Read Online Landon (In Safe Hands Book 1) by S.M. Shade - Free Book Online

set for you boys,” he says.
    We
own the farm, though it can’t be tracked back to us on paper, and Jed keeps the
place up for us. “Appreciate it. How have you been, Jed?”
    “Can’t
complain. You boys come in for a drink before you go.”
    “Will
do,” I reply as we carry the corpse past him and towards the barn. A large
industrial wood chipper waits behind the barn, a bag already attached to catch
the “clippings”. Justus gets the unfortunate job of stripping the body while I
build a fire in a large metal drum. Once it’s roaring, in go the dead man’s
clothes and the rug he was wrapped in.
    Now
for the body. Justus turns on the chipper, and I help him tilt the man’s body
in head first. It’s a good thing we’re far away from people because the sound
of the wood chipper eating away at bone and flesh is deafening. It doesn’t take
long for the corpse to be completely shredded, the remains landing in the
collection bag.
    A
chipper doesn’t get rid of everything, even if you were to run the remains
through it more than once, so our next stop is the barn. I gag on the smell of
blood as we detach the bag and carry it to the pig trough. The asshole isn’t
any lighter just because he’s ground up. The sloshing sound that echoes across
the night when we dump the human soup into the trough will haunt me forever.
Apparently, it sounds appetizing to the hogs that instantly crowd in to, well,
pig out.
    Justus
tosses the collection bag into the fire and adds a little gasoline before we
head inside the house. “All done?” Jed asks, pouring us each a tumbler of
bourbon.
    “Pigs
are fed. Do you mind if I crash on your couch for a few hours? I need to bleach
down the trough and chipper, plus make sure everything burned,” Justus
explains.
    “No
problem.” Jed is pushing sixty, but sharp as ever. We met him a few years ago,
well, tracked him down, actually. It was all over the news that someone was
killing sex offenders, just making their way down the registry. He would’ve
been caught and spent the rest of his life locked up if we hadn’t found him
first.
    His
granddaughter had been abducted, raped and killed when she was ten years old.
Though her murderer is spending his life behind bars, Jed realized there were
many who weren’t. And that the government kept a nice little hit list for him.
Once he found out who we are and what we do, he was more than happy to help in
a way that won’t cost him his freedom.
    We
chat for a bit before Justus turns to me. “Better get going if you’re going to
make the drive back before your coach turns into a pumpkin.”
    “You’re
funny as a fuck in church.” I shake Jed’s hand and promise to stop by without a
body in tow sometime, and head to my car.
    I’m
nervous on the drive home, even though there’s no visible blood on me. I’ve
seen enough crime shows to know there’s always transfer between a body and the
person toting it around. The sky is just beginning to lighten when I pull into
my garage.
    Stripping
off all my clothes, I build a fire in the fireplace and toss them in before
taking a long hot shower. I fall into bed and inhale the light scent of lemon.
Zoe is using a new fabric softener and it smells wonderful. Almost as good as
her. Fuck, what would she think if she knew how I’d spent my night? No wonder
none of the guys from ISH can maintain a relationship.
    I
wake with Zoe still on my mind. I’ve never even considered a relationship
before, but after knowing Zoe for only a month, the thought is a lot less
ominous. I don’t know what it is about her that makes me want to tell her
things I don’t tell anyone. It’s probably a good thing she has a boyfriend,
though I’ve never heard her mention him.
    I’ve
barely slept, the sun is still high in the sky, taunting me with everything I
can’t have. It’s on days like this, when I wake early and restlessly pace the
house with nothing to do, that I really feel different. Finally, I decide to
head to