panic by stating that the creature had been caught. It was the opinion of the editor of the ‘Jefferson Observer’ that if anything, the local population would rest easier knowing they had nothing to fear from the Chupacabra.
“Yeah,” Roth replied in a lull in the conversation over the phone that afternoon, “just like no one would have panicked over the capture of a space ship near Roswell, New Mexico back in 1947.” Although he himself didn’t believe in aliens or flying saucers, Jacob’s grandfather had told him stories of his days after WWII, when he missed most of the action overseas and spent most of the aftermath in Roswell as a corpsman working security as an MP.
His grandfather told him he had been one of those called out to pick up every bit of debris surrounding the crash site of the UFO. Roth considered it a story and nothing more. After all, he reasoned, no one really believed in life on other planets anymore. Did they? As far as he was concerned after the events of the past two days, life had gotten pretty strange on earth without involving little green men.
The next morning, Roth decided to get a jump on the work that had backed up on his desk as a result of the investigation into the mutilations. It would still be another day or two before the pathologists got back the results of the analysis by Oscarson’s contact at the University of Texas in Austin. That was the first reason that he was surprised to hear from Emil’s colleague David Klein so early that morning. The second was even greater cause for alarm.
“Deputy Jacobs, you must get down here right away. We require your presence immediately!”
“What is it, David?” Roth tried to get a coherent word in edgewise amidst an incessant banging.
“What’s all that racket? Can you cut it out long enough for me to hear you?”
Klein was literally screaming in the phone now.
“That’s just it, deputy. We can’t. We haven’t touched the creature. It’s revived, clawed its way out of the straps and the body bag. It’s the Chupacabra throwing itself against the steel frame door of the morgue and I don’t know how much longer it will hold. Please, hurry!”
ALLIES
“I’ll be right there!” Jacobs called out into the phone even as he was hanging it up. Although it was no longer up to his ear, he could still hear the cries of the frightened coroners and the resounding clangs of the Chupacabra as it threw itself against the interior of the steel framed door as it sought escape. Bill James was not yet in that morning, preferring himself to have the afternoon and evening hours for the most part, so Roth scrawled a quick message on a yellow sticky pad and slapped it down on the rubber ink blotter on the other deputy’s desk.
Looking around quickly, the half-Cajun deputy ran into Sheriff Crawley’s office to get the combination to the gun cabinet, a heavy safe left over from the days of the old west that was one of the sheriff’s prize possessions. Besides, he always said with a grin, it was too damn heavy to move, anyway.
Fortunately, Jefferson, Texas was hardly a high security risk area, so all Jacobs had to do was lift the corner of the desk mat and read the hyphenated sequence of numbers. He crossed the room to where the five foot tall former Wells Fargo monolith stood narrow and immovable, Roth set the dial and called them out to himself under his breath as he worked the numbers into the turns until he heard each pinging echo of tumblers fall.
Following the third, there was an additional drop of locking mechanisms that braced the handle from the inside, allowing him to turn the tapered handle downward with an audible click. Pulling the door open, he saw that he had a choice of weapons ranging from a deer rifle to a double-barreled shotgun. He took one of each with enough shells to wage a range war and, as an afterthought, a preloaded .22 caliber with a CO2 canister to propel feathered tranquilizer darts. Two others were housed in a plastic case with a yellow seal warning that the projectiles within were not intended for small animals or humans.
“No problem there,” Jacobs muttered, as he wrapped the guns in his arms and shoved the cabinet closed with his shoulder. He shifted the rifles down at an angle in his left arm and tucked the bullets, shells and darts under his elbow against his right side. He moved as quickly as he could to the inner door, threw it open and fumbled to pulled it closed as the outer was suddenly opened behind him. Expecting to push against the resistance of the glass-paned aluminum outer door, he had already tangled legs and fallen to the sidewalk atop a smaller figure that expelled all its breath with the dual impact of the concrete and the 180-pound deputy.
