9 Seconds of Freedom, Original Suspense, Part 28, links first 27 parts

It was Skinner that came out to get me. He stepped in the middle of my back, pressing hard, so that my face was crushed against the rock-hard clods of the field.

“How’s that feel, West?” he said.

His teeth were clenched tight. He brought his boot down hard, in the middle of my back.

“That’s for my brother’s tires,” he said.

He tore my left arm out of socket, matching up my wrists for the cuffs. It burned. I stayed quiet. He’d do worse if I said a word. Crawford rolled his cruiser out into the field. They picked me up and body slammed me against the hood.

Crawford kicked my feet out so that my nose busted against the hot sheet metal. I tasted blood.

Skinner took great pride in crushing my scrotum as he searched me. I nearly passed out. There wasn’t anything to find. They rolled up the windows of the cruiser and slammed me into the back seat, chest down. Then they closed the doors.

Somewhere, I’d heard this called ‘hotboxing’ it was a warm day. They were going to let me sit in the hot car for a while. Soften me up. I heard them walk away. I threw up.

The pain from Leeanne’s beating and the dislocated shoulder were too much. I lost consciousness again, and when I came to, I was bumping along in the back of the cruiser down what felt like a dirt road. I couldn’t see out the window. But, I could tell from the sun on my face, it was light outside.

We skidded to a stop and the door opened. I was slid, face first, from the car, by my cuffed hands. It hurt like hell. I landed in a patch of goat head stickers. One lodged itself in my right nostril. The good news was, now the shoulder didn’t bother me so much.

I saw Crawford’s orthopedic shoes. Skinner’s boots joined them. Then a smaller pair of feet walked up. The shoes looked like women’s. A black bag was pulled over my head and someone picked me up. I got my balance and staggered along as they shoved me toward whatever was next.

It was dark and dusty, wherever we were. I was pushed roughly onto a wooden chair. The floor under my feet felt like hard packed dirt. I heard the familiar sound of wind over metal roofing. I sniffed. The burr dug in deeper and I couldn’t think of anything but blinding pain for a moment.

I heard a gate close, then a lock clicked shut. It was quiet. I waited for a long time. No sound. I decided it was safe to move. I stood up. I pushed back against my seat. It was a light weight wooden chair. As I moved, I realized, the floor was wooden. It was uneven.

There was a loud clank, then the unmistakable sound of Sulphur lights coming to life. I started to see a faint glow, through the hood. Surely, they knew I’d been here. What was the pillow case for? Theater. Pure theater.

“What was your business with Vern?” Crawford asked.

He sounded far away I couldn’t tell which direction.

I didn’t answer him.

“Why did you go to Vern’s yesterday?” he asked again.

“I came here to kill him and rape his teddy bear,” I said.

“We know you didn’t kill him,” Crawford said. “What we don’t know is why you’re here, in River Grove.”

Was that true? It couldn’t be. They’d followed my every move. Surely, they’d heard at least one conversation. This also meant they didn’t have Leeanne, or at least she hadn’t talked. That was a good thing. Maybe. I wondered. Would she care what happened to me? Did I care if she cared?

“I’m a rare bear collector, he had one I needed,” I said.

“Fine, have it your way,” Crawford said. “We brought you here because, officially, we never saw you. So, when you left town, you never came back. We’re very good at making people disappear, West.”

Threats. Logic says threats are only necessary if you need something from a person. Otherwise, they’d have made me disappear already. There was a whole lot of open space between here and where they caught me.

“If you want me gone so bad, why bring me here?” I asked.

“Someone wanted to talk to you,” Crawford said.

“Dalton,” a female voice said.

It was Rita Skinner.

“I’ve been very impressed by you. You’re a very resourceful young man. Very talented with your hands. I have a project for you,” she said.

“No thanks, got a job,” I said.

She laughed. “Oh, this isn’t a choice, my dear sweet boy. We’re missing something. There’s a girl. If she is who we think she is, she poses a very particular threat to me. So, you’re going to find her,” she said.

“Or what?” I asked.

“Or, we’ll destroy what we found,” she said.

Someone lifted the hood from my head. Bert Skinner had been inside the cage with me the whole time. I squinted. My head was pounding, and the mayor was silhouetted against the lights. But, what she held in her hand was very clear. It was the bear.

“We know you want it,” she said. “We just don’t know why.”

“If I have to explain, you wouldn’t understand,” I said.

Skinner grabbed my arms and gave the slightest upward lift. I buckled. He drove me over and off the platform, until I was on my knees, my face pressed against the cage. Rita crouched on the other side of the wire, inches from my face.

“Listen, you little maggot. You’re going to do it, and you’ll do it, because if you don’t, we’ve got another little farm in Louisiana, just for pretty little boys like you,” she said. “We don’t know how much she told you, but we know you were there. So, you understand the stakes.”

She almost purred.

“They will take you apart, piece by piece, until you’d eat your own privates on a bun to get out of there,” she said. “Do we have a deal?”

“What’s in it for me?” I asked.

“Return the girl in two days, you get the bear, and the contents of his head. Show up late, come back without her, or run, and we’ll hunt you down and, if you survive, put you out to pasture on the farm,” she said. “Then I’ll find her myself and give her back to junior here as his personal play thing.”

“What makes you think she’ll trust me again? She attacked me, left me for dead on the road not far from here yesterday,” I said.

“Well, you’ll just have to fix that, won’t you? Oh, and don’t even think about going to the police. If you do, your picture, with photos of the crime scene in Vernon’s basement, will immediately be circulated to every police agency in a four-state area. You should keep your head down, West,” she said.

Rita Skinner walked out of the barn. Peter Skinner knelt down and undid my cuffs. He dropped the keys to my truck beside me on the platform and walked out, leaving the cage open.

“You heard the boss. Forty-eight hours, West. See you soon,” Crawford said.

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