Elizabeth
Steele jumped from his spot and sprinted to the front. Terrified of what he might do after everything that he had said, I hurried to follow him, though not before pouring out my beer onto the desert ground and leaving the solo cup behind.
I hated littering, but I hated the prospect of explaining some sort of possible citation for public drinking to my father even more.
I got to the front just in time to hear the garage doors slamming shut, leaving Steele as a one-man show to defend the party against the sheriff. That seemed unbelievably shitty on the part of the rest of the Black Reapers, but Steele showed no signs of resentment or fear. If anything, he seemed a little too eager for the sheriff to get out of his car.
“What’s going on?” I said.
“Let me handle it,” he said. “I’m in charge of dealing with the cops.”
That was somehow even less reassuring than my first thought.
The sheriff kept his blue lights on as he stepped out of the car, wearing the typical sheriff’s hat and a star on his chest. I had never had a run-in with the police like this; even though I had no guilt in anything illegal, it stillfeltlike I had done something wrong. In fact, I couldn’t even remember ever talking to a police officer before.
“Steele, good evening,” the sheriff said, apparently calm at first. “Ma’am, how are you?”
“Fine,” I said, my voice shaky.
“Fine?” the sheriff said, suspicion in his voice. “Ma’am, are you OK? Has this gentleman done anything to you?”
“It’s fine, Davis,” Steele said with a snarl in his voice.
“As the law and order in this town, boy, I’ll be the judge of that.”
The sheriff turned back to me, a real Jekyll and Hyde. The intimidating tone and glare he’d given Steele morphed almost instantly into that of a teacher taking care of the class pet.
“Do you want to go to my car, ma’am?” he said. “We can get away from this boy if you want.”
“I’m fine, I promise, Officer,” I said, still feeling like I’d somehow be guilty of something. “We were just talking out back. He hasn’t done anything but provided a listening ear.”
I could feel Steele relaxing to my right. The sheriff’s face twitched with disappointment before he chuckled.
“Well, Mr. Harrison, I guess you have grown up a bit,” he said. “But tell me, what in God’s name do you and your boys think you are doing here on a Saturday night?”
Grown up a bit?
It was no secret to me that the guys had frequent run-ins with the sheriff. Tara had bailed out Brock before they’d dated, and I needed to only think back a few weeks to the bar fight at Reapers to know they were never more than two steps away from getting in cuffs. But this particular remark seemed more pointed, more personal.
“Throwing a party, officer,” Steele said.
I stole a glance at him. He had a cocky smirk on his face.
“And that is perfectly legal.”
“So I take it then that you are not selling alcohol?” the sheriff said. “Because if you don’t have a license, that’s a fine right there.”
“No, sir, just a private party. Nothing illegal.”
Again, the sheriff’s face twitched, but this time with much greater anger than before. Far be it for me to say as the poster child for being protected and sheltered, but it was painfully obvious there was some sort of corruption or, at least, bias against these guys.
“Ma’am,” he said.
What now? Am I in trouble for being here?
“Are you sure there’s nothing you need to say to me? Are any of your friends inside in danger?”
“That’s enough, Davis,” Steele said. “You want to come here and shut us down, I suggest you have legal means to do so instead of trying to bully us out of it. Your shit isn’t going to work.”
