Deadly Waters Pt. 01

AUTHOR'S NOTE

This is book one of a three book series. While I endeavored to make it possible to enjoy each book on its own merits, I believe the books will be most enjoyed by reading them in the following order.

Deadly Waters

Flashover

Boosted

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PROLOGUE

"What's the flow?" Margaret Neese asked as she leaned over Chester Holland's shoulder and squinted at the two computer screens.

She had to speak louder than normal to be heard over the howling wind and the rain lashing against the windows. Hurricane Chasity made landfall in South Carolina as a category three storm, and though it'd been downgraded to a category two, they were still dealing with winds of more than one hundred miles per hour and rain that, at times, exceeded five inches per hour.

Chet clicked a new tab on one of the computer screens. "We're over eleven MGD." He clicked back to the tab he was on when she walked up. "Main is reporting a high wet well."

She stared at the screen. Three of their lift stations were blinking red, indicating that they were in a high wet well condition. "Are the pumps running?"

"Yeah. Primary and secondary pumps are all running."

She pursed her lips. Main was their largest lift station and could theoretically pump six million gallons a day, although realistically, four was about all it could handle. If it was high, and the pumps were operating, that had to mean the well was flooding, probably the result of the nearby park's duck pond overflowing its banks. If Main flooded, there was no way for them to handle the flow coming into the plant.

"Shit," she muttered under her breath. "We're going to spill," she said more loudly.

Chet nodded, his lips pursed tight, clearly frustrated there was nothing they could do. "Yeah," he grunted as another well turned red, indicating it could no longer handle the flow coming into it.

Timothy Johnson, the other operator on duty, was sitting at another desk with a computer opened to the National Weather Service website, watching the hurricane on a radar loop. "Looks like we've got about another thirty minutes or so before the eye passes over," he said.

They'd been in the teeth of the storm for the past twenty minutes. She rubbed her forehead, trying to think of a way out. Chasity was kicking their ass, and though they could handle the increased flow for a little while, there didn't appear to be any way to prevent a spill from occurring. The plant was already at capacity. All five of the UV units were online, and that was the choke point of the entire facility. If the surge didn't abate, and soon, it was only a matter of time before water started pouring over the sides of the tanks. She had her entire maintenance staff, and another set of operators, on site and ready to go, but it was all going to be for naught. She was still pondering the problem, trying to think of a way to prevent a spill, when the lights flickered and went out.

"That's all we—" Tim began as the lights sputtered back to life for a moment, went off again, and then blinked back on.

She held her breath, wondering if the lights would hold, but they went out again before she drew her next breath. After thirty seconds of darkness, the only sound the roaring wind and pounding rain, she heard the two giant Caterpillar diesel generators roar to life, their loud bellows muted by the fury of the storm. A moment later the lights came back on. With power restored, everyone gathered in the operations room, all four operators working to get the systems back online as quickly as possible.

Leaving her people to work, Maggie walked to her office and picked up her phone, breathing a sigh of relief when she heard the dial tone. Yesterday, knowing they were likely to lose power, she'd written the numbers she'd need on a sticky-note and stuck it to the phone so she'd have them handy when she needed them. Her first call was to Duke Energy to report the power outage. They were a priority facility, along with hospitals and other essential services, and she didn't want there to be any confusion that they were without power. It was just before midnight, and she hated to do it, but her next call was to the Casper Oil emergency number.

"Hello, this is David."

"David, Maggie Neese. We've lost our power here."

"Yeah, you and everybody else," David Casper replied. He sounded tired.

"We're going to need to execute our emergency clause."

"I've been expecting your call. I have my trucks already loaded and I'll get someone out to top off your tank sometime tomorrow."

Their fuel tank was full, filled to brimming in preparation for the storm, but the two big Cat generators were thirsty beasts and would suck the tank dry in only a couple of days.

"Thanks. I couldn't get an estimate on when they expected the power will come back on, so we may be on generators for a few days."

"We'll do the best we can to keep you supplied."

"David, I have to have those generators. Without those, we'll lose the plant. The lift stations too."

