Free Origin - Season One by Nathaniel Dean James Page A

her finger, then picked it up and pulled back the zipper before Jesse could protest. “Oh my god!”
    “What?” Jesse said.
    Amanda pulled the bag open and tilted it toward him.
    “Holy fuck!” Jesse said.
    “Why would she give you this?” Amanda said.
    “I told you, she was nuts.”
    She pulled one of the bundles out of the bag and fanned the bills with her thumb. “They’re all hundreds. This must a hundred thousand dollars at least.”
    Amanda put the bundle on the seat beside her and reached into the bag again. This time she pulled out a small rectangular box made of some light gray metal.
    “Should I open it?” she said.
    Jesse didn’t answer, just looked at her and shrugged.
    She unhinged the small clasp on the box’s side, lifted the lid, and cautiously held up the thing inside, as if it might explode if shaken. “What is it?”
    “A hard drive,” Jesse said.
    “A what?”
    “A disk drive for a computer. Looks ancient.”
    He took it from her and inspected it briefly. It was a lot heavier than he’d expected.
    They reached the Seven-Eleven a few minutes later and Jesse got out to use the payphone. He dialed the number to the sheriff’s office printed on a large red sticker above the number pad.
    “Sheriff’s Department, Deputy Mills speaking.”
    “Good evening, Deputy. It’s Jesse Corbin.”
    “Who?”
    “The photographer from the Herald?”
    “What can I do for you, son?”
    “My friend and I passed a car on the interstate about ten minutes ago. It had a blowout. I tried to give the lady a hand, but she started acting real weird. Thought she was being followed or something. And she didn’t look too good either.”
    “Bit of a nut job, was she?”
    “Yeah, something like that.”
    “Well, you did the right thing. You get some pretty crazy folks on the roads these days. I’ll get Heck out there to check it out. North or south?”
    “North. She also –”
    The line went dead. Jesse turned to see Amanda standing next to him with her index finger on the switchhook.
    “What did you do that for?” Jesse said.
    “Jesse, we should think about this.”
    “Think about what?”
    “I’m just saying, that’s a lot of money. What if she doesn’t tell anyone? Hell, what if she doesn’t even know? You said she was nuts, right?”
    Jesse looked at her, astonished. “Doesn’t tell anyone? For all we know, she’ll say we robbed her.”
    They heard a car coming up the interstate and turned to see two black sedans fly past, heading back in the direction of Fryer’s. They both had blue bubble lights flashing on the dashboard and must have been doing at least a hundred miles an hour.
    “That was quick,” Amanda said.
    “That wasn’t the sheriff’s department,” Jesse said.
    “How do you know?” Amanda said.
    “They don’t have any unmarked cars. Come on, we need to hand that in.”
    When they were back in the car, Amanda took the bag and put it in her lap. “Let’s run away, Jesse. We’ll go to California and rent a house on the beach. Live like bums. It’ll be great, I promise.”
    “Very funny.”
    Amanda pouted her lips and looked away. “Jesse, you’re no fun.”
    “Trust me,” he said. “You’ll thank me. When that woman turns out to be some drug dealer’s wife running away with his money, you’ll be glad one of us kept our heads.”
    “Fine. But not right away,” she said. “Pleeeasse, Jess. Let’s go down to the lake first. At least let me count it so I’ll always know how rich we could have been.”
    He considered this for a moment. “Fine. But I’m not leaving your house without that bag.”
    They got back from the lake at half-past-eleven. When Amanda finally fell asleep on the couch just after midnight, Jesse got up and gently pulled the bundle of hundred dollar bills from her hand. He put it back in the bag, zipped it up and stood watching her for a while, then turned off the TV and let himself out.
    It wasn’t until he got back in the car that he