by Vella Day
With fantasy time over, Dax climbed into his truck and took off. Orchard Avenue was paved for the first two miles before turning to dirt. Dense forest lined both sides of the road, and boulders, some the size of an eleven-man football team, sat on the edge of the forest. Thick trees blocked out the last rays of the day.
Maybe coming this late hadn’t been such a good idea. He probably should have waited until morning when the sun was shining and the trees weren’t hovering over him like the specter of death.
Get a grip. He wasn’t trapped in a mine elevator, and he wasn’t hearing his father’s last screams or feeling the heat of fire singe his feet after the methane gas exploded below. He was safe. Yet the panic still clawed at his gut every time he was in a small, dark space. The woods at night might be in the wide open, but the rush of anxiety still claimed him. So far, no amount of therapy had helped.
Dax hummed and tapped the wheel to get his mind off the dark, hoping to stop the impending panic from ripping out his guts and making him wish he were dead.
Light peeked through the leaves at random intervals, and he could see for a few seconds at a time, which helped reduce the stress and lower his blood pressure. Once he reached the mine, he planned to keep his headlights on, which meant he had nothing to worry about.
Willing to take the jostling for the sake of time, Dax sped up. His struts squeaked, proving once more he should buy a new truck, but he’d grown fond of this one.
After another mile, the trees thinned. At the end, he hung a right, and a terraced hillside appeared. Four wooden structures, complete with a tall silo were pressed against a large mound of dirt that some might call a small mountain. In front sat the mine. A large No Trespassing sign was leaning halfway over, looking as if the metal post had been run over by a car or some piece of heavy machinery.
Pop. Ping.
What the hell was that? He looked around, straining his senses to hear where the noise had come from when his car jerked to the left, forcing him to fight for control. His tire hit a pothole, and he flew upward, smashing his head on the cab ceiling. “Shit.”
He let up on the gas pedal and slammed on his brakes. When he brought the truck to a halt, he jumped out to check the damage. Wind whipped his hair and sent a chill straight to his bones. He stepped around to the passenger’s side only to find his tire was flat and the rim bent. That sucked. He knelt down and ran a finger along the warm rubber, his heart nearly stopping when he felt a familiar shape of metal lodged deep in the tire.
A bullet.
A pissing sound near his foot drew his attention, and then the smell of gas hit him. His gaze shot to the rear of the truck to where a second bullet had creased the side panel. When he ran a hand under the gas tank, liquid was streaming out. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
The beginnings of fear bubbled in his gut until anger took over. Dax stood and scanned the area, looking for the bastard who’d crippled him. He had to guess there was someone or something at the mine he shouldn’t see. Whether the warning shot had to do with Sadie or Clinton, he couldn’t hazard a guess.
Then reality sunk in. The shooter was still out there. Dax raced to the driver’s side and ducked down. He didn’t need to be pickings for some sharp shooter. He listened harder this time, trying to spot his location. Tree limbs banged against each other like dry bones, a bird chirped, and a squirrel raced up a tree, but that was all. No one was shouting for him to leave the area, and no one was running through the forest trying to get away.
Despite his training, Dax couldn’t locate anyone. It was as if the man had dropped in from outer space. While Dax had a gun in the glove compartment, he couldn’t hit what he couldn’t see.
He hadn’t passed any vehicle on the road nor spotted any car parked nearby. Because no one could have known he’d be there, the shooter might not have been targeting him personally. The town could have some sicko who lived nearby who took the No Trespassing sign to heart, though Dax couldn’t see him spending his days waiting with a scope to his eye for the occasional trespasser. On the other hand, Bruno the bartender could have called ahead to say some out of towner was asking questions.
The Nash’s used to own the mine, but Margaret had sold it to someone else. Batman? Catman? He’d have to ask her again.
Christ, he didn’t need this. Shooting out a tire took amazing training, and if the man had wanted Dax dead, he’d be dead. Stranding Dax there made even less sense as he might think to seek shelter at the mine—exactly where the shooter probably didn’t want Dax to go.
