Flashover Pt. 02

Sean looked at his ringing phone in annoyance. Between talking to Pete about the arson, having to explain to an irate woman that pregnancy was not a valid excuse to park in front of a fire hydrant, and then lunch, he hadn't gotten anything done today he'd planned to do. With a sigh, he lifted the handset. "Sean."

"Mayor Klinger is here to see you," Kim said.

He rolled his eyes. He'd found out the North State Textiles fire was arson less than three hours ago and already Rudy was here. He probably wanted to know if he'd arrested the guy yet. "Send him back," he replied then placed the phone back in its cradle.

This was the first time Rudy had paid him a visit since the Locoste incident. Rudy had seemed contrite after he'd given him so much hell for investigating his longtime friend once Sean had been proven right. Now, after the news Pete had given him about the arson, he wondered if they were going to be right back where they started.

"Mayor Klinger," Sean said, rising and motioning to a guest chair in silent invitation.

Rudolph Klinger was greying, at least seventy pounds overweight, and hadn't changed his appearance in decades. Wearing a brown suit with a wide striped tie and a slicked back pompadour, he looked like he'd stepped out of a nineteen seventies men's catalogue.

"Sean. Good to see you again," Rudy replied as he settled into one of Sean's brown leather guest chairs.

Most of the police station was a typical government building with inoffensive paint, tile floors, and utilitarian furniture. Sean's office, however, was much nicer than the rest of the building thanks to his predecessor. He still had the green and ivory fake marble tile floor, but his walls were trimmed with dark wood wainscoting and he had nice leather furniture and a wood desk. When he'd moved into the office it was a blank canvas, and was still mostly that way. Bill had removed everything except the furniture, the American and North Carolina flags, and a couple of paintings of Brunswick by a local artist.

"How can I help you?" Sean asked.

"I want to talk to you about Tilley."

Rudy's response surprised Sean. He'd assumed Rudy was there to talk about the fire. "Okay. What about it?"

"Hudson Voiles, the Tilley mayor, is asking if we'd, more specifically, you, can take over the policing of their town."

Sean rocked back in his chair, unsure he'd heard Rudy correctly. "He wants the Brunswick PD to provide law enforcement for Tilley? Why?"

"A couple of reasons. One, their police force is overwhelmed and they don't have the resources to hire more officers. Second, what you did with the Thacker case has impressed the hell out of everyone." Rudy looked down, obviously still smarting over his actions and how he'd tried to influence the investigation. He looked back up. "You've proven you can get the job done." Rudy paused again. "Lastly, because it's a proposal I made to them years ago, back in my first term."

Sean's eyes widened slightly as he leaned forward again. "You proposed the idea? Why?"

"Because Brunswick was dying. We were headed in the same direction as other small towns as we lost jobs and residents to Raleigh and Fayetteville. When I took office, I had the idea that if Brunswick, Abbyville, and Tilley combined our resources, we'd be stronger together than we are separately. I approached Abbyville and Tilley with the idea of our towns forming a partnership and working together to support each other. Part of that was Brunswick would provide essential services, specifically, water, sewer, police, and fire. They took us up on the water and sewer, but not the police and fire. Until now."

"Why the change?"

Rudy shrugged. "I don't know, but I assume it's because we're beginning to turn the corner. The Mills at Brunswick is just the latest development and we're still recruiting hard. We're growing again. I think it's gotten their attention and, Tilley at least, wants to hitch their wagon to ours." He paused and looked at his hands. "I suppose you heard about the rape last week?"

"Yeah."

"Sixteen years old. This isn't the first time something like that happened. A couple years ago, before you got here, a young woman was kidnapped, raped, and murdered. She was attending SCCC, Siouan County Community College, studying to be a nurse. Beautiful girl. It was a real tragedy, and they never caught the guy who did it. I think Tilley is fed up, their police force isn't getting the job done, and I think they're looking to you, hoping you can make things better."

Sean nodded slowly. "What's in it for us?"

