They Stalk the Night, page 10
“We both heard someone walking in the snow. I wasn’t imagining that.”
“Maybe it’s Stig or Gordy pulling a prank on us. They park here with their girlfriends sometimes.”
“God, I hope it’s not them.” Tina hated Jake’s sketchy friends.
He rolled down the passenger-side window. “Stig, Gordy, is that you out there? Ha, ha! You scared us real good. Come out of hiding and show yourselves.”
No one responded.
“What about the bowling alley?” Tina said. “Some kids might have sneaked inside.” She had done it herself with her friends to drink beers and smoke weed. One of the glassless windows had loose boards you could push aside to enter the vacant building.
Jake yelled out the driver-side window, “Anyone inside the bowling alley?”
Of course, nobody answered back. What trespasser would?
He shrugged. “Whoever made those tracks is gone. Maybe just an animal walked past. Moose or mountain lion.”
“Oh, that’s reassuring,” she said sarcastically. “I want to leave.”
“But we’ve barely had an hour together.” He returned to the back where she sat hugging herself on the mattress. He rubbed her arms. “Come on, babe, let’s stay a little while longer.”
She couldn’t stop shivering. “I don’t feel safe here.”
He opened a side compartment and pulled out his .357 Magnum pistol. “I have this to protect us.”
“It’s not just the creeper that’s got me spooked. I keep worrying my father’s going to wake up. If he checks my room, I’m fucked. Please, take me home.”
“All right. I’ll get you back.”
“Thanks for understanding.” Tina patted his bare chest. “Next week, we’ll finally hit the open road and be together for the rest of our li—”
Again she heard footfalls crunching snow outside. This time running fast, charging closer and closer. Something slammed into the side wall. The van rocked on its wheels.
Jake and Tina screamed and fell against the mattress. He shielded her with his body as whatever attacked the van rammed again with a powerful force. The side wall buckled inward. The vehicle tilted on two wheels, threatening to fall over on its side.
Tina tumbled over Jake to the edge of the mattress and onto cold metal, then he rolled over her as the van fell back on all four tires. Bounced on its axles.
“What the hell?” Jake shouted.
The impact felt like someone had driven a vehicle into the van’s side. Tina imagined her enraged father broadsiding them with his truck. But there was no roar of an engine.
Another wave of terror shuddered through her as some kind of animal grunted and snorted. Right outside. A bear? Moose? An overwhelming stench, like rotting roadkill, filled her nose, made her eyes water. What sounded like a rake scraping metal screeched along the van’s exterior.
Tina yelped. “What was that?”
Whatever animal scratched the side wall bumped the van again. Then it leaped onto the roof with a heavy crash. The metal above their heads crumpled. The back windows exploded outward. Frosty air blew in, chilling Tina to the bone. Vapor puffed out of her mouth as she shivered uncontrollably.
Jake, trembling too, raised his gun. “Go away!” He hammered the pistol against the ceiling. “Go on, get!”
The heavy animal on top walked the van’s length, denting metal with each step.
“Must be a bear. I’m gonna kill it.” Jake moved toward the back doors.
Tina clung to him. “No, don’t go out there.”
“Stay inside, toward the center.” He pushed open the back double doors. Breathed a couple quick breaths. Then, howling like a warrior, pistol raised, he stood at the back of the van and fired shots at whatever was on the roof.
Tina covered her ears at the bang-bang-bang of gunfire and scrabbled backward, away from the open rear doors.
The beast growled overhead.
Jake screamed.
Tina watched in horror as his body was lifted off his feet by an unseen force. She cried out for her fiancé, “Jake! Jake!”
A loud wet crunch echoed across the night.
His arms and legs fell limp, dangling in the air behind the van. As his body shook wildly, blood rivered down his legs and soaked his jeans red.
Then Jake was snatched upward.
Gone.
Tina wailed. Fear and shock turned to blind panic.
Next thing she knew she was outside the van. Running barefoot through snow. Stumbled. Fell on her hands and knees. She picked herself up. Sprinted to the back of the building. Her frozen fingers struggled to pull the loose boards off the busted window.
Behind her, heavy animal grunts and footfalls.
Holding back the screams that rose in her throat, Tina ripped the last board off and climbed through the window. As she fell headfirst into the darkness of the bowling alley, the animal crashed against the building.
* * *
Kujak was piss-drunk by the time he staggered out of the Ice House at two in the morning. His friends made a weak attempt to take away his keys, but since he was bigger and stronger than all of them, he had no problem fending them off. Besides, the guys were all drunk too. When Kujak threatened to punch the next man who tried to take his keys, Nash and Joey gave up, muttered, “Good night,” then walked haphazardly across the iced-over parking lot to their trucks.
Josh could barely stand up. “Don’t ram yourself into a tree,” he burped out as he searched his coat pockets for his keys.