The sun’s warmth was slowly disappearing, and with it, its light. Shooter or no shooter, Dax wasn’t going to stay there any longer. He opened the driver’s side door and slithered in, not wanting to expose his body to another shot. He opened the glove compartment and found his one and only flashlight, having handed his other one to Jessie last night. He grabbed his gun and shoved it in his side holster.
Waiting was not an option. Without gas, this truck wasn’t going anywhere and given his cell phone didn’t have any reception, he had no choice but to hightail it back to town. The only trouble was, would the shooter be close behind?
Chapter Five
After Jessie left Amanda and Brian bonding at the restaurant, her day went downhill from there. No sooner had she stepped from the café than she received a call from Harper Barton about a gas station theft. The owner said someone stole one hundred and fifty gallons of gas, but that he had some super duper sophisticated camera trained on the pump. All she needed to do was watch the video, identify the thief, and make the arrest. Easy.
Too bad when she arrived, she discovered that someone had shot the lens out of his precious camera, and that Harold hadn’t even watched the footage. Even spookier, when Harold replayed the part up to the shooting, the camera didn’t pick up the person’s image. All they heard was this loud popping noise, followed by the tinkling of glass hitting the pavement. With a dead-on shot, the person had to be in front of the camera—only he wasn’t.
If she hadn’t watched the footage herself, she wouldn’t have believed it. The story just might qualify for Ripley’s Believe It Or Not, especially since Harold kept a spotlight focused on the tanks twenty-four seven.
Jessie had even tried to duplicate the shot by standing five feet back from the camera and aiming her revolver at the lens. Even pretending to take a shot, her hands shook enough to make hitting the two-inch lens unlikely.
As far as she was concerned, the only person who had the talent to do the job was a military marksman, and Jessie didn’t know anyone like that in Kerry. The perpetrator could have been a passerby, but then the camera would have picked up the car driving in.
Something strange was happening to this town, and she wished like hell she knew what it was. She’d been with the department seven years, going on eight, and nothing like this had ever happened before. They had the usual domestic violence and drunks getting into fights, especially on a Sunday night, but not murder and theft.
Jessie refused to buy into Nana’s alien theory. As for other beliefs, global warming affected the weather, but it didn’t kill people or rob them.
That was when she decided Clinton had indeed been murdered, and that this wasn’t some hoax, as the I-know-so-much private eye, Mitchell, had first suggested.
What she couldn’t figure out was who had Clinton pissed off enough to want him dead? He’d arrested close to half the men in this town at one time or another, but she couldn’t think of a single soul who didn’t deserve the punishment. Then again, the guilty party might not share her definition of deserving. Thinking she might be headed down the wrong path, she went back to the office to check Clinton’s desk drawer for some answers.
So here she sat, at his desk, completely confused. She’d found receipts for a generator, one for a large screen TV, and another for a tractor. The problem was Clinton DuPree didn’t need a tractor for a lawn that was but fifty feet across, so what the hell was going on? She needed to figure this out fast b
efore someone else was hurt. As much as she didn’t want to admit it, it looked like Clinton was on the take, or worse, he could be blackmailing someone. If he had been, her list of suspects just shot up to around six hundred—the town’s small population. Okay, maybe five hundred, since not every person in Kerry had a secret worthy of blackmail.
Her boss had lived a simple life. She’d driven by his house plenty of times and had even dropped him off a time or two, but she’d never been inside his home, so she couldn’t know that for sure. She’d assumed it was a typical bachelor pad complete with cheap furniture that didn’t match. From the outside, his house needed a lot of TLC in the form of a paint job and some landscaping that included weed killer. She was having a hard time believing that the man her father had recommended to take over the sheriff’s seat was a cheat. But even the best were fooled sometimes.
Her eyes blurred, and she gulped down the rest of her cold coffee. She sure could use a break, but right now she couldn’t afford to rest. She still had to look into yesterday’s food raid at the Kerry supermarket and prayed this crime spree would stop.
