The last thing he wanted was someone driving through the crime scene because he failed to properly secure it. And he wanted Rebel not be implicated, which would bring heat back on him. That could be the tricky part, that balance. A job well done, by the book, but no result or arrest. The immediate prize was praise for him, and with enough mud on Chandler to spark a no confidence vote. Or recall election. Buck wasn’t sure how all that worked exactly. He was kind of hoping the county’s Board of Supervisors would take over from there and he could simply ride the wave of subsequent events. And then they would hopefully forget about the perpetrators and leave him be as Sheriff Garner. As long as the county lasted, anyway.
Mrs. Fouche waived with a flashlight from the top of the drive and began walking down the picket fence along the driveway. He walked to greet her, also staying on the grass to the side for no other reason than she was. The heavy dew made his socks wet. His boots were “uniform boots” and not field boots. As she came closer, he saw the twelve gauge broken open on her right shoulder like she’d been out chasing Ruff Grouse though the season was over last month.
A little girl in her night clothes was with her, dead on her feet and dragging a stuffed bear. Evelyn wore a simple country dress, with rubber crocks, and a long unzipped sweater. The sweater’s pockets bulged and the weight stretched the garment’s fabric downward. Buck guessed extra shells. As they neared, she turned off the flashlight, put it in the dress’s bib pocket, and took the girl’s free hand. The little one leaned her head against Evelyn’s leg, like she might fall back asleep standing up.
“Is everyone okay? I just wanted to get that out of the way first. Everything else can wait.”
“We all fine. Aren’t we, Girl?” Evelyn gave a gentle shake of her arm and the child nodded.
“Any luck getting hold of the sheriff?”
“You know when Chandler is off duty, he is off duty. There’s no phone down at the cabin. I was going to call one of the cousins to go tell him, but he’ll be back late night. If I fetch him now those boys won’t get to fish.”
“You said they tried to vandalize his truck?”
“Look at it up there by the house. It’s all tore up. Sure, it has some shotgun pellets in it. I had to protect little Latoyia, here. But you look at the back door and the radiator. You’ll see,” she said while nodding her head for emphasis.
He strode to the top of the drive, outpacing her dragging the small child behind her. Buck turned on his light, and did a full circle twice around like his boss had taught him. Always good to have a “big picture” perspective before diving into the details, he’d said. The second time around he saw the phone box.
It was partly hidden in the shadow of the chimney and a nearby bush, bent over and hanging from the conduit stub that rose out of the ground. Only a piece of sheathing, that bound all the wires together that wasn’t trimmed during installation, kept the box from falling to the ground by catching in the entry hole of the panel’s bottom. No wonder she had to walk down to the neighbors. Buck had thought Rebel would just use some of his mechanical expertise to slip in and out in the middle of the night. This might be better. He couldn’t wait to look over the Durango.
Evelyn had certainly done a number on it. Small plastic crumbles of the windows were sprayed everywhere. Buck thought she must have hastily broke open cardboard ammunition boxes in the dark to stuff handfuls of loose shells into her pockets without regard to their type. Some shells had been surplus from the department’s “nine-ball machine,” the cop nickname for the 12-gauge pump shotgun with buckshot. In size “double-ought,” the twelve gauge held nine pellets. However, unlike hunters that used soft lead, these were steel and tore through the sheet metal doors and chair cushions of the passenger compartment until stopped by the engine block. Other shells had been bird shot, leaving everything peppered with tiny pockmarks. But regardless, the car was clearly a write-off.
He noted the mangled door which had yielded under brute force, and the telltale red droplets across the backseat. Chandler’s evidence box was both open and empty. Around front someone had stabbed at the radiator, but Buck didn’t know why. Worried about pursuit, he guessed. Buck considered his next move.
