Country roads the jackso.., p.1
Country Roads (The Jackson Clay & Bear Beauchamp Series Book 2), page 1
PRAISE FOR COUNTRY ROADS
“I absolutely love this story. I love these characters, and I love the dynamic between Bear and Jackson…This series could go on for a really long time with the two of them.”
CHARLY COX, AUTHOR OF THE DEVIL’S PLAYGROUND AND ALONE IN THE WOODS
“Country Roads is an unputdownable, adrenaline-charged read that cements Jackson Clay’s place next to other iconic avenger-type heroes. With terrific storytelling and characters that are topnotch, B.C. Lienesch delivers a page-turner that breathes new life into the action/thriller genre, giving us all a new favorite hero to root for.”
SHAWN BURGESS, AUTHOR OF THE TEAR COLLECTOR AND GHOSTS OF GRIEF HOLLOW
“If you liked B.C. Lienesch’s debut action/thriller, The Woodsman, you’ll love the sequel Country Roads which features again heroic protagonist Jackson Clay and his wisecracking companion, Bear. Once again, Lienesch delivers an action-packed story with new characters that are as fully developed and engaging as his returning cast. It’s been a while since I’ve both loved and hated fictional characters this much.”
DAVID A. VOYLES, CREATOR OF THE DARK CORNERS PODCAST
COUNTRY ROADS
B. C. LIENESCH
Copyright © 2022 by B. C. Lienesch
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental. For more information, visit www.bclnovels.com
ISBN: 978-1-7373752-2-7 (Paperback)
ISBN: 978-1-7373752-3-4 (Hardcover)
Library of Congress Control Number: 2022905990
The subject matter is not appropriate for minors. Please note this novel contains profanity, depictions of violence, drug use, and sexual situations including sexual assault.
Book edited by Austin Shirey
Book designed by Carpe Creative, LLC
First Digital Edition: June 2022
CARPE CREATIVE, LLC
3422 RUSTIC WAY LANE
FALLS CHURCH, VIRGINIA 22044
www.bclnovels.com
For Angie
Reading from Heaven
Montani semper liberi
“Mountaineers are Always Free”
—West Virginia State Motto
The woods are lovely dark and deep
But I have promises to keep
And miles to go before I sleep
And miles to go before I sleep
—Robert Frost, Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
CONTENTS
Part I
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Part II
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Part III
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Part IV
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Part V
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Chapter 65
Chapter 66
Chapter 67
Part VI
Chapter 68
Chapter 69
Chapter 70
Chapter 71
Chapter 72
Chapter 73
Chapter 74
Chapter 75
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by B. C. Lienesch
PART I
MANHUNT
1
The last hour of Emma Miller and Mason Westfall’s lives began with an empty tank of gas. Emma watched the orange fuel-light flicker on as Mason said something to her from the passenger seat.
“So, what do you think?” he asked.
“About what?” she said.
“Blake’s offer to move in with him. You want to see the place again?”
“No, I saw it. It’s great.”
“So?”
Emma stretched her arms and sighed as she sat back in the driver’s seat of the old Chevy S-10 her father had recently given her for her eighteenth birthday.
“You’re serious about doing this, aren’t you?” she asked. “Moving to California. To L.A.”
“Of course I am,” Mason said. “I was born here. I grew up here. I’m tired of here. I’m ready for something different.”
“And you think we can make it? On our own? Out there?”
Mason turned toward her and brushed her chestnut-brown hair away from her warm, amber eyes, giving her his signature everything-will-be-all-right smile. She smiled reflexively back at him.
“It won’t be easy to start,” he said, “but we can make it work. We’ll get jobs waiting tables or something while you work on your music. Maybe even bartend a few joints looking for performers. Get your name out there.”
The thought tickled Emma. When he talked about leaving Rion, West Virginia and moving across the country to a city they’d never been to before, it didn’t sound reckless or crazy. It sounded like it was meant for them to do it. It’s what Emma loved about him. Where every other girl had adored him for his looks – that flowing, sandy-brown hair atop a tall, trim frame bronzed from hours working in the fields – she’d been drawn in by his heart.
