The Hum by D.W. Brown Page A

door, my footsteps were numbered.”
    After another short pause, he continued. “When I first saw the entrance to that cavern, I was only thinking of a place to hide out. I thought I’d get some rest and maybe even get lucky enough to come out far away from that station.”
    “What about the drugs? From the looks of the bag you carried out of that back room, you had quite a bit of cocaine, and I assume aa hefty sum of cash. Where are the drugs and the money now?”
    “I left it down there in the tunnel. Look Sheriff, things haven’t been the same for me ever since I killed my wife and kids. The nightmares won’t give me any rest, and it always feels like I’m being watched. Every time I think I’ve moved past it, it happens again. I thought I was finally going to live a pretty normal life until my boss’s son and my ex-girlfriend’s adulterous ways caused the humming to enter into my head, again. It wouldn’t stop until I killed them. I guess once you’ve killed someone, it gets easier each consecutive time.”
    “What made you kill you wife and kids in the first
    place?”
    “If you’ll take me away from this place, I’ll tell you.” Russell pulled the handcuffed Mr. Black to his feet, and began leading him out of the woods and back towards the service station. After a few steps, Mr. Black turned around and yelled, “I’m never going back there. Do you hear me? You can’t get to me in jail! Leave me alone! Please…just leave me alone.”

CHAPTER 11

    From the pleading sound in Mr. Black’s voice, Russell knew something or someone had put a fear unlike anything he’d ever witnessed in the man.
    Once he was secured in the back of his cruiser, Russell said, “Okay, now tell me why you killed your family.”
    “Alright, but it will take a little while.”
    “We’ve got two more hours before daylight, and neither one of us will be sleeping tonight, so we’ve got the time,” replied Russell after looking at his watch by the glow of his flashlight.
    Russell listened intently as Mr. Black began, “To tell you the truth, I sometimes wonder how everything got to that point. When I first met Jeannie, she blew my mind. She was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. She stood 5’6”, was well endowed up top, and had the perfect waistline. Add Angelina Jolie lips and brown hair, and you had my bombshell. I was going to college down in Saginaw when I met her at the bookstore there on campus.”
    Russell waited as Mr. Black took another one of his short pauses. This time he had a smile on his face as he remembered his wife of long ago.
    He continued, “This may sound cheesy to you, but all movement and sound within that bookstore stopped, and I felt my feet propel me forward in her direction. It was like I had to talk to her, had to get close to her. I’d dated many girls prior to Jeannie, but none seduced me like she did. I’d heard the old cliché love at first sight before, but thought it only happened in the movies. I’m here to tell you that was exactly what happened to me.”
    “Within minutes of seeing her face, I was introducing myself. Mind you, I’m normally not that forward around girls, but that wasn’t the case with Jeannie. I found myself spouting out anything that came to mind just to get her attention. It must’ve worked, because we went on our first date that same weekend.”
    As the man replayed his story, a story of true love gone terribly wrong, Russell could hear the regret in his voice. It was a story Russell had heard before: two young adults with plans for an eternal future of joy, ending in murder. The same old question came to mind: Why not get away from each before you do something you can’t take back? Why couldn’t people just get a divorce and move on?
    “When I saw Jeannie walk out the door of her dorm in that red dress, I almost lost my mind. It was more than lust, I tell you; it was like someone had cast a spell on me. Once again I couldn’t hear or see anything