***
Bob Lyle was in a foul mood. Lately, he stayed in a foul mood, and that fact served only to piss him off even more. Lyle had held the position of sheriff for more than two decades, and during that time he had come to the conclusion that ninety percent of the people in Meade County were idiots. Out of the remaining ten percent, at least nine percent more were slobbering idiots. That left one percent (of which he counted himself one) who had more brains than God gave a mule.
Whatever brains Ben Rollins had possessed were now scattered about the interior of his car. Judging from the looks of it, and from what Lyle knew of the man, the sheriff felt justified grouping Rollins into the slobbering idiot category. The loser hadn’t even been able to keep a job with the town crew, and that was saying something. The mess in the car was merely a product of natural selection. Thinning the herd, so to speak.
The problem was that Lyle’s herd was being thinned at an alarming rate recently. This tended to make the rest of the herd extremely skittish, and a skittish herd wasn’t likely to re-elect its shepherd. Lyle had been sheriff for so long that he wasn’t sure if he could do anything else, and he wasn’t in any hurry to find out.
Lyle looked up from the gory mess inside the car and saw two of his deputies emerge from the woods beyond the edge of the roadway, each carrying a flashlight. The smaller one, Paul Kenner, was a little rat of a man who definitely fell into the ninety percent. Personally, Lyle wouldn’t trust the man to guard a pile of rocks, but Kenner’s uncle was on the town council.
The big one, John Talbot, was a good guy. Lyle actually liked John, and that was saying a lot because Lyle hardly liked anyone at all. Big John was a good deputy. He was serious about his job and followed orders well. Best of all, Big John knew when to keep his trap shut. That was a valuable commodity in the world of law enforcement. Sadly, it was also a commodity in very short supply among Lyle’s deputies.
“Find any more of him?” asked Lyle.
Big John shook his head. “Nothing. No blood, no pieces of clothing. Wherever the rest of him is, it isn’t here.”
Lyle had figured as much, but he was still disappointed. He had hoped beyond hope that this wouldn’t be connected to the others, but he should have known better. Something had set those damn fairies on a rampage, and now his only hope of controlling the situation was Finn McCoy, the King of the Slobbering Idiots. Lyle disliked McCoy with a passion. The man was reckless and cocky, two attributes Lyle despised in a person. McCoy was also the luckiest son of a bitch ever to walk the face of the Earth, by Lyle’s estimation. By rights, something should have had the fool’s ass on a platter years ago. But McCoy was blessed; he could fall in a tub of shit and come out smelling like a rose.
“You want us to look around some more?” Kenner asked.
“No. I do not want you to look around some more. I want you to get someone out here to clean this mess up. And be quick about it. When word gets out we’ll be up to our armpits in rubbernecks driving by here to see what’s up.”
“Sure thing, Chief.” Kenner hurried to his cruiser to radio dispatch. Lyle watched the moron go with open contempt. He hoped to God Carl Kenner lost his seat on the council come next election.
“So, what do you think?” Big John asked when Kenner was safely out of earshot.
Lyle rubbed at his forehead. “I don’t know. Some wild animal, I guess. Maybe a bear or mountain lion.”
Big John’s look told Lyle that he knew he was being fed a bunch of bullshit, but he was professional enough not to call the sheriff on it. There were very few people in Shallow Springs who knew the whole story. McCoy knew more than anyone, Lyle guessed, but so far he’d had enough common sense to keep fairly quiet about it. Besides, most people viewed McCoy as a kook—eccentric but harmless. And though most of them liked him, they weren’t likely to listen if he started running off at the mouth about killer fairies.
“People are starting to get scared,” Big John said. “Bunch of people missing, and now this. I know how you feel about calling in the state boys, but…”
“We’re not calling anyone, least of all those idiots.”
“But…”
“But nothing, John. We handle this in-house. There’s no evidence here of anything other than an animal attack. As for the others, some of them will probably turn up. Even if some of them don’t, it’s not that unusual for this area. People turn up missing all the time. Most of it’s probably tied to drugs.”
“How could we tie Bessie Peterson to a drug deal gone bad?” Big John asked. “The woman is seventy-four and plays the organ in church every Sunday.”
“She’s also on every medication known to mankind,” Lyle said gruffly. “For all we know, somebody whacked her and made off with her pills. It happens every day.”
Big John had no answer for that, so he said nothing more. Lyle turned his attention back to the car. In the darkness, even with the flashing blue lights illuminating it, it didn’t look all that bad. But looks were deceiving. It was that bad; the whole situation was bad. And now that even Big John was beginning to question Lyle, the window of opportunity to put a lid on this thing was starting to close.
As bad as Lyle hated to admit it, everything now hinged on McCoy. Lyle was not about to go fairy hunting, and he couldn’t very well send his men without telling them what they were looking for. Not only would he land himself in a rubber room, but on the off chance that someone believed him, he would face numerous questions concerning cover-ups and blatant misdirection of certain past events. He could not answer those questions without ensuring the sudden and final end to his career as a law enforcement officer. He might also go to jail, and Lyle would rather face the Queen Fairy herself than to be put behind bars.
So, once again, he found himself in the position of having to kiss Finn McCoy’s ass. As unpleasant as that thought was, it sure beat the aforementioned alternatives. As much as Lyle would like to see McCoy fail, or even better, get eaten by some big, hairy monster, McCoy’s success was the only way Lyle would make it through this unscathed. He would be polite. He would offer McCoy whatever limited assistance he could. Then he would sit back and let McCoy do his thing, whatever that might be, and hope that everything worked out to his advantage in the end.
It was getting late, and Lyle was tired. It was going to be a long night. McCoy would be arriving in the morning, and Lyle would be able to pass the buck. Until then, he had a few matters to take care of, the first being to ensure that the little rat Kenner would keep his mouth shut about what he’d seen here. There wasn’t much to tell, really, but it would be best to keep everything close to the vest until the whole matter was resolved.
Lyle spat at Ben Rollins’ blood-soaked car, motioned for Big John to follow, and walked over to talk to the rat.