"I know, Maggie, I know, but I only have so many trucks. You're not the only person to call me. Everybody's on generators. I can move the fuel only so fast."

"I don't want to be a total hard case on this, but we have an agreement. I expect you to honor it."

Casper Oil had an agreement with the city to supply essential services—police, fire, wastewater, and potable water—with fuel ahead of all other customers except the hospital. Business owners might not like it when they couldn't open because their generators ran dry, but they'd like it even less when shit started backing up into their house or they didn't have water to drink.

David sighed. "You'll have your fuel."

She smiled to herself in victory, and then looked up and raised a finger in the air, indicating to Rick, another of her operators, that she was almost done. She knew David was over extended, but she also knew he couldn't afford to lose the city account.

"Thanks, David." She hung up. "What?"

"Flow's over fifteen and we just got the high-level alarm at the screen."

She grimaced. "Okay. Let's go." They walked down the hall to the operations room. "Open the bypass on the screen."

"Already done," Chet replied.

She pursed her lips. "And we're still high?"

"Yeah. As soon as the high-level came on I opened it, but it didn't make any difference."

She turned to the maintenance tech who was hovering nearby in case he was needed. "Kevin! I need you to go to the screen and make sure the bypass is actually open."

He'd been expecting that request. "You got it," he said, reaching for his slicker.

It was starting. If the bypass was open and they were still high, they simply couldn't handle the flow into the plant anymore.

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ONE

Sean McGhee was reviewing his budget, trying to figure out how he was going to replace the ancient Windows 7 computers in his office so his staff had something better than the digital equivalent of stone knives and bear skins to work with.

His predecessor, William Horton, was completely old school and saw no need for computers except to send and receive email. Because of that attitude, the Brunswick Police Department was a totally paper-based operation. He intended to change that, but first, he had to get some computers that were manufactured in the current decade.

His phone rang and he glanced at the display. 911 Dsptch. He was used to doing budgets, but that didn't mean he enjoyed it, so the interruption was welcome. He picked up the handset. "Sean."

"You'd better get down here," his dispatcher said.

"Be right there."

He hung up the phone and walked down the hall to the dispatcher's office. Brunswick, North Carolina, wasn't large enough to have a call center, so the 9-1-1 operator shared space with the rest of the small police force. Sitting behind a large pane of heavy glass, with a speaker that allowed the dispatcher to speak with guests, the operator also doubled as their receptionist.

"What've you got?" he asked as he stepped into the small room.

Kim Wells looked up from her computer with wide eyes. "I just dispatched Fish and Chips to the sewer treatment plant. They found a body." It was clear from her tone and the way she was looking at him, she thought he should be there.

"What kind of body?"

"White male. They said they found him in the oxidation ditch, whatever that is, tied down with weights."

He hesitated, unsure of what to do. He didn't feel the need to micromanage his officers, and he knew how he'd feel if he were dispatched on a call and his superior showed up uninvited. He trusted his officers to do their jobs, and if they couldn't, he'd find out soon enough. He was still treading lightly in his new position as the chief of police. He was the outsider, the damn Yankee, and the last thing he wanted to do was make his people think he didn't trust them.

He knew he looked nothing like the stereotypical police officer. When he'd introduced himself to the officers and operators under his command, he could tell by their reactions they didn't know what to think of him. A bit taller than average at a tick over six feet, he had strawberry blond hair, a soft-spoken demeanor, and his glasses made him look more like an accountant, or an IT nerd, than a cop.

"May I make a suggestion?" she asked, her lips twisting into a sideways grin at his hesitation.

"What?"

"Go. This isn't Boston."

"You don't think Fish and Chips will see that as me horning in, or that I don't trust them?"

Her smile spread. "Like I said, this isn't Boston. I think they'd like to have you there. We don't get many murders 'round here." He was still thinking it over when he saw her attention shift. "He's right here," she said, speaking into the mic at her lips. She flipped a switch on the console. "Go ahead Fish, he can hear you now."

"Chief, you better get down here. This is liable to get ugly," the voice said over the speaker.

He bent over and pressed the button on the desk mic. "What've you got?"

"It's Boyd Thacker."

