The Cleanest Kill

by Rick Reed

  The tickle in his nose grew worse. He slid his boxer shorts off and held them over his mouth and nose. If he could filter the musty stuff, calm himself, take slow breaths, he would be okay.

  He sat still, concentrating on each breath, feeling his lungs expand and contract, expand and contract. The cave was dead quiet, except for a steady drip. The water must be coming from the rocks. He could feel it beneath him, a steady drizzle. Not a flow. He would be safe if he could find a way out. His breathing became more regular and his panic subsided. He would work on one problem at a time. He wouldn’t drown. Now he just had to find a way out of here.

  He rolled carefully onto his side. His head pounded, but the nausea was gone. He pushed up into a kneeling-squatting position. Still good.

  “Hey!” he yelled. “Can you hear me?” His words flattened, bounced off the ceiling and walls of his dark prison. “Where am I?” The steady drip answered him.

  He crawled four or five feet further away from the water and his hand struck a smooth vertical wall. It was rock, the same as the floor, but there was something wrong with this rock if this was a cave. The rock was smooth, slick, damp. He turned and crawled carefully to his left, planting his hands and knees carefully to lessen the sharp cuts from the cinders.

  His hand hit something metal. He ran his hand over it. It was hard and shaped like a train track rail. But the gauge of the steel wasn’t heavy enough for a train. Not a cave. Not a tunnel. A shaft. An underground mine shaft.

  He sniffed his hand. It smelled of charred wood. Charcoal. He was in an underground coal mine. He remembered that the machinery used to grind through the coal seam threw off cinders of burned coal. His throat threatened to clench shut and he fought off a wave of panic. He crawled over the track and found another running the same direction. It was a steel track for a railcar. He sat back on his buttocks, thinking, calming himself; taking slow, steady breaths.

  The pain in his head was forgotten. To hell with his clothes. If he followed the tracks they would lead to an exit. He couldn’t be that deep in a mine. He must have been blitzed last night, but still, he couldn’t imagine how he’d even found a mine. Couldn’t imagine that he—someone who grew up in mining country and was deathly afraid of the dark spaces underground—would go into a mine. Some of his high school buddies had gone to work for Peabody Coal, but not him. Hell no! He’d been in one mine in his whole life and that was on a dare at a graduation party.

  He stood up and reached above his head. He was six-feet-tall and the ceiling was just above his head. The water at the bottom of the shaft must have been rain runoff. The dripping sound was steady. He remembered hearing the pools were sometimes so deep the shaft required constant pumping or it had to be abandoned. He couldn’t hear a pump, so this one was abandoned. He was lucky he hadn’t staggered into the water and drowned.

  He followed the tracks, one foot touching the rail. He covered several feet and stumbled, went down hard, and landed smack on his face. His reflexes were too slow to throw his arms out to break his fall. He heard his nose crunch and felt the cinders grind into his lips and teeth and cheek.

  He pushed himself up on his knees and examined himself. He could taste the blood running from his nose. He held his head back and pinched the bridge of his nose to stem the flow, knowing it would do no good. He’d played football in school and had a little experience with broken noses. It would hurt like hell, but would eventually stop bleeding. He wanted out of here. He put the meat of his palms on each side of his nose and popped it back in place. He got to his feet and moved forward, feeling in front, shuffling his feet, feeling for other obstacles.

  From somewhere in front of him he heard hinges squeak and a bolt slide into place.

  “Hey, I’m in here!” he yelled. “Help me!”

  Nothing. He yelled again. “Help! Help me! There’s someone in here! I’m in here!”

  Still nothing. He moved forward faster, hands feeling out in the darkness. His hand came in contact with another wall. This one felt like wood. A door. His heart pounded and he frantically scrabbled for a handle, but found none. The boards making the wall up were wide and fitted together closely, but he found a seam and ran his fingers along it, up to where it intersected with another wider seam. It was a door, but there was no handle. He felt the entire surface and felt a smaller door set into the door roughly in the center near the top. It was closed too. He beat on the door, then the smaller one. It felt like it was heavy, thick, and neither one budged.

  He put his face against the seam and felt cool air coming through. At least I’ll have air. And water. If the water is drinkable. But I’ll get out of here before any of that happens. Someone will come. He remembered meeting a bunch of friends in the bar. They had gotten him rip-roaring drunk. They were probably having him on. It’s a joke. A not-very-funny practical joke. Right?

  He pounded the sides of his fists on the wood and yelled until he became hoarse. The wood was solid. Probably to keep anyone from going down in that shaft. It was thick enough that he couldn’t hear a sound, except for his pounding and yelling and the steady drip of water from below.

  He stopped pounding, put his back against the door, and kicked his heels into the wood and screamed until his throat hurt and his head pounded. He sat down against the door, legs straight out, his breath coming in pants. The wound on his head was forgotten. He had bigger problems. He was trapped.

