Chapter 16

Some people’s lives seem preordained at birth. As youngsters, they pass time playing with other children, absorbing what teachers and preachers have to say until they’re old enough to accept their destinies. Sheriff Lonnie Jacobs was one such person.

He was born and raised in Rabun County in an area the locals called Chechero. His backyard playground was Rainey Mountain where he roamed the woods as a boy, learning to shoot by the time he was eight and hunting alone with his shotgun by the time he was eleven. Like most boys he knew, he learned how to use a gun responsibly and scoffed at the liberal media reports he would see from time to time that proclaimed guns as unsafe. He knew guns were safe, if treated with respect, and were deadly if treated with negligence. Just as a motor vehicle is, just as a knife is, just as baseball bat is. “Heck,” he had recently told a friend over coffee at the Clayton Cafe when debating the subject, “the banjo is legally considered a deadly weapon under Colorado state law. It’s true!”

Lonnie first learned the word sheriff from Mrs. Welch, a Sunday School teacher at the Bull Creek Baptist Church. She was reading a passage from the book of Daniel that said, “the king sent to gather together the princes, the governors...the judges...the sheriffs, and all the rulers of the provinces.” Lonnie wanted to become one of those leaders, those rulers. Becoming a prince was out of the question and he had no interest in becoming governor since he’d have to move to Atlanta. Nor was he inclined to sit behind a bench, so he ruled out becoming a judge. He thought long and hard of becoming a pastor when he was a teenager, but also felt destined to become one of the sheriffs.

He had learned his way through the woods, knew how to hunt, how to track, what to eat, what to avoid. Lonnie also knew how dangerous the north Georgia woods could be to anyone unfamiliar with them. Fortunately, most folks in his county knew that all too well since most of them were born and raised there. No local in his or her right mind would just wander into the dense woods unprepared or without knowing how to get out. Certainly two locals never would, he thought to himself as he turned his new SUV into Blake Savage’s driveway.

The sheriff’s office had only recently begun using the SUVs, and Lonnie thought it was about time. Most of the sheriff’s territory in Rabun County was rural and lightly populated. Old dirt roads, washed and rutted by rains racing down steep mountainsides, were the norm. Blake’s driveway off Hale Ridge Road was no exception, but just getting there was the real battle.

Hale Ridge was one of the most isolated, least populated areas of Rabun County. The gravel road itself was in decent shape, Lonnie noted, with only a few bumpy ruts causing him to slow to a crawl. When it rained hard, however, it was a different story. Roads such as Hale Ridge became quickly impassable no matter what you were driving and were low priority for the road maintenance crews. Heavy rains would bring down huge trees, generally right over roads and power lines. To make matters worse, each side of the road was lined with terrain so steep a car could tumble off. If the drivers were sufficiently injured they may not be found or known about for a very long time, if ever. Hale Ridge road was wider than a one-lane road but not as wide as a two-lane road. It was rare for cars to meet on the road. When they did, they would each have to snake just along the edge of the road until they passed. Lonnie hated to think what that task would be like if the ground was waterlogged.

Lonnie knew Blake, but not very well. Like most folks in and around Clayton, Lonnie went to the Wildcat football games on Friday nights and had cheered as Blake dominated defenses until the rising star graduated in 2000. Lonnie himself had graduated from Rabun County fifteen years earlier before heading off to Georgia State College in Atlanta, where he majored in Criminal Justice. He hadn’t cared for the city lights of Atlanta much and mostly kept to himself in his dorm, with one exception. Turner Field was within walking distance and he could buy tickets for Atlanta Braves games for only a dollar in the cheap seats, something he did several times a week when the Braves were in town. When Lonnie finished up at Georgia State, he headed back to his home on Rainey Mountain to pursue his life’s calling just as he knew he always would. Ten years later he was elected Sheriff of Rabun County.

Lonnie parked in front of the house next to Blake’s F-150 at 8:10 a.m., got out, and shut the door quietly, as was his practice. He straightened his hat and walked with purpose and authority to the door at the center of the A-frame, and rang the doorbell.

Blake sat on the sofa when the doorbell rang, having just finished a heated call with Nick to discuss the delivery Blake would make later in the day. He looked toward the door and exhaled deeply. Angelica, if you’ve locked yourself out..., he thought to himself with exasperation as he got up and walked to the door. As he reached for the handle he could see through the stained-glass door that it was not Angelica. The figure loomed large, with the morning sun casting a large shadow over its wide-brimmed hat. Blake’s throat dried and his pulse quickened as he opened the door.

Lonnie gave a professional smile. “Mornin’ Blake.”

“Mornin’ Sheriff. How can I help you?”

Blake immediately wished he hadn’t said that. It was so formal, so distant. Not something you say to someone you know, someone you want to be friendly with, unless you want to appear uneasy. Blake had never been friendly with Lonnie. He was much older and Blake’s gang in high school, while not troublemakers, had always steered clear of the law. Lonnie tuned in to Blake’s demeanor and took the lead.

“Well,” Lonnie began with a slow mountain drawl, “I just wanted to sit with you a minute and ask a couple of questions. That’s if you don’t mind, Blake.”

In the second that it took Blake to respond, the worst thoughts raced through his mind. What does he want? What does he KNOW? Am I in trouble? What should I do? The rage began to boil within Blake as he knew that only someone who has something to hide would think such thoughts.

“Sure Sheriff, come on in.”

Lonnie walked in and, to Blake, appeared to notice nothing other than the bar stool he sat on. But Lonnie was a trained observer, both in the natural world and in the manmade one. He took a quick inventory of the environment before him, noting nothing unusual. A flat screen TV, a shotgun on the wall and a handmade walking stick leaning next to the sofa. Everything was in order, Lonnie surmised.

“I’m looking for a couple of fellas that live around here, Blake. They’ve been missing for going on a month now and, well, I’m just asking around to see if anybody knows anything that might help.”

“I ain’t seen ’em, Sheriff,” Blake blurted.

“Seen who?” Lonnie asked.

“Seen...whoever’s missing. I assume you’re talking about them boys I heard about.”

“Well, what’d you hear?” Lonnie asked as he watched Blake wrench his hands.

Blake was nervous and was sure the sheriff knew it. He shouldn’t have answered so quickly, so abruptly. He felt out of control, as if he was being interrogated in his own home. SETTLE DOWN! He told himself, the same way he used to when it was late in the game and he needed to lead a scoring drive.

“I just heard at the coffee shop that some boys were missing,” Blake said. “Folks figured they ran off or something.”

Lonnie nodded and reached into his shirt pocket, slowly retrieving a pen and note pad. He opened it and wrote a note reminding himself to stop by the hardware store on the way home. Blake watched the sheriff write and his pulse quickened even more. What is he writing? Blake realized he couldn’t just stare at the sheriff so he surveyed the room, noticing the empty coffee pot. He realized he should offer the sheriff some coffee.