“You neither. I need….” Kujak’s head was swimming and he had to grip the side of his truck to stay upright. “Need you at work tomorrow.”
“I, um –” hiccup, “– promised Justin I’d take him shopping. I can’t disappoint him again.”
“Fine, bro. But every day next week you and me are going hunting. If your wife’s got a goddamned problem with that, stand up to her. Wear the pants.”
Josh gave a thumbs-up, then the two friends shook hands with a half man-hug then climbed into their trucks and drove off in opposite directions.
How Kujak made the winding, rural drive home, he had no recollection. The night, falling sleet, and road had been a moving blur. Thoughts of Shelby swirled in his beer-logged brain. But just like many nights before, he somehow found the snowy, tree-lined drive that led to his backwoods trailer. It was a quiet and lonely place. He missed the welcoming bark of his faithful old dog, Ringo, who had to be put down a couple weeks back. It happened the day before Kujak had told Shelby how he felt about her. Should have told her about my dog dying, he now realized. That would have softened her up.
Kujak parked. After grabbing a whisky bottle from behind his seat, he climbed down from his big truck in a rush and nearly fell flat on his face. The frozen ground seemed to tilt from side to side as he walked behind the trailer to the edge of the woods. He stopped at a crude wooden cross that had a dog collar wrapped around it. Kujak raised the bottle. “To you, Ringo. You were a damned good hunting dog.” He took a swig of whisky.
Behind him, a door slammed.
Kujak turned around, tried to focus his eyes. Something was off about the shadows that surrounded his backyard. In front of a row of metal sheds and empty chain-link dog pens, he made out silhouettes of parked trucks that didn’t belong there.
“Who the fuck’s on my property?” Kujak shouted.
On a vehicle’s roof rack, spotlights flashed on, blinding him. The surrounding dark woods stirred with movement as several men approached from all sides. Pipeline workers wearing matching wool caps formed a circle around him. Seven men in all.
Kujak patted his coat, then realized he’d left his pistol in the glove compartment. His rifle hung on a rack in his truck’s back window. More guns were stashed in his trailer, but the tightening circle of men cut off any path of escape.
Holding up his palms, Kujak said, “Eh, I got no beef with any of you.”
“Well, we got one with you,” said Mack Brody, the tallest among the group.
A two-by-four smacked Kujak in the back. The impact shocked his senses. A second blow he didn’t see struck his ribs. He fell to his knees, the wind knocked out of him. Fists came down at him from all directions, pummeling Kujak’s face and head. Boots kicked his side and stomach until he was lying in the fetal position on the frozen ground. The men seemed to have stopped short of breaking any bones, but damn was he in a world of pain. Too weak to fight back.
Next thing Kujak knew, hands were peeling off his coat. Someone pulled off his boots and socks. A knife sliced through his flannel shirt and thermal undershirt, ripped them off. Freezing air bit his exposed skin. He shivered as the men held down his arms and legs, pinning him flat on his back against the icy ground. They packed snow on his bare chest, the sudden cold burning into his flesh as sharp as dry ice.
He recognized several faces looming over him: Mack Brody, Harp Kellerman, Jackson Whitaker. The shortest of the group, Pete Dobson, stood back from the circle, wielding the two-by-four. A few other faces Kujak had seen at the bar, but he didn’t know the men’s names.
He spat blood on the men holding him. “I’m going to kill you all for this.”
The pipeline men all laughed and taunted him, pelted him with snowballs. Pete kicked his ribs. As Kujak gasped in pain, the men around him fell silent and stepped back.
Footsteps approached. Then Mason Thornhill was standing above Kujak, looking down at him. The oil company boss placed a boot against Kujak’s windpipe.
Struggling to breathe, Kujak fought against the restraints of the other men.
Thornhill’s boot pressed down harder on Kujak’s neck. “Let this be a final warning, you piece of shit. Stay the fuck away from my daughter, or next time I’ll crush your throat. Then we’ll take you deep into the woods and bury you.”
* * *
Bare feet on cold wood. Fumbling through darkness.
Tina Aaker gasped for breath as she tried to recall the bowling alley’s layout. She had grown up coming here. Her dad had bowled in a league. Her sister worked the shoe station and concession stand. Tina had bowled with her friends, even celebrated a birthday in the party room. That was right before Thunder Strike Lanes closed down and became a dusty, boarded-up tomb.
She coughed as she ran blindly down a hallway that had led from the back of the building to the main bowling area. Her fast-beating heart felt like it might burst. The constant ramming against the metal door behind her made her yelp.
The back door exploded open.
The beast was inside the building.
Growling. Scraping.
Tears streamed down Tina’s face as she ran blindly. With no lights, the bowling alley was a black cavernous maze. She felt her way past abandoned tables and chairs stacked in the hall, past the concession area where her big sister used to hand out free hot dogs and pizza to family members.