Jessie picked up the crinkled piece of paper on which she’d scribbled the details of the incident. The manager had called yesterday, saying someone had walked off in broad daylight with a few caseloads of food in their grocery cart that was worth about four hundred bucks. She would have thought that a worker, a shopper, or even the manager himself would have noticed who’d skipped out without paying. Clearly, people walked around with blinders on.
Then there was Sadie’s disappearance she still had to deal with. True, Dax Mitchell was working on the case, but she’d promised Nana she’d help too. As busy as she was, Jessie had found the time to speak with both of Sadie’s neighbors on her way home from the gas station fiasco and before she’d discovered Clinton’s double life, but those two women had been of no help. One was deaf and the other nearly blind. What she wouldn’t give for a reliable witness. Hell, what she really needed was a clone.
“Hello?”
Jessie jerked and shot a hand to her chest. “Amanda, you scared the crap out of me. Why are you dressed up like a police officer?” Goodbye hooker, hello cop. Although Amanda carried off the look like no one else could.
“Sorry, darling, didn’t mean to frighten you.” She pulled up a chair, scraping the legs against the wooden floor and sat down. “I’ve come to ask you a favor, or actually, to do you a favor.” Amanda brushed off some imaginary lint from her neatly pressed sleeve.
“What would that be? I assume it has to do with the uniform. Or is this a Halloween costume.”
“No. I want a job.”
With the crazy way today was going, all Jessie could do was laugh. She tried to remember if the costume shop down the street had many sheriff uniforms.
Amanda’s eyes squinted and her mouth turned into a pout. “What’s so funny?”
“Are you telling me that uniform is for real?” Her sleeve had a Georgia Sheriff’s Department logo on it, but Jessie couldn’t picture Amanda making an arrest. Hell, if she found two men robbing a store, she’d probably ask if they wanted to make it a threesome. No, Amanda Simmons and cop did not go together. Not unless the cop asked her to go for a joy ride or give him a blowjob. As soon as that thought crossed her mind, Jessie was ashamed of herself. Her rotten attitude was due to the stress.
Her friend crossed her legs and leaned back in the chair. “Absolutely it’s real, darling, and I was damned good at my job when I worked in Georgia for two years. I have references if you don’t believe me.”
Amanda’s story wouldn’t have surprised her any more if she’d told Jessie that Nana had killed Clinton DuPree. “I don’t know what to say.”
“Try saying yes. You’re swamped, aren’t you?”
“That’s an understatement.”
Amanda threw her a satisfied grin. “There ya go. You need help, and I need a job. When can I start?” She slapped a palm on the desk with a resounding thump.
Jessie jumped again. “I’m not sure ab—”
“Listen. I won’t take no for an answer. I have a criminology degree from the University of Georgia, which was followed by a four-year stint in the Navy. After I got out, I worked at the Sheriff’s Department in Macon for two years.” She slipped her hand in her purse and produced documented copies of what she’d claimed.
Jessie studied them. “I had no idea.” Amanda was bright and always had an interest in law enforcement, but she never thought she’d pursue her dream.
“If I don’t work out after two weeks, fire me.” She pulled a nail file from her purse and sanded down her pinky finger.
Dear God, Amanda had turned into a girlie-girl. How was that possible, given her career path? Back in high school she used to be more of a jock than a walking ad for a cosmetics company. Jessie wasn’t even sure she could relate to this new person.
An authoritative knock sounded on her door. Without waiting for an invitation, Mayor Bob Kreplick and Peter Lucas, the President of the Bank of Kerry, marched in. My, my. Two dignitaries were coming to her lowly hovel. Maybe the aliens had disturbed the atmosphere as Nana claimed.
“Gentlemen, to what do I owe this honor?”
They stared at Amanda then back at her. “May we talk in private?”
Amanda stood. “I can take a hint.” She twirled around to face the door and wiggled her fingers goodbye. “Later, gator.”
Jessie was about to protest her friend’s casual attitude, but Amanda held up her hand. Now wasn’t the right time to pick this fight. As soon as her friend slipped out the door, the two men sat down opposite her.