“And when are you going to let your friend out there know about all this?” she asked.
Mason turned and looked up at Bobbie Casto’s house, its weathered baby-blue facade tinted an ugly brown by the orange barn light over the front door.
“Soon,” Mason said, the excitement in his voice gone. “I just have to figure out when. He’s not going to be happy.”
“You can bet on that,” Emma said.
Mason looked out the window a moment longer before turning back toward her. “The real question is, when are we going to tell our friend out there about our new friend in there.”
Emma instinctively placed a hand on her abdomen. It wouldn’t be that flat for much longer. She smiled shyly. “I don’t know. Maybe we wait and tell him when we’re in California? It might make it easier on him. Two of us leaving him instead of three.”
“Em, he’s our best friend. We’ve got to tell him. And sooner. Not later. Definitely not after we’ve already left.”
“Okay,” she said. “Tonight then, maybe.”
A big smile stretched across Mason’s face, which brought an even bigger one to hers.
“You sure?” he asked.
Emma nodded as a happy tear rolled down her cheek. Mason caught it with his finger as he cupped her face and brought her in for a kiss.
“I love you,” he whispered.
“I love you, too,” she whispered back.
They held each other a moment longer before slinking back into their seats. Emma arched forward to look out Mason’s window.
“That is,” she said, “If tonight ever happens. Where on earth is he? Did you tell him we were out front?”
“I texted him,” Mason said. “I’ll text him again.”
He pulled out his phone and punched in a message.
YO, DIPSHIT. WE’RE WAITING.
A minute later, Bobbie replied with a laugh emoji. Mason frowned.
“I’m guessing he’ll be a minute,” Mason said, sliding his phone back into his pocket.
“No, here he comes,” Emma said.
The front door of the house swung open and Bobbie Casto jumped over the front railing and ran down the hill as if he were a dog that had gotten loose. In one clumsy motion, he opened the back door of the S-10, threw himself and his bag in, and shut the door behind him.
“Took you long enough,” Mason said.
“Hey, I had to wait until my stepdad was passed out to grab his Natty Light,” Bobbie s
He pulled the hood of his sweatshirt back, revealing curly, dark-brown hair trimmed into a mohawk fade and dyed caramel on top. The freckles on his golden skin—a perfect union of his mother’s rosy hue and his late father’s swarthy complexion—scrunched together as he smirked and held up the case of beer.
“Natty Light is piss,” Mason said.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Bobby said. “And what beer did you grab for us?”
“None, but I got us this.” Mason reached over and flashed the pocket-sized pouch of weed and pipe he carried.
Bobbie snatched it out of his hands before he could put it back. “Nice, dude.”
“Are we ready?” Emma asked, an edge of impatience in her voice.
“Yeah, I just gotta stop at Wawa real quick,” Bobbie said.
“Fine, we’ll stop. Put all that crap away, though.”
Emma put the truck into gear before reaching across and squeezing Mason’s hand. Mason looked back at her, his head bobbing to the music as he turned up the truck’s radio.
The two of them would be dead in 43 minutes.
2
Ronnie Franko watched the silver Chevy S-10 pull into the Wawa station from across the parking lot. He took a long drag from his Winston Red, blowing the smoke out the open window where it formed a cloud with the truck’s exhaust in the crisp night air. Two young men got out of the far side of the Chevy. A woman stayed behind in the driver seat.
“They might work,” Franko said. “Silver pickup. They look young. And dumb.”
His partner, Arsen Bragg, nodded as he looked up from his flask.
“Looks like juvees,” Franko added.
They watched as the two went into the store and split off in opposite directions. One, in a red hoodie, ordered something at the hot food counter while the other, sporting a denim jacket, filled two cups with Coke at the soda fountain.
“Think they’re holding?” Bragg asked.
Franko took another drag of his cigarette, his stubble-laden face frowning as he pondered the question.
And nothing we can’t fix.”
“Do you know the black one?” Bragg asked. “Ain’t many of them in the county.”
“Don’t think so,” Franko said. “We ought to introduce ourselves. To protect and serve and all that.”
