As the three men conversed, discussing the predicament the town was in, familiar blue lights flashed through the open blinds through the dining room window. Jem went to the front door, and opening it, he saw a police cruiser creeping up the road.
A voice over the loudspeaker in the vehicle repeated an announcement. “Attention, attention. All men of Decker. There is a mandatory meeting downtown on the square. Seven pm. Attendance is mandatory.”
The message was repeated continuously as the police cruiser drove down each street in the neighborhood. Even after it had turned the block, Jem could still hear the echoing voice from the vehicle.
Jem’s neighbors across the street were out on their lawns. The elderly man who lived directly across from him shrugged his shoulders. “Another meeting? What else needs to be said?” he called out from his lawn.
Jem shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know.” The Kobold watch on his wrist read just after 6:30. “Not much notice either.”
Jay and Scott came outside. “Mind if we walk to the square with you?” Scott asked.
“Not at all,” Jem said.
The city square was less than two miles from their neighborhood, across the river that ran through town. Jem figured it would take at least twenty minutes to get there, and they began the trek. He hoped a good, long walk in the autumn air would help alleviate the wine drunk flitter in his head. He’d also be able to sober up a little while he formed a plan for leaving town in the morning.
As they walked, the three men were joined by others as the men of the town filtered out of their neighborhoods. Like a pilgrimage, their throng grew as they made it to Main Street.
“Do any of y’all know what this is about?” one of the men in the back of the crowd asked.
“Probably something about that shooting at Central Market,” someone else said.
“You think the chief is going to try to take our guns?” another voice asked.
“Did y’all hear about what was going on over on Lynn Drive?” another voice asked. “Rumor has it they found a body.” This started a commotion as every man in the flock began talking all at once.
“A body?” one of the men asked. He was wearing a red trucker hat with oil stains on the bill.
“Yeah. Some woman,” the first man said. “That’s what I heard though. I went down there and they had the whole place taped off. Couldn’t even get down to Harmony Street.”
“Why would she not have vanished with the rest?” another man in the throng asked. He was older, portly with jowls that hid his neck.
“I’m not even sure it was a body. That’s just what I heard,” the first man said.
Jem listened though he held his tongue. It wasn’t just a hallucination. What he’d seen, in the vision, was real.
They reached the city square and the steps of the courthouse were lit by mobile floodlights and the podium at which the chief had addressed them earlier was still in place, though Jem figured it had probably never been moved.
Men steadily filled the open lawn and parking lot in front of the courthouse as Chief McMillan took the podium. Walking behind him were two of his deputies escorting another man, his hands bound behind his back. Jem’s breath stopped in his throat and he immediately recognized the cuffed man.
It was Steve’s killer.
Jem now knew what this mandatory meeting was. It wasn’t another informational conference. It was a sentencing. It was public court.
As Chief McMillan spoke into the microphone, his voice echoed through the crowd. “Men of Decker. This is a solemn night. As many of you know, one of our own was unnecessarily gunned down at Central Market today. I am here to let you know that unlawfulness will not be tolerated.” As he spoke, his voice echoed, each syllable crashing on the previous. “We intend to deal with any threatening activities swiftly and harshly.”
Jem’s fists were clenched as the man who’d killed Steve was led to the front of the steps. Jem could see the man’s face was swollen from being beaten and dried blood and snot caked his nose and lips.
The chief turned to the man. “Thomas Lancaster, you are charged with the murder of Steven Jones. By account of eyewitnesses of the act, you are hereby found guilty. I sentence you to death by hanging.”
The crowd went wild. There was applause and cheering, and groaning. Jem’s fists remained balled at his side and his jaw clenched. The man on the front steps of the courthouse broke down in tears and the two officers held him up as his knees buckled. Even through the noise of the crowd, Jem could hear him begging for his life.
A rope was lowered from the rafters above the steps, the end tied in a noose. Jem found it impossible to turn away. He was mesmerized and disgusted. As the end of the rope was placed over the killer’s head, Jem finally averted his gaze. He couldn’t watch. He couldn’t be part of this.
As he looked away, his head began pounding like earlier, when he had driven to the highway. At first it was slow and then quickly the pain radiated to his eye sockets. Jem saw a flash of light and he blinked.
He saw the hallway again. In his mind, flashes of the vision from before played out. He saw the hallway, the open door. The woman on the bed, her lifeless body splayed out under a mat of hair. And then, at his feet, the child. The man had his hands around the child’s neck, strangling him. Just as he’d strangled that woman. Jem tried to save the child, but the invisible barrier held, keeping him out of the room. He pounded on the barrier, his fists hitting it with an audible bounce that echoed through.
Jem shook his head, trying to clear these images from his brain. They were different from the vision he’d seen earlier. Why had it changed?
Finally, his senses came back to him and the pain left his temples. The crowd roared cheers as the man on the steps was lifted off the ground by the neck. Lancaster’s body thrashed as the bones in his neck gave to the pressure of the rope. Finally, he stopped moving and his body hung silently, swaying gently from the kinetic energy of his thrashing.
Silently, Jem turned and made his way out of the crowd and started the long walk back home.
