False Prey: A Wildfire Novella (Wildfire Saga) (5 page)

Danny jumped up as a stream of angry locals came out next, ushered by stone-faced courtroom guards.

“String him up, that’s what I say!” cried one of the men.

“This is a travesty of justice!
 
A travesty!” said Greg Moore, the auto parts owner Danny had interviewed at the scene of the arrest.
 
He glanced at Danny and started to say something but the press of people propelled him down the corridor.
 

“Judge Klein is a senile old fool—I’ll make sure to vote his ass out of office come November!” said the third man, a tall, scarecrow of a man with a sour expression on his face.
 
He glared over his shoulder at the courtroom as he moved down the corridor.
 

The guards pushed and cajoled the last of the locals until they had all dispersed, grousing to each other and gradually making their way to the exit.
 

Danny called out, “Officers, what’s happened?
 
Can I get your reactions?”

“Up yours,” muttered the the one without a flu mask.
 
He shoved Danny roughly aside and stalked off down the corridor after the locals.

His partner, still in his flu mask, frowned, his eyes looking past Danny.
 
Almost absently, he put a hand on Danny’s shoulder.
 
“Sorry about that.”
 
The mask slightly muffled the man’s voice.
 
“Billy kinda got chewed out by the judge in there.”

“S’all right—all part of the job.
 
So, can I get a reaction from you, officer…?”

“McCuller,” the cop in the mask said.
 
“Tom McCuller.”

“Thanks, Officer McCuller,” said Danny as he scribbled down the name.
 
“M-C-C-U-L-L-E-R, right?
 
I want to make sure I spell it correctly for the story.”

“You got it.”

“And what’s your partner’s name?
 
You called him Billy…?”

“Perkins.
 
Billy Perkins.”

Danny wrote that down, too.
 
“Okay, Officer McCuller, what’s going on?” asked Danny, stepping aside to let the last few court attendants out.
 
The guards glared at Danny before the courtroom doors slammed shut.

Officer McCuller sighed, causing the flu mask to move on his face.
 
“Judge Klein listened to witnesses and ultimately decided that the defendant couldn’t be held without bail—in fact, he couldn’t be held at
all
.”
 

Officer Perkins reached the locals at the other end of the corridor and the noise of their complaints ratcheted up a notch.
 
News spread fast in a small town, Danny figured.

“So what happens now?”

“The defendant…excuse me, the person of interest, is free to go.
 
For now.”

“So the police department is still watching him?”

“We’ll be keeping an eye on him and anyone else that’s acting suspiciously.
 
I personally think the Judge is making a mistake, but it’s not my job to question him.
 
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to get to my partner before he starts a riot.
 
We’re going to have a hell of a time keeping the peace when the good folks of Brikston find out about this ruling.”

Danny thanked the cop and stood there, alone in the corridor, watching the drama unfold by the exit doors.
 
The two cops were trying to keep the locals they’d herded outside from re-entering the building and storming the courtroom.
 
They were all shouting obscenities and feeding off each other’s anger.
 
Danny scribbled down some descriptions of what he was watching.
 
A slight noise behind him caused him to turn.

The big doors to the courtroom were opened a crack.
 
“Hello?” Danny asked.
 
The door opened further and he saw the recently exonerated defendant looking out the door into the corridor with a hunted look to his eyes.
 
Danny would have bet a few crisp Benjamins the man was looking for a way out of the building that didn’t involve walking past the locals.

“They said,” he mumbled, glancing over his shoulder.
 
“That I have to leave…n-now…”
 
The wretch clutched his roughly bandaged arm.

Righteous indignation welled up inside Danny.
 
Here this guy had been beaten half-to-death and then hauled before a court without so much as a cursory medical exam, finally set free, and now they simply wanted him to go away.
 
Danny turned and glared down the corridor toward the still arguing locals with their police escort.
 

The cops sure aren’t moving them out of here very fast.
 
The cop—the one called Billy back at the church—turned and looked down the corridor at the defendant.
 
He smirked.
 
It sent a cold feeling down the reporter’s old bones.
 
That one’s up to no good or I’m the Tooth Fairy,
he told himself.

“Look at the way he’s looking at me,” moaned the defendant.
 
He shrunk back into the courtroom.
 
The man was shorter than average to begin with—maybe 5’6”, Danny guessed—but now he looked positively small.
 
His face was a grisly mess of dried blood and fresh bruises.
 
The left side was so bad, his slightly almond-shaped eye had swollen shut.
 
He had more blood on his torn undershirt and a rough, bloody bandage on his right arm.
 

“I can’t leave this way…” he said.
 
His voice sounded more like a sigh.
 
Then he closed his eyes and sank to the floor.
 
“I can’t go
anywhere…Mr. Moore still has my car…”

Danny looked back at the suddenly quiet locals.
 
They were all watching him now.
 
The sight was definitely unnerving.
 
Danny felt the urge to flee somewhere and hide.
 

“Look pal, I don’t think we have much time before Brikston’s finest let that group of concerned citizens loose.
 
Come on.”
 
He reached down and gently helped the younger man to his feet.
 
The man tried to smile a little.

“Thanks—but what good will it do?
 
Without my car, I’m trapped in here…” he looked around, tears filling his one good eye.
 
He spat a bloody glob onto the courtroom floor.
 
“I hate this place.
 
I wish I’d never seen the exit for this one-horse town.
 
Bunch of inbred hicks.”

“That’s the spirit.
 
Now come on, we gotta get out of here the back way.
 
They look like they’re waiting for you out the front door.”
 

“What’s the point?” asked the Asian man as he was dragged along by Danny.
 
