Free Final Justice by Patricia Hagan

crying and begging him to let her go.
    "What the hell?"
    Sara grabbed his arm. "Whatever it is, stay out of it, Luke."
    He shot her an incredulous look. "But she's just a little kid and look how he's treating her. There's no need for that, and—hey—I've seen that kid before. A picture of her, anyway. She's Ocie Rhoden's girl."
    "Who's Ocie Rhoden?"
    "You remember him. He was the drum major at East Hampton High." East Hampton was the colored high school, and the white kids loved to go to their football games on Monday nights. They enjoyed the spirited music and antics of the band, especially high-stepping, high-strutting Ocie.
    "Oh, yeah," Sara responded thoughtfully, "but how do you know that's his daughter?"
    Luke felt his guts tighten at the way the pot-bellied deputy was shoving her around as he screamed into her face that she was going to jail. "He was in basic training with me at Fort Benning. We stayed in touch and ran into each other in Nam. He showed me her picture. He's still over there, risking his life so fat-assed gestapos can bully his kid."
    His last words were drowned by the slamming of the door. He was out of the truck and sprinting across the sidewalk just in time to grab the deputy's arm.
    "Hey, whaddaya think you're doing?" the deputy roared.
    Luke gave him a rough shove. "I'm saving you from getting your face punched in, tough guy, because that's what's going to happen if you don't get your hands off her."
    With a curse, the deputy went for his gun, but Luke was quicker. Pinning the deputy's arm behind his back, he spun him around and pressed his face against the wall. "You don't want to point a gun at me unless you plan to use it, and if you do plan to use it, you better be fast. Now how come you're picking on Ocie's kid?"
    The little girl rallied from her terror to cry in wonder, "You know my daddy, mister?"
    "I sure do, honey."
    The deputy growled, "You're interfering with the law, buddy. She was stealing."
    The child, buoyed by Luke's intervention, spoke up to defend herself. "That ain't so. I was just lookin' at a doll and holdin' it and walkin' around pretendin' it was mine, but I was gonna put it back. I don't steal."
    The deputy, despite Luke's hold and his face mashed so hard against the brick wall, snickered, "Niggers are natural-born thieves, you lyin' little pickaninny."
    Luke mashed his face harder into the wall to shut him up as he asked the little girl, "Where's the doll?"
    A clerk who had been standing in the doorway watching called out, "I have it." She held up the doll. "She dropped it when he grabbed her."
    "Was she trying to hide it?"
    The clerk hesitated. She did not want to dispute the deputy's word.
    "Well, was she?" Luke repeated loudly, impatiently.
    She shook her head. "I don't guess so."
    He released the deputy. "You stupid jerk. Don't you know you can't arrest somebody for shoplifting until they leave the store with the goods? As long as she was inside, she wasn't guilty of a damn thing."
    "Well, you're the one in deep shit now."
    "No, you are, for dragging her out and accusing her of shoplifting."
    "If I had waited till she left, she'd have took off, and I never would've caught her, fast as pickaninnies can run."
    Luke narrowed his eyes and thought for a minute. Then it dawned on him, and he chuckled, "Faster than you, that's for sure, Howie." He had recognized him—Howell, Howie for short—Camden. He had been a fat slob in high school and still was.
    And Howie recognized him as well. "You might've won a medal, Ballard, but that don't mean nothing around here. The sheriff is gonna be plenty mad when he hears what you did, and—"
    "And you tell him I'm real worried about it, okay?" Dismissing him, he asked the clerk, "How much is the doll?"
    She looked at the square white tag stapled to the doll's gingham dress. "Two-ninety-nine."
    He pulled out his wallet, handed her three one dollar bills, then took the doll and gave it to the little girl. "Now it's yours. Your name's