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51: The Beginning Chapter 3 Part 2
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2025-09-12 06:44:45“How did that call to Ms. Johnson’s house go last night? I heard it was you and Andy. Why were you with Andy, anyway?” Little Bob fired off without pausing in his work.
“How did you know about that call?” Lindsay asked.
“I could tell you that it's because I take my job seriously and keep informed about everything so that I can pass it on to you. However, the real reason is that my mother called me this morning. She and Ms. Johnson go to church together. You seem to have made quite the impression on her, and she is hard to impress,” Little Bob answered.
“Well, thankfully, she was fine, but something damaged her phone box at the back of her house. As far as why I was with Andy, it was because Andy came to my house yesterday evening. It seems as though Big Bob had told him that if he did not come to talk to me, I would fire him. The call came in while Andy was still at my house. He wasn’t familiar with that area, so I went with him and drove,” Lindsay said. “Is there anything else you want to know?”
Little Bob was still taking things off the walls as he asked, “Why did Big Bob tell him that? I mean, besides the fact he wanted to mess with the poor guy.”
“I think that was his only reason. I have to say that Andy surprised me. He did pretty well. He was able to answer my questions and even ask me a few of his own. We do need to work on him getting better at interacting with women, but we need to be nice about it. The last thing we need is for him to have a nervous breakdown,” Lindsay told him.
Little Bob stepped off the ladder again, walked over to a chair in front of her desk, and sat down. He looked like he was trying to figure out how to say something.
“Lindsay, my mother told me what the call was. Was one of those things out there?” Little Bob asked.
“I don’t know. We didn’t see anything,” Lindsay said, staring at her desk. “I can tell you that it smelled the same. Andy smelled it too, and so did Ms. Johnson.”
“Why would it rip out her phone?”
“I don’t know. I doubt that it was actually trying to prevent Ms. Johnson from calling anyone, even though it appeared that way. I think it was just a random act,” Lindsay replied.
Little Bob stood up and walked back over to the wall where he had been removing things. Lindsay was thankful he did not push things further. He was among the few people who believed her and had been on her side when she was fired. She heard the click of Cat’s high heels and saw her approaching her office.
“So, what attacked the old lady’s house last night?” Cat asked as she walked back over to where Little Bob was working.
“Seriously, that is how you ask?” Lindsay asked, shocked at how blunt Cat had been.
“Sorry, but I figured it was easier to get it out there than to beat around the bush,” Cat said.
“One, please refer to her as Ms. Johnson or even Rita. Next, I don’t know what it was. It was an animal of some kind. That is all I know. Which reminds me, I need to call the conservation department about what happened last night,” Lindsay told her.
“I called the conservation department last night after you asked me to call the phone company for her. The game warden was the one who just called. He went out there this morning and had no idea what it was. He said there was still a strong smell of something, but he couldn’t say what it was,” Cat informed her and Little Bob.
“Sounds like it was one of them again,” Little Bob said without turning from what he was doing.
“Them?” Cat asked, confused.
“Don’t worry about it,” Lindsay told her.
Little Bob and Cat continued to remove the trophies from the walls as Lindsay continued with her paperwork. She was trying to focus on it, but was having difficulty doing so. She knew that people would be asking her all kinds of questions. What happened to the old sheriff? Why was she fired? Why was she asked to be the interim sheriff? She knew she needed to have diplomatic answers to any questions. Quite frankly, a diplomatic explanation for what happened to the old sheriff was starting to look like that would be the hard one.
As she went through the stacks of reports and information that should have been filed months earlier, she found things that did not make sense. There were far more discrepancies than could be written off to human error, simple mistakes, or even blatant carelessness.
“Cat,” Lindsay said, looking up from her paperwork, “Where is our chief deputy? I have not seen him since I took over.”
Cat turned toward her. “He is on vacation for the next three weeks. The sheriff approved his vacation request just minutes before he resigned.”
“Why would the sheriff give the chief deputy three weeks of vacation, then resign minutes later?” Lindsay said as she rubbed her forehead.
“I don’t know. I couldn’t make sense of that either,” Cat answered.
“Bob, do you know anything about it?” Lindsay asked Little Bob.
“I have no idea, but that definitely sounds wrong. You want me to call Big Bob and see if he knows anything about it?” he asked Lindsay.
“That would be great. Would you do that now? I keep looking at all of this, and things are not adding up,” Lindsay said as she motioned to all the stacks of paper on her desk.
“Not a problem,” Little Bob said as he took the last trophy, a stuffed squirrel, off the wall and handed it to Cat to put in a box.
Little Bob and Cat gathered up the boxes and ladder and left Lindsay’s office. Lindsay knew she was lucky to have them working there during the day. Even if Lindsay was not there for some reason, things were in good hands. She continued going through the forms and reports that were piled around her. The numbers were off on everything. Some of the reports had been completed but had not been submitted to the state. Other reports did not match the calls received by the department or the reports that had been taken. The number of crimes, the types of crimes, the number of tickets, and the demographic to which tickets had been issued were all incorrect. Now, she was wondering if any of the previous ones were correct. How long had this been going on? Why was the better question? Just then, a knock on her open door interrupted her train of thought. Cat was standing there.
