Free Out of the Blues by Trudy Nan Boyce Page A

her car disappeared down the road. There were nights when he slept over at Salt’s—better to leave in the early morning after a good night’s sleep. “Okay, buddy.” Wills rubbed the dog’s shiny fur, kneaded the lean flank muscles underneath, and followed him to the couch where they both drew deep breaths and began to nod. Wills was soon asleep on the sofa. The dog lay beside him on the floor, ears twitching up when he heard a car on the road, down when it was not her car, his eyes, blinking reflected moonlight, only partially closed, then open.

CHURCH
    V ibrations from the gigantic pipe organ came through the shiny ceramic tile flooring to the soles of her shoes and up to her knees. The auditorium of the colossal Big Calling Church reverberated with bass notes of something in a minor key. Salt began to walk toward the back of the space, looking up in order to locate the position of the organist somewhere high in the sanctuary above. The pews, walls, floors, and even the windows were all finished in shades of beige and pastel pinks. Enormous columns down the sides of the aisles were filigreed with plaster cherubs and doves.
    â€œYou’re not supposed to be in here.”
    Salt startled. “Damn.”
    The two men were sitting together in the otherwise empty nave, less than three feet from where Salt had stopped to look up toward the front. She immediately recognized one of the men as Reverend Midas Prince. His dark features and broad nose were ubiquitous at any and all significant events in the Atlanta public forum—celebrations, televised services, civil rights holidays—wherever themedia gathered. He was wearing a suit that perfectly blended with the décor.
    â€œGet Madison,” he said to the light-complexioned young man beside him who immediately scurried from the pew.
    â€œI apologize, Reverend Prince. I was startled. I didn’t see you there.”
    â€œSo you don’t normally curse? Or just not in the presence of others? Or in God’s house?” He stood and buttoned his suit coat over a collarless light pink shirt.
    â€œI’m sorry.” Salt retrieved her badge case from a back pocket. “Here’s my identification. I’m Detective Alt.” She had to raise her voice above a crescendo from the organ.
    The preacher took the ID wallet and opened it, and then took his time looking back and forth between her photo on the laminated card and her, his nose and mouth scrunched as if he smelled something bad. “How did you get in? All the doors are supposed to be locked.” He leaned toward her so he could hear her answer over the organ, which was rising to a flourish.
    Salt waited for the music to finish, but the organist kept building to what now seemed an ever-distant climax.
    â€œEnough, Karl.” Prince yelled with all his famous oratorical force.
    The silence was immediate, a vacuum in contrast with the previous sonic bombardment.
    The young man returned followed by an Atlanta police officer, dressed in the green fatigues of the SWAT team, their footsteps echoing as they came down the aisle. “Hello, hello, hello, little lady,” hailed Sandy “True Grit” Madison, a square-jawed walking cliché. Even his fellow team members made fun of him, mocking his affected John Wayne walk anytime they could play it for a laugh either behind his back or to goad him. She knew him mostly by his all-hat-and-no-cattle cowboy reputation. But he’d also been with the SWAT when calls on her beat had escalated and procedure required a SWAT response,more manpower and equipment than were available to beat officers—some barricaded gunmen, hostage situations, a couple of suicide and bomb threats, suspicious packages, and explosive materials. He completed his greeting by wrapping her into his six-foot-five bear hug.
    â€œSo you know this woman?” Prince asked him.
    â€œSure, Reverend. Everybody knows Salt. She’s