He looked to Kim as her lips thinned. It was clear she recognized the name. "Is that supposed to mean something to me?" he asked.

"No, probably not, but you still need to get down here."

"I'm on my way," he said as he straightened, and then looked at Kim again. "How do I get there?" he asked. New to the job and area, he was still learning his way around.

"Go out and get on I-95 South. Go to the next exit. Make a right and then cross Millbrooke. Take the first left, and then an immediate right. If you see the plant on your left, you missed it and went too far, turn around and go back."

"Ninety-five, next exit, right, cross Millbrooke, left then right," he repeated.

"That's it," she confirmed.

"You know this guy?" he asked, wanting to get a heads up before he arrived.

Her lips thinned again. She obviously didn't like the victim very much. "No, not really."

He could tell she was holding something back, but he gave her a nod and stepped out of her office before he forgot the directions. He hurried out of the station and threw himself behind the wheel of his car while running over Kim's instructions one more time. As he pulled out of the station, he was pretty sure he had them, but if not and he got lost, he could always call for help.

-oOo-

Sean exited the interstate, rolling to a stop in his unmarked Dodge Charger. Two weeks on the job, and now this. He'd thought he'd gotten away from this kind of work when he accepted the job in Brunswick. He'd been looking for a change of pace, and becoming the chief of police in a sleepy little southern town seemed like just the ticket. He'd had visions of Andy Taylor and Mayberry, and the warm winters with no snow had also been a big draw.

He followed Kim's directions and crept through the open gate, but saw no sign of his officers. He picked up the mic attached to the center console. "Fish, Chips, what's your twenty?"

"Stay on the road leading in and follow it around," Chips responded.

Sean did as Chips instructed and then pulled into the grass to park behind the two patrol cars. Unlike his black, unmarked car, Brunswick's patrol cars were white with a bold blue stripe that arced from the rocker panel behind the front wheel to just under the door handles as it thinned and flowed to the rear of the car. If the emergency strobes on the roof weren't enough to identify the vehicles, the word Police, with the city's name below in smaller letters, emblazoned on the doors in the same reflective tape as the stripe, did.

"Chief," Chips said as he approached.

Charles Langley, Chip to his friends and Chips to his fellow officers, had been an officer on the Brunswick police force for less than five years. A touch under six feet, with dark hair and eyes, and bulging arms, Chips had joined the city fresh from passing his Basic Law Enforcement Test. He was a good, smart cop, and probably wouldn't be with the city much longer.

Brunswick had two kinds of officers. Young officers, like Chips, fresh out of school, who worked for the city a few years before moving on to larger departments for more money and greater opportunity, and a couple of older officers who had retired from larger police forces but wanted to keep their hand in. Other than himself, Brunswick had no sworn officers at the height of their career.

Sean followed Chips to where a small crowd was standing around a blue plastic tarp draped over a vaguely human shaped lump on the ground. Everyone was dressed like they were going to the Arctic even though it was in the upper thirties.

"We've already called the county coroner," Chips explained, his breath appearing as small puffs of vapor. "Fish was here first and pulled his wallet. All the money and credit cards were still there."

"So probably not robbery," Sean mused. "Fish said it was some guy named Boyd Thacker, like that meant something."

"Yeah. He's the riverkeeper on the Siouan."

"I don't know what that means."

"Maggie Neese, she's the plant manager, can fill you in on all the details, but suffice it to say he wasn't very well liked around here."

"Any thoughts?"

"On who might have done it?" Chips grinned. "Only the entire city council, the mayor, and everyone who works here." Sean didn't say anything and stared at him in disbelief. Chips snickered. "I told you he wasn't very well liked."