"Money for one thing, but more importantly, it gives us a bigger presence. If we can bring Tilley under our wing and work together as one community, we go from a population of around eleven thousand to nearly seventeen. If we can add Abbyville, then we'd be at nearly twenty-five. We'll never be able to compete with Raleigh, but with a combined population of twenty-five thousand, working together we can out compete all the other small towns in the area for development and growth."

"And Tilley can't do this without our help?"

Rudy shook his head. "Tilley and Abbyville are dying. When the jobs began leaving, it hit them harder than it did Brunswick, and it hit us plenty hard. Crime is a real problem for them, and people are fleeing. The only people left in Abbyville and Tilley are those who can't leave. Their police can't handle it. Tilley only has four officers, one of which is their chief, and they can only respond to emergencies. The town is thick with drug dealing and God only knows what else. They have a really bad reputation, and I think it's deserved, but they want to change that. Hud came to me yesterday and asked if my offer was still on the table."

"I know, but what I don't understand is how this works. If they can't afford to hire more officers, how are they going to afford to pay us? What makes them think we can do a better job than their own force?"

"That's what I want to talk to you about. What's it going to take to clean up the town? Is this something that's even possible?"

Sean thought about it for a moment. "We can do it, Rudy, but not with what we have now. With sixteen officers, we're actually a little thin just covering Brunswick. Brunswick is pretty safe so we can handle it, but there's no way we can take on another six thousand people, not without more manpower, especially as bad as it is there."

Rudy nodded. "Hud, he wants this. They're ready to make the commitment to working together with us, and they know the first step is to get their crime problem under control. They've gotten a grant from the feds and the state to help pay for it. We've cut them a deal on the price, so they're ready to pull the trigger."

"What kind of deal?" Sean asked, his eyes narrowing slightly.

"Brunswick will eat all the benefits and admin costs, and we'll provide all the equipment. Basically, they're paying a flat fee for each officer, and we'll take care of the rest."

"So, it's just police now? Not police and fire?"

"Just police for now. They have a volunteer fire department." Rudy snorted. "That seems to be the only city service that's working."

"Why are you willing to give them a deal like that?"

"Because this is a good deal for Brunswick too. Part of our recruiting problem is the crime rates of our neighbors. I'm not willing to take it in the shorts for them, but the admin costs are nominal. Getting those places cleaned up so it stops tarnishing our name will make it money well spent."

"I'll have to look into it before I can give you any kind of answer. The short answer is 'yes, we can do it,' but what it'll take, I don't know. Give me a couple of days to work something out and I'll get back to you with a plan, but I'm telling you now, it's going to require more officers. Certainly more than the four they have now. Depending on the call volume, it may even require another 9-1-1 operator and dispatcher."

Rudy nodded. "Tell me what you'll need and what it'll cost, and then we can go from there. I'm not trying to rush you, but make it as fast as you can. I want to move on this as soon as possible. If we can bring Tilley into the fold and begin to turn things around there, maybe Abbyville will follow."

Sean watched Rudy a moment. "And the officers who work in Tilley will report to me? What will Coop think of that?" Wayne Cooper was the police chief in Tilley, and Sean knew how he'd feel if he were put in Coop's shoes.

Rudy shrugged. "I don't know. Not our problem, really. That's Hud's problem. If that's how you want it setup, make it part of your proposal. I want this to work, Sean, and you're going to know more about how to make it work than I am. I'm not going to tell you how to do your job." He gave Sean an apologetic smile. "Well, not anymore. I learned my lesson the last time."

Sean nodded. Maybe Rudy wasn't such a bad guy after all. "That's the way it'll have to be. If I'm going to have the responsibility, I need the authority, and I don't want someone bucking or undermining me."

Rudy nodded in return. "I understand completely. We'll present Hud with your proposal and then go from there. If we can't come to some sort of agreement..." he shrugged.

"I'll take a tour of Tilley later today and start putting some ideas together. As soon as I figure out what I need, I'll get a proposal on your desk."

Rudy nodded. "I'll go ahead and tell you now that your computer upgrades are going to be in this year's budget, so factor that in as well."

Sean smiled at the news. "Good. If Tilley is as bad as you say, we're going to need them or we're going to be buried in paperwork."

