K-9 Outlaw: A Kelton Jager Adventure Book 1

by Charles Wendt

  Rebel was tired of failing. He’d pretty much flunked school, only staying for shop classes before dropping out. His daddy had bled the business dry keeping his racing dreams alive, but when he got hurt Rebel had to take over and the business side of running the shop was not the same as replacing a head gasket. When the pressures got to him, he’d hit her for insistent nagging, and she’d disappeared while he was in prison for it. Now, he couldn’t seem to make it as a drug dealer. Digging out the pit for a secret place to cook the meth had been an expensive and dumb idea and now the latest profits from his largest batch ever had been stolen.

  He shook his head at the stack of fake work orders for tractor maintenance activities, oil changes, tires that had gone flat over winter, sharpening of bush hog blades and the like, he’d use to launder the money. The only problem was no money to launder. He’d invested in security, nearly a half dozen rough and ready who’d paid with their lives, and the green had still walked.

  He had to go for the money. It wasn’t enough to solve his problems, but it bought him some time. Buck and Doris wanted to lay low, but he didn’t have time for that. Moving on to the next batch just wouldn’t work. They would have to smurf up the pills, which wasn’t free, and then he would have to cook. Then there was delivery to Church Hill in Richmond whose customers would still be enjoying the current shipment. Prices wouldn’t be back up for a while. They preferred crack cocaine there, but he couldn’t supply that and lacked the contacts to find other meth markets. Add in laundering the money, and there was no way he’d be able to make a large enough tax payment in time to avoid being swarmed with armed agents.

  His father, the useless crippled drunk, would say he needed to pray. Rebel slammed the table with his clenched fists as he heard that irritating voice inside his head. How he’d been made to get scrubbed up and go to the great stone church on the city square for Sunday school like it was a gateway to living in high society. Instead the old lady had brought him to the minister for punishment for taking an extra Graham cracker during snack time. His fist clenched hard around the pencil, shattering it like he had that minister’s neck for doing that to him. He should have paid the Sunday school teacher a visit too, but she’d already died.

  Rebel’s erection reliving those events surprised him, and he thought of going down to the pit again, but then thought better of it. He’d attacked that fantasy with elation, fueled by the meth like a fiend the past couple of days. He didn’t want to embarrass himself by being unable to complete, and he needed to come off the ice for the mental clarity to save his shop and the Gray Ghost. It wasn’t near as much fun when he wasn’t high, and Baylee Ann would be there when he was ready again.

  The soft rumbling of rubber on gravel made him look out through the greasy shop window to see Buck’s patrol car making its way down the drive. He wished the deputy would be more careful, but at least Rebel did work on the patrol vehicles from time to time. And they did need to talk. Rebel wasn’t sure what to do with the Dixie girl and still manage to save face. It wasn’t something he’d been able to think through beforehand. The money wasn’t in the safe, and when she was walking down the alley he grabbed her in a mad fit.

  Dixie was useless for ransom. Neither Buck or Doris had much money. That’s why they were involved in his scheme. Doris would never tolerate her being used as payment to Shep for another group of bikers. He didn’t need her as leverage over Doris and Buck. They were in much too deep to get out if he was still alive.

  Was that why Buck was coming, he thought, to kill him? Of course not. Buck was a coward and bully. If that time ever came, it would be a bullet in the back. But not yet, because they still needed cash. He was coming to beg for his woman.

  “What the fuck are you doing here?” Rebel snarled as Buck came in the door.

  He didn’t bother to stand up from where he slouched in the grease stained overalls. It didn’t make the snarl particularly menacing.

  “You took something that belongs to me,” said Buck coldly, eyes hidden behind the sunglasses.

  He stood in the doorway, backlit by the brightness of outside, with his arms folded across his chest.

  “What have you got to trade?” countered Rebel.

  Buck’s head looked down and to the side as he considered. Rebel helped him out.

  “Where is the money now? If Chandler didn’t put it in his office safe, where would it be?”

  Buck exhaled, and considered.

  “His house. His car. Maybe he took it to the bank and put it in a safety deposit box.”

