The Summer House

Chapter 19

Special Agent Manuel Sanchez pulls over to the side of the road in his rented Ford sedan, yawns, rubs at his eyes. It’s been one long grueling day, for after his interview with Wendy Gabriel he decided to continue going up and down Route 119, interviewing other households that might have witnesses to what happened on Wednesday night.

Not surprisingly, the interviews went bust. He’s talked to two men, three women, and two young boys, in a variety of rural houses and mobile homes, up and down this lonely stretch of Georgia state highway, and no one saw a thing. Lunch was a bottle of orange Fanta and two packages of peanuts from a service station’s vending machine just outside Sullivan.

He checks the car’s clock. It’s just after 8:00 p.m., the time when Wendy said she saw the pickup truck owned by Staff Sergeant Jefferson leave the kill house four nights ago. The dirt driveway to The Summer House and a utility pole with a single streetlight are up ahead.

Time to see what Wendy claims she saw.

He puts the car in drive, goes to the driveway, and backs in a couple of meters. Sanchez leaves the engine in park, gets out, and walks in the glare of the headlights, out to the road.

He turns around, looks at the Ford sedan. Even with the glare of the headlights it’s easy to make out the license plate. He goes back to the car, flicks off the headlights, leaving the amber parking lights on.

There.

Still visible.

He stands on the road, looks up at the streetlight. It’s an old streetlight, the kind with a large bulb screwed into a metal dome. The light is yellow and weak, gradually fading in and out.

Interesting.

He looks around at the scenery. So dark, so empty. Just brooding, heavy trees. The bare pavement. So quiet, save for insects out there, and night birds and a dog barking. Toby Baby? Maybe. So very, very different from the constant lights, noise, horns, engines, and music back home in LA.

Sanchez goes back to the car, switches off even the parking lights, and then returns to the road.

The overhead utility light is still bright enough to make out the license plate. Not crystal clear but enough to do the job, for someone to get the first three letters and a number.

“There you go,” he whispers.

His jacket feels clammy and confining on him, so he takes it off, folds it in half, and then stops.

A car or truck engine, out there.

He turns.

No headlights.

He looks back at the sedan.

Walks to it, opens the door, drapes the jacket — a Brooks Brothers coat with shiny buttons his wife, Conchita, bought for him when he got a promotion last year — over the driver’s seat, so the buttons are facing up.

He switches on the headlights.

Goes back to the road.

The license plate is clear. The color of the car is easy to make out, as well as the car brand.

That’s it.

He returns to the car, switches off the headlights, puts on the parking lights once more.

Goes back to the road.

Waits.

The overhead utility light fades in and out, the yellow light faint.

An engine loudly starts up, and his LAPD instincts kick in as he leaps away from the road, just as a pickup truck roars by, so close he feels the warmth from the exhaust pipe. The truck races down the road and brakes, squealing rubber.

The truck’s lights are doused.

It waits, somewhere down the road.

Sanchez’s SIG Sauer is in his hands. He doesn’t remember pulling it from his holster. He quickly goes to the Ford, switches off the parking lights. He drops to one knee, holding the pistol in both hands, over the hood of his rental car.

The truck is still there.

Engine running loudly.

No lights. No voices. No honky-tonk tunes coming from within. He’s pretty sure the driver switched off the engine some ways back and coasted down here before roaring by, to catch him by surprise.

Sanchez wishes he could trade the rented sedan for one of the unit cars he used back when he was a cop. Then at least he’d have some heavier firepower, a Remington 870 pump-action shotgun or a Bushmaster .223 semiautomatic rifle with a thirty-round magazine.

The driver revs the engine.

Sanchez whispers, “Come on, pendejo, come on back and let’s play.”

Another squeal of rubber and the truck roars down the highway, and a few seconds later, its headlights and taillights flick on, like the driver is taunting him.

Sanchez stands up, puts the SIG Sauer back in its holster.

The overhead streetlight is still weak, and he looks into the car interior and sees not a thing.