Free Refuge Book 1 - Night of the Blood Sky by Jeremy Robinson, Jeremy Bishop Page A

her sort things out. But Frost was in the back, checking on Avalon. Winslow was bent over a desk, scribbling something like words onto a piece of paper. That left her with Dodge, who was basically the last person with whom she wanted to talk.
    “How long are we supposed to wait?” Dodge asked. He’d been pacing by the door for ten minutes, muttering to himself, and that made her nervous. The muttering, more than the pacing.
    “Isn’t patience a virtue, Pastor?” Rule asked, hoping to distract the man from wearing down a circular path in the linoleum.
    “Ugh.” Dodge rolled his eyes so hard his whole head swiveled around like a bobble-head figure. “That’s not from the Bible. It’s a fifth century poem.”
    “Well,” she said. “It shoulda been in the Bible.” She wasn’t sure why she was egging the man on. Probably because she needed to release some tension. She didn’t feel like she could be serious with him, and he was an easy target.
    Dodge turned to her. “‘Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.’ Romans 12:12. That’s just one of many actual Biblical references to patience.”
    “In that case, Pastor, I don’t see you smilin’, or prayin’, or—”
    “I haven’t stopped praying, Sheriff.”
    So that’s what he’s been doing, she thought, and decided to give him a break. While her faith was about as solid as a Jell-O block, she appreciated that he was putting his to work on their behalf. Of course, she had no idea what he was praying for, but he was a good man. Despite his propensity to cry Devil, Dodge had done a lot of good for the town over the years, and he had helped keep people rooted during the tough times that had predated her reign in the town. In a way, the pair of them kept the town in order using a combination of the world’s law and God’s law. He wrote prayer requests. She wrote tickets. He carried a Bible. She carried a gun, and cuffs, and mace, and a—well, she liked to think she was prepared for the end times Dodge preached about regularly.
    A shadow bounced back and forth on the windows of the station’s front double doors. Someone was running up the steps. She sat up, for some reason expecting a screaming panicked person. Instead, it was Griffin. He yanked open the outer door, stepped through the foyer, opened the second set of doors and entered the office with a confidence she wished she felt.
    Dodge glanced at Griffin, gave him a once over and stepped back. “You have a gun?” He looked at Rule and pointed at Griffin. “He has a gun.” The words came out as part declaration, part warning, like Griffin might go on a shooting spree. Rule half expected Dodge to dive for cover, but this was Griffin and not the Devil, so he stood his ground, waiting for Rule’s response.
    “He’s also got a permit to carry that gun,” she said, deflating Dodge’s inflating anxiety balloon. “And if he didn’t bring it, I was going to give him one.”
    This surprised both men until she reached down to the desk, picked up a circular deputy’s badge and tossed it across the office. The circle-encased star looked like some kind of Japanese weapon as it spun through the air, but Griffin had no trouble catching it.
    He held the badge up. “You sure about this?”
    “If anyone comes in here while we’re gone, they’re going to feel better seeing that badge on your chest.”
    “People here know me,” he said. It wasn’t necessarily a protest. More of a clarification.
    “It’s all about marketing. Perceptions. If you need to make a call, that badge will make people listen faster than the gun on your hip or your good reputation.”
    “If they don’t listen to me, they’ll have to answer to you, is that it?” Griffin smiled, and Rule joined him.
    “Exactly.” She waved him over. “Did you find the phone?”
    “Needs to be charged,” he said.
    “Don’t you need to swear him in or something?” Dodge asked, taking a circuitous route to the side of