  He let his arms drop to his sides and he felt something on the ground. He picked it up. It felt like an empty plastic bottle. He tossed it and listened to it rattle across the ground. The sound was eerie in this small space.

  He was angry and scared. Mostly scared. What if none of this was real? What if he’d had an accident, a concussion? He was unconscious and imagined all of this? He’d imagined the sounds. Maybe he was hallucinating the whole thing. The last thing he could remember was going to a bar in Linton and running into a couple of old friends from high school. Maybe someone there had slipped acid or roofies in his drink. Was it even last night? He had no way of judging time.

  He’d grown up in a mining town, but he’d only been in a mine once after graduation from high school. His friends had pressured him into going to a by-invitation-only graduation party. His father was a minister and would never have allowed him to go to a party where there would be drinking and drugs and sex. He snuck out and met them near the old Sunflower mine number 2. The Sunflower was on the edge of the hustling metropolis of Dugger, population eight hundred. He didn’t have a serious girlfriend all the way through high school and his friends knew it. They also knew he was claustrophobic. They’d taken care of both of his problems, or so they said. That was where he lost his virginity.

  He’d hated the shadowy entrance that grew bleaker as it retreated into nothingness. If he hadn’t been afraid of his friends calling him a pussy he would never have gone with them. But he was more afraid of what they’d think than being scared of the dark. He’d done a little acid that night too, but he justified it because they all had. He regretted it to this day.

  He had to wonder if his father had been right. If this was his punishment for mistakes made. Being here. Reliving that experience. Doing penance in hell. A fist of emotion seemed to swell in his chest and tears streamed down his face.

  A hinge squeaked and he caught a glimpse of movement above him. Something hit the ground a few feet in front. The hinges squeaked, the bolt slid shut, and he heard a loud hissing noise coming from nearby. His reflex was to jump up and bang on the door again, but caution told him he should find remain still, find out what had been thrown into his cell. It sounded like a snake.

  The hissing continued and his eyes stung, his nose clogged, he couldn’t breathe. It was gas. Tear gas. The fumes were filling the shaft. He lay on the floor, where he thought the gas might not be as strong, but he was wrong. It was worse near the ground. Gas was heavier than air.

  He scooted back to the
door and stood against it, trying to find the seam where he’d felt the air coming in. For one panicked moment he couldn’t find it, but when he did he put his mouth against the crack. He succeeded in drawing in a large lungful of the gas.

  He rubbed at his eyes and coughed and spat, but everything he tried made it burn deeper. He hacked and gagged until his throat closed. He laid back against the door, unable to even cry out. Soon, he slumped to the floor, eyes open and swollen, nose running, hands on his own throat. His body spasmed, one leg kicked out, and he lay still.

  Acknowledgments

  I would like to acknowledge some special people who have allowed me the use their names as characters in this story: Tony Walker, Tim Morris, Penny “Jackie” Pepper, Karen Stenger Walker, Ginger Purdie, and Bennet Cato.

  I would also like to acknowledge the men and women of the Evansville Police Department and the civilian employees. I can’t imagine a world without law enforcement. Be safe. Thank you.

  The existence of this eighth book in the Jack Murphy thriller series is due in no small part to Michaela Hamilton, my editor, who believed in me and gave me a chance. I consider her my friend and mentor. And kudos to my excellent team at Kensington, who are experts at publicity, marketing, proofing, editing, legalese, cover design, distribution, and so many other things. Without all of you this book would still be a file on my computer.

  If I have not mentioned you, I hope I have thanked you in some way and you will forgive my omission.

  Last, but not least, I thank my beautiful wife, Jennifer, for giving me space and understanding, not to mention reminding me it’s time to eat or go to bed, and bringing me a scotch from time to time.

  This novel is a work of fiction and is not intended to reflect negatively on any law enforcement agency or person. Any resemblance to people, groups of people, businesses, or agencies is purely coincidental. I sincerely hope readers will understand my taking poetic license. If there are any errors in this book, they are all mine.

  USOC, or Unsolved Serial and Organized Crimes, is not a real FBI task force and is solely my creation.

  About the Author

  Author photo, by George Routt

  Sergeant Rick Reed (Ret.), author of the Jack Murphy thriller series, is a twenty-plus-year veteran police detective. During his career, he successfully investigated numerous high-profile criminal cases, including a serial killer who claimed thirteen lives before strangling and dismembering his fourteenth and last victim. He recounted that story in his acclaimed true-crime book, Blood Trail. Rick spent his last three years on the force as the commander of the police department’s internal affairs section. He has two master’s degrees and upon retiring from the police force, took a full-time teaching position at a community college. He currently teaches criminal justice at Volunteer State Community College in Tennessee and writes thrillers. He lives near Nashville with his wife and two furry friends, Lexie and Luther. Please visit him on Facebook, Goodreads, or at his website, www.rickreedbooks.com.

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