Another Kind of Eden (Holland Family Saga 3)

“Take it to a bar and sell it anyway.”

“I think I’m beginning to understand why you’re no longer an educator.”

“Where are the people in the bus?”

“Search me.”

“Jo Anne says they ran an electrical cord to her house. The pig farmer says they took one of his hogs.”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“Jo Anne did nothing to deserve these kinds of problems. What the hell is wrong with you?”

“Want me to call security?” he said.

“That might be a good idea.”

“Stay away from me,” he said, pushing his chair backward.

“Want to make a call? I’ll help you.”

I picked up the phone receiver from his desk and twisted the cord around his neck and tightened it until the blood to his brain shut down. Then I dumped the plastic wastebasket on his head and hammered it over his shoulders and flipped his chair over backward and jumped up and down on the basket. He looked like the top half of a refrigerator on the floor.

“Pay the money you owe Jo Anne, or I’m going to put your organs up for sale,” I said. “Clank your head if you understand.”

He understood.

* * *

TWO CRUISERS AND Wade Benbow’s unmarked car forced me to the curb before I could make the highway. The deputies got out of their vehicles and headed toward me, their hands resting on their weapons. Benbow raised one hand for them to stop and pointed into my face with the other. “Get out of the car, Broussard!” he said.

I lifted my hands. “I’m reaching for the handle. Okay?”

“I wouldn’t waste a bullet shooting you.” He ripped the door open and jerked me out on the asphalt, then threw me against the car. When I tried to turn around, he stiff-armed me between the shoulder blades. “You really piss me off.”

“If you want to be a hump for a man like Henri Devos, that’s your problem,” I said.

“Spread your feet.”

“Eat shit,” I said.

He slapped the back of my head, then lowered his voice. “Do it, kid.”

I half looked at him.

“Do it,” he repeated.

“Yes, sir,” I replied.

“I’m going to hook you up and put you in the back seat now. Are we on the same page?”

“Yes, sir.”

He snipped the handcuffs on me and opened the back door, then put one hand on my head and eased me onto the seat. “I got it from here,” he said to the deputies.

They waved and drove away. Benbow got behind the wheel and started the engine.

“What’s the deal?” I said.