Resolve Read Online Free PDF

the smallest of climbs can shake your confidence to the core and cause you to question your resolve.

    “D r. Keller? Dr. Cyprus Keller?” said one of the detectives cautiously. He was expecting one of the older-looking men in the group to step forward.
    Detectives are pretty easy to pick out if you’re accustomed to seeing them. It doesn’t take superhuman observation skills to key-in on the obviously unmarked car, cynical expressions, worn shoes, and unbuttoned coats with foreboding bulges near the hip. The fact that I saw detectives’ badges displayed on their belts may have helped too.
    “Please. It’s just Cyprus.” I answered.
    Cops hate pompous titles. For that matter, so do I.
    “What can I do for you detectives?” I asked.
    Then, my thoughts raced to the point where they should have already been.
    “Is my wife okay?”
    The smaller of the two detectives, the one wearing the black leather jacket, said, “I’m sure your wife is fine. This isn’t a family matter or anything like that. Do you have a minute?” He gestured to a picnic table that was away from my colleagues and any roaming ears.
    My colleagues told me they would catch up with me later as I walked—slightly out of breath and covered with sweat—with the detectives over to the table. I’m used to being around cops, and as a rule they don’t make me nervous, but I was certainly concerned about what they could have wanted from me.
    None of us had bothered to sit when the detective began again.
    “I’m Detective Shand,” he announced, “and this is Detective Hartz.” Shand gestured to his partner who dipped his head at me while pulling his coat tighter around him as a breeze shot by. “We need to ask you a few questions.”
    “Um . . . sure.”
    I get paid to talk for a living.
    Shand was in his early thirties, shorter than me, and personified the city of his employment. His rivet neck looked like it belonged on the end of a socket wrench, and his torso was that of a man who enjoyed a good beer. He completely filled out a leather jacket that was just short enough for the bottom of a holster to be visible on his right side. His light complexion was characteristic of the area, and his squared-off hair screamed former military. His movements betrayed a hint of shrouded agility. The fact that he was home-grown was also abundantly clear after the first few words he spoke. His distinct Pittsburgh dialect leapt from his amplifying presence, and it was easy to imagine him throwing out a yinz in place of the more common you all .
    He pulled out a small notepad and asked, “Do you know a student named Lindsay Behram?”
    Son of a bitch.
    She must have made some harebrained, outlandish accusation against me. In the back of my mind I was afraid she might accuse me of coming on to her or harassing her, but it never occurred to me that she would call the cops on me. What the hell for? She could have said anything. Sure, Steven was there when I shot her down, but she could say that something happened between us anywhere . . . anytime! How do you defend yourself against something like this?
    I didn’t allow my expression to betray my anger.
    “Yes. She’s a student in one of my classes.”
    Now it was Detective Hartz’s turn. “Do you know her well?”
    Did his tone carry just a touch of condescension?
    Hartz was the older of the two and the polar opposite of his partner. Standing six feet five inches tall and weighing at least 230 pounds, his skin was dark brown and his voice baritone. His dark coffee-colored suede coat that he kept pulling around his massive shoulders by the lapels matched his experienced eyes. I noticed an enormous ring on his finger that prominently displayed a perfectly placed silver “Y” on top of a red stone. The word “National” arched above the garnet with “Champions” providing the cradle. I surmised that more than a quarter of a century prior he had played football at Youngstown State and made several