He Called Every Truth a Lie novel · Chapter 23 of 24

Chapter 23: The Correction

The review board met in a conference room at the fire department's headquarters, under a flag and a framed photo of a ladder truck.

Five people sat behind a long table.

Ethan sat alone on the other side of it in his dress uniform, with his hands on his knees.

I sat in the second row with Bridget on my right and Toby on my left.

Behind us the room had filled up in a way nobody had expected.

The woman from the ranch house on the east side sat by the door in a clean blue blouse, with a bruise that had faded to yellow along her jaw.

Behind her sat three women from the Garden Club in their good coats.

The detective stood against the back wall with his arms folded.

The chairwoman of the board looked at her folder.

"Mr. Conlan. You filed an amended report on two calls to the Nordin residence, seven and eleven months ago. You wrote that your original reports were inaccurate."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Your captain says that amounts to a falsified record by your own admission."

"It does." Ethan didn't look at the captain. "I wrote what the husband told me. I didn't write what I saw. I saw pinpoint pupils on a woman who hadn't been drinking. I saw four bruises on her wrist. She asked me not to leave her there, and I wrote that she was intoxicated."

His voice was level.

"Then I left. Twice."

A man at the end of the table cleared his throat.

"And you're asking this board to keep you on the street."

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