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We entered through the back door of the station and Tammy went straight into the break room to start the coffee. The prisoners were entitled to a cup of coffee with each of their meals.
Off the rack in the office, I grabbed the keys to the run and unlocked the door with my good hand. That set off a round of hollering and yelling as I picked up the three bags of food from the floor and went inside.
The two women were crying and trying to tell me something and it was so garbled with sobbing and sniffling, I couldn’t make it out.
I started at the first cell and handed food through the bars to Purcell and Foster. Then I moved along to Gail and Suzie.
I handed the containers to Gail and she said, “That crazy guy at the end with the long hair beat up Suzie’s brother. You need to call a doctor for him.”
“Please help Carter,” sobbed Suzie. “This is all your fault, Sheriff. You put Carter in a cell with a maniac.”
“Those are the chances you take in jail, Suzie. And that’s where you’re going to be for years and years. If I were you, I’d rethink my position. You need to call a lawyer and give me a confession. That would be your best bet.”
In passing Thorn’s cell, I handed him off a breakfast package and then I gave one to Tyrone Reading. He hadn’t said a word since Tammy shot him. Just laid on his bunk and kept his leg elevated.
In the last cell I got a good look at Raza lying on the concrete. He looked dead.
Garrison was lying on his bunk ignoring the world around him. “Garrison, come over here and get your breakfast.”
He stepped over Raza, grabbed his breakfast out of my hand and said, “He ain’t dead.” He stepped over Raza again and went back to his bunk.
I left the run and locked it behind me while calling for an ambulance for Raza. I figured I’d be calling Doctor Olson next. Raza was next thing to dead, but according to Garrison he wasn’t quite there yet.
Tammy and I waited in the office until the ambulance came, then I unlocked the run and showed the paramedics where the patient was located.
I opened the door of the cell and stepped over Raza sprawled on the concrete. Standing next to the bunk, I held my Sig at Garrison’s head while the medics lifted Raza onto a stretcher and rolled him out of the cell.
“You got your privacy back, Tibor. That what you were going for?”
Garrison shrugged and smirked. “He attacked me. It was self-defense.”
“Sure. Enjoy your solitude.”
“Thanks, Sheriff. I ain’t forgetting what you took from me.”
“And I ain’t forgetting what she looked like when I took her out of your trailer. We’re even.”
“Ain’t no even until you’re dead.”
“Same thought I’m having. Good one, Tibor.”
As I left the run, I used my cheerful sheriff voice, “Coffee coming up in a minute people.”
Cut Bank Hospital.
Tammy and I followed the ambulance all the way to Cut Bank to the hospital to make sure our prisoner was secure. When we caught up to the paramedics in the Emergency room, they informed me that Carter Raza had died in the ambulance on the way. He didn’t make it.
DOA.
“Aw, fuck, he’s dead.” I reached for my cell and called Doc Olson.
Thankfully, both his office and his residence were in Cut Bank and not far from the hospital. He met us in the Emergency area about ten minutes later.
He examined the body and then returned to the waiting area where Tammy and I were sitting. “Beaten to death, Travis. Was he a suspect in Chris Concordian’s murder?”
“Yes. I think he and the wife were in it together.”
“He won’t be standing trial,” said the doctor.
