The Sheriff - Wildfire
Copyright© 2022 by Charlie for now
Chapter 6
Come early spring, the weather was clearing and warming. It was an otherwise beautiful day when a large sedan with Illinois plates drove slowly by the front of our new Colby County Law Enforcement Center and opened fire with automatic weapons, peppering the front of the building and cracking up most of the aluminum and glass front. The windows were all bulletproof and shatterproof, but not crackproof.
What the shooters didn’t see was four deputies on the side of the building drying their vehicles after a couple of trustees had just washed them. Two of the three men in the vehicle were killed by those deputies and the car ran into a tree at the end of the driveway. The third was questioned and just conscious enough to give some pertinent information before he too passed away.
“Cross is going to kill you, assholes,” were his dying words. Frank called and told the ambulances to slow down.
The investigation conducted by soon to be Corporal Shirley proved them to be employees of Cross’s enterprises and driving a vehicle which was stolen from a business in Quincy, Illinois, just that morning.
We will always remember the day of the drive-by shooting of our workplace, as it was the eve of Lori and Charlie’s little wedding. There were at least ten federal agents at the reception, since they’d be there a few more days investigating the shoot-out. It was a pretty big deal and even hit the national news.
The next day, at noon, she said, “I do.”
About a minute later, I said, “I do.”
I then had her Uncle Roger’s explicit permission to kiss his niece. I had no idea Robert’s brother was a preacher. I thought, like his other one, they were all lawyers. After the service, as we were signing documents, I asked him about it.
“Well, Charlie, our mother and father wanted one of us to have an honest job. Tag, I’m it.”