Jesse Pace - Fulton's Affliction Excerpt

First draft stuff, still needs some revision. Jesse's life remains interesting to say the least.

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“There’s our boy,” Randy said, Jesse sitting shotgun in the Ford Expedition, an older model, a better blend with the prevailing age and condition of vehicles in Benson. They sat parked along the street, fifty feet from the prefabricated home their pawn was ready to enter. Only recently paired with Randy, Jesse kept to himself, observing more than speaking, getting baptized by fire, finding himself involved in the highest priority criminal narcotics investigations in the state. Randy, a good cop in the middle of his career, seemed overwhelmed by the sudden responsibility of the Task Force leadership. He could lean on strong investigative instincts and time on the practice squad but, Jesse thought, wasn’t quite prepared for the intense pressure associated with the work under a media microscope and within a highly politicized environment.

     Prescription drug abuse had been ravaging the northeastern part of the state for years. People were going asleep and never waking again, young children were being left to suffocate in cars while parents were shooting oxycodone at a friend’s home, home break-ins targeting cash in pursues and pills in medicine cabinets overwhelmed local law enforcement and social workers, the good ones, desperately tried to save as many as they could. 

     They’d gotten a lucky break a week ago when the Benson police found someone asleep in their car at a waterfront park. 

     “It’s Jeremy, right? Jeremy Hampton?” Randy asked, interrogating the guy after getting called in to assist. “25 oxycontin, 20 xanex  and a half-joint in the ashtray? No wonder you were passed out.”

     The doper sat there laconically, still messed up from however many pills he snorted before passing out. He mumbled, “I wasn’t gonna sell any.”

     “Doesn’t matter what you say you intended to do. That quantity and variety assigns your intent. And, you were in a public park. You’re looking at a couple of years locked up, kid.”

     “Want a lawyer.”

     “You’ll get one. And when they get here, I’m going to tell them the only thing which will save you from prison is to work with me.”

     Randy said his lawyer would be in soon with an offer. “You’ll be wise to take it.”

     Jeremy Hampton cut the deal.

     “Know someplace you can make a bust,” Hampton offered.

     The opportunity didn’t represent more than a drop in the bucket but the Task Force needed a headline. “You’re gonna have to give me more than this before I get to excited about helping you out.” Randy dropped a manila folder on the table. “You got a cousin, getting ready to get his parole revoked.”

     “Yeah.”

     “You all get high together?”

     “All the time.”

     “Good, don’t want to waste you on penny ante stuff like this. Got some other ideas for you.”

     10:00 illuminated the dashboard.

     “Think these troopers got things covered?” Jesse asked. Unmarked highway patrol sat down both ends of the roadway.

     “Be hard to mess up a perimeter on this one,” Randy answered. “Doubt these folks gonna run out.” Randy pressed on the earpiece monitoring the transaction inside. “It’s going down. Let’s go.”

     A pair of state police sprinted around each side of the mobile home. Randy and Jesse paused at the front door. “On three.”

     Randy kicked the foam core door in, Jesse entered, gun drawn. “State Police! Hands up where I can see them!”

     The three in the living room remained seated around the television. Two put their hands up, one left his on the armrest of the recliner he was in. Neither Randy nor Jesse made a fuss about the suspect disobeying. His emaciated arm was entangled within the tube delivering oxygen to the mask on his face.

     Jesse judged he’d be dead within a month from the cancer eating away at his insides and wouldn't need the pain pills his daughter was selling where he was going next.

Comments

[Camaro]

Thanks for the extract! I can't wait to see what's going to happen next ! I was busy converting mp4 to avi but postponed it because bumped into this page accidentally and enjoyed the piece a lot. Again, thanks for sharing.