Rudy stood. "I won't keep you. When do you think you can have something on my desk?" When Sean glared at him, he held up his hands in surrender. "I'm not rushing you, but I need to tell Hud something. Are we talking a couple of days, a week, or what?"

"Say a week to be safe."

Rudy nodded again. "Good enough. Thanks, Sean."

"I'm leaving a little early," Sean said as he stepped into the dispatcher's office. "I have to take a quick tour of Tilley."

"Oh? What's up?"

"I need to do a little fact finding."

Kim bobbed her head once in understanding. "See you tomorrow then."

Abbyville, Brunswick, and Tilley, or ABT as the locals called it, had once been three completely separate towns. Over the years they had grown toward each other until there was little to separate them from one another other than an occasional sign. Now Brunswick was growing again and was gradually surrounding its two smaller neighbors.

He slowly drove through Tilley's dilapidated downtown. Most of the businesses were boarded up or displayed dusty windows looking into vacant stores. Brunswick's downtown area was thriving with small mom and pop stores, professional offices, and a few restaurants, but the only building which appeared to be occupied in Tilley was a secondhand clothing store, and it had a Closed sign hanging on the door. It was nearly five, and with the exception of a couple of clusters of men who watched him pass with suspicious eyes, he saw no one.

It was areas like these that were breeding grounds for crime and drug use. He reached the end of the small downtown and turned right. Tilley was too small to get lost in and he wandered aimlessly through the town. As he prowled through the residential areas, his lips pursed in sympathetic despair. Every now and again he saw a house that someone took pride in, but they were the exception. He saw many abandoned houses, and the rest were in desperate need of attention. Most were in ill repair with sagging gutters and flaking, sun bleached paint. Weed choked yards, oil-stained driveways, and near derelict cars with crushed body panels and ruined paint were the rule.

Most of the houses were small, and the few people he saw were often sitting on porches, fanning themselves slowly, watching with blank faces as the world passed by. Occasionally he saw a child playing, but mostly it was empty yards. It was a depressing sight and he wondered if the lack of kids was because people were afraid to let their children play unsupervised.

Most towns had a depressed area along with a more affluent section, but nowhere in Tilley did he see a well-maintained and prosperous group of homes. Other than the occasional house with a well-tended yard and semi-fresh paint, all of Tilley was sliding into ruin. Rudy said the only people left in Tilley were those who couldn't leave, and the general state of the town reinforced that idea.

There was evidence the town had once been, if not prosperous, at least not struggling to survive. Occupying a large corner lot was an ornate brick church that once rang with the song of worshipers. Now it was abandoned, its roof collapsing from a fire and many of the windows broken. At the edge of town, he discovered a vacant building that had once housed shiny new cars, the old signage for GM Service still visible on the wall. Like most of the businesses, the Chevrolet dealership appeared to have closed at least thirty years before, probably about the time the jobs began to leave. According to what he could find, the ABT area had lost nearly ten-thousand residents from their heyday in the sixties. Brunswick was beginning to prosper again as a bedroom community for Raleigh, but Tilley was still struggling.

He hated to judge based on appearances, but at half the size of Brunswick, it appeared Tilley would be twice the problem. Tilley was full of desperate people performing desperate acts to survive. If they took over jurisdiction they were going to have to move into the town in force and establish a presence to send a signal to the criminal element that things were changing. That was going to create a lot of resentment and resistance from the thugs and hoodlums who were preying on these people, but if the town was asking for help, hopefully that meant the general population would welcome the officers and the increased patrols. It was never easy to clean up a town, and it'd take time before the predators decided to leave and find easier targets, but he was certain it was something his department could do, so long as they had the manpower and the support of those they were trying to help. He wanted to help. Nobody should have to live in fear and despair as these people appeared to. Tilley was trying to pull itself up by the bootstraps, like Brunswick had, and he wanted to give them a fighting chance to succeed.

He'd seen what he needed to. Rudy wasn't going to like what he had to say, but he wasn't going to sugar-coat the truth. Tomorrow he'd start working up his report, and then he'd see if Rudy still thought taking over the patrols of Tilley was a good idea.

