Page 49 of Mistletoe

“I’ll need to take a look around to make sure you’re not harboring a monster.”

“Do you have a warrant?”

“I can come back with a warrant, or you could just let me search the property, and I’ll be out of your hair.”

“Hmm, no. I think I’m going to insist on that warrant. Signed by a judge, not somesheriff’s warrantyou wrote yourself.”

“There’s no such thing as a sheriff’s warrant.”

“Then you’ll have no problem coming back with an official warrant. I know you’re not expecting a favor. It’s not like we’re friends.” Emma’s tone seemed particularly contrary, as if she were picking at an old wound between herself and the sheriff.

“What’s that noise?”

“Goats.”

“Making that noise?”

“You don’t have much experience with goats.”

“The goats are over there in the pen. I’ll ask you again, what’s in the barn?”

“Winnifred. She tore a tendon and won’t rest, so she’s confined to a stall.”

“Open the barn door, De Lacey.”

“Not without that warrant, sheriff.”

“I’ve got probable cause. Stand aside.”

Hal dared to peek through the window. A woman he did not recognize pushed her way past Emma into the barn.

No. His memory churned slowly. The sheriff. Emma said the sheriff was a witness to the bar fight. She saw Hal and rightly assumed Emma knew something. The sheriff was currently fishing for information, but soon, she’d be hunting monsters properly.

Let her try.

Hal could not go back into a cage. Never again.

“Whatever you do,pleasedon’t look in the hay loft.” Emma’s voice carried out from the barn.

Whatever was said next, Hal did not catch.

“The bottom rung is rotted. I need to replace the whole ladder, honestly.”

More muttering, not loud enough for Hal to hear.

“That looks infected. Is it too soon to be infected?”

Hal bit on a knuckle to keep from laughing.

“What’s in that building?” the sheriff asked, clearly in the mood for malicious compliance.

“That’s the workshop. Nothing in there but old junk,” Emma answered, happy to deliver.

“You wouldn’t happen to have a printing press in there?”

“We don’t have a printing press. Pa’s all talk.”

“Then you don’t mind me having a peek,” the sheriff said.

---