Eden Bound

by Darrell Maloney

  Eddie, singing about beer bottles on the wall, had just taken one down and passed it around and now had “a hunnerd and four” left to go.

  He was driving Frank nuts, but it was his own fault so he couldn’t complain much.

  Eighty yards behind Frank, Johnny Connolly and his girlfriend Tina were nervous.

  They didn’t like having a big white Tahoe with the markings of the Lubbock County Sheriff’s Office riding their tail, even though the deputy had introduced himself to them and seemed to have no idea Johnny was a wanted criminal.

  Still, there was nothing they could do about it, so they accepted what was.

  In any event, Johnny and Tina were planning to slip out of the convoy once they made it to Big Spring. Frank was pressing on to Salt Mountain, west of Eden, and the big deputy behind them was headed for San Angelo.

  So all they had to do was mind their manners a few more miles until they made it to Big Spring and they could go on their merry way.

  And quite honestly, Tina was happy in a way for the deputy’s presence behind them.

  Johnny was a scumbag extraordinaire, you see. He was an ex-con, a fugitive from the law, a shameless thief and a drug dealer.

  But he’d never crossed the line and committed the ultimate sin: murder. He’d never gone that far.

  Oh, he was ready to. He’d come dangerously close to murdering Frank, Josie and Eddie before Deputy Sonmore pulled in behind them.

  Tina had been trying her best to talk him out of it. She possessed a higher sense of humanity than he did.

  As much as she was willing to tolerate everything else he was, she didn’t want to be chained to a murderer.

  There was another side to her reasoning as well.

  She suspected that once a murderer killed his first victim, the second murder was a bit easier and the third easier still.

  There had been many times during their relationship when Johnny got violent. Several times when he used his fists to brutalize her.

  She was afraid that if he decided he liked killing; if he developed a taste for it, he might let himself go too far the next time he was furious with her.

  He might put aside whatever it was inside him that made him stop before he did too much damage to her.

  He might start pummeling her with his fists and keep pummeling until the life drained from her body.

  She was just as terrified as he was when the blue lights atop the big white SUV behind them lit them up.

  And just as relieved as he was when the deputy got out of his car not to arrest Johnny; but rather to introduce himself and to find out why the vehicle in front of them was moving so slowly.

  Tina was further relieved when Johnny’s plans to become a mass murderer were seemingly postponed, and hopefully cancelled altogether.

  She breathed a sigh of relief that things were going to work out; that they’d make it to Big Spring and rid themselves not only of Frank and his crew, but of Deputy Sonmore as well.

  But maybe she should have held that sigh of relief just a bit longer.

  -26-

  Law enforcement agencies are very good about helping each other out when an agency needs it.

  It’s not well advertised, but happens all the time.

  If one department is short of working vehicles, for example, a neighboring department is quick to provide loaners.

  If training needs to be done but an agency has no one qualified to provide it, not to worry.

  Another agency is happy to send a qualified trainer to bring their officers up to speed.

  From time to time an agency is hit particularly hard by illness.

  That was why Deputy Daniel Sonmore was on his way to San Angelo.

  The annual influenza shots all the deputies in Tom Green County received that year were defective. They were mandatory, as they always were.

  But for some reason they didn’t take, and the flu bug which swept through the city was especially harsh.

  Fully a third of Tom Green County’s deputies were at home in bed, sucking down hot coffee and chicken soup and trying to ride out the storm.

  The Sheriff of Tom Green County didn’t have enough men left to patrol the county and keep people safe from evildoers and had to come up with a plan to augment them.

  That’s where the brotherhood of blue came in.

  Ask and ye shall receive.

  At least if you’re a lawman in need of help.

  He put out feelers for the surrounding counties to see if anyone had any extra manpower they could spare, and of course every county came through.

  The problem was that the “loaners” weren’t familiar with the county, and therefore would have trouble getting around without getting lost.

  The sheriff’s solution was simple.

  While the volunteers coming in from near and far might not be suitable for patrolling unfamiliar territory, they could certainly man the county jail.

  And the normal jailers, who lived in the county and knew their way around, could be freed up to drive their SUVs around the county and assist citizens in distress.

  It sounded like a simple process, really.

  But nothing was ever simple or easy anymore.

  The bitter cold and ice and snow cover made doing even the simplest things difficult.

  No one knew the highway between Lubbock and San Angelo was blocked by huge snow drifts. Some of the highways were plowed on a regular basis and others weren’t.

  Highway 87 hadn’t been plowed for several weeks, but Deputy Sonmore didn’t know that.

  When his supervisor asked him how long it would take him to get to San Angelo he said, with all due certainty, “Half a day, maybe a little more.”

  He expected to make the two hundred mile trip at pretty good speed, considering the icy conditions.

  Maybe at thirty, forty miles an hour.

  Instead he was traveling six miles an hour, behind a homemade Humvee snow plow. Frank Woodard was doing the best he could, but wasn’t the fastest plow operator there ever was.

  This was the third day since he left Lubbock, and Deputy Sonmore was frustrated, as Frank was.

