High in Trial - By Donna Ball Page 0,39
he hurts himself.”
“Sounds like a light night for a Friday,” Buck said. He glanced through the duty log on the way to his office. He called good morning to the guys who were filling their coffee cups and good night to the ones who were just leaving.
“You know what else we need to do,” Ham said, following him.
“Hire two new deputies.”
“At least. One good case of flu and this county will be wide open.”
“I’m working on it, Ham.” Because he knew that sounded a little short, he glanced up and added, “I appreciate the job you boys are doing.”
Ham rubbed his cheek wearily. “Ah, hell, Buck, we know you’re doing the best you can. It’s just with tourist season coming on and some of the guys are worried about vacation time…”
Buck said, trying for that just right note between patient understanding and confident authority that Roe always used to master so effortlessly, “I know. I’m working on it.”
Ham looked as though he wanted to say something else, but settled for, “Well, I’m ready for some shut-eye. Oh, Rosie said before she left last night to make sure you saw that.” He gestured to a printout on top of Buck’s desk. “An APB on some fellow by the name of Jeremiah Berman. Came in after you left yesterday afternoon. She said you’d tagged him.”
The Hanover County Sherriff’s Department was routinely notified of all APBs in the tri-state area because of their proximity to the junction of North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee. The sheer numbers would have been overwhelming, so only those alerts with a specific reference to Western North Carolina—or those that had been specifically requested by law enforcement in the area—were directed to the Sheriff’s Department inbox. After learning of Berman’s parole violation yesterday, Buck had put in a routine request for an alert if and when his name came up in the system. He hadn’t expected such a quick response.
There was such a jumble of papers on his desk that Rosie had taken to flagging the important ones with red sticky notes. Now there were so many red sticky notes that the word “urgent” had lost its meaning. Buck scrambled among the papers until he found the printout of the computerized bulletin and scanned it quickly.
“Looks like he drove off without paying at a gas pump in South Carolina,” Ham supplied. “The police traced the plates and found they were stolen. Parole violation, theft by taking, armed and dangerous.”
The printout included two camera shots: one of a thin-faced man with a scraggly beard, the official prison ID photo, and the other of a six-year-old blue Chevy pickup truck. Unfortunately for Berman, the angle of the camera also clearly showed the presence of an M14 rifle casually stored behind the passenger seat. Failure to report to his parole officer was one thing. Possession of a firearm while in commission of a crime was something else altogether. And Buck couldn’t help noticing the irony of the fact that the technology that might have proven Berman’s innocence twenty years ago was now going to send him back to prison for what might be a very long time indeed.
“Do we need to keep a lookout for this fellow, Sheriff?”
Buck frowned as he read the paper. “Killianville?” he said. “That’s nowhere around here, is it?”
“Nah, it’s farther toward the coast. You’re headed toward Charleston, you’ll see exits for Surreytown, Killianville, Pembroke. Two hundred miles away, easy.”
Buck relaxed. “Well, that’s something anyway.” He slid behind the desk and unlocked his computer, still puzzling over the printout. “Why the hell South Carolina?”
Ham said uncertainly, “Something we need to know, Sheriff?”
“Hmm?” Buck tapped the Enter key impatiently, urging the screen to come up. He glanced at Ham absently. “No. Nothing yet. Get some sleep, Ham. Tell Adele hi for me, okay?”
“Yes, sir. Okay, will do. Have a good day now.”
But Buck was already deep into the information on the screen, and he didn’t even notice when Ham left.
He was still researching updates when his cell phone rang ten minutes later. He glanced at the caller ID and answered with, “Hey. Listen to this. Berman apparently left Georgia yesterday after ‘borrowing’ his brother’s pickup truck with an M14 in the back. Changed license plates somewhere in South Carolina and stole a tank of gas late last night in Killianville. Abandoned the truck in a mall outside of Pembroke, where we can assume he picked up another car. The rifle wasn’t found.”
Wyn said, “Good morning. I love you