“We have a proposition for you.”
* * *
Dax’s leg throbbed like a bitch with every step. To control the pain, he had to drag his foot, instead of putting his full weight on it. Once the ache turned tolerable, he jogged until the throbbing started again. Drag, jog, drag, jog. It got old real fast, but he had to reach Jessie and warn her about the shooter. It was possible the person trying to stop him didn’t want anyone—including Jessie—to learn what happened to Sadie.
When he couldn’t take another step, Dax rested his back against a tree and slammed his fist against the sharp bark at his weak leg. As fresh waves of sweet smelling pine and alder wafted toward him, he pushed aside his fatigue and began to move again, though he didn’t remember four miles being this far. It seemed like he’d jogged or dragged for ten miles already.
The sky had turned dark and small animals kept scurrying in the underbrush. With all the racket they were making, he’d never be able to hear a person approach.
He swung his light back and forth to make sure no one was hiding behind a tree lying in wait for him. On the next pass, a pair of glowing eyes looked back at him and he stilled. Then the baby deer twitched its ears, and Dax relaxed. His imagination was out of control. He inhaled deeply and took a moment to marvel at the animal’s beauty, but the spell was broken a second later when the deer jetted off, disappearing into the dense foliage.
It suddenly occurred to him that perhaps a hunter and not some psycho had nailed his tire and tank while trying to kill a deer. Regardless of who had shot up his truck, Dax had to forge on. Expecting the worst, he zigzagged to make it more difficult for someone to hit him. The evasive action came second nature to him, but it expended a lot of energy. He stayed close to the forest edge just in case a car happened to drive down this hardly-ever-used road. Assuming the person didn’t look like a killer, he’d flag him down.
He did a mental head slap. It wasn’t like he could tell a killer by his looks. God, he hated what was happening to his mind. The darkness was making him crazy.
He’d spent two years disarming land mines in Iraq and remained calm under stress. Facing a little darkness shouldn’t cause him to panic, but it did.
A flash of lightning lit up the sky, and while his face burned cold from the wind, his body was hot from the exertion. He hoped it didn’t rain because the flashlight might die if it became
too wet.
Move.
Dax continued, counting his steps, trying to take his mind off the darkness. With his gaze on the beam hitting the leaves and rocks, he turned his thoughts to something more pleasant: Jessie. He pictured her sitting on the sofa, all snuggled up in a blanket, drinking hot cocoa, looking sexy and warm. He closed his eyes for a second to picture her face smiling up at him, but then he had to use his imagination since she’d mostly shown him a tense, uptight look. Only once had he’d seen her softer side.
Thinking of Jessie instead of where he was going, he tripped. The next thing he knew, he was face down on the cold, wet leaves, and his flashlight had slipped from his fingers. A crack sounded, and the light disappeared.
Oh, shit. Please no. Blackness closed in around him, squeezing the breath from his lungs. His instincts kicked in, telling him to find the light. As he pushed up to his knees, the rain came down in earnest, and Dax patted the ground, frantically trying to locate his precious beacon. The moon peeked from behind a break in the heavy clouds just enough to allow him to spot his much-needed light. He grabbed it then flipped the On switch but nothing happened.
No. No. No. It couldn’t be.
He slapped the body of the light against his palm, hoping the batteries or the bulb had been dislodged in the fall, but it failed to turn on. His heart sped up and air slipped down his throat in a thin trickle. His palms sweated.
My fears are irrational. My fears are irrational. My fears are irrational. He kept repeating his mantra, but the calm didn’t materialize. Instead, a sharp ache swirled hard in his gut.
Push the fear aside, as my shrink would say. I just need to walk until I reach town.
Yes. I can do that.
To help calm him, he pictured Jessie once more alive and happy. With teeth gritted, Dax moved to the paved road, self-loathing nearly making him cave. He’d give anything to stop the demons from attacking his mind and ruining his life, but so far nothing ever helped.
