Excerpt from Chapter 24 ~~ PROGRESS
“Why do I get the feeling this ain’t a Christmas present?” I mumbled.
Julian, kneeling by the package, looked up at Jillian and she nodded. When he cracked the seal on the foam lid, puffs of white vapor escaped into the night air.
“It’s packed in dry ice,” Jillian commented and I instinctively moved a half step backward.
Julian yanked the lid off and reached in. When he had examined the contents, he stood and walked to the porch steps, staring out into the night.
Jillian inched forward and peered down into the box. I moved with her. Through the opening of the bag and the swirling vapors, I saw two oval shapes. Hard to make out. Impatient, I grabbed the lip of the container and dragged it over under the porch light.
We looked in again. Staring back at us, unblinking, were two faces. Eyelids drooping, mouths sagging, skin stiff and rubbery. One Caucasian and one Negro. Two detached heads, frozen in eternal expressions of their final agonizing moments on earth.
“Uh oh,” muttered Jillian.
“Holy fuckin’ shit!” I stumbled back, reaching for the railing to steady myself. Vision blurry, I felt a hum in my ears. “No! Shit… no way. Shit.” I kept stammering away, fingers instinctively placing a smoke in my mouth.
Goliath was growling again, trying to see inside the box. Jillian shooed him in the front door and came over to stand near me. “Know them?”
“Fuckin’ A right, I know ‘em,” I answered through my teeth, smoke leaking through my nose, sweat beads forming on my brow. “The white one is Bucky Cummings… the missing driver. The black guy is Delroy Jenkins. Shit! What have you people got me into?”
Julian picked up the package and carried it to the Porsche.
Jillian rested one hand on my back. “Dak. Easy now. Calm down.”
“You calm the fuck down! Maybe you get heads delivered everyday. I don’t!” For some reason, I kept picturing that bloody horse head in the first Godfather movie. A sinister, gruesome threat.
“I understand. I know it upsets you. But, let’s not lose our heads here… I mean, uh,” she reacted to my irritated glare by shaking her head. “I mean, let’s not do anything hasty. Let’s sleep on it.”
“Yeah, right! Like I’m ever gonna’ sleep a wink now.”
“It was just some kind of warning, Dak. Caleb will know what to do. Let’s go inside.”
“We’ve gotta’ call the cops… or the FBI.”
“No, I don’t think so. Caleb knows best. It can wait until morning.”
I want my life back. No Westlands. No death threats.
0 Comments:
Post a Comment