Page 1 of S.O.S. Billboard

CHAPTER ONE

Billboard came to awareness slowly.

He opened his eyes.

What the…?

Blinking a few times, he gazed up into the canopy of trees above his head, noting the position of the sun, and—

He couldn’t have been out more than a few seconds.The enemy must have…

“Shit.”

He swore out loud. He wasn’t in the wretched forests of South America.

Billboard remembered where he was and his shoulders relaxed. He was in the woods, yes, but in a town south of Boston.

He recalled his foray into the suburban treed-acres with a wry twist of his lips. He’d been looking for a lost boy. Ethan Jakes.

“Lost,” Billboard snorted. “Right.”

George Seingold—or Billboard as he was called—wasn’t in the habit of talking to himself, but this situation was…interesting? Or maybe he’d simply hit his head too hard and was slightly concussed. Still, this mission was turning out to be damned amusing because it wasn’t difficult for him to put two and two together, and determine that the boy didn’twantto be found.

Mrs. Jakes, however, was clearly not on board with that.

SOS had been contracted by the boy’s distraught mother early that morning, saying her eleven-year-old son hadn’t come home the previous night. Apparently, for him to be out all day in the woods these fine, late spring weekends was not unusual, but for the boy to stay out past duskwascause for alarm. By the timeMrs. Jakes called SOS, twenty-two hours had passed since her boy had disappeared, and she was frantic.

When asked why she hadn’t called the police, she’d disparagingly cited that she didn’t trust them, although she wouldn’t say why.

Del, Billboard’s boss and teammate, knew there had to be a lot to that story, but in light of the missing child, he’d taken the job, determined to get to the bottom of Mrs. Jake’s distrust at another, less crucial time.

Billboard’s other teammates, Perk, Sarge, Prez, Wiley, Daire, and Brent were all out on their own assignments. That had left Billboard as the designated tracker, which he was exceptionally good at. He’d learned some trailing techniques while deployed with the Marines, but since being employed by SOS, he’d taken additional, very intense lessons from Sarge. The man was a genius, and so accomplished he could track an ant through water.

Those skills had come in handy for Billboard this morning, as it had led him to determine, early on in his search, that young Ethan was playing some kind of game.

The boy’s path had been apparent from the start; his sneaker prints entering the woods in a spot that looked well-traveled, which meant it was his normal ingress. But after several hundred yards, Ethan had clearly taken great pains to cover his tracks. He’d leapt from rock to rock, he’d climbed several trees and jumped down from them as far as his small legs would allow. He’d brushed over his prints with branches, and he’d even laid down some false trails before carefully doubling back.

Billboard hadn’t been expecting the attempted subterfuge, but once he was onto the boy’s tricks, he was impressed. Thereafter, he didn’t have to look hard for the clues which soon became obvious to his honed instincts.

Another ironic laugh escaped BB.

Honed instincts.

Sarge would have his ass if he knew what Billboard had fallen into.Literally.With his eyes focused on a particularly difficult tree climb for the youngster, BB had gone ass-over-teakettle into a covered pit that the boy had very carefully dug and disguised.

Sure.Billboard hadn’t been expecting it, but that was no excuse. Sarge wouldn’t have been blindsided.

Billboard lay still, letting the beautiful day wash over him as his gaze wandered around where he continued to lay while regaining his equilibrium. He lifted his head slightly and felt for the goose-egg he knew had to be there.Yup.The cavity wasn’t that big, but that’s probably why he’d struck his head on the way down. The roughly six-by-five hole barely fit his length. BB was six-foot-two, and there was about an inch to spare on either end of him, with the edges embedded with a number of rocks.

For sure, he’d hit one of those protrusions.

There was nothing he could do about it now as he took additional stock of his resting place.

As for depth, the hollow was little more than three-feet-deep, and rough as hell, but still, Billboard was amazed. It had to have taken weeks for the boy to dig it.

Billboard eased himself into a sitting position. Rotating his head, he decided his brain wasn’t all that rattled. Flexing everything else, he also determined there was no additional damage to his body. He slowly came to his feet and looked around.

Knowing the boy was building traps and obstacles, Billboard vowed he’d be completely focused from here on out.

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