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Chapter One
Joel
Seven months earlier
Here lies a weak man. The world is full of them. But now is not the time to bite off more than I can chew. Like they say, you have to bloom where you’re planted and, well, that’s exactly what this fella is going to do from this day forward.
First, though, I have to make him dead. All is well. I have a plan. I always have a plan. Not surprisingly, he’s not making my plan easy.
Asphyxiation is a lot harder than it sounds, and though it’s a crisp, early winter’s day, I’ve already broken a sweat.
The easiest thing to do would have been to bring him to his final resting place already dead, but the best laid plans often go awry.
“Please,” he begs. “I have a family.”
“Treasures gained by wickedness do not profit, but righteousness delivers from death. That’s—”
“Proverbs,” the man says. “I know.”
I make a tsking sound. “Seems there’s a disconnect between knowledge and application somewhere.”
He looks at me like he doesn’t know what to say, like he can’t believe his bad luck. Like,who is this guy?
I raise the shovel. This isn’t the way I wanted to go about his death. The truth is, it’s messy, but I’m not exactly looking for a wrestling match either. I’ve already tried to suffocate him twice, and somehow he’s breathing easier than I am.
“Please.”
I start toward him, the shovel overhead, ready to strike.
“Please!” he cries. “Just shoot me.”
I hate it when they beg. It just delays the inevitable, and quite frankly, it puts a foul taste in my mouth. Why does everyone have to be so weak?
“Fine,” I say, pulling the .38 from my belt. I aim for the spot just between his eyes. His pupils dilate. I change my mind and take aim at his chest. The hammer falls. “Not a problem.”
One shot, center mass. He drops, and he bleeds out into the dirt. Blood has sprayed upon the surface of the hole I dug and the surrounding trees; it’s crimson paint against nature's canvas. Less mess than my usual work, but messy still.
I walk over to the man, Joseph McFarland—or just “Joe.” His ID says “McFarland,” but it's an alias among many: David Flack was his real name. Not a nice guy.
Stephanie Reynolds was his ex-wife, hissecondex-wife, and he has a child somewhere, possibly in this very town. He also has a rap sheet that goes back years for fraud, abuse and more charges of abuse, possession and distribution of narcotics, trafficking in stolen goods, disorderly conduct and more. He’s currently awaiting trial on several counts of tax fraud—he’s a dentist—sexual assault, and various other charges that would make you shake your head in disbelief if you could believe it. Again, he’s a dentist.
Mrs. Reynolds has been waiting for justice for six months now; she finally got the call last week that it was a go. She isn’t doing too great—she has always been a bit unstable—but she’ll do well to get some closure on this asshole who used to beat her and got her hooked on drugs.
I know, I’ve done my homework.
Stephanie Reynolds knows every word to every song ever dedicated to an ex-wife; she’s an expert on cutting remarks and silent treatments. She can recall with precision what Joe did or didn’t do on each of their anniversaries. She hates the man with a passion beyond the capacity of any ordinary woman. Mrs. Reynolds hasn’t been able to find work because of Joe—he said some terrible things about her around town. She has bills stacked from here to eternity because of him, and she has no money to pay them. He hid all their assets and drained their accounts before skipping town to start over under another name. According to his ex, her parents are dead because of him; even her dog is dead because he fed it table scraps laced with rat poison. There’s not much else to be said about Joe McFarland. If even half of that is true, it’s more than enough.
What kind of monster poisons a dog?
The kind that’s, as they say, better off dead.
I empty his pockets. There’s a knife, some spare change, a can of dip, a little booklet, and his wallet, of course. It’s nothing special—standard stuff, at least to me. I lay it all out beside him, then gather it all up when I’m finished with the heavy lifting. I’ll dispose of it elsewhere.
First things first. I lift him—he's heavy—and dump him into the shallow hole, where I saw off his hands and feet, and hammer out his teeth. Later, I’ll bag them up—they’ll want them in lieu of a body.
Once that is taken care of, I continue digging until the job is complete. Tomorrow a new body will find its permanent resting place on top of his, one Edward Defoe, for whom this grave was intended.