He turned around once, and peered back at the podium. There, his eyes met Chief McMillan’s heavy gaze that burned into Jem’s soul. The chief’s lips were curled in an evil smile, the corners of his mouth turned upward as he stood before the crowd, though his eyes stayed locked on Jem.
Finally, Jem turned back toward the road that led to his house.
There was no question about it now, though. This town was too dangerous to stay.
CHAPTER 23
CHIEF | 7:45PM
“THAT SON OF a bitch thinks he can do whatever he wants? Just because he’s some big shot writer? We’re not putting up with anyone out of line,” the chief said, now back in his office.
After he’d made an example out of Lancaster, whose body still swung in the chilly night air out on the steps of the courthouse, he dismissed everyone back to their homes for the evening. He tasked a couple of the officers to escort the men so as to ensure there wouldn’t be any more trouble.
That Jem Taylor walking off though made his blood boil. The chief wanted him hanging from the courthouse steps next.
“Sir, he’s not breaking the law,” Barnes said quietly, hoping to calm down his boss, though he was cut off.
“We make the damn laws now, son!” he roared. “This is how it starts, don’t you see? You give these men out there an inch, and what do they do? They ransack the gas stations.”
“I understand that, sir, but we do need to be understanding as well. He’s not making trouble,” Barnes tried to reason.
“If I wanted you to tell me how to run this town, Barnes, you’d be in this chair. But you’re not.”
Almost out of spite, the chief pulled the radio off his belt and turned it on. “Chris, come in.”
After a few seconds of static, his son’s voice came over the speaker. “Yeah, I’m here.”
“When you answer the radio, it’s yes sir.”
“Yes sir,” th
e crackly voice came through the speaker.
“I want you to go down to the Pine Hills neighborhood where our local celebrity lives. He decided to leave tonight’s meeting without permission. Tell him he’s wanted downtown for questioning. If he gives you trouble, you have all rights to arrest him,” the chief said.
“Yes sir,” came the response over the speaker.
Barnes sighed. “Chief, the man we took in for the Harlow murder,” he said, changing the subject. “He’s down in holding now.”
“As he should be,” the chief said.
“I know that, sir. But, it’s his son. The boy has been here all day. What should we do with him? He’s obviously got no one to take care of him.” Barnes said.
“Give him a blanket and some food and put him in a cot somewhere. There are plenty of empty offices down here where he can stay,” the chief said dismissively.
“How long do you plan on keeping him, sir?” Barnes asked.
Howard was beginning to get annoyed with all the questions. “Look here, that kid is the only thing keeping his father alive. I would have had that man hanged right out there,” he pointed to the open window, “with Lancaster if he didn’t have his son. So, we’ll keep the kid as long as we need to. Now since you’re so worried about him, go take care of him.”
Barnes pursed his lips, though gave a short salute to the chief and turned to walk out of the office.
CHAPTER 24
JEM | 8:02PM
IT FELT LIKE death, the unnerving quiet of the town as Jem walked back to his house, taking the residential streets alone in the cold autumn air. Though he darted his eyes around, making certain that he wasn’t noticed by any of the police assuredly on duty, he also couldn’t keep his concentration off the vision. The scene that the fog had showed him, the woman dead on the bed, the man and the little boy, none of it made sense. He didn’t know what it meant. He wanted to get home and think, without the paranoia of getting caught by the police out here.
When Jem walked around the corner of the street that led to his house, he tensed up. In front of the house, a police car was parked and idling. Cursing under his breath, he nearly turned around, hoping to lose the officer in the dark. That wouldn’t work, though, and Jem knew they’d just end up back here again at some point. Instead of running off, Jem walked up into his driveway. Perhaps the best course of action would be to talk to the officer. For all intents and purposes, words were of course his specialty.
He traipsed across the lawn, the dew-moist grass leaving wet spots on his sneakers, and he approached the car with his hands held up in front of him. As he did, the officer opened the driver’s door and stepped out. Even in the dim moonlight, Jem could tell, much like the majority of Decker’s police force, he was young. He looked like a skeleton in a uniform, the clothes baggy on his slender frame.
“Hands where I can see them,” the officer said with a false-tough tone.
Jem kept his hands up at shoulder height. “Good evening, officer,” he started, but he was cut off.
“The chief required all citizens at the meeting this evening. Attendance was mandatory and you left early, Mr. Taylor,” the officer said, stilting his voice with that false toughness. He stayed in the shadow behind the cruiser.
“I understand, officer,” Jem said, staying put on the lawn. “I shouldn’t have done that. Just needed to get some fresh air. Surely you can understand that.”
“What I understand is, we’ve got some big-shot outsiders who think the rules don’t apply to them,” the officer retorted. “I ought to take you in. My father would love it if I arrested you right here.”
Jem rolled his eyes. “You’re McMillan’s son. I should have known. They get a little short-staffed downtown? Taking in temp workers on the force?”
“If you’re going to be a smartass, I’ll just take you right now.”