  But there was nothing he could do about it, and with any luck the road between Big Spring and San Angelo would be plowed.

  If not it would likely be three more days before he made his destination.

  Deputy Daniel Sonmore was a patient man by nature. And he didn’t sweat the small stuff.

  He’d promised to stay for a month at Tom Green County Jail helping out. If he got there two or three days later to start that month, it wasn’t the end of the world. And there was nothing he could do about it anyway.

  He’d spoken to the warden at the jail, who said he certainly understood the delay was unavoidable.

  Sonmore’s supervisor in Lubbock, on the other hand, wasn’t as patient.

  He’d been calling Sonmore every couple of hours on the two-way radio, like clockwork, and bugging the heck out of him.

  “I told them you’d be there two days ago, damn it. Where are you now?”

  Sonmore wanted to be a smart aleck. He wanted to say, “Twelve miles closer than the last time you called.

  But he wasn’t that way.

  Once again he apologized, and once again assured his boss he was making the best time he could.

  And regretting that the powerful radio with the whip antenna worked so far outside of Lubbock County.

  -27-

  When one is driving along a lonely highway at the breakneck speed of six miles an hour he gets incredibly bored.

  The flat land and the distant city lights which never seemed to get any closer were driving the deputy crazy.

  There was another deputy who’d volunteered to come with him, but who’d backed out at the last minute.

  Consequently, Sonmore had no one to talk to.

  The guy in the black pickup truck a hundred yards in front of him, now he had someone to talk to.

  What was that guy’s name, anyway? He’d introduced himself
to them. Usually he was good on names. He remembered the girl’s name: Tina. It dawned on him that pretty girls always made a bigger impression on him than men. He always remembered the names of pretty girls.

  Tina was a very pretty girl and seemed oh, so sweet.

  He wondered if that made him a cad.

  Then he decided not. He was a gentleman in the tradition of Texas cowboys and always respectful to ladies, pretty or not.

  What was Tina’s boyfriend’s name? He was kicking himself for not being able to remember.

  The guy in the Hummer a couple of hundred yards in front of the pickup, now he had someone to talk to as well.

  Deputy Sonmore had only himself to talk to. And talking to himself wasn’t something he was prone to doing.

  Even when bored out of his skull.

  The standard accessory package for Tahoes purchased by Lubbock County was bare bones.

  They came with an AM-FM radio, but no CD player.

  No USB port either.

  The sheriff didn’t want his deputies jamming out to their favorite tunes when they were supposed to be focused on the job.

  Most radio stations were shuttered for the duration of the freeze. Few people were driving anymore, so there didn’t seem to be much point.

  The only FM station the vehicle picked up in Lubbock had a rather weak signal which petered out the day before.

  He tried humming to himself.

  That kept him entertained for about an hour.

  He tried singing to himself.

  After a couple more hours his voice started to crack and his throat started to hurt.

  He resorted to whistling and stopped after twenty minutes.

  Desperate for something to do, it dawned on him he could find out Tina’s boyfriend’s name easily enough by using a tool unique to law enforcement officers.

  He picked up his microphone and keyed it.

  “County Twenty Seven to Lubbock Dispatch.”

  The powerful radio and whip antenna did their job.

  In just a couple of seconds a bored dispatcher in Lubbock responded.

  “Go ahead, Twenty Seven.”

  “Hey, run a plate for me, will ya? Texas, kilo kilo echo, three three seven. A black Ford pickup.”

  “Stand by.”

  He chided himself as he waited. Why didn’t he run the plate before? He wouldn’t have had to struggle for hours just to remember Tina’s boyfriend’s name.

  The operator came back, “Vehicle is registered to Johnny Dale Connolly. He’s got several warrants, four felony and two fugitive. And homicide wants to talk to him about that cartel murder a few months back.”

  Holy moley.

  Sonmore wished there was some mistake. But he knew there wasn’t. As soon as the dispatcher said the name Johnny Connolly he remembered it as the name the man introduced himself as.

  “Dispatch, is he a suspect in the cartel murders?”

  “Negative. Homicide got a tip he might be a witness.”

  So, at least, there was that.

  Still, Johnny Connolly needed to be arrested.

  “Twenty Seven, do you have backup?”

  “Negative.”

  “What’s your present location?”

  The deputy repeated the same words he’d used every couple of hours for more than two days. He knew he sounded like a broken record, but his location was slow in changing.

  “State Highway 87, just north of Big Spring.”

  There was a long pause. Sonmore got the impression the dispatcher was conferring with someone. Or maybe receiving instructions.

  A full thirty seconds went by. Then, “Twenty Seven, the sheriff is here. He says to use utmost discretion. If you cannot safely make the arrest, to wait until you get to Big Spring and request backup from them.

  “He says that you are not to make the arrest unless you’re sure it’s safe to do so.”

  “Ten four.”

  After the dispatcher ended the conversation the sheriff took another deputy aside.

  “How much fuel is in your unit?”