Bragg chuckled.
Both six feet and change, the two Hopewell County sheriff’s deputies were an intimidating sight draped in their bullet resistant vests. Bragg was clean-shaven with a military buzz-cut while Franko’s face was framed by greasy, blonde hair that ran down to his shoulders. His skin was weathered and aged, like it’d seen too many dive bars and not enough dermatologists.
Bragg shifted his weight in his seat as he watched the boy in the red hoodie grab a bag of food.
“They’re gettin’ a bite to eat,” he said, “No booze or nothin’, though. Twenty says they’ve already got some in the truck.”
The two boys rendezvoused at the checkout counter to pay before heading back to the truck with the girl. The one in the red hoodie came over to her side and said something that earned him in a punch in the arm.
“You think she’s fucking that one?” Bragg asked.
“Shit, she’s probably fucking both of them,” Franko said.
“Probably is,” Bragg muttered. “Goddamn slut.”
The guy in the red hoodie jumped into the bed of the truck. The woman behind the wheel yelled at him for it, pointing to the back seat before giving in and firing up the engine. The reverse lights lit up their dark corner of the parking lot as the truck backed out and turned for the small highway the Wawa was nestled on.
“That’s a minor in the bed of a moving truck,” Bragg said, grinning. “Dumb kid just gave us probable cause.”
Franko shifted their truck into drive, the transmission clanking with a brief but audible objection.
“Sometimes it’s almost too easy,” he said.
The black truck’s headlights flicked on as it rolled forward, stalking the smaller pickup with the three teens in it as they headed away from the convenience store.
Two of them would be dead in 29 minutes.
3
Emma drove the three of them to the top of Cooper’s Hill, where the highway ran through the trees and alongside an empty lot perched on the edge of a steep hillside. When she parked, the trio climbed out onto the hood of the truck together, overlooking the valley below. Downtown Rion was a smattering of fireflies clustered together in the autumn night. To the north, at the edge of it, brilliant light towers illuminated the high school football field, calling everyone around to come and worship at the only religion that mattered until Sunday morning. The trio could hear the rat-tat-tat of the snare drums as the marching band played in the stands.
“You think Hopewell’s winning?” Mason asked.
“Shit,” Bobbie said, snorting with a laugh, “they ever win when we were there?”
“Hey, you never know. Things change.”
Emma leaned forward and shot Mason a look. He chuckled and leaned back, reaching for the case of beer behind Bobbie. He pulled out a can and opened it.
“I thought that was piss,” Bobbie said.
Mason chuckled as he cocked his head back and poured lukewarm beer into his mouth. Swallowing, he rested his elbows against the windshield and looked up at the night sky. He scanned the stars until he found the only constellation he knew. Orion’s Belt. The three stars – Alnitak, Alnilam, and Mintaka – all similarly spaced in a straight line.
“Orion,” Mason mumbled. “Oh, Rion...”
“Jesus, you take a few hits off your pipe before I got in the car?” Bobbie asked.
Mason laughed. “Nah, man. Orion, Oh, Rion. It’s just funny.”
Bobbie packed a bowl into the aforementioned Rick and Morty pipe and took a hit. Coughing, he offered the still-smoking piece to Emma; she politely shook her head. Mason sat up and took it from Bobbie, but didn’t light it. He clasped it between his hands and looked out over the valley. Emma unwrapped one of the burgers they’d grabbed from Wawa and bit into it. The three of them sat in quiet.
“I’m almost nineteen and I haven’t been farther than I can see from here,” Mason said after a while.
“There’s more out there. You just can’t see it,” Bobbie said.
Mason smiled, seeing the segue he needed to bring up California. But just as Mason opened his mouth, an engine roared behind them. Together, the trio turned and look back to see a black truck pull sharply into the lot and skid to a stop just short of their own. As the two doors on the black pickup opened, a pair of red and blue lights began flashing from the windshield.
“Oh, fuck,” Bobbie said.
A man came around the driver’s door of the pickup and clicked on a flashlight, shining it in Bobbie’s face.