“I don’t think that’s necessary, officer,” Jem said, exsaperated. “Like I said, I shouldn’t have left, but I’m not causing any trouble. Now if you don’t mind, I’m going to go in my house and try to get some sleep.”
The officer stepped around the front of the vehicle, and, in the headlights, was illuminated. Jem could see the man and he nearly stumbled backward. “Holy shit!” he cried out.
“Hey!” Chris yelled, reaching for his holster at his hip. “Settle the hell down!”
Jem wanted to scream, to cry out, gather as much attention as he could to the man in front of him, though he knew it wouldn’t do any good. The entire neighborhood was still downtown. But he wanted them to come out and witness this, the police officer in front of him. Surely he was imagining things. It couldn’t be the same man, the one he’d seen in his vision. The man on the bed with the dead woman. The chief’s son.
“Did you—” he finally mustered out. “Did you kill her?”
Chris McMillan froze, his eyes wide. “What? What did you say?”
“I saw you. In a...in a vision. With the little boy. That woman. The one they found. Did you do it? Did you kill her?” Jem began to backpedal.
“You,” Chris stammered. “In the shadows. You were there. That was you.”
Chris reached for his pistol, and in a fight-or-flight moment of blind panic, Jem lunged at him, knocking the young man to the ground. The gun came loose and Jem kicked it away from McMillan. They tossed on the ground, rolling in the grass. Jem felt a fist knock him in the jaw as the murderer pinned him down. McMillan was small and lanky though, unlike his father, and Jem was able to push him off. As he did, Jem lifted his knee and jammed it into the kid’s groin, smashing his testicles. Doubling over in pain and clutching his stomach, he rolled over onto the grass. Jem hurried back up to his feet and ran to his vehicle in the driveway, stumbling and clawing his way back up to the Jeep.
He jumped in the vehicle and turned the ignition, the eight-cylinder engine roaring to life. Throwing the shifter into reverse, the tires screeched on the pavement and he tore out in the darkness. Knowing he couldn’t get out of town, Jem could think of one other place he could hide. He just prayed that the kid would be there.
CHAPTER 25
JEM | 8:24PM
JEM PULLED INTO the parking lot of the shopping center, never daring to even stop at the intersections, blinking red lights be damned. The light from the suite he was looking for was on, a soft glow of white among the dark windows. Jem drove around to the back of the shopping center to the service alley behind the building and parked his Jeep next to a beige city dumpster. City of Decker — a clean community was emblazoned in green on the front of the thing.
The whole thing still felt surreal to him. Chief McMillan’s son had killed that woman. Now that the kid was wearing a police uniform, he felt there was only one person who could help him prove it.
Slinking around the front of the building, careful to stay in the shadows as well as keep an eye on the road, Jem made sure no police cruisers were on his tail. He felt like a fugitive, which, after his tussle with the McMillan kid in the lawn, he was certain a charge of assaulting an officer was on the docket. Given the way the town had devolved in the course of the day, he’d even put a wager on the idea of a death warrant.
At the front of the building, Jem went up to the door of the cell phone repair shop and knocked on the glass. Please be here, he thought, repeating it in his head. His heart jumped when he saw movement inside, a head peep around the corner.
The young man that owned the shop came to the door and turned the deadbolt lock. He opened it up and started, “I’m sorry, sir, we’re closed.” He stopped himself, however, and his eyes went wide when he recognized who his late-night visitor was. “Yo! The writer!”
Jem craned his head to look behind him again, paranoid that he had been followed. However, the streets remained quiet and dark. Complete stillness.
“Brandon, right?” Jem asked, standing impatiently at the door. “I need your help.”
Brandon opened the door, letting Jem in. “What’s going on, my man? You break your phon
e or something?” Brandon locked the door behind them and led Jem to the back work area. “You want some coffee?”
“No, nothing like that. Can you turn these lights off up front?” Jem asked as they walked into the work area.
“Yeah, absolutely,” Brandon said. “Wait a minute. You in trouble?”
“A little bit. Get these lights shut off and I’ll tell you all about it,” Jem said.
Brandon flipped a couple of switches on the wall and the bright halogen lights in the ceiling shut off.
At first, Jem didn’t register the sound in the work area, so used to the droning of everyday noise, but his head snapped around to see where the sound was coming from. For a moment, he was completely silent, struck in awe. On the wall behind the workbench, a mounted television was on and playing an episode of The Office.
“Is this…” Jem stammered. “Is this downloaded?”
Brandon cracked a wide, proud smile. “Nope.”
“This is actual—”
“Yup,” Brandon interjected. “Streaming.”
Jem collapsed in a chair next to the kid’s workbench, completely in awe of the images on the screen. “You figured out internet. How?”
“It was a little difficult at first,” Brandon said. He then started on this entire diatribe of IP addresses and DNS servers that Jem had no clue about. Jem wished he’d understood. But, he was born just a few years too early, which meant he was too late to the technology party. As Brandon droned on about wireless signals and cell phone data, Jem just nodded his head.
“What about signals from other cities? Like newscasts?” he asked.
Brandon, who had taken a seat at the table opposite of Jem, held his head down. He swallowed hard. “Nothing.”
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