If Sheriff Frank Wilkins hadn’t been so hellbent on covering his own tail, he might have felt his hackles raise as the two men clopped up main street toward the Thorn Hollow jail.
Instead, he was just impressed with his new deputy.
Why, Wilkins had been trying to collar Tommy Chance for the better part of twenty years. All Wilkins really wanted was a few minutes alone with Chance — just long enough to find out how much the young rancher remembered about their first encounter.
Never was able to convince Tommy to sit down and chat, and never could find a charge to pin on him.
But as a first assignment, Wilkins had sent Davy Rusk out to the Chance place to see if he couldn’t convince Tommy to come into town for a spell.
Not that Wilkins thought Rusk would come back with his quarry …
But, by golly, there they were, shuffling along and jawing like they were old friends!
Wilkins greeted the two men at the door with his best phony grin.
“To what do I owe this pleasure?”
Tommy nodded. “Sheriff. Deputy Rusk here says you been wantin’ to talk to me.”
“Oh, yes. That. Well, I just like to get to know all my citizens — you and me never really had a heart to heart.”
Wilkins motioned Tommy to a chair in front of the desk. He didn’t notice Rusk lock the door when he came in.
Or that the deputy pulled out his handcuffs as he stepped behind the sheriff’s chair.
“Now,” Tommy said, propping his feet on Wilkins’ desk as Rusk cuffed the sheriff to his chair.
“Why don’t you explain to me and my half-brother here why you killed our mama and my daddy all those years ago?”
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