She’d find out soon enough.
“What about the sheriff’s staff?” she asked.
“What about us?”
“What makes you different from the last batch?”
He flinched. “We’re handpicked—”
“Not elected like the sheriff?”
“No, but—”
“Mack!” Another deputy stuck her head through the office doorway. “You’re wanted at the high school. Stat.”
As Deputy Whittaker reached for his Stetson, Chloe stuffed her pencil, notebook and camera in her backpack, then activated her pocket tape recorder. When the two deputies left, Chloe trotted along right behind, observing every move, picking up every word.
“What’s the story?” Whittaker asked.
“Rival groups again,” the second deputy answered. Her name tag read Breckinridge. “Same old beef. This time someone pulled a knife.”
“Do we have anyone out there?”
“McMillan and Sooner answered the call. The kids are being held in the school cafeteria until you and the parents get there. Most of them are from The Program. That’s why Principal Cox called for you.”
Chloe didn’t understand everything they were saying. She hoped the recorder was picking it up, allowing her to get clarification later. This was the kind of eye-witness involvement she’d anticipated, the kind that would lead to a compelling story. Her pulse raced.
Deputy Breckinridge halted at the big double doors leading to the parking lot, but Chloe slipped outside behind Whittaker. He didn’t acknowledge her presence.
When he got to his cruiser, she automatically went to the passenger door.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he barked across the roof.
“I’m working my story.”
“Today’s interview is finished.” Abruptly he got into the driver’s side and slammed the door. She opened the passenger door and climbed in, slamming her door for good measure.
“Get out.” By his tone of voice, he meant business.
So did she. “Drive.”
He glared at her.
“While you’re driving,” she added, “you can explain the history of this altercation.”
Muttering under his breath, he turned the key in the ignition. As he pulled the patrol car out of the parking lot, she could feel the anger radiating off him.
“I’m not going to waste time arguing with you.” The veins corded and pulsed along his temple. “When we get back, though, I’m calling the Sun to request your replacement.”
He wouldn’t dare. But in case he did, she hunkered down in her seat and prepared to defend her right to be there.
CHAPTER TWO
IT WAS ALL MACK COULD DO not to speed. At least Deputies Sooner and McMillan had this call under control. The kid—the reporter—wouldn’t be in any danger. Only in the way.
When he heard a click, he looked over at her. She had taken his picture. An itchy heat crawled up the back of his neck to join forces with the headache. “Put that thing away,” he warned, holding up his hand to shield himself.
“You’d better get used to it. Do you know how many photos I’ll have to take to get two or three perfect ones for the article?”
He grasped the steering wheel tightly and concentrated on the double yellow line in front of him. On the evergreens and granite boulders crowding the edges of the two-lane county road. On anything but her. She was an invasion.
“Put it away for this call,” he ground out. “Even under the best of circumstances, you’d have to get written releases to photograph the students. And these aren’t the best of circumstances.”
“But I’m photographing you—”
“Put it away.”
She sighed.
He refused to look at her again.
After several seconds he could hear her zip the camera into her backpack. “Why were you called to the school,” she asked, her words measured, “if your deputies already had the situation in hand?”
He took a deep breath. “This program’s the sheriff’s baby. Right now, I’m acting sheriff.”
“What program?”
He might as well tell her the whole story. She wasn’t going to let up until she got it. “Because of county-wide growth,” he began, “we had to build a third high school. Letting the seniors spend their last year at their two old schools—McEaster and North Colum—the board of ed pulled surplus juniors and underclassmen from the overcrowded schools to attend the new one—Harriman.”
“And if this area is anything like all the others in the South,” Chloe said, “high-school sports rule. They fuel small-town social life and loyalties.” She was quick to catch on.
“Yeah.” He ran his window down. Quick to catch on or not, she made the car’s interior feel too close for comfort. “The underclassmen have settled in fine, but the juniors have the hardest time forgetting. McEaster and North Colum used to be fierce rivals. Now the students from those two schools are expected to pull together for a brand-new school.”
“Deputy Breckinridge said someone pulled a knife this time. That’s extreme.” She had good ears, too.
“You have to understand. Not only are we dealing with the displacement of old school loyalties, but also with an influx of newcomers, mostly affluent families from the city. Plus immigrant workers who’ve come to service an expanding vacation sector. There’s cultural friction…and more. We may be rural, but we aren’t untouched by drugs. Meth has replaced moonshine.”
“And you can never minimize the pressure of teenage hormones.”
Caught off guard by the thoughtfulness in her tone of voice, he hazarded a sideways look at her. “You’ve got it.” Her eyes half closed, she was contemplating him. He snapped his head forward. “So…Sheriff McQuire established a program,” he said, retreating to his spiel. “A public-safety program that’s an offshoot of the Junior Deputy Program we run in the elementary schools. The sheriff put me in charge of the high school.”
“I can’t picture teenagers willingly participating in something called a Junior Deputy Program.”
The cruiser’s two-way radio crackled. As she reached out to adjust the volume, he put out his hand to stop her. Apparently, she wasn’t real good with boundaries.
“At the high-school level,” he explained, “we just call it The Program. And it’s as no-nonsense as its name. We deal with peer pressure,