He didn’t resist much and for that Danny was grateful.

He led his new charge out the side door under the watchful, impartial stare of the court guards.
 
One leaned his head over and spoke into a microphone attached to his shoulder epaulet.
 
Danny could only assume he was alerting the local cops.
 
They wouldn’t have much time to escape, now.

As the door shut behind them, Danny saw another stone bench just outside the courtroom.
 
He pulled as hard as he could and slowly worked the bench over to block the door.
 
It wouldn’t slow down the all-pro linebackers they hire as cops in Brikston, but it would give Danny and the defendant a few more precious seconds.
 
He hoped.

“This way!” Danny said, urging the younger man forward.
 
“That fire exit—quick, open it!”
 
Danny tore off the top page of his notebook—an old grocery list—and threw it on the floor when the fire door alarm began to shriek.
 

“That ought to get their attention,” Danny said with a smile.
 

“Why’d you ask me to do that!?” hollered the defendant as he put his left hand up to the right side of his face.
 
“Jesus, that’s loud!”

“Follow me!” shouted Danny over the noise.
 
He scurried off down the hallway towards another exit and quickly stepped outside into the relative peace and quiet.
 
The defendant quickly followed.
 
Danny took one last look and saw the door from the courtroom shudder against the stone bench.
 
He quietly shut the door and stepped to the side.
 
“Now, we just need to get to the front of the building—that’s where my car is.
 
Follow me and we’ll sneak around this side.”

“Won’t they follow us?”

“I’m hoping they’ll go through the fire door you set off—I think that takes them out to the back of the building, where there’s a big overgrown lot, if I remember right.
 
Tall grass.
 
Sort of rubble piles people might hide in.
 
Hopefully they go looking for you there.”
 
He paused at the front corner of the municipal building.
 
A police officer trotted past and entered the building, his radio squawking.
 
Danny looked to the right around the corner and saw four men rush through the front door of the building.
 
One had a baseball bat.
 
Another cop followed them, not even trying to slow them down.
 
Finally the coast was clear.

“Okay, there’s my car, second row.
 
See that Camry?”

“That thing actually runs?”
 

“You wanna wait for one of them to give you a lift?” Danny asked as he jerked a thumb over his shoulder.
 
“C’mon man, think you can make it?”

“Just get me the hell out of here.”

“On three.
 
One, two…three.
 
Let’s go!” hissed Danny.
 
The two jogged across the front two rows of the parking lot—the defendant, despite his wounds, easily kept pace with Danny’s awkward, rumbling gait.
 
They reached the old brown Camry safely and jumped inside.

Less than a minute later they were safely on the road and three blocks away, taking every turn a different direction.
 
Danny checked his mirror—no one was following them.
 
“Okay, there’s not many people out…but get down in front of the seat so no one sees you…”

“Oh, gross…what is this?” said the defendant.
 
He shifted his weight on the seat to the sound of crinkling fast-food wrappers.
 
“What—do you live in this thing?”

“Hey, I’m a reporter—sometimes I have late hours…now shut up and get down—I’ve got to think.”

“About what?” asked the defendant.
 
He burrowed down in fast food wrappers and empty coffee cups and was nearly concealed by debris trapped between the seat and the dash.
 
“Ugh, something down here stinks…”

“You got a name?” asked Danny as he drove.
 
There were only a few people on the streets and they all wore flu masks.
 
They watched his car suspiciously.
 
He resisted the urge to floor it and get out of town.
 
Remember, word spreads fast in a small town.

“Thomas.
 
Thomas Sang.”

“Nice to meet you, Tommy.
 
I’m Danny Roberts, ace reporter,” he added ironically.
 
“You got a place to stay?”

“I was at the Holiday Inn out by the interstate…but I doubt they’ll let me back in now.
 
Everyone in this town is out for my blood!”

“All right, take it easy.
 
First things first, we gotta find a place to hole up.
 
You need to rest and I need a drink.
 
You drink, Tommy?”

“Yes, and it’s Thomas.”

“Sure, Tommy.
 
Now where the hell are we going to take you?”
 

Danny took the next turn to the right, heading back toward the interstate when he saw it through a copse of trees on the side of the road.
 
The welcome sign was hanging by one chain, dangerously lopsided over a very nicely un-cut patch of neglected landscaping.
 
There was a tree branch in the driveway and an oak tree that looked about to follow the branch leaned precariously over the lobby.
 
The Motor-On Inn.

“Perfect,” said Danny.

Sang stretched his neck up and peered over the greasy hamburger wrappers that littered the car’s dash.
 
“Oh, my
God
.”

C
HAPTER
5

Danny paused before opening the motel room door.
 
He looked left and right, then checked the parking lot again.
 
Not a soul in sight.
 
The lot held two cars, his old brown Toyota Camry and the motel owner’s equally-old Subaru Outback.
 
There were no cars on the access road and only the occasional car speeding along I-75.
 
It was a gloomy, gray, autumn morning in Kentucky.
 
The air was heavy—there were sure to be storms later in the day.

Satisfied there was no one else around, he put the key in the lock and stepped through the door carrying his plastic bags of food and medical supplies.
 
He juggled the two hot coffees in his left hand and dropped the keys on the chipped table just inside the door.

The motel room was definitely nothing fancy and in Danny’s mind was only one step up from sleeping in his car…but it kept Thomas Sang out of sight of the angry townspeople.
 
After all, he had been exonerated by Judge Klein.
 
Surely
,
Danny had figured, Thomas could get out of Brikston in a few days—just as soon as Moore fixed his car.
 
With any luck, all this nonsense would blow over by then.