’t know, she said. Her dad was ambivalent about SWAT training, since that would put her in dangerous situations. By the same token, he knew that most troopers were hurt or killed in normal, everyday enforcement situations. Her mother was less informed, but still viewed her daughter as someone who should still take orders from her parents.

When she walked out of the house that morning, neither parent was happy. She had her own car, though, and there was nothing they could do to stop her.

That might have smoothed over, had things gone as she planned. Her plans for that day were to spend some time with Erica and then the twins. She and Erica caught up within an hour. They had kept up a stream of texts and phone calls as they finished their initial training, so they were already mostly up to date.

Robby and Randy kept walking by Erica’s bedroom door, though, and after that hour, Erica said, “Go. They’ll wear out the carpet in the hallway if you don’t.”

It was snowing heavily. A big storm was in progress and the weatherman on Channel 8, KLKN in Lincoln, predicted the storm could last for two more days. Traffic was already snarled and flights were being cancelled. Had Ronnie already been stationed somewhere, she would likely have been too busy to celebrate Christmas at all.

But she wasn’t, and her car had four wheel drive. Since Bob and Julie were both home and not going anywhere, Veronica’s only choice to spend time with her lovers was in her car. It was an SUV, purchased used, and the back seat was relatively roomy. They found that one of the boys could sprawl on that back seat while Veronica sat on his lap, impaled. To be honest, they were just being intimate, and not trying to achieve orgasm. She would get one of them in her and rock slowly, while talking to both. She also called and texted them, regularly, but they didn’t get the detail about her training that their sister did. So there was a lot of talk as she coupled with Robby and rocked gently on his lap. Randy stayed in the front passenger’s seat, watching and talking, and waiting his turn.

The windshield was covered with snow, and a thin coating of ice had built up on the inside of the windows as moisture from their exhalations settled on the glass and then froze. Veronica was predicting that, in a few short months, she’d have her own place, and what they were doing would no longer be necessary to be together.

A tap on the driver’s window interrupted them and all three faces turned to that area of the car. The tap came again, stronger this time.

“Holden Police!” came a muffled voice from outside. “Roll down the window, please!”

“Fuck!” whispered Randy, as both Ronnie and Robby tried to figure out what to do. “What do I do?”

“Open up!” came a more strident voice. “I know you’re in there. The motor’s running and I saw the vehicle move.”

“Get in the driver’s seat and talk to him,” gasped Ronnie. “Just act like you’re the driver.”

Randy scrambled and, unknown to them, that caused the vehicle to rock even more as officer George Stratton stood, hand on his pistol, warily looking at the frosty, snow-covered car. It was parked in a far corner of the parking lot of a business that was closed. He’d been on routine patrol when he saw it and thought it odd. He drove quietly next to the car, where he saw the almost filled tire tracks, but no footprints in the snow, and then detected slight movement as Ronnie moved her hips back and forth on Robby’s stiff prick. He was paid to be curious, so he parked his car and called in the license tag before approaching the vehicle.

When he announced himself and nothing happened, save urgent, muffled voices and movement from within, he got suspicious. He was also paid to be suspicious. No windows were cracked, so he couldn’t smell anything, but his initial conjecture was that kids were probably smoking dope in the car. His second rap on the driver’s window produced only more whispering voices from within. He couldn’t see through the frost, except to confirm there was movement inside, so he stepped back. He was trying to decide whether to call for backup or not when the driver’s window went down a couple of inches.

“Yes?” came a tremulous voice through the opening. The car rocked more violently and now he saw movement in the back seat.

“What are you doing here?” he asked, officiously.

“Um ... I’m just ... uh ... resting,” came a male voice.

“Lower your window and show me your hands,” said Officer Stratton. He stepped closer, carefully, and sniffed.

The window slid down further, but only halfway.

“Is there a problem, Officer?” asked a young man with a shock of brown hair.

“You’re parked on private property,” said George. That was always good for probable cause, particularly if the establishment was closed, as in this situation. “Do you have any ID?”

“Uh ... sure,” said Randy. “Hang on a sec. It’s in my billfold.”

“I also want to see the registration and insurance for this vehicle,” said George. “Who else is in the car?”

“Just my brother and a friend,” said Randy, trying to get his license out.

“Is this your car?”

“No. Um ... it belongs to my friend.”

“Does your friend know you have the car?”

“Yes!” said Randy, finally able to answer a question without having to think. “She’s the friend who’s in the car.”