The way he thought it would have gone, would have been more akin to the office break-in. Such as using a “Slim-Jim” to stealthily unlock the door. Sure the box on the floor would be sprung, and there might on an outside chance some minor vehicle damage like a broken window that could be quietly repaired. Nothing that would have raised huge questions or an investigation. Then Buck could have threatened Chandler by exposing that key evidence was lost because he hadn’t followed proper procedure, imply that he might be perceived by others as dirty, and offer to let him resign and retire instead. Maybe even get him to endorse his bid for the office.
But there was no hiding this complete demolishment. Such things didn’t happen here. Buck had never seen it during his tenure, anyway. Some cop-shop jurisdictions, like New York or Chicago, might lose a cruiser every couple of weeks. They would have processes and procedures for that type of thing. Here, everyone in the county would be circling the wagons to discuss it, trying to figure out what to do. The board might even hold an emergency meeting over it. Buck couldn’t keep it quiet, even if he wanted to.
That might be better, anyway. He wouldn’t have to confront Chandler and try and blackmail him. It was a conversation he knew he’d have to have to realize his plan that way, but also one where he wondered if he could go through with it. This way, the problem was Rebel getting caught, and then implicating him. Rebel had been to prison. His DNA was on file. There was no way they weren’t going to find that DNA in Chandler’s backseat. Buck had to find Rebel, and kill him, before the State Police lent a hand and brought a manhunt. The weekend, and his boss being away, might work in his favor. He was being blessed with a head start.
He turned around to Evelyn.
“How long ago now?”
She looked at her watch, “Probably close to ninety minutes by now. They long gone.”
“What was he driving?” Buck asked, going through the motions while giving his mind time to work.
“There were three of them,” she said, “in a big blue crew cab truck. They drove away to the north, the last man barely jumping in the back before they sped away.”
He asked her a few more straightforward questions, trying to decide how best to handle things and not let on that he knew more than he should. Lights were beginning to come on in the little houses up and down the street, and the east sky was growing a lighter shade along the horizon.
“I’m going to call the lab technicians to collect evidence when their shift starts. Trying to rush them out here in the dark will just make it likely that something important gets trampled. Better to give them the extra hour, and get it done right when everyone can see.
Why don’t you go inside and get some rest? I’m sure this has been an upsetting night.”
“I’m up by now anyway, but this one could stand to lay back down. Would you like some coffee, Deputy Garner?”
The air was chill and he hadn’t gotten to eat anything in his rush out the door.
“Mrs. Fouche, I would be much obliged,” he replied. “But I do need to return to my cruiser and call in some help. I’ll be back up in a few minutes.”
In truth, he was down there for nearly fifteen minutes. He called for the state crime scene technicians, since Lowland County didn’t have their own. Then he got out the map and took a look at the roads. They mainly ran north-south, with short “cut-overs” defining long narrow rectangles around agricultural or forestry plots. Rebel would have had lots of options with which way to go. But what Buck wasn’t sure about was where would he go?
Evelyn had said there were three of them, but he assumed it was Rebel who was wounded in the back seat because of the evidence can. He wouldn’t trust touching the money to anyone else. A quick hop over a cattle fence and a short sprint into the darkness and they would be gone with f
ifty “g’s”. Was he hurt badly enough that he would go to a medical facility? Rebel was one mean son of a bitch. If it was really bad though, thought he was going to die, he’d go to the closest: St. Albans Clinic. If it wasn’t life threatening, he’d not go anywhere at all. He’d tough it out.
Evelyn hadn’t gotten a plate number, and Rebel may have taken precautions such as obscuring it with red clay mud. Which meant Rebel might be hopeful that no one had identified him and he’d simply hole back up in his garage and lick his wounds.
There was a third possibility, that of a fresh start. Rebel had two girls in his pit to trade to Shep for help. Shep might have connections to get him a fake driver’s license and such. Sell the truck, buy a bike, and go down the road a piece with the satchel of cash. Buck wouldn’t put it past the snake to run out on him and Doris. The only family he had was the crippled drunk that urinated on statues in the square. The garage was nostalgia, and its day was over. This might cause him to clear out.