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51: The Series 51: The Storm Chapter 2 Part 2
The drive back to the sheriff’s department was quiet. Little Bob and Annie sat in the back seat. Lindsay looked in the rearview mirror and checked on them. She could not understand what he was saying, but she could see that Little Bob was softly talking to Annie and holding her hand as if she were one of his daughters. Lindsay thought back to when she had started at the department years earlier. He had known her for many years and treated her the same way, even though she had worked for another department. Little Bob always tried to take care of everyone and make them feel better. That was part of why he was so good at his job. That was part of why she had given him the position of Chief Deputy. When they pulled up in front of the sheriff’s department, Lindsay and Wren exited the car and opened the back doors for Annie and Little Bob. “I got her,” Little Bob said as he began to help Annie out of the car and into the building. “Wren, why don’t you have Bob help you get Annie back t
51: The Series 51: The Storm Chapter 2 Part 1
Lindsay and Wren arrived at the scene where Little Bob and Annie had hit something. When they pulled up, Little Bob was staring at the car before he began to walk toward them. Annie was at the side of the road, bouncing up and down. As she did, her ponytail bounced up and down, making her look even younger than she was. “When you said she was young, you weren’t kidding,” Wren said, watching Annie. Lindsay replied, “I told you she’s barely legal to carry a gun. Did you think I was joking about that?” “No, but good grief, she looks like she’s twelve,” Wren said. “I know. Annie makes me feel old, and no comments from you about my age. Remember, you are older than I am,” Lindsay said. They got out of the car just as Little Bob reached them. He just stood shaking his head. Wren reached into the backseat of Lindsay’s car and retrieved a black case. “I hit something, and it is still there on the road, but for the life of me, there is nothing there,” Little Bob said, shaking his head.
51: The Series 51: The Storm Chapter 1 Part 2
Lindsay did not even finish reading the report; she closed it and pushed it across the desk toward Wren. She looked at him and could see in his eyes that what she and the department were dealing with bothered him. “Sweetheart, I know you can’t tell me about all of this,” she said as she motioned to her desk and the map on her office wall. “But do you have any idea as to how long this is going to go on? I can barely find deputies to replace those who quit because of this stuff. The only deputies whom I know are not going anywhere are the Bobs, Andy, and Max. I hired Annie, and so far so good, but she is fresh out of training and barely old enough to carry a gun.” “I wish I knew, but I have to say what you and this department are doing is a huge help. I don’t have the resources to track and locate everything, and your idea of this map has been more helpful than you know,” Wren said. “I promise I will tell you everything I can as soon as possible.” “I know you will. Do you want to cal
51: The Series 51: The Storm Chapter 1 Part 1
Lindsay Gold was pulling her patrol car up in front of the sheriff’s department and parking when Little Bob began to walk toward her. Little Bob said, shaking his head, “I can’t believe that you hired that girl. She is going to drive us all crazy.”“Let’s go inside and talk about it,” Lindsay said. As they went inside, Cat was waiting for them, and Annie was sitting in a chair beside the desk that Little Bob used. Cat looked at Lindsay and raised an eyebrow as if she was questioning her. Lindsay looked at Cat and then back at Annie, who was still sitting in the chair. The only thing she thought was that it was too early in the day for this. She motioned for Cat to follow them into her office and closed the door behind them. “OK, yes, I know she is young and inexperienced, and she talks nonstop, but she is also here and wants the job. It has been weeks, and she is the only one who wanted it. What else was I supposed to do?” Lindsay asked, looking at Cat and Little Bob. “Anyway, B
51: The Series 51: The Storm Prologue
Sheriff Lindsay Gold sat in her office, looking at the file of the one person who wanted to work for her. Losing Deputy Keith Abernathy had been a blow to her and everyone who worked for the sheriff’s department. When he had quit, others quickly followed suit. She read what she had in her hands, and she agreed with the decision that Big Bob and Little Bob had made about who to hire. Over the past few weeks, she and the Bobs had called at least two dozen people who had applied to work there in the past, and all of them refused the job. A few who had been working as reserve or volunteer deputies had even said they wanted to quit doing that. Lindsay hoped this person would want to work there for a while, even with all the weirdness that had been going on in the county. Lindsay heard the door chime on the department’s main door. She looked up to see a very short young woman standing at the counter, speaking with Cat, the day dispatcher. She saw Cat turn and walk toward her open office doo
51: The Series 51: The Beginning Chapter 16 Part 4
When they reached where Lindsay was sitting, the little creature looked up at them and waved as if it had been trained. They could see that it had blue eyes, almost the color of the ocean. It slowly walked upright to Wren, touched him on the leg with one hand, and held up the other, almost as if it were a greeting. It then moved on to each of the other men and then back to Lindsay, sitting on her leg and lifting her hand back to its head.“I think you have a pet,” Wren told Lindsay.“She will never be a pet. She’s just lonely,” Lindsay said. Randy asked, “How do you know it is a she?” “I will sound crazy, but I just feel it,” Lindsay told him.“Well, it is an almost rainbow-colored flying monkey, so I would say that crazy is the new normal around here,” Randy grinned.Wren asked Lindsay, “Would you be willing to help put this little girl in the van for the trip?” “Of course,” she told Wren. “Let me get up, little girl. You need to go with these men to your new home. I will carry you
