Fort Oakley | Part One

21 | When The Law Is The Last To Know (As Usual)

For the next two days after Vance and I hid away in the treehouse until he determined it was safe to go back through the woods, my phone vibrated endlessly.

Elvin. Always Elvin.

I ignored every call, every weird message he sent me. After learning he and Willa were apart of The Order, answering wasn't an option. I had come to determine they hadn't just appeared in my life—they were planted there, carefully placed to keep an eye on me.

Puppets of the cult.

I'd spent those two days coiled in tension, waiting for some other shoe to drop. Vance checked in regularly, ensuring I was still safe tucked away in Claire's house. I hadn't heard from anybody else, and for all I knew, Fort Oakley didn't exit beyond the trees that hid Claire's house away from the town.

Finally, Sheriff Lucien's police car rolled up Claire's driveway. When Sheriff Lucien stepped out with a thick file in his hands and a petrified look in his eyes, I knew this was no casual visit.

"What the hell is going on, Charly?" he demanded when I greeted him at the front door, his voice tight. "Lieutenant Roscoe sent me this."

The way his fingers gripped the folder made my stomach twist.

"What is it?" I asked as I let him step into Claire's house.

"Stuff about a supposed cult in Fort Oakley," Sheriff Lucien said, his voice tight. "Stuff about them being after you."

When Sheriff Lucien sank onto the living room couch, I saw the fear in him.

"I'm going to call Agent Vance," I told him. "He can explain everything to you better than I can."

I could see the questions in the Sheriff's eyes, but he looked to tired to ask them.

Vance picked up on the first ring. "Do you need help?"

"I've got Sheriff Lucien here," I said quickly. "Lieutenant Roscoe sent him a file with information about the cult. He wants to know what's going on.

Vance didn't skip a beat. "Please give him the phone, Charly."

Sheriff Lucien took the phone reluctantly, his eyes narrowing as he listened. I sat across from him, trying to gauge his reaction, but his expression was unreadable.

When he finally handed the phone back to me, he just sat there, staring into space.

I went to the kitchen and grabbed one of Claire's liquor bottle, pouring Sheriff Lucien a glass and handing it to him. "You look like you need this."

Sheriff Lucien silently took the glass from me, downing the drink in one go. I poured him another glass. "You know, Charly, you're cooler than me now. You're in canoodles with the damn FBI."

I rolled my Sheriff, though his words brought a faint smile to my lips.

"I think I get it now," he says quietly. "Why Claire's parents didn't want me around. Why Claire showed up with you so suddenly right after graduation."

I didn't say anything. There wasn't much I could say.

Sheriff Lucien shook his head, like he was trying to shale off the weight of everything he'd just learned. "I think I remember Jade and Vance when we were kids. They were a couple of years older than me and Claire, but their names are ringing a bell."

Sheriff Lucien stayed a little longer, trying to piece everything together while I refilled his glass more time than I probably should have. By the time he left, the tension in my chest had eased—just a little At least now, someone else know.

Later that afternoon, I found myself back on the dock, a paintbrush in hand, trying to lose myself in the movement of colors and shapes. After a while, I movement it was getting too dark outside, the only source of light I had to illuminate my surroundings being the floodlights attached to Claire's house.

They were motion-activated, so when they went on after I had been sitting still, I knew something was wrong.

The figure limped haphazardly in my direction. He came from the woods, and there was only one other person other than myself who I knew had no problem being in the woods.

But this wasn't Jacey.

This guy was my age, but he had been beaten to an inch of his life. I couldn't see an area of his kin that wasn't bruised or covered in blood.

He want recognizable.

I only knew it was Jacey Andino, my forgotten childhood friend because of those intense green eyes of his. They weren't sad or emotionless like they were all the other times I had seen him. Now, there was a desperate, helpless look in them which had me struggling to breathe.

"Jacey!" I yelled, dropping everything and running towards him. He collapsed into me, his dead weight nearly knocking me to the ground.

"They're going to kill him, Charly," he gasped, struggling for breath. He was clutching the left side of where his ribs were with both hands, and I knew something was terribly, terribly wrong here.

"Who?" I asked, struggling to hold him up. "Jacey!"

"Mason," he choked out. "Who's Mason?" I asked, but his eyes fluttered shut. I shook him even though he looked like he was in severe pain. "Who's Mason, Jacey?"

His knees buckled, and I sank to the ground with him, stopping his head from hitting the ground.

His eyes fluttered open, looking dazedly up at me with fear and exhaustion.

"My little brother," he whispered, his voice fading as his body went limp on the ground.

"Jacey!" I shook him, panic rising in my chest. "Jacey!"