Chapter 14: Hands on the Hood

Three patrol cars came up the drive and stopped in a line with their lights turning.

I set Poppy down behind my legs and kept one hand on her shoulder.

Carys's truck came over the hill behind them and stopped at the gate.

She stepped out with the old rifle held low in both hands.

"Carys," I said, loud enough to carry. "Put it in the truck bed."

She looked at me for a long moment.

Then she laid the rifle in the bed of her truck, shut the tailgate, and raised both hands.

The sheriff got out of the lead car.

He was a heavy man in a clean hat, and he had eaten dinner at the Faulks' table more than once.

The deputy who had cuffed me at the rodeo got out behind him.

"Rawlins," the sheriff said. "Hands on the hood."

Poppy gripped the back of my jeans.

"Daddy, no."

"It's all right, baby," I said. "Stay right there."

I walked to the patrol car.

I laid both palms flat on the hot hood and spread my feet.

In the war I had been told twice to surrender and had not.

This was harder.

The deputy put the cuffs on, and he put them on tight again.

"Sheriff," Cassidy called, coming across the gravel with her hand at her throat. "He took my daughter out of my trailer and hurt six men."

"I see them, ma'am."

"His woman was up on that ridge with a rifle," Cassidy said, and pointed at Carys.

"I was on the ridge," Carys said. "And I put one round in a stock that was aimed at his chest."

The sheriff looked up at the hayloft.

A man lay in the straw below it, holding his arm, with a rifle in the dirt beside him.

The sheriff walked over and turned the rifle with his boot.

A white tag hung from the strap.

It said ARENA SAFETY, in the same block letters I had seen on the guard's vest.

"That's the rifle he took off the guard at the rodeo," Cassidy said quickly.

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