Follow Me to the Edge by Tariq Ashkanani

Author:Tariq Ashkanani [Ashkanani, Tariq]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Thomas & Mercer
Published: 2022-03-07T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Nineteen

Driving back to the station from the high school, the streets were quiet. Inside the car it was quieter still. It was early afternoon, but Joe was already feeling tired. He was glad his partner was behind the wheel.

Ackerman, mulling it all over, said, “So. Next stop, we go talk to this guy MacFarlane. See if he can’t shed some light on all this.”

Joe laughed. “Good luck with that.”

“Oh yeah? Why, he some kind of hard-ass?”

“He’s dead. MacFarlane had a heart attack back in April. One of his hired workers found him pitched over a fence.”

“Shit.” His partner slid a fresh cigarette into his mouth and lit up. The man was a chain-smoker. “Who’s looking after the land now?”

“Who knows. Farm’s locked up in probate. Last I heard, they tore his house down. Place was condemned. Any workers living there are long gone now.”

Ackerman sighed and cracked his window. The dry afternoon air whipped at his hat. He took it off, tossed it on the back seat. Ran a hand through his hair. “So, according to a schoolkid, we’ve got Jacob’s dad living out in the fields somewhere, him and a whole bunch of others, and they’re going into town to butcher families.” He paused. “Does that setup ring any bells?”

“Don’t say it.”

“You know what it sounds like, Joe.”

“Brian, I swear, if you try to compare this to some kind of Manson family bullshit—”

“You don’t see it?”

“Not like you do. People want to go sing ‘Kumbaya’ in the middle of nowhere, that’s fine with me.”

“What if it’s some kind of religious cult, hmm? What if we’ve got some Branch Davidian nutjobs hoarding modified AR-15s? Christ, from the sounds of it, who knows what goes on out in those fields?”

“Corn, mostly. Some soybeans.”

Ackerman smacked his palm off the steering wheel. “This isn’t funny, Joe! Six months ago, I watched that David Koresh freak bring hellfire down on himself and his idiot followers. You asked me why I left San Antonio? Because of shit like that! It happened not three hours from my front door!”

Joe went quiet. Ackerman had a point. That Waco shitshow was something he’d want no part of.

After a couple of moments, his partner flicked his half-smoked cigarette out the window. “I’m sorry. Didn’t mean to go off on you.”

“No, I get it. I didn’t mean to poke fun.”

They slowed at a set of lights. Ackerman leaned across and started rummaging through the glovebox.

“What you looking for?” Joe asked.

“Cigarettes.”

“How many of them do you get through a day?”

“Too many.” Then, pulling a pack out from under a badly folded map: “You want one?”

“I told you, I’m trying to quit.”

“That’s right. Good for you.”

They drove in silence the rest of the way. Wasn’t long—a couple of minutes, maybe.

“We could try and speak to neighboring farmers,” Ackerman said as they pulled into the station parking lot. “Maybe they saw something.”

Joe shook his head. “MacFarlane’s land is out in the middle of corporate hell. I promise you, no one out there knows shit about any field other than the one they’re being paid to churn through.

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