  “Do you think he has gone to the bank?”

  Buck’s lips contorted as he thought, and shoulders shrugged. Rebel rose, and leaned in near the side of Buck’s face.

  “Bank or house? We only get one more shot at this,” said Rebel.

  “It has to be house. He’s an evidence box on the backseat floor of his Durango. It’s just an old ammo can with a padlock on it. Banker hours are pretty narrow, and he’s been busy with interviewing the dog guy, cleaning up after your break-in, and consoling Doris.”

  “Okay then. His house it is. May even help you win the next election. Legit sheriff’s homes don’t get raided.”

  “Don’t overdo it. We don’t want some sympathy backlash starting a manhunt. It has to make Fouche look shady.”

  Rebel nodded in agreement.

  “Okay. You want your bitch back?”

  Buck nodded.

  “She’s not stupid, you know. I haven’t hurt her, but she’ll figure out where she was and raise a fuss. If it weren’t for Doris, I’d sell her to Shep and a biker gang riding way out west or something. You’ll have to explain it to her.”

  “Doris won’t like it.”

  “Doris will want her to be alive. Dixie’s a cold bitch, but she won’t want her mom and dad in the slammer, or lose their help with the rent.”

  “I’ll tell her the details,” agreed Buck.

  “Not all the details. Just about her mother will be good enough. Don’t tell her shit about me.”

  Again Buck nodded.

  The garage was a typical layout of a two stall bay with a front office on the side whose large front window faced the road along with the door Buck had entered. A back office served as Rebel’s living space. Another door from the front office opened into the bays, which Rebel led Buck through. The near bay was cleared for use, but the far one had degenerated into ad-hoc storage with surplus tools, parts, and other supplies choking the floor.

  Rebel took him to the squat metal shelving unit with boxes of assorted motor oils and radiator fluids standing between the bays.

  “Give me a hand with this, will you?”

  Rebel started to push it, using his back against it and extending his legs. Buck joined in, the unit sliding and grinding upon oil soaked kitty litter on the shop floor. They had only moved it about a yard before fully exposing the trap door of plate steel.

  Rebel knelt at it, while Buck stepped off to the side with hands on his hips. Rebel grasped the handle, began to pull, looking up toward Buck.

  “I should get some food and water for the b-,” he began, his words cut short as debris pelted the side of his face. He groaned, clutching at his right eye as it squinted shut in protest over sand and other grit. A blond woman sprung from the hole like a rabbit, and made for the open bay doors. Rebel reached for her with his off hand, but missed the tackle as his fingers didn’t quite manage to close about her ankle. His belly hit the floor, the pork rinds in the chest pocket of his denim overalls crushed into powder.

  “I got her,” said Buck.

  Rebel looked up to the see deputy dragging Bambi by her hair back toward the hatch. She screamed and twisted, pounding at him with her fists, but his grip was too strong and no one was within hearing of the remote garage. Another blond head poked up from the hole in the floor. He pushed himself up onto his knees, eyes wild and face flushed with raw red anger.

  Buck raised Bambi by her hair just high enough to be able to throw her down
on to the floor. Then he kicked her with his steel shank patrol boots. She curled up into the fetal position crying. Showing just above the hole in the floor, Dixie’s eyes went wide and her jaw dropped.

  Buck pulled the wooden nightstick from his utility belt, and tapped the open palm of his off hand as he towered over the girls. Their resolve died as quickly as their plan.

  Rebel pushed himself to his feet and pointed an angry finger at Dixie.

  “You! Go to him,” he said with a thumb flick toward Buck.

  Dixie made her way out the hole, limping a tad on the slightly swollen ankle. Rebel bent over to make a grab at Bambi’s hair. Dixie turned on him in a quick whirl.

  “Leave her alone!” she exclaimed as she slapped at him with her right arm.

  Rebel easily caught her hand and pushed it backward. With the hurt ankle, Dixie lost her balance and tumbled to the floor. Buck reached down to help her up, and as she took his arm he threw her up over his shoulder. Her legs flailed, but he refused to let go or set her down, easily holding the nightstick in the other hand.

