The All Powerful Jeremiah Steel

CHAPTER FOUR

“What?!” Jeremiah exclaimed, utterly shocked by the statement.

Everyone looked at Jeremiah and they didn’t say anything. They were okay with using him for the task.

“Come here, boy!” Lady Elizabeth instructed, and Jeremiah’s eyes blinked rapidly.

He was being forced to involve himself in the situation, and he didn’t know what to do about it.

He hesitated to move and then noticed that his mother was also holding him. She didn’t want her son to join the cover-up for murder.

Lady Elizabeth looked at Michelle who was trying to prevent Jeremiah from moving and she frowned.

“Hey witch, what did I tell you about interfering in my affairs?!”

Michelle gulped.

“You told me not to, Lady Elizabeth” she replied.

“Then what do you think you’re doing—?!”

The sirens got louder.

“I don’t have time for you at the moment, but don’t make the mistake of thinking that your actions will go unpunished. Now, you have one second to let go of that bastard, and he has less than three seconds to come here or else”, Lady Elizabeth threatened.

The mother and son duo were caught in a dilemma. However, Jeremiah didn’t want anything bad to happen to his mother, so he took the initiative.

“It’s fine Mom. Let me go.”

Michele looked at her son with watery eyes.

“But, Jeremiah—“

Jeremiah pulled his mother’s arms from his body, saying “It’s fine Mom, I’ll be fine. I’ll just get this done quickly and be right back”

“B-but—“

Jeremiah smiled and said “Just trust me, mom. Everything will be fine, so just wait for me, and I’ll be right back.”

Going against her better judgment, Michelle freed her son, and he walked over to Lady Elizabeth.

“What do you want me to do grand— I mean, Lady Elizabeth?”

She stretched the car keys to him and he took it.

“Drive the car to the lake out back and let it sink in. The police are almost here, so you better worry.”

Jeremiah looked at the rest of the family whose hate for him remained, even though he was about to do such a huge favor for them. He chuckled after realizing that nothing he did was ever going to make them accept him.

He took a deep breath and sighed, now fully prepared for the risk he was about to take.

He looked at the car, then at Lady Elizabeth and replied “Okay.”

Jeremiah rushed to the car, got in, and drove it out of the premises. He was taking it to the lake to sink it as Lady Elizabeth had asked.

The moment he disappeared, the police arrived and parked in front of the family.

Lady Elizabeth, who represented her family, stood in front of all of them.

“Good evening officers. What can we help you with this fine evening?” They asked the moment the officers came out of their cars.

The lead officer looked at the entire family, then he looked at the matriarch.

“Good evening, Lady Elizabeth. I’m sure you don’t know this, but there’s been an accident not so far from here and the eyewitness account gave us a description of the vehicle involved in the accident.”

“Okay. And?”

“We’re here checking to check if the driver was someone from this estate,” the lead officer said.

Lady Elizabeth chuckled.

“I don’t mean to obstruct your investigation, Officer…” Lady Elizabeth checked the name of the officer on his badge and continued “Officer Prince, but what made you think the car you’re looking for is on my estate?”

“That’s because we asked around, and we were told that a car that matched the description given to us by the eyewitness drove up here and this is the only house for a good mile, so we’re just checking.”

“Hmm, that’s a serious accusation—“ Lady Elizabeth said, but was interrupted from behind.

Gwen, who was being eaten up by guilt and curiosity, asked “Sorry to interior you Officer but what happened to the man who was hit by the car?”

Immediately, Officer Prince looked at her and raised a curious eyebrow.

On the other hand, Lady Elizabeth frowned at the girl for opening her mouth. She might have just made things worse than they already were.

Officer Prince walked up to Gwen and her parents. He observed that the girl was shaken up about something, and he started putting two and two together.

“I don’t think I ever mentioned the victim being a man, but for some reason, you knew. How did you know that important detail about the case, young lady?” Officer Prince asked and Gwen’s eyes widened.

She had messed up

She quickly thought of what to do, but this was the first time she was in a situation like this, so her mind was blank.

Lady Elizabeth had to step in and protect her asset, so from behind the curious Officer, she said “Well, look at the time of night we’re in, Officer Prince.”

The Officer grimaced and turned to the daring Matriarch.

“And what about the time, Lady Elizabeth?”

The Matriarch chuckled then made it to the Officer and stood between him and her scared granddaughter.

“Only a man would be daring enough to be walking around this time of night to eventually be run over by a car. After all, men are the highest demographic of accident victims, right?”

Officer Prince looked at Lady Elizabeth, then he looked at Gwen and groaned.

“I guess you’re right.”

“Thank you—“ the lady smiled but was interrupted before she could finish her sentence.

“Still, I think it’s only right we continue with our investigation, so if you’d excuse me, my colleagues and I would like to start our search” Officer Prince walked away and was about to meet up with the other officers, so they could start the investigation, but Lady Elizabeth stopped them.

She had thought of whether Jeremiah had been successful in sinking the car or not. Then she started thinking about the possibility of something going wrong that would reveal the truth.

“Yes, Lady Elizabeth?” Officer Prince turned around and asked.

She took a deep breath and sighed.

“I haven’t been honest with you from the start and I apologize for that. Please allow me to tell you the truth”, Lady Elizabeth said, and everyone wondered what she was going to say.

*

*

*

Jeremiah had parked momentarily in front of the lake and prepared himself for what he was about to do, then he hit the gas and drove straight for it.

The car went in and started sinking very fast, which meant he had very little time to get out before he couldn’t anymore.

He opened the door and was about to jump out, but then he heard and felt a thud.

“What was that?” Jeremiah asked himself, then noticed that the car had stopped sinking.

He grimaced.

“What’s going on? Did I hit something?” He asked, and his eyes widened at the realization that exactly what he feared had taken place.

“I don’t have time for this. Maybe if I…” Jeremiah hit the gas, trying to see if he could break free of whatever was stopping the car from sinking.

Unfortunately, all his efforts were fruitless. Whatever was stopping the car was unmovable.

What Jeremiah didn’t know was that the lake was semi-natural. It wasn’t as big as it was now and had gotten this way by digging away land and widening it.

In doing that, some of the trees had been cut down but weren’t stumped. So, right now, Jeremiah was being blocked by a very thick tree stump and no matter how much he hit the gas, nothing could remove the barrier from his way.

Realizing that whatever was blocking his way was too big to drive past, Jeremiah decided to drive around it, so he wanted to reverse.

However, there was a problem.

The car had gone too far deep into the lake and his path backward was a muddy one. He couldn’t get enough friction to go even an inch backward.

“This can’t be happening!” Jeremiah panicked when he couldn’t go back, and he couldn’t go forward.

“Move, god dammit!” Jeremiah yelled, stumping the pedal and slamming his hands on the steering wheel, but nothing he did worked.

Panting heavily, Jeremiah wondered what he was going to do, but at that time it was too late because…

“We have you surrounded! Turn off the engine and come out with your hands up” said Officer Prince through a megaphone, while all the police car headlights beamed at the car stuck in the lake.