George leaned over and peered through the eight inches of unobstructed glass.

“I don’t see your friend,” he said.

“Uh, she’s in the back seat,” he said.

“The owner of the car is in the back seat of the car,” said George, dryly.

Randy handed out his license. George took it and stepped forward, to lean so he could see into the back of the SUV. He saw another Caucasian male putting on a shirt, and what appeared to be a black female zipping up a parka.

George’s first thought was, “Two guys with a hooker.” But that couldn’t be right. Holden’s population of African Americans was small, and George had never heard of any black prostitutes. To be honest, the only prostitutes in Holden were two women the police knew well, but most of the population didn’t even know existed. Both of those women were white.

“I need ID from everybody in the vehicle,” said George. His ball cap was covered by snow, now, as were his shoulders.

He saw the black woman reach up between the front seats and open the glove box.

“Slowly!” he barked.

“There’s no problem here, Officer,” she said in a mellow voice. “We were just talking. The registration and insurance are in the glove compartment.”

Documents and two more driver licenses were passed through the window.

“I’ll be right back,” said George.

Back in his warm, dry car, George looked at the IDs curiously. The behavior of the people in the car was peculiar. The store wasn’t open. It was Christmas Eve. The car was moving slightly, as if someone inside was climbing around. The passengers were a male and female and he’d heard what might have been a muffled “Get dressed!” before the window went down. He suspected that this was just some kind of kinky sex thing. That wasn’t illegal, but it was suspicious.

The last names of the males were the same and the pictures made it clear that they were probably twin brothers. The address was local. It was when he looked at the last name of the female that his heart skipped a beat. Green. As in Sergeant Green? He knew Terry had a daughter, but he’d never met her. There were so few blacks in town, though, that this couldn’t be a coincidence. He looked at the address. It was on Elm Street. He knew Sergeant Green lived on Elm.

“Fuck!” he said, softly. “What the fuck do I do, now?”

What Officer Stratton did was what his recently promoted patrol sergeant had trained him to do. He got on the radio and, once he got a response from the office, said, “Hey, could you have Sergeant Green give me a call on my cell?”

“He’s off today,” said the disembodied voice on his radio. “Is there a problem?”

“Probably not. I just need his advice on something.”

“You have a patrol supervisor,” the radio operator reminded him.

“Just have Sergeant Green call me, okay?” barked George.

“Shall I dispatch the patrol supervisor to your location?”

That was a ridiculous question, since Jerry Hopkins, who had seniority over George by the whopping figure of six months, could hear everything that was being said. Unless he was out of his vehicle for some reason. But George hadn’t heard him call out on anything. It had been a very quiet day thus far. Most people were snug in their homes.

“What’s going on, George?” came Jerry’s voice.

“I’m handling it,” said George into the radio. “I’ve got a car full of kids parked in the Perkins Farm and Home parking lot. I don’t think there’s a problem.”

“Then why are you bothering Terry on Christmas Eve?” asked Jerry.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” whispered George. If the girl in the car really was Terry Green’s daughter, he didn’t want the whole fucking world to know it. If she was smoking dope or... whatever she was doing in that back seat ... he wanted her father to handle it, not him.

“George?” came Jerry’s voice of the radio. “I’ll be over there in ten minutes. I’m just leaving Pop’s right now. “Pop’s” was a local diner that everyone on the force patronized. They had homemade donuts and good coffee.

“I don’t need you here,” said George into the radio. “Control, just get me Terry on the phone.”

“Roger,” came the voice of Shelly Zimmerman. She’d been unhappy that she had to work on Christmas Eve. Now, maybe something interesting was going on.

She picked up the phone and hit the speed dial number for Sergeant Terrance Green.

“What’s going on?” asked Sergeant Green on his cell phone.

“This is George,” said Officer Stratton, needlessly.

“I know that,” said Terry. “I called you.”

“Is your daughter named Veronica?”

“Yes.” The hackles rose on the back of Terry’s neck. His daughter was away from the house, and if someone on the force was inquiring about her, it couldn’t be good news. “Have you had contact with her? Is she okay?”

“Yes, to both questions,” said George. “I did a routine check on an SUV I saw parked in the extreme northwest corner of the Perkins parking lot. It was running. I saw the exhaust. They’re closed today and I wondered why a car had parked there. I saw tire tracks but no footprints. The windows were frosted over but there was movement so I looked into it. I think your daughter might be in the car.”

“Okay,” said Terry. “Have you spoken to her?”