Jacobs had no time to waste in his hurry to get to the county morgue before he added ‘cause of death’ to his list of improprieties in the investigation of the Goatsucker. He rolled off of the person who had cushioned his fall, even as the deputy began to scold his unseen benefactor for not watching where he was going. He turned up on one elbow as he got to one knee and looked down on the face and feline body of a young black woman, possibly black Creole. It generally depicted a south Louisiana native wholly or primarily of Afro-Caribbean ancestry, usually of French-speaking heritage. Although a distinct ethnic group, black Creoles exerted a profound influence on Cajun culture, and vice versa.
Her hair was not kinky, but soft and framed a beautiful face that looked up at him with green eyes.
There was nothing soft and gentle in her voice as she broke the deputy’s reverie by asking him if he would please get off of her. “Huh? Oh, sorry! My apologies, Mrs…” Jacobs fumbled with the guns as he struggled to rise and offered his hand to help the young woman up from the sidewalk in front of the Sheriff’s office.
“Davis,” she said with a slight Caribbean accent, “and it’s Miss. I’m not married.”
“I’m sorry,” Roth apologized as he gathered his weapons back under him and checked his watch.
He really didn’t have time for this.
“I’m not,” she confessed. “Odessa,” she said as she extended her hand.
“What?” Jacobs asked distractedly as he ignored the proffered hand and headed for his squad car.
“My name, it’s Odessa Davis. I’m here visiting my aunt from Puerto Rico. I’d like to talk to you.”
“No time,” the deputy called back over his shoulder. I’m very busy right now. Miss Davis.”
Roth leaned the arsenal against the bumper of the Plymouth squad car and tugged at the keys at his belt on a retractable loop secured by a tether of thin wire. Twice he cursed himself; once for letting go when his sweaty palms lost their grip on the oversized bob and the whole phalanx slapped against his hip. The other was when the woman called out to him still brushing herself off from the spill to the sidewalk.
“Where are you going with all that firepower? Is this about the El Chupacabra you captured?”
The Jefferson deputy slammed the trunk of the patrol car down with the guns safely lodged inside and rested his palms against the lid as he carefully contemplated his next question. “Now, just how do you know about that?”
Odessa brushed her palms together and walked toward him with a lopsided grin. “I thought that would get your attention. She looked at the trunk again before bringing her vivid green eyes up to meet the harried blue of his own.
Those eyes, he thought, searching his overworked imagination to separate his recent memories from his waking nightmares, doubts and fears over the nature and intent of the bizarre creature.
“I’ve seen them before.”
“Yes, you have,” Davis explained, Jacobs realizing only too late that he had made his final comment aloud. “Now, you can either stick around long enough to figure out where or let me ride along with you and explain on your way to deal with the Goatsucker. It’s your choice, but you’re out of time.”
The deputy rounded the brown and gold squad car as he vigorously shook his head.
“No way, Miss Davis. It’s much too dangerous. We don’t even know what we’re up against.”
“But I do. I know much more about this creature than you do,” the black woman countered.
“No deal,” Jacobs said after a momen
t’s hesitation. He turned over the ignition.
The deputy backed the car out of the graveled parking space filling the pothole when a final plea reached his ears. “Then perhaps you can learn what I know from that newspaper editor. What’s his name, Borjon? Of course by then, it will be too late for any of that knowledge to do you any good now, won’t it?”
Roth took his foot and applied it as quickly and as heavily from the gas pedal to the brake and rested his head against his knitted fingers atop the steering wheel. This was getting ridiculous. Was he the only one besides Bill James, who knew nothing of the whereabouts or habits of the Chupacabra? Migrant workers, cattlemen, bartenders, drunks, housewives and even children were feeding information to that damn Jeremy Borjon. Well, this was one source that would stay in protective custody until this investigation ran its course.
The deputy pulled the car back into the parking space and reached over to unlock and push open the passenger side door. “Get in,” he said with all the enthusiasm of a trapped taxpayer during an IRS audit. Odessa Davis climbed in with a wild look in her eyes and a gloating smile running from ear to ear.
“So, where are we going?” She asked as the deputy pulled the strap of the seat belt across her chest to lock her into place.
"Just hang on,” Jacobs cautioned as he whipped the car back out of the lot and