Buck thought he might let him go, with the money, if he was truly going. Doris would be out of luck, but that wasn’t his problem as long as she kept quiet. He bet she would for Dixie’s sake. It meant Baylee Ann and Bambi getting back into circulation, and that could be dangerous if questioned about his false witness report. The faster they dropped charges against Dog-Boy starving in his cell and escorted him to the county line, the better. And it also meant that Rebel would have needed to have thought things through.
And that, thought Buck, was the single most compelling reason to begin searching for Rebel locally and immediately. He’d get started just as soon as the technicians arrived. Feeding Kelton Jager in his cell could wait, or he’d call Dixie later and order her to do it.
CHAPTER—20
Kelton, Azrael and Baylee Ann stood in front of the little pharmacy, five minutes before it opened at seven, on the west side of Lowland Road. It was a two story brick structure, with windows covered by thick curtains upstairs. The front window had a variety of advertisements for snacks and school supplies, as well as medicines. Easter and St. Patrick’s Day decorations were on sale.
Down the street the county offices were mostly dark except for one window on the second floor. The nearby coffee shop showed shadows of activity within, but its lights also remained off. Kelton briefly walked along the building’s sides looking for a water spigot, but didn’t see one. He squeezed some water into Azrael’s bowl from his CamelBak instead.
A soft jingling of bells made him look up to a tired old man in a dingy white lab coat. He reversed the closed sign and smiled as he held the door open.
“Sitz,” Kelton commanded and followed Baylee Ann inside.
They walked in leisurely, to give the old man time to beat them to the back counter. His steps were slow and painful, and his back was rounded. He curved to the side to get behind the counter, and stood smiling with the shelves of various pill bottles behind him. Baylee Ann handed him the prescriptions, and he held them fanned in one hand while the other adjusted his glasses. Then he nodded and began walking from shelf to shelf.
“We appreciate you being up early for us,” said Kelton.
“It doesn’t make good business sense, I must confess. But when you need something, you need it,” he said as he took down a large white bottle from a top shelf with a red lid. “And with Lily gone, I suppose I’m just marking time trying to do my civic duty.”
The old pharmacist shuffled around to the next shelf.
“Things are slow then?” asked Kelton, trying to keep up a friendly air to overcome his homeless look.
“Any faster and me and my diabetes wouldn’t be able to handle it. But our satellite location sells enough allergy pills that I can pay the taxes.”
Kelton kneeled down by some health products and grabbed a handful of protein bars, “Yeah, where’s that?”
“The truck stop. Doris sells quite a bit to the truckers. I guess those boys get a lot of pollen driving through those farm fields and trees sixteen hours a day,” he said as he returned from his workbench with a trio of the translucent orange bottles with white tops. “Do you have any insurance?”
“No,” Baylee Ann admitted.
Kelton intervened, “I’m her insurance today. I’ll take these, too,” he said piling the protein bars on the counter. He would eat them first, as their expiration dates were closer than the ones in his backpack.
A few minutes and a $150 of plastic money later, they were back on the sidewalk and heading toward Main Street. They split one of the protein bars, as among the antibiotic, stool-softener and anti-inflammatory pill bottles, a couple were labeled to take with food. Kelton struggled to walk slowly enough for her to keep up, zig-zagging and driving his poor dog who was trying to heel to distraction. They reached the feed store and began to make their way down Main Street to Ed’s.
“Kelton,” she smiled sheepishly.
He turned toward her.
“Will you please buy me some jeans? These sweat pants don’t really fit, and they rub and get too hot when we are walking.”
Instinctively he felt denial rising up inside him, but rapidly reconsidered. A pair of jeans from a farm store couldn’t cost much, especially compared to medical bills, and would go a long way toward helping her feel back to normal. And, it was going to be a warm day for spring. The heavy sweat pants had been great overnight, but if they were going to do any amount of walking she’d quickly be miserable. A T-shirt would be a nice add, too, he thought. It wouldn’t be long before she’d want to shed the hoodie.
