Tiny didn’t say a word. He was horrified. Sweat stood at attention, awaiting instructions.
Reese stood, faced the camp, and screamed at the top of his lungs, “You’re dead! You’re a dead man! You killed him! You killed him! You son of a bitch! Do you hear me? You’re a dead man walking!” Then he grabbed anything he could get his hands on, slinging it as far as he could, screaming over and over, “You’re a dead man walking!”
The Chevy pickup came sliding out of the camp house area and disappeared down a road, away from the gang and into the heart of the property.
“Man, he’s haulin’ ass!” Tiny said.
“And he’s gettin’ away!” Sweat added.
“No, he’s not…he is doin’ just exactly what I want him to do.” Reese chuckled out loud. “OK, boys; the two of you go down this road till you hit the Dummy Line-y’all know where it is. He’s gonna try and get out that way. You’ve got a good ten-mile jump on him. The gate combination is nineteen ninety-two, I think. If it ain’t, just shoot the damn thing off. There’s only two ways out of this bitch, and we will be on both of them. Kill him and anybody he’s got with him. I want that sumbitch to suffer. You hear me?” Reese was spitting as he screamed.
Looking each of them in the eyes, Reese continued, “I’ll follow him that way.” He pointed the direction Jake had driven. “He can’t make it very far, it’s too muddy. That stupid sumbitch is trapped, and he don’t know it! Go! Now!”
Sweat and Tiny jumped into their truck. Tiny stomped on the gas with all his might, his mud grips shooting a rooster tail of dirt and rocks thirty feet. Sweat checked his pistol. It only took a few minutes to reach the old abandoned railroad track. Tiny nearly lost control of the truck when he turned the sharp corner. In spite of sliding wildly, Sweat never looked up. Miraculously, Tiny regained control and stood on the gas again. After miles of rough road, they saw headlights piercing the darkness at the gate. Sweat started cussing. Then they both let out a rebel yell at the top of their lungs.
Reese was trying to figure out what to do with Johnny Lee’s body. He decided to leave him in the back of the truck until they killed that scumbag. Reese covered Johnny Lee’s head and shoulders with a jacket. He then got into the truck, cranked it up, and slowly drove back to the camp house.
Floodlights illuminated the yard. The camper lights were on. Its door was standing wide open. Reese approached cautiously, pistol drawn, peeking in the windows until he was satisfied that no one was inside. He stepped in and looked around. Camo clothes were everywhere. A heater glowed in the corner. On the top bunk, he saw a lime-green sleeping bag with a pink pillow and lying on the floor beneath was a stuffed toy of some kind. That’s odd, he thought as he stepped on it with a twist. He noticed several kids’ mystery novels. It started making sense. The scumbag’s got a kid with him…probably a girl. Oh, this is gonna be good-really, really good.
As Reese was leaving the camper, he noticed a hunting magazine lying on the couch. He picked it up and looked at the small white mailing label in the corner. “Bingo!” he said out loud, a demonic grin forming as he meandered back to the truck. He cranked it up and raced the engine while he thought. The loud dual exhausts gave him energy. He was going to kill the man, just like Johnny Lee wanted…and more.
“I’ll get him, Johnny Lee…I swear I will,” he pledged aloud.
He picked up Johnny Lee’s cell phone and flipped it open. It was a Southern Link radiophone. He switched it to radio, scrolled through the names until he found the one he wanted, and pressed Send. Beep-beep.
Twenty seconds later Reese heard beep-beep, and someone responded.
“Yo, Johnny Lee, what’s up?” Music was in the background.
Beep-beep. “Moon Pie, this is Reese. I need a favor.”
Beep-beep. “Yo, dog, you got it.”
Beep-beep. “How quick can you be in West Point?” Reese got out of the truck to pace.
Beep-beep. “Twenty, twenty-five minutes.”
Beep-beep. “OK. Listen. This piece of shit dude just shot and killed Johnny Lee.”
Beep-beep. “Son of a…are you serious…shit…man, are you OK? Why? What the hell’s goin’ on?”
Beep-beep. “We were gonna rob him and he freaked out…it’s a long story. We’re chasin’ him through the woods right now. I want you to go to his house and see if anybody’s there. I want you to grab ‘em. I don’t care how ugly it gets.”
Beep-beep. “You think he’s got an old lady?”
Beep-beep. “Yeah, I’m bettin’ he does…and I wanna make him pay.”
Beep-beep. “Give me the address.”
Reese read it to him from the magazine.
Beep-beep. “I’ll call you back…I’m on it, dog.”
Reese got back into the truck, and with an evil smirk, he slowly, deliberately dropped the gearshift into drive, and started easing down the logging road, stalking Johnny Lee’s killer.
Within thirty minutes from the time the call went dead in Mick’s ear, he was at the camp gate. On the way, Mick tried unsuccessfully to reach Jake on his cell phone. He didn’t want to call Jake’s house at this hour. He wasn’t positive what was going on, and he for sure didn’t want to worry Jake’s wife. He had talked with her once before and was not eager to repeat the experience.
Mick sat in the truck for a minute, taking everything in. He knew the guys who owned this camp wanted the necessities like satellite TV but not a telephone. Inside, the camp house was dark, but all the floodlights were on. Mick noticed that Jake’s camper had all its lights on and its door was standing wide open.
Mick slowly got out of his truck and told Beau to stay.
“Jake?” he yelled.
“Jake?” he called louder.
He walked slowly to the camper and yelled out again, “Jake, are you here? Hello…is anyone here?”
Stepping inside the camper, he saw Jake’s hunting clothes. The two beds looked like they had been slept in. Nothing really looked out of place…other than the door being wide open. He then walked toward the camp house. Beau was whining in the back of the truck, wanting out.
“Stay!” Mick told him.
Inside the front screened porch, the main door to the camp house was also wide open. Mick stuck his head inside and began looking around.
“Hello? Is anyone here?” he yelled as he slowly stepped inside.
Mick walked past the pool table. Everything looked like he expected it would. Nothing was seriously out of place. Actually, the place was a mess, but since it was a hunting lodge, no one ever cleaned it up. It always looked like this. He went back outside. This is weird, he thought, as he petted Beau’s head.
After climbing into his truck, he backed up, looking around one more time. Something was gnawing at him, but he couldn’t place it. He said, “Aw, to hell with it. I’m too freakin’ exhausted for this crap.” He headed home to get some sleep.
When he arrived, his wife was sitting in the kitchen with a glass of milk and some warm raisin bread from the Mennonite bakery in Livingston, sheepishly grinning with guilty pleasure.
“I couldn’t go back to sleep,” she said. “What’s going on?”
“I don’t know. The lights were all on, but no one was there. It was kinda strange. I’m a little worried that something’s wrong…but…but I just don’t know what,” he replied.
“Mick, what’s that all over your pants legs?” she asked, pointing. The bottoms of his blue jeans were covered in something dark and wet.
Mick reached down, touching it. He rubbed his fingers together. “It’s blood!” he said with a scared look on his ashen face.
“Oh my God! Mick!”
“I’ll call the sheriff!” he said, reaching for the phone, worried at what this might mean.
“Sumter County Sheriff’s office,” a woman with a husky, cigarette-ravaged voice answered.
“This is Mick Johnson. I need to speak to Sheriff Landrum. It’s important.”