There’s a new badge in the land of crime fiction… and it’s pinned on a man who can stand tall alongside lawmen like Raylan Givens, Walt Longmire, and Jesse Stone. Sheriff Colt Harper lives by his own moral code. His relentless crusade against drug crimes in his rural Mississippi County infuriates a Memphis mobster who sends Hack, his cold-blooded assassin, to stop him. ATF Special Agent Molly McDonough, looking to save her troubled career, follows Hack’s trail of corpses to Harper’s turf. The fates of Harper, McDonough and Hack collide in a bloody, brutal showdown for justice, redemption and survival that can only be fought outside the law. Outside the Law By Phillip Thompson Brash Books, LLC Copyright © 2017 Phillip Thompson All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-1-941298-99-2 CHAPTER 1 COLT He climbed out of the car and into the rain falling like silver three-penny nails on a moonless night. Fluorescent lighting bathed the gas pumps in the convenience store parking lot and cast weird splotches of light on the cracked, rain-slick concrete. He pulled on a brown sheriff's department ball cap and squinted at the deputy cars that sat on either side of the pumps, their lights still revolving, slinging blades of vertigo-inducing blue light across the front of the store, which glowed from its windows decorated with neon beer lights. An engine screamed behind him, and he frowned when he turned to see the local TV station's remote truck pull to a stop by one of the deputy cars. He started toward the store entrance, then spotted John standing near the door over a body — male, facedown, smoke still rising out of a blown-out hole in his back. John saw him, stepped from under the store awning, and met him at the pumps. He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the TV truck. "Get those assholes out of here," he said. John turned his head and let loose a piercing whistle that brought a deputy to the door of the store. He pointed at the TV truck, and the deputy — this one in a brown vinyl rain parka with LCSD painted in yellow across the front — trotted over to corral the reporters. He was met by loud groans and a few profanities as they argued with him over the rights of the people and the First Amendment. He and John walked back to the body. "Wayne Freeman," John said. "Owner. He was working the register." He looked at Freeman's body, the longish gray hair askew, his back now a bloody exit wound. His right hand still clutched a semi-auto pistol. Nine millimeter from the look of it. "He hit anyone?" "Hard to tell in this rain. There's a blood smear here," John said, pointing to the window near the door. "But we won't know whose it is for a while." He nodded. "What we got inside?" John scowled. "Two wannabe gangsters — one dead, one beat to a pulp — and one very satisfied Deputy Reynolds." He winced and, on reflex, glanced back at the TV crew setting up in what was now a steady downpour. "Shit. Why did it have to be the meanest deputy I got?" "If by 'mean' you mean racist, yeah, makes you wonder." "Not now, John." He stepped over Freeman's body and into the convenience store, which was a rat's nest of dry goods, groceries, kiosks of all kinds of shit, fishing tackle, and an array of lottery tickets four feet high behind the register. Deputy Tom Reynolds stood toward the back, in front of the wall of beverage coolers. Full uniform, of course, thumbs hooked into his gun belt. His eyebrows were nearly as big as his mustache, and he looked like a younger, uglier version of Mike Ditka, if such a thing were possible. Clearly satisfied with himself. At Reynolds's feet lay a crumpled body that resembled a pile of laundry, except for the pool of blood the size of a trash-can lid that had gathered near the upper half of the torso. From where he stood, he could tell the corpse was young, black, male. Jeans, high-tops, bright T-shirt that had been yellow before becoming soaked in blood. Sitting behind Reynolds was another young, black male. Hands behind him, presumably cuffed. Dressed like the corpse, but with a blue T-shirt. His left eye was swollen shut, and his bottom lip was split. Blood had spilled down the front of his shirt like a Jackson Pollack painting. "Tom," he said. "Sir." Reynolds always called him "sir" on account of his Marine Corps time, but it still pissed him off. He let it slide. "What you got?" Reynolds cleared his throat. "The owner called in a robbery in progress at 2322. I was heading up Highway 69, so I took the call. Arrived here 2331. Encountered a deceased white male out front, apparently shot through and through with a shotgun. I called for backup, but the two perps inside saw me. "I entered the premises and ordered them to halt so as to arrest them. They were both armed. "This one," Reynolds said as he pointed to the floor, "decided to take me on. I shot him in the head and a double-tap to the chest. That snub-nose in the blood there is his. "This one," he said, pointing to the