“Okay,” he relented, “and try and find a shirt, too.”
With it being a feed store, all three went inside. It was a brick warehouse, dating back to the town’s founding days with solid wood beams and large square-headed iron nails. All the electrical wiring, be it for outlets or lights, ran in surface mounted conduits whose galvanized coating was tarnished with years of dirt and hay dust. Most of the store was pallets on the concrete slab floor with fifty pound sacks in a variety of brands and purposes. But there were a few odds and ends, like nuts and bolts or tractor pins, on some shelving near the cash register. And that included jeans and boots.
She found her size, while the old man watched from his stool. Younger backs, breaking down a just delivered pallet, didn’t pay any mind at all to them.
“Nice dog,” he complimented. “Can I sell you a biscuit?”
Baylee Ann held up the denim to her hips, trying to make up her mind about the cut and fit. She did the same with a pink camouflage T-shirt with “Browning” on the front. Then she carried them to the restroom.
“I’ll buy if he’ll eat yours.”
The old timer grabbed one from an open box at the register with a cardboard and marker sign of $1.50 each. They were large biscuits, about the size of a man’s palm and thumb, and came in three colors that must have denoted flavors. He tossed a reddish one, landing to crack on the concrete between Azrael’s front feet. Azrael looked up at Kelton.
Kelton nodded, “Go ahead.”
Azrael lowered his nose to the biscuit, lingered a few seconds and then looked up at Kelton with wide uncertain eyes. They seemed to be searching for understanding of what he had done wrong.
Kelton smiled with a shrug, “Sorry, no sale there.”
“Can’t sale them to anyone in town either. When I was young, our mutts weren’t so particular.”
“I’ve held him to a high standard,” Kelton explained. “I guess he does the same to me.”
Baylee Ann wore the jeans and T-shirt out of the powder room, the sweatpants nowhere to be seen. The hoodie was tied about her waist by the sleeves. Kelton started to say something about saving the other, but then just bit his tongue and paid instead. A few more pleasantries and they were back on Main Street and heading east.
Baylee Ann moved a bit better in the jeans, and their pace correspondingly increased. Kelton noted Colonel Redigan’s truck in the city lot, easy to spot as it dwarfed the various smaller cars. Mr. Butler and his barb
ershop weren’t yet open, nor was the florist. The doughnut shop filled the morning air with pleasant aromas, but they didn’t stop in given their destination. Then, came Dixie’s house.
If she knew it was Dixie’s home across the street, Baylee Ann didn’t let on. Kelton composed a few questions but then left them unasked. He’d gone to Rebel’s garage and found her there because of Dixie, even though that had been more of a slip of the tongue than a pleading for a rescue. Dixie had been let go, but the other two had been kept. Even though the law had been there. Why was that? Kelton pondered.
“I’m sorry to be a burden,” she said.
Kelton came back to the present.
“You’re fine. We’ve nowhere to be,” he shrugged.
“You mean you and your dog?” she asked. “People have dogs. With you it’s like you’re a pair of people or something.”
“I guess that’s right. Kind of like you and your friend Bambi, I guess. How long have you known each other?”
“Kindergarten, probably. Although I think it was second grade before we became inseparable. That’s not real unusual here, it’s just that then you get married and things kind of change. But no guys ever wanted to marry Bambi and me so we just kept hanging with each other.”
“We’ll help you find her. Just need to spend a day resting you up.”
They crossed over Thigpen Road and its yellow flashing light. Ed’s parking lot in the distance was nearly deserted.
“Bambi and I used to hang out and smoke cigarettes she’d stolen from her dad before he ran off. In that field, right there. There were other girls there, too. Then we got old enough that the truckers started to notice us. A few years after that, they didn’t notice us at all.
K-9 Outlaw: A Kelton Jager Adventure Book 1 Page 17