Sean crouched next to the body and lifted the tarp, the stiff plastic crackling as he did. His stomach rolled over in disgust. The victim was bloated and heavily decomposed. He was missing a boot, and his pants, shirt, and coat were badly ripped, the right sleeve of the coat torn completely away. What fabric remained strained to contain the swollen body. There were obvious broken bones and large chunks of the faintly greenish-blue flesh were torn away, probably by whatever had shredded the clothing. The body hadn't been treated gently. Between whatever had happened to the body to crush the victim's jaw, break the shoulder, and twist his right elbow into the grisly unnatural angle, along with the decomposition, the face had become grotesque and unrecognizable, the only identifiable feature being a light brown beard. The wrists and ankles of the body were tightly bound with zip ties that had cut deeply into the bloated flesh, causing it to start tearing open. There were a pair of ten-pound barbell weights, one at the wrists and one at the ankles, attached with more zip ties. The body looked like something out of a bad zombie or horror movie, and while the victim hadn't started falling apart yet, he didn't look far from it. But worst of all was the stench. He didn't know if the smell came from the decomposition or the fact that the victim's stomach had been ripped open so he could see his organs, but wherever it came from, it made his stomach churn. Feeling queasy from the sight and smell, he dropped the tarp and stood so he wouldn't embarrass himself by puking in front of everyone.

"Ms. Neese, this is Chief Sean McGhee," Chips said as Sean stood, introducing him to the only woman there.

"You're the new chief? Nice to meet you. I bet you're sorry you took the job now, huh?" the woman asked with a grim smile.

Sean pegged Maggie to be between thirty-five and forty. She'd probably been stunning at one time, and though time had softened her, she was still quite pretty with her big brown eyes and dark brown hair tied up in a ponytail. He forced a small smile. "Ms. Neese," he said in greeting. "Who found the body?"

"Call me Maggie. Everyone else does. Tim. He was making his rounds."

"Who's that?"

Maggie tossed her head in the direction of Fish. "The one your officer is talking to."

Sean watched Fish a moment but decided not to interfere. "Can you give me the thumbnail?"

She shrugged, her hands in the pockets of her coat. "Not a lot to tell. We make rounds every three hours, just looking the place over, making sure everything is working as it should, nothing is leaking, that sort of thing. He saw the body hung up on the scum skimmer, but didn't know what it was. When he started to fish it out, he realized what he had. He called the other operator and a couple of the maintenance guys and they pulled the body out. Then we called the police."

"Why didn't you leave the body where you found it?"

"Because, as I said, he didn't know what it was. It was floating face-down just under the surface. Once he realized what it was, we knew we had to get it out of there because he'd pulled it loose. If we didn't, it would've gotten sucked back into the mixer and we might never have found it again. Not without draining the ditch anyway."

Sean looked around. He'd never been in a wastewater treatment plant before and he didn't understand what she was saying. "Can you show me?"

"Sure. This way," she said, giving her head a jerk before turning away.

As Fish and Chips continued with their interviews, Sean followed Maggie to the end of a long, low, concrete wall then up some steps to a platform. Below them, about a foot below the top edge of the wall, was fast moving water the color of chocolate milk.

"That's the mixer up there," she said, pointing. He looked to where she indicated. On the opposite end of the ditch were two large, concrete, bunker-like buildings with enormous electric motors sitting on top, one for each of the two ditches. Below the top was a wide opening with water roiling and churning as it exited the structure. "Inside are huge blades that agitate the water. The water flows down this trough, around the curved end here, and then back to the mixer. We found the body there," she said as she pointed to an opening in the curved wall that allowed water to escape the ditch behind a line of bubbling foam trapped by a floating piece of plastic. "He was wedged in there, in that opening. You can't see much because the water's so murky. Like I said, he was floating face down and it wasn't until Tim hooked the body and pulled it back that he could tell what it was."

"How deep is the water here?"

"Around twenty-five feet."

"Any ideas on how the body got in there?"

"Someone dumped it in there."

"You're sure?"

"Positive. There's no way a body could get into the ditch unless someone put it there. If it'd come into the plant any other way, it'd have gotten caught on the screens," she said, pointing to another concrete structure farther up the hill. Sean looked to where Maggie was pointing but couldn't determine anything about what he was seeing. "That's designed to catch debris the plant can't handle, things like baby wipes, tampons, condoms, and all the other crap people flush down the toilet," she continued. "There's no possible way for the body to have slipped past that, but even if it did, then it would have hit the grit system. That filters out even finer stuff the screens don't catch. So, to answer your question, no, the body was dumped into the oxidation ditch."