  Then it was Bambi’s turn, Rebel grabbing her by the hair and raising her, forcing her folded body to unwind. A couple of steps, and he was lowering her back into the pit. She grabbed the ladder rungs, and Rebel stepped at her hands to keep her moving downward. A quick slam of the steel plate and a slide of the latch and he had his biker girls secure. He would have to move the shelves back himself later. Buck had his hands full.

  “Anything else, Rebel?”

  Rebel thought about coordinating the raid on Chandler Fouche’s home with Buck, but shook his head no. Dixie would hear, and despite Buck’s best efforts she may give the secret away. The raid would come in the night just as soon as he could buy some new muscle. And you could only buy muscle with four things: money, drugs, guns, or pussy. A third of his only account walked out the door on the deputy’s shoulder.

  Buck sat Dixie upfront in the Chevy and took his time walking around to the driver’s door. She didn’t make a run for it. Her ankle wasn’t that bad, but he didn’t think she’d get too far on him. He sat down behind the steering wheel and turned toward her. She sat glaring out the passenger side window, arms crossed over her bosom.

  He waited, but she was stubborn and didn’t turn toward him.

  “Most people I rescue are grateful.”

  She turned toward him incredulously.

  “Why aren’t you arresting him? Why aren’t you rescuing the other women?” she asked with tears starting in her eyes.

  “Because I have to draw the line somewhere, Dixie.”

  “What in the world does that mean?” her jaw dropping.

  “Your mom is in business with Rebel to pay your dad’s medical bills. I like you, and don’t want to put your mom in prison and have your dad wind up in a home. The state will take his business to pay for his care, and you’d not be able to keep your home.

  If I take those skanks from Rebel, things will unravel and he’ll drag us all down. But I can’t have him bothering classy southern ladies like you now, can I?” he smiled.

  “What are you saying Mom is into?” asked Dixie sharply, but the intensity of the question faded before the end of the sentence.

  She’d always felt on the rich side of poor. She’d always had nice clothes, food and money for movies and such. It made her feel wealthy amongst her friends growing up. But she also knew the other truth. Her bedroom had been a motel room. She couldn’t afford her own car, even if she had needed one. She’d never been on an airplane. There weren’t vacations down to Myrtle Beach in the spring other than the one time, the only other time she’d been out of the state than a school field trip to the North Carolina Zoological Park. In the world, despite all the money that passed through their hands, the Johnsons were very far from well to do.

  “It doesn’t matter,” he said. “The less you know the better. And she doesn’t do it because she’s a bad person. She loves your dad and this is the only way she has to make ends meet and not lose their business. And if you make any fuss around town, I won’t be able to keep covering it up for you.”

  Buck started the car. He would have liked to get the witness signatures, but this was much more important.

  She nodded. A few minutes later they drove past the empty sheriff station parking lot, did a U-turn, and stopped in front of her house. He turned off the engine.

  “Thanks for taking me home,” she said getting out.

  He got out after her, and his door closing caused Dixie to look back at him over her shoulder as he followed, her tape-savaged eyebrows raised and mouth terse.

  “I’m coming in, too.”

  Her eyes flickered with defiance briefly, but she turned around and put the keys in the door. He pushed through the doorway behind her. Patsy meowed, and started rubbing her legs as Buck threw the deadbolt. As she reached down to stroke her, she felt Buck’s strong arms encircle her waist from behind and his hips start grinding her bottom. Dixie tried taking a step forward to break the encirclement, but he stayed with her taking a heavy step forward. The glass figurines spilled off the end table.

  “Not now. I’m gross from being in that pit,” she protested.

  He used his nose to move aside her blond locks, kissing and biting at the back of her neck. Dixie grabbed at his hands, trying to break his embrace, but his grip was too strong. Buck picked her up, his mouth never leaving her neck and carried her forward through the door of the small bathroom.

  She squirmed and twisted, and the shower curtain rod fell. He kicked it aside as he put down her feet in the pale green tub. As Dixie turned her head, his kisses left her neck and blazed across her cheek toward her lips. Buck’s grip loosed as one hand reached to turn on the water.

