Daniel Poort
Chapter 4: DIRT ROADS
CHAPTER 4: DIRT ROADS
Bill sprung from his chair and sprinted out of his office. As he headed for the back door Carlyle joined him in stride. It seemed as if they both finished reading at the same time.
“You know where the Jacobs place is?” Bill asked the young deputy.
“Yeah.”
“You’re driving then.” Bill cocked his shotgun before climbing into the passenger seat.
The Jacobs family home was about a thirty minute ride from the station, a sprawling estate and horse ranch located in a maze of dirt roads. Carlyle pressed the cruiser into dangerous speeds and Bill thought the kid would make it a third of the time. In fact, Jimmy Carlyle’s fearless nature was why Bill wanted him to drive. If they were on a clock to stop Jacobs from getting killed, there was nobody more capable of getting them there in time than Carlyle.
The dust and rocks peppered the nearby trees and Carlyle whipped the cruiser around the final corner, the rear tires breaking traction and the cruiser briefly entering a quasi-controlled slide. Bill re-adjusted his grip on the shotgun as they skidded into Jacobs Ranch driveway. Bill and Jimmy rushed the door and Jimmy gave it a strong kick as if he was back in Fallujah hunting terrorists. What they found was shocking.
The amount if blood that painted the mansion’s living room was astonishing. Carlyle and Bill cleared the house, a laborious process that took the better part of an hour in the enormous mansion. They did not find anyone living. What they did find was a sack of meat that loosely resembled the better portion of Kyle Jacobs. Jacobs’s head was missing and in its place was the head of one of the horses from the ranch. Bill thought he would be sick. Even though Bill saw horrible things during his time as a homicide detective from Chicago, nothing prepared him for the brutality of what they found at the Jacobs ranch. Bill noticed no visible signs of such distress from Jimmy, who remained stone faced through the whole ordeal.
“How do you do that?” Bill asked.
“Do what boss?” Jimmy asked as he continued searching for evidence and marking it for state forensics.
“How does this shit not freak you out?” Bill asked. “I mean, you know I saw some shit down in Chicago, but this?”
“Seen worse,” Jimmy said so matter-of-factly that it sent chills up Bill’s spine.
“I don’t even want to know,” Bill said.
“Yeah you do,” said Jimmy. “Otherwise you wouldn’t have brought it up.”
“I’m sorry, I just…” Bill started but trailed off before completing the thought. It was true, he did want to know. What had Jimmy seen during the war that made him able to remain stone-faced when Bill, the former Chicago homicide detective turned small town Sheriff, found himself well beyond out of sorts.
“You know I was Special Forces right?” Jimmy asked.
“Yeah, that’s what your resume said when I hired you,” Bill said.
“Well, sometimes guys like me would get loaned out to those types of government organizations that aren’t supposed to exist,” Jimmy said as they walked toward the car to wait for the state troopers. Bill wouldn’t get the rest of the story that day, though, as Jimmy froze when he reached for the car door handle. Bill almost asked him what was wrong, but then he saw for himself. In the seat of the patrol car was Mr. Jacobs’s head, and in the mouth was a large envelope, just like the one that contained the first correspondence from the killer.