Chapter 1: The Call
Up ahead, Davis froze mid-step.
His laughter died instantly. The confident, swaggering roll of his shoulders vanished, replaced by a sudden, rigid tension that traveled all the way down his spine.
He slowly turned around, his eyes locking onto the phone in the old man's hand. The setting sun caught the silver of Davis’s own rookie badge, glinting sharply as he stared at the weathered man in the worn denim jacket.
Arthur stood exactly where Davis had left him. He didn’t look angry. He didn’t look afraid. He looked utterly, terrifyingly patient.
“What did you just say?” Davis demanded, his voice dropping an octave, losing its mocking lilt. He took a hesitant step back toward the rusted Ford pickup.
Arthur didn’t lower the phone. He kept it pressed to his ear. Through the receiver, the gruff voice of Deputy Commissioner Thomas Marshall echoed, tiny but sharp in the quiet evening air.
“Arthur?” Marshall’s voice crackled. “What’s going on? Where are you?”
Arthur kept his pale blue eyes fixed on Davis. “I’m on the shoulder of County Road 9, Tom. Just past the mile marker for the old steel mill.”
“Who are you talking to?” Davis snapped, his panic starting to curdle into defensive anger. He took another step forward, his hand instinctively dropping toward his duty belt—not to his weapon, but in a universal gesture of police intimidation. “Put the phone down, old man. I gave you a lawful order to get back in your vehicle.”
“You gave me a suggestion,” Arthur corrected him, his voice flat. “And I’m declining it.”
By the cruiser, Officer Miller finally shifted out of his passive stance. The younger, slightly heavier cop jogged forward, his boots crunching on the gravel.
“Hey, Davis, let’s just get out of here,” Miller muttered, his eyes darting between Arthur and the cell phone. He hadn't heard the name clearly, but he recognized the sudden shift in the atmosphere. The power dynamic on the side of the highway had just flipped, and Miller’s instincts were screaming at him to retreat.
“Shut up, Miller,” Davis hissed. He pointed a trembling finger at Arthur. “I said put the phone away. You are interfering with a traffic stop. You want to go to jail for resisting? Because I will lock you up right now.”
Arthur finally moved. He lowered the phone from his ear.
For a split second, Davis looked relieved, thinking the threat of jail had worked. His chest puffed out again. He took a step forward, ready to assert his dominance, ready to push the old man around just to prove he could.
But Arthur didn’t hang up. He simply tapped the screen with his thumb.
A sharp beep signaled the speakerphone activating.
“Arthur?” Marshall’s voice boomed from the small speaker, amplified and echoing off the side of the rusted pickup. “Are you dealing with patrolmen? What the hell is happening out there?”
Davis stopped dead. All the color drained from his face, leaving his cheeks a pasty, sickly gray.
Every cop in the state knew that voice. It was the voice that delivered disciplinary rulings at the downtown headquarters. It was the voice that terrified shift sergeants and made captains nervous.
“I’m dealing with two officers,” Arthur said calmly to the phone. “One of them just confiscated my wallet, pulled sixty dollars out of it, put it in his right breast pocket, and threw my badge in the dirt.”