  “God it’s cold!” she screeched.

  He found her mouth and she opened it, kissing him back. His utility belt’s steel buckle clunked loudly on porcelain, as it landed between the tub and toilet. Buck lifted her wet skirt and gripped the thin cotton panties. She grabbed at his wrists, but he tore the fabric away and spun her, pressing her chest to the lime spotted tiles. He stepped into the tub, standing behind her.

  Patsy sat screeching in the bathroom’s open door, twitching her tail, as the wall was battered and water splashed across the walls and floor.

  CHAPTER—12

  Kelton kneeled on the brushed concrete floor to do another set of pushups, trying to keep some level of rage up. The long hours in confinement, with no food and marginal water, were mellowing him and he resented it. When his arms trembled, he sat on the cot with his head in his hands. He’d done nothing wrong. He and Azrael had tried to help them. They had locked him up. Worst of all, they had shot at his dog, and he didn’t know where Azrael was or his status.

  The light through the high bay windows, much too high for him to see out of even standing on the cot, was steadily growing in intensity. It must be getting late in the afternoon he thought. There wasn’t a visible clock and they’d taken his phone. His stomach grumbled in emptiness, even if he knew he’d eaten plenty of calories at breakfast. The glass and steel door to the office hallway was dark with shadow.

  He slapped one of the steel bars in frustration, listening to the ring until it died. He repeated it again and again. With intense auditory focus he heard a truck parking outside. It was in the parking lot, and not the alley. It might be the sheriff’s Durango, but it sounded bigger and deeper. It wasn’t a diesel, but there was no mistaking the big engine. When it shut off, he heard the slam of the door and then nothing.

  Kelton’s ears strained, hearing the soft buzzing ringing of nothingness. With a fingernail he tapped the bar yet again, to help his ears calibrate to hearing something real instead of imaging something. Yes, he was sure he was hearing it. The distant footfalls echoed on the linoleum tiles, announcing the advance. They were booted feet, in a confident steady cadence with a heavy but powerful stride. And they were growing louder. There was a flicker of movement in the glass door, and a pausing of steps
just long enough to work the door mechanism into the cell bay.

  The man stopped as he entered and briefly surveyed the entire bay as if to ensure everything was as he’d been told to expect. He was tall and white, skin with a bronze healthy glow that bespoke of an active outdoor lifestyle despite approaching sixty. His hair was silver, but very full, and trimmed short with long sideburns. Draping off his powerful shoulders was a tweed sport coat over a forest green shirt with an open button-down collar. He wore slacks of French khaki, neatly folded to tuck into knee-high Irish boots. With his right hand he pushed an office chair on its casters. He carried a brown buffalo hide satchel draped over one shoulder.

  Kelton said nothing, merely standing with arms gripping the bars like an extra in a prison movie. He watched as the gentleman positioned the chair in the aisle across from him, put down the satchel and removed his sport coat to drape over its back. Removing the coat revealed a 1911 pistol on his right hip, the hammer back, in an “inside the waistband” type holster. On the left hip was a spare magazine and a small tactical flashlight in a leather carrier. He sat, feet shoulder width apart, and placed his hands on his knees leaning forward slightly.

  “Captain Jager, I presume. I am James Redigan, the Commonwealth’s Attorney of Lowland County. Please, have a seat,” he said with a small hand gesture and a commanding voice, but with a friendly undertone.

  Kelton remained standing for a moment regarding him, but the prosecutor patiently gazed upon him with bright eyes. He let go of the bars, and sat upon the head of the cot facing him.

  “I am told you have been detained for my questioning, but have not been placed under arrest. I’m sorry the detainment has been inconvenient. The sheriff did not inform me beforehand he was taking this step, and I needed to work through some schedule challenges before coming to see you. Even in a small town, that tends to be the burden of holding office.”

  Kelton shrugged to acknowledge the apology. It seemed reasonable and he didn’t want to delay the situation any longer than necessary. He wanted out as soon as possible to go find his dog.