The pounding came again.
“Coming,” I said. My voice cracked. “I’m coming.”
I opened the door.
A sheriff was standing on my porch. A real one. Tan uniform, gold star on his chest, a wide-brimmed hat in his hand. He was maybe sixty, tall and thin, with a gray mustache and a face that looked like it had been left out in the sun for a few decades.
Behind him, two patrol cars were parked at the curb with their lights still going. A young deputy was standing by one of them, talking into the radio on his shoulder.
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