~ In The Sticks ~

by

Joel Jurrens

He pulled into Angel Geode’s yard and called out his location to Priscilla. The place didn’t look much different on the outside than the last time he had been there. The lab team had come and gone without a trace. His boots made sucking sounds in the wet earth as he walked to the porch. Once on the porch he noticed the yellow strip of plastic crime scene tape that said “POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS” hanging by one end flapping in the breeze. The wind gusts from the storm must have torn it loose. He took his flashlight out of its holder on his belt and turned it on. The screen door was shut, but the inside door was open.

Kids coming to look at a murder scene, he thought. Then he noticed the door had been forced open and the latch had been busted out of its frame. He looked at the inside door and saw a footprint level with the doorknob where someone had kicked the door open. The footprint still glistened with moisture. Lyle shone the flashlight on the floor. A set of still-wet footprints headed across the kitchen’s linoleum floor.

The hair on the back of his neck stood to attention. He unbuckled his .357 from its holster and began to pull it out. It had just cleared the top of the holster when he saw the flash.

He saw the flash inside the house first. They should have been simultaneous, but they weren’t. He never heard the sound of the gun—maybe the flood of adrenaline made him temporarily deaf. But he saw the flash, then felt the bullet strike his lower right chest just below his nipple. If he hadn’t been wearing his body armor, he would have bled to death in minutes right there on the porch. Even with the body armor, it punched his breath from him. He dropped his flashlight.

Lyle took a step back. But then his body kicked into automatic. He went into the modified Weaver stance without thinking about it. Point and shoot. No aiming. Look at the spot where the flash came from and nothing else. Put as many rounds there as fast as he could. The old revolver sounded like an automatic weapon. The hammer fell on two spent cartridges before he realized his gun was empty.

Turning to retreat, he fell over the porch railing. He landed hard in the same daylilies where he had puked when he found Angel’s body. Any air still in him left in a hoarse grunt. He couldn’t breathe. He moved without thinking. Some primal survival instinct kicked in. His gun had to be reloaded. Any second someone might slam through the screen door and start shooting bullets into body parts not covered with Kevlar. He wished he had the easy reloading .40. The revolver loaded slower. He glanced up at the porch expecting to see a gun muzzle. He inserted the speed loader into the revolver.

Lyle tried to do it as calmly as he could, but a voice in his head kept screaming, “HURRY! HURRY! HE’S COMING! HE’S COMING!”

He glanced at the porch again as he released the bullets in the speed loader. They weren’t seated. All six bullets fell out and were buried in the day lilies. He grabbed the last speed loader out of its holder and forced himself to concentrate. This time he pushed the bullets all the way down and turned the thumb screw. They fell into place. He snapped the cylinder closed.

Lyle hadn’t breathed during the entire process. His head spun. A fog clouded his vision. He thought he would pass out. When his breath came to him, it was in short gasps at first. After a few gasps, the deeper breaths came until he was breathing normally again. The fuzziness in his head dissipated, but with the clearing of his head came weakness. The revolver felt like a cement weight. He could barely hold it up. If someone came charging through the door, he didn’t think he would have the strength to pull the trigger. Time to retreat and call for backup.

Lyle backed away from the porch on his hand and knees, keeping his revolver pointed up at the porch. When he reached his squad car, he started the motor. He turned on his headlights, spotlight and take-down lights up on his light bar. He wanted as much light on the house as he could get. This wasn’t the time for surprises. Whoever was in the house wasn’t going to sneak up on him without being seen. Lyle kept his eyes on the house and picked up the radio microphone.

“Cossack County from car three, EMERGENCY!” The words came out in a high-pitched scream.

“Car three, go ahead with your emergency,” Pricilla’s voice came over the speaker sounding as sexy as ever.

“I have a man with a gun! Shots fired! I need backup!” He panted from screaming.

An uncharacteristic moment of silence came over the radio.

Gerry Oleson broke the silence. “Cossack County from Calvin car one. What is car three’s location?”

Again, silence from Priscilla.

“It’s the old Simpson place on River Road,” Lyle said, his voice not as high-pitched as before. “Where the murder took place.”

“Cossack County car one is en route to car three’s location running code three.”

“Ten-four. Calvin car one is en route, code three,” Priscilla repeated.

A short silence followed, but Lyle could tell by the crackling radio that Pricilla still held her mike key. “Car three from Cossack County?” she said.

“Go ahead for car three.”

“Are you okay, Lyle?” She sat on her chair in the control room miles away. A locked steel door with bulletproof glass and concrete walls kept her safe, but the tension in her voice could not have been greater if she’d been standing beside him.

“I’m okay,” Lyle said and touched his shirt where the bullet had hit.

It was fifteen miles from Calvin to where Lyle sat in his patrol car with his revolver pointed at the house where the bullet had come from. Going sixty miles per hour it would take fifteen minutes to get there. In less than five minutes Lyle heard the siren of Gerry’s car. When they were a mile away, they shut the siren off. At a half-mile away, they shut off their top lights. Their headlights went off at a hundred yards. They turned into the driveway running without lights to keep from making an easy target for someone waiting inside the house.

The city squad pulled up beside Lyle’s car and lit up the house with headlights, spotlight and take-down lights. Gerry opened his door for cover, got out and knelt down beside Lyle. Blaine Neuman stayed on the driver’s side with the door open and his shotgun pointed at the house.

“Are you okay?” Gerry asked.

“I’m going to need a new shirt.” Lyle pointed to the hole in his shirt. “Thank God for body armor.” His ribs hurt.

“How many people are in the house?” Gerry asked.

“I didn’t take roll call while I was there,” Lyle said. “At least one.”

Gerry nodded. “We’ll do the entry. You stay here.”

Lyle shook his head. “I’m going in, too.”

“No one expects you to go back in,” Gerry said.

“I do,” Lyle answered.

He did not want to re-enter the house and take the chance of another bullet finding its mark. Something inside him; however, would not let him stay outside in relative safety while Blaine and Gerry went in.

“Okay,” Gerry said, “but Blaine and I will do the initial entry. You cover the rear.”

Lyle nodded in agreement.

“Let us get positioned on the porch. When we’re there, you shut the lights off and get up there with us,” Gerry said.

Lyle pointed his thumb at the mercury vapor light sitting twenty feet up on a pole above them. “We need to get the yard light shut off.”

“Blaine, see if you can find a shutoff switch for the yard light,” Gerry said. “If you can’t find one, shoot it out.”

Blaine disappeared and a moment later they heard the metallic creak of an ancient circuit breaker being thrown. The light went dark. A sudden wall of black fell behind the squad cars.

“When we’re in position, we’ll give you the signal and you shut the car lights off,” Gerry said. He went around the back of the car and joined Blaine on the other side.

They went far to the left using the glare of the lights as cover. They approached the porch and slipped under the railing. They crawled to the door. Gerry gave Lyle the signal. Lyle shut all the lights off on his squad car. Moving over to Gerry’s car, he shut off the lights on it, too. The yard was swamped in black.