Sean was busy in his small kitchen when he heard the knock at his door. It was probably Maggie, but even so, she was going to have to wait a moment. He dipped the last two fish cakes out of the oil, placed them on a baking sheet, and then slid them into the oven. He flipped off the heat under the oil, sat the pan onto another element to cool, and then quickly moved to the door.

"Sorry," he said, opening the door and stepping to the side. "You caught me right in the middle of something."

Maggie stepped in and smiled before kissing him in greeting. "Smells wonderful. What is it?"

"Cod cakes, baked beans, and coleslaw."

When she cooked, Maggie made traditional southern favorites, and when he cooked, he did the same with New England and Boston classics. He didn't mind cooking. Before he'd met Maggie, he cooked for himself most nights. The only frustration was trying to find some of the proper ingredients, especially the fresh fish. He'd stumbled across some nice-looking cod in the grocery store, so he picked up a couple of pounds in preparation of making the cakes. He'd started the meal last night, after he got home from Maggie's, preparing ahead so it would go faster today.

She peeked in the oven. "Those look wonderful!"

He smiled at her compliment. He'd already introduced her to his recipe for Boston Baked Beans, which she liked, and Boston coleslaw. His slaw was creamy and made with mayonnaise, which was different than what was typically served in the area, but she claimed to like that as well. "It'll be about thirty minutes before the cakes are done, then we'll be ready. Want a glass of tea?"

"I'd love one, thanks! I'm parched."

He retrieved a glass from the cabinet, added a few cubes of ice, and then poured the tea from her pitcher, the one with the green lid and far too much sugar. There was another pitcher of unsweetened tea for himself, with a white lid. Now that the weather had warmed up, he understood the appeal of iced tea. They'd tried to find a compromise, so he and Maggie didn't have to go through the hassle of two pitchers, or her having to add sugar, but when he thought the tea was far too sweet, she didn't think it was nearly sweet enough. So, for now, it was two pitchers.

She took the glass, hoisted it in thanks and took a large pull. "Ahhh... Perfect. I can't believe you don't like this," she teased.

"I can't believe you don't have hyperglycemia."

She snickered. "Years of training."

He shook his head in amusement, pouring off the oil and then washing up the pan he'd used to sear the fish. He refilled her glass and then took her elbow and steered her into the living room. There was no point standing in the kitchen while the fish baked. He slid a thin red sleeve off the television stand.

"Look what I got today," he said, handing her the disc he picked up at a Redbox.

She took it and glanced at it. "Arrival! I've been wanting to see this!"

"I know."

"You're so good to me," she said, putting the disc down and giving him a fleeting kiss. "We'll watch right after dinner?"

"That's what I'd planned."

She softly clapped her hands in child-like delight, beaming at him as she did. She was so vibrant and effervescent he enjoyed surprising her just to watch her reaction. "I'm going to have to restart my DVD subscription. I love streaming, but there are so many things I want to see that aren't on streaming yet, and I don't know if they ever will be. Why can't Netflix stream everything?"

He shrugged. "I'm sure they'd love to. It's a lot cheaper to stream video than send DVDs through the mail. Get your air conditioner fixed?" he asked, changing the subject as they settled into their customary places on the couch.

"No. The coil is leaking. They've ordered a new part, and it should be here in a couple of days. It was hotter than seven hells in the office today and it's screwing up our lab."

"What are you going to do?"

"We bought a couple of fans today, and that helped, but it's supposed to be hotter tomorrow than today. We may have to contract out our lab work until the we get the air fixed."

"I don't know how anyone lived down here before air conditioning."

"You get used to it. We're getting soft because everyplace is air conditioned now, but my parents didn't have air conditioning in their house until I was in grade school, and then it was just a couple of window units. And the schools didn't have air conditioning until after I graduated."

"Ugh. I can't imagine."

"Why do you think so many people my age and older have their birthdays in the summer? Before air conditioning, it was too hot to make babies in the middle of summer."

"Thank god for air conditioning!"

She grinned. "Amen to that. What about your day?"

He shook his head as he twisted his lips to the side in a crooked grin. "Nothing much. I got a visit from Mayor Klinger today."

"Uh oh. That doesn't sound good."