Deputy Kaelin drew his side arm and strode toward the front door, checking with a quick dart of his head through the window for any sign of movement. He pounded on the door in the approved police manner. His heart also pounded, either with excitement, or from running up the long drive - he wasn't sure which.
"Anna! Anna! Are you in there? Are you okay? We got a call about a disturbance. Anna!"
He motioned for his backup to go around to the back. Boy, that training up at State had really paid off; the other officers knew just where to be, just how to move, just how to wait for his signal. His little department was all coming together in a rush, but first he had to look after Anna and make sure she was all right. He made as if to pound on the door again, but his wrist was grabbed and held by a large, furry white paw.
"Are you trying to wake the Dead?" said the Easter Bunny.
Kaelin stared in slack-jawed disbelief. The rabbit held up a basket full of jelly beans as proof, then knocked softly on the door.
"You have to call them softly, like this: 'Ooooo. Oooo-wooo. Ooooo,' and then they'll come back."
Kaelin thought it was the saddest sound he'd ever heard, but was outraged that he was being upstaged by a big white rabbit. Just then, the door opened with a bang, and Anna stood on the threshold wearing a blue dress with a white apron. Kaelin had to admit she looked kind of hot. In token of this he eased his equipment belt, the heavy leather creaking in a satisfyingly masculine way, and said nothing other than "Evening, ma'am." It seemed like the right thing to say, the right thing to do.
With barely a glance in his direction, Anna reached into the Easter basket and picked out all the red jelly beans, and began eating them with evident glee. She looked sidelong at him and walked back into the house, only now it wasn't her house, it was his living room.
He reached out for her and said, "Oh, c'mere, you. Gimme all the green ones."
*BANG!* *ring* *ring* *ring* *crash*
Deputy Kaelin found himself staring up at several wads of ancient chewing gum stuck to the underside of his coffee table. The phone was on the floor, a tiny voice issuing inquiringly from the handset, and his head hurt. He deduced that he had fallen off the couch again and sat up slowly, rubbing his neck. After a moment's thought, he remembered that he didn't like green jelly beans at all, and picked up the phone. It was Lewis, the duty guy back at the cop shop.
"Um, took you a while to answer. Y'all want me to phone back later, or maybe not at all?" Lewis was one of those guys that wanted to know about everybody else's doings, but he never dished the dirt in return.
"No, dammit. I was taking a nap. What?" Kaelin's tone indicated the truth about his well-oiled machine of a department; most of the guys were volunteers with no training and less sense. Yes, that had been part of the dream, too.
"Waaa-al, you might want to take a run out to check on that little lady Anna again. That little fussbudget Miss Lily was seen poking around in the bushes outside before she went in, and then later she came out of the house with some guy, and then they left in a big hurry. The neighbor lady - Mrs. Peabody, the one that runs the church socials? She seen everything.
"Anna? Anna left with some guy?" The last tattered shreds of his dream evaporated.
"No, Lily. The little girl. She left hollering and wiggling fit to bust and crying. And there's this other call about a fight at the Opelika Inn, but I thought you might could go check on things at Miss Anna's house, and I'll send Otis over to the Inn. Probably someone rolled a drunk businessman. Not important."
Deputy Kaelin struggled to get his equipment belt on while he juggled the phone and grabbed for his keys. "Never should have taken a nap," he thought numbly. "Now I'm all screwed up for the rest of the day." The leather belt was tighter than he would have liked, but he got it buckled in the end.
He tore over in his patrol car to the old house Anna had taken and took the steps two at a time. His heart pounding, he noted glumly that the girl's backpack was wedged in the door, as if it had been torn from her shoulders as she left. It was a blatant clue - "signs of a struggle," the next morning's paper would read. He knocked on the door and callled out.
"Anna! Are you okay? We got a call.." His throat closed up, dry as a bone, and the skin on his arms and neck was stung with tiny pinpricks of fear. "So this is deja vu," he thought.
The door opened with a crash, and he stepped into the most beautiful right hook of his life. It took him totally flatfooted - the irony was not lost on him - and dropped him like a sack of potatoes on the front porch. Anna stood over him, glowering and rubbing her sore knuckles.
"Depitty DAWG! You! Are! Going! To! Tell! Me! justwhythehellyouknowsogoddamnmuch about jewelry somebody bought years ago, and why you know all the details about an old murder case that should have been solved and forgotten back when Ike was running for President. And why everybody else but me in this goddamn one-eyed burg knows so damn much about..."
She collapsed, sliding slowly down the doorjamb to the ground.
"Me. He... they... someone took..." but the rest of her sentence was drowned out by the shrill squawk of Kaelin's walkie talkie, suddenly filled with chatter from every yahoo in town that had a CB, horning in on the emergency channel.
It was something about the Opelika Inn...something bad.
(to be continued)
Posted by captainhoof
at 10:27 AM CDT