***
Bill Jacobs stopped at his apartment and made a phone call to the GBI office in Atlanta then laid down on the couch and fell asleep. By the time he awoke, it was almost ten o’clock at night. Trained to be awake instantly, he headed back outside to his truck. He was going to the courthouse and talk to Brooks one last time.
Sheriff Brooks, looking weary and angered, gave Jacobs little time to say anything once he stepped into the office and closed the door. “You come to ask for your job back, Jacobs? No way. Now get out of here before I have Brian toss you in a holding cell.”
Jacobs shrugged. “Go ahead. I’ve made my phone call already. The GBI is on its way, Brooks. It’s all over.”
Brooks leaned heavily over his desk and said sternly, “It ain’t even got started yet, Jacobs. Miss Pary called me this afternoon and said you were going to have Edie arrested. Now just how were you going to do that? You’re not a cop anymore.”
Jacobs sat down and said, “We’ll see when the State agents get here in the morning. I think both of the Pary women know something about the attack on Chuck last night and he will testify that Edie was there and saw the whole thing.”
Brooks shouted, “Chuck Veal was drunk last night and got banged up when I ran him off the road...”
“I saw and talked to Chuck Veal an hour before you stopped him on the road. He was stone cold sober.”
“Well he was pretty drunk when I found him. Things like that don’t take long to happen as you should know.”
“Brooks? Somebody jumped him, hit him over the head with a board, and still he managed to get away alive. Have you talked with the doctor? He’ll tell you the same thing.”
“Yeah, I’ve talked with the old coot and I’ve talked with Veal, too. I asked him what happened and he claimed that I beat him up. I placed him under hospital arrest too.”
“You knocked the crap out of him a time or two. I saw that with my own eyes.”
The two men eyed one another. “If you saw that then you also saw Veal trying to fight me and escape. Don’t tell me you missed seeing that too. He was giving his buddy in the car with him a chance to get away.”
“There was somebody in the car with him? Who was it?”
Brooks shrugged. “Probably Blake Squires but I couldn’t tell through all that rain.”
“No Walt, Blake was with me at the time I heard your radio call. It wasn't him.”
“So now you’re a part of their little scheme and you’re covering for that black bugger too? Let me advise you of something, Jacobs. The doctor told me that Veal had been drinking and his blood alcohol was pretty high, sixteen I think he said.”
Jacobs was at first stunned and then realized the Sheriff was lying. “I don’t believe you, Walt. You are lying and you know it.”
Walt stormed around the desk and snapped, “It’s a lie that will hold up in court. I’m picking up Veal just as soon as he leaves the hospital.”
“Brooks you can’t be serious about charging him with DUI.”
“I not only can, I already have.”
Brooks pointed a shaking finger at Jacobs and said, “Now you get out of here before I change my mind about locking you up and if you show your face around town again in the next couple of days, that’s what I’m going to do.”
Jacobs stunned but cautious, stood glaring back at the man. Something was seriously wrong that only the influence of Max Pary could explain.
“When your buddies with the GBI get here, I’m going to tell them that Edie Pary had nothing to do with Chuck Veal. There was no beating because Veal was drunk and he sustained that banged up head when I ran his car off the road.”
Jacobs clenched his fist, turned and stormed out of the office. Brooks shouted something after him but he ignored it.
The Beginning (Whispering Pines Book 1) Page 37