“Pop, I’m trying to look out for you,” Titus said.
“And I’m grateful, son, I really am. But I got a 1911 Colt that belonged to my daddy. I’ll get him to keep me company tonight. But I ain’t leaving my house.” For a moment the years were washed away and Titus saw the old Albert, full of piss and vinegar and not about to move for anyone.
Titus put his hand on his father’s shoulder.
“Okay, Pop. We’ll stay.”
“Titus!” a voice yelled from the shadows. Titus turned and saw Kellie and Hector trying to get through his deputies, who had formed a phalanx to cut them off. He hurried over to the commotion.
“Kellie, what are you doing here?” Titus said.
“We have a scanner. Are you okay? Can you tell us anything? Do you think this was the killer?” Kellie said. She was holding a thin wireless microphone. Her tone was professional, but her eyes were wide and red around the edges. She was scared for him. He didn’t need to hear her say it.
“Kellie, go back to Todd’s Inn. I’ll talk to you later, but right now y’all just getting in the way.”
“You heard him, miss,” Carla said. She gave Kellie a gentle push on her shoulder.
“Don’t touch me!” Kellie said. Rage, as hot as the slag from melted metal, filled her face.
Titus stepped up and got between them. “Kellie, please go. We’ll talk later. I promise.”
“You might want to teach J. Lo about the first amendment, Titus,” Kellie said as she and Hector made their exit.
“What did you call me?” Carla said, but Titus cut her off as she started to walk toward Kellie.
“You ever want to sit where I sit, you have to get a thicker skin, Deputy,” Titus said.
“I don’t know what you saw in her,” Carla said.
Titus sighed.
“That’s a long story, Deputy,” he said.
* * *
Douglas, Carla, and Davy talked to everyone on Titus’s road. No one saw anything. Most people were out running errands or at work. Trey went over to River Oak and reviewed the tape, but he called Titus to tell him that the video quality was extremely poor. All it showed was an individual, in a hoodie and a ski mask, wearing gloves cutting a hole in the fence with tin snips and then taking the poor lamb. Without enhancements there was no way to tell if it was a man or woman, tall or short, white or Black. Titus told Trey to get the tape and they would send it to the BCI in the morning. After that there wasn’t really anything else for the deputies to do, so most of them went back on patrol or went home. Carla went to check on Dayane. Davy went out to the island to see if Elias had returned.
“You want one of us to sit in the driveway?” Pip had asked.
“No. If he comes back, I’ll meet him on my own terms,” Titus said. He knew that sounded menacing, but the reality was he didn’t want to endanger his deputies if it could be helped. This person, the Last Wolf, the Angel of Death, was falling apart. Titus figured he would do something chaotic soon. Something in his mind was apocalyptic. Pip deserved to retire, not get caught up in some madman’s death wish.
So Titus sent everyone to their homes or their duties.
Now he was sitting on his porch with his Jameson and his riot gun across his lap. The clouds had vacated the premises and long-dead stars littered the night sky with phantom light. Frogs, crickets, and night jays competed for his attention. He didn’t sleep much on a good night, so he fully expected to be awake until the sun rose. Here in the dark with his father asleep cradling his own pistol, the horror of what had happened finally settled into his bones.
Titus had no one to blame but himself. He’d challenged the killer, sent a message through Dayane, and he had responded. He always told his deputies to never let the job get personal, but it was beginning to feel downright intimate between him and this abomination.
Titus pulled out his phone and called Darlene.
“Are you okay?” she said when she answered.
“We’re fine. I was calling because I didn’t want you to worry.”
“I’m not worried. I’m scared to death.”
“It’s fine. Everything going to be fine,” Titus said.
“Titus, someone nailed a goat to your door,” Darlene said.
A lamb, but I guess that belongs to the ages now, Titus thought.
“I know. It’s going to be fine, but I think we need to be cautious. I don’t think you should come over tonight or for a while.”
“How long is a while?” Darlene asked.
“Just for right now. We’re going to catch him, but for right now, well, I’d never forgive myself if something happened to you,” Titus said.
“And I don’t know what I would do without you,” Darlene said.
“You’re not going to have to find out. I just want you to be safe, okay?” Titus said.
“I love you, Titus,” Darlene said.
“Me … I love you too.”
“Call me in the morning. I’m so stressed I took a sleeping pill and I’m about to pass out,” Darlene said.
“Okay. Sweet dreams.”
“You too, Smokey.”
He hung up the phone.
Titus took a sip from his bottle. He closed his eyes and visualized the case as a jigsaw puzzle. He visualized himself putting the pieces together. Elias had gone missing after Titus had talked to him. Cole Marshall had died. Dayane knew the name of the person they had partied with, the person who had killed Cole and those kids. Now Elias was missing. What if Elias wasn’t the killer? What if he was the motive? Or, more accurate, the genesis? Was he a part of the killer’s origin story? Griselda had said that wherever that boy had ended up she hoped the people were locking their doors at night.
What if that place was Charon?
What if the boy had come home and had become the Last Wolf?
Titus took another sip. His mind didn’t feel dulled by the alcohol. If anything, it was like it sharpened his thoughts.
Say the boy that Elias and his church had abused had come back to Charon to live. But he’s got this pain in him. A ravenous pain. He meets Spearman somehow and they realize they have the same prurient interests. Or similar interests. Somehow Latrell becomes a part of it and that’s their mistake. Now the boy is settling old debts and tying up loose ends as he spirals down into his own personal black hole. His two acolytes were dead. His mission, his war with God, had been thwarted. Titus was convinced that was what this was all about.
“They cracked something inside you, didn’t they? And now it’s shattered,” Titus whispered.
Titus took another sip.
That meant Elias was probably dead. He was waiting on Carla to call him, but if Dayane was missing that meant she had skipped town or was dead too.
Titus opened his eyes.
He called Trey.
“Yes, sir,” Trey said.
“In the morning, go to the judge and get a warrant for Cole Marshall’s business files. I know he had a contractor license, so that means he was paying taxes. If he took cash for building that place he talked about for his friend, we’re shit out of luck. But if the friend paid with a check, he had to make a record of it. We cross-reference his customers with people who could fit the profile. A physically strong white male, twenty-five to thirty-five, with enough land to build a fancy man cave or something close to it,” Titus said.
“That’s a good idea, boss. Will do first thing in the morning. Hey, I know this might be a bad time, but how’d that other thing go?” Trey said. Titus could hear a woman’s voice in the background. Trey was trying to keep their conversation confidential.
Titus thought he’d make a good agent if that was what he wanted.
“I took care of it.”
“Well, good enough, I guess. I’ll take care of that thing first thing in the morning,” Trey said.
“Good night,” Titus said.
He took another sip.
Even with all that he’d seen, all the things he’d done, the image of that lamb hanging from his door haunted him. Children and animals were easy targets. Neither had learned to be wary of good intentions and sweet words.
TWENTY-TWO
Preston Jefferies often wished he could control the weather. The Farm Bureau said they were technically no longer in a drought, but his electric bill for his irrigation system begged to differ. His corn had taken forever to mature and ripen for the fall harvest this year despite the twelve thousand dollars he had sunk into said irrigation system. Here he was in the third week of October finally getting ready to fire up his combine and try to equal last year’s yield. He wasn’t going to beat it. That bus had left town a long time ago. But if he kept his yields close, he would still qualify for that grant from the state. His was one of the few Black family farms in Southeastern Virginia, and those grants helped stanch the bleeding when they lost out on big ethanol contracts or when feed producers tried to lowball them.