  “I topped it off this morning.”

  “Get in it. The highway behind Twenty Seven is cleared and you should be able to get there in a couple or three hours. Once you’re there you can back him up and make the arrest.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  As they flew down Highway 87 at roughly the speed of a herd of turtles Sonmore considered his options.

  It would be easy enough to maintain the status quo; to continue to follow the pickup until they made it to Big Spring and to request backup from the local police.

  But he’d gotten word that Big Spring was like Lubbock. The city had done a pretty good job of keeping the streets cleared of snow. The ice would be there, but Johnny would be able to take off in his truck.

  High speed chases through cities were always a hazardous affair. Most police officers were expert drivers.

  Most fleeing suspects were not.

  Most high speed chases ended in crashes, or vehicles were hit along the way.

  Sometimes pedestrians too.

  The snow would be gone, but the ice would still be on the streets.

  Odds were good that someone would get injured or killed.

  No, he decided.

  Waiting for Big Spring was a bad idea.

  -28-

  A high speed chase was out of the question.

  Sonmore didn’t want an innocent civilian on their way to buy milk to get hurt.

  He didn’t want himself or another peace officer to get hurt.

  He didn’t want that sweet young girl riding in the truck with his suspect to get hurt.

  He didn’t want Johnny Connolly to get hurt either, for that matter.

  And all of those were possibilities should a car chase ensue.

  He considered other options.

  In some respects, the current situation was ideal.

  Johnny Connolly wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon. He was stuck behind a Humvee driving six miles an hour.

  A Humvee he couldn’t pass, because he couldn’t get around it. The plow on the front of the Hummer was clearing a single lane of traffic. If he passed the Hummer he’d have to face three feet of snow.

  And his pickup wasn’t built for that.

  Behind him was an experienced deputy sheriff, well armed and well trained how to use his weapons.

  Sonmore got the sense they’d break out of the snow and into the cleared streets of Big Spring any time now. On each side of the highway he could make out occasional shuttered businesses which told him they were on the outskirts of town.

  If he was going to avoid a high speed chase he’d have to do it quickly.

  And then, as though fate herself was playing a hand, the black pickup truck in front of him came to a complete stop.

  Johnny and Tina, after two and a half days following Frank’s snow plow, had developed a routine of sorts.

  They had plenty of food and water in the cab of their truck.

  And they weren’t shy about eating and drinking it.

  The thing about eating and drinking, though, is that it requires occasional pit stops.

  Frank noticed in his driver’s side mirror that the truck had stopped. He wasn’t concerned, though, because he believed that Johnny and Tina stopped for what he himself frequently stopped for.

  A potty break.

  Sonmore recognized it as such also.

  Each time Johnny and Tina stopped to use the restroom they let Frank get a quarter mile or so ahead of them.

  That was because Tina did her business in the freshly cleared highway in front of the pickup. She wanted her privacy, you see, and that was the only place she was out of view of Deputy Sonmore.

  She had no real reason to believe Frank would watch her in his mirror, but felt more comfortable nonetheless when she waited until he was some distance away.

  Johnny, he wasn’t so picky.

  He just stood next to his pickup and peed into the snow bank on the side of th
e road.

  Sonmore did the same thing when he had to make a similar stop.

  As soon as the pickup rolled to a stop and while Tina waited for Frank to get out in front of them a piece, Sonmore hatched his plan.

  He put his SUV in park and eased over to the passenger seat,

  Once Tina and Johnny exited the pickup, Sonmore then eased the door open and stepped out.

  No police officer likes making a felony arrest without backup.

  Many things can go wrong, and nearly every one of them can be very unpleasant.

  Still, he’d interacted with both the suspect and the girlfriend and neither seemed particularly hostile.

  He didn’t see weapons on either of them, and although they could have had weapons concealed on their persons he didn’t think that was the case.

  There was no real reason for either of them to be armed out here on the lonely highway, and he didn’t see any telltale bulges.

  Any arrest without backup can be dicey. Felony arrests even more so.

  Fugitive arrests can be dangerous as well. Officers have no discretion to let an offender go. And most people, especially convicted felons like Johnny, don’t want to go back to jail.

  Many will fight to avoid it.

  But Sonmore had the body of a weightlifter and could easily outwrestle a scrawny weakling like Johnny. If Johnny was indeed unarmed, this might not go as bad as he expected.

  In any event, he had to move and he had to move now.

  He wouldn’t get a better opportunity.

  Gun drawn, he moved quickly to the back of the pickup.

  Johnny was still doing his thing, oblivious to Sonmore and everything else. He was cold and wanted to finish so he could get back inside his warm truck. That was the extent of his mindset.

  “Mr. Connolly, I’ve got warrants for your arrest. I need you to get on the ground, face down, your hands behind your back.”

  Johnny was an antsy and jumpy fellow by nature, and practically jumped out of his skin when he heard the commands behind him.

  He recovered quickly, though.

  He’d been arrested several times in the past and was used to dealing with cops. He knew not to make any sudden movements or do anything threatening.