Ferocious growls echoed from the hallway. Then several crashes, as stacks of chairs fell over.
At the center of the wide-open space, she reached the shoe station. It smelled of old leather and foot odor. She had to find a place to hide. Where? If she hunkered down inside the shoe station, the beast would find her.
The bathrooms. No, she’d be cornered in there.
Her eyes adjusted to the dark. Moonlight filtering through a high window made the ten lanes faintly visible now in the gloom. Her cousin, Billy, used to work down in the ball pit behind the lanes. He’d once kissed her back there.
She headed that way as snarls came from the darkness behind her. Claws scraped the wood floor.
Tina bolted down a wooden lane, careful not to twist an ankle in the gutters.
Glancing over her shoulder, she saw a monstrous shadow loping on arms and legs across the lanes. It leaped onto the lane behind her. The boards vibrated under her feet as the growling beast charged after her.
She ran faster. At the end of the lane, she dropped into a slide, like stealing second base, and slid on her side across the pin deck and landed down in the pit. The cramped space behind the pinsetters was cluttered with machinery, belts, and ball return wheels. All the metal rattled as the beast slammed into the racking system. Heavy wooden pins fell against the deck and rolled down into the pit on top of her.
Grunting, the beast paced on the other side of the barrier, searching for a way into the pit. Its hands shook the pinsetters, but the old mechanical system held strong.
The creature crouched right above her. As it snorted, a death-stink wafted from its breath. Then it shrieked so loud her ears popped.
The enraged animal snarled as it fought to get down to her. Its arm lunged through a gap in the metal and wires.
Tina picked up a bowling pin and batted at a hand with impossibly long claws. “Go away!” she screamed.
The talons slashed her forearm and then the hand withdrew. Tina’s arm bled from four claw marks. A painful chill washed over her, as if she’d plunged into a freezing pond. She collapsed to the pit’s floor. She heard heavy feet pounding boards. The beast loped away, leaving her in a frenzy of uncontrollable shivers.
* * *
Tire tracks at the bowling alley never led to anything good.
While out patrolling the village, Officer Randy Calland couldn’t ignore the twin tire ruts that carved a path through the snow-covered parking lot. He hated chasing off kids or interrupting young lovers. He’d been a teen once too and understood the need to unwind with friends. Plenty of times, he’d participated in passing around joints, underage drinking, and fooling around with a girlfriend in the back seat of his car.
But now that Randy was a cop with ambition to move up the ranks, he put duty first. He never busted the young trespassers. He was related to many of them one way or another: cousins, nieces, nephews, or his friends’ siblings. With a population of one hundred and six people, the branches of the family trees in Hellum were intertwined. Randy usually just busted up the parties or make-outs and made the kids leave the area with a gentle warning.
He parked his SUV near the building’s front corner and called the night dispatcher. “Renee, you still awake?”
Her sweet voice spoke over the radio. “Of course, I’m a night owl. Got my coffee and a riveting paperback. Phones have been quiet tonight. How are things on patrol?”
“Boring so far. Not near as warm as the station. I could sure use some of that coffee.”
“I’ll brew another pot for your next break.”
“Much appreciated,” Randy said. “Listen, somebody’s driven behind the bowling alley. I’m going to check it out.”
“I’ll record it in the system.”
“Keep that coffee hot for me. See you after I handle this.” As he climbed out of his vehicle, Randy thought about asking Renee out on a date. One day, he was going to do it for sure. Just as soon as he lost the extra twenty-five pounds he’d packed on and gained his confidence back. He made a mental note to cut back on the burritos and ride more miles on his stationary bike.
Hitching up his utility belt, Randy followed the trail of tire tracks around the side to the back of the building. He felt coldcocked by what his mind took in: smashed-up van, blood everywhere, a severed arm riddled with bite marks on the snowy ground.
Stumbling back, he looked away.
He couldn’t stop shaking, but got his feet under him enough to shine his light inside the van. Empty. Large animal tracks led off into a dense fog.
“Renee,” he huffed into his two-way radio. “Wake up Chief Omdahl…send backup quick. One or more people have been killed behind the bowling alley.”
“Oh, no, who’s dead?”
“I don’t know yet, just get every cop out here.”
“I’m on it,” Renee said. “Randy, please be careful.”
Her caring voice grounded him. He shined his flashlight in an arc. He’d seen dead bodies, but nothing like the bloody mess strewn around the van and across the snowfield. Like a man had gone through a woodchipper.
A sudden noise sounded behind Randy. He whirled around with his pistol and flashlight. The bowling alley’s back door had been busted in. A faint, hollow banging was coming from inside the building. He probed his light into the dark interior.
“Hello!” he called. “Who’s there?”
“Help me!” a girl’s desperate voice cried out. She sounded far away, deep within the building.
Someone had survived.
“This is the police!” Randy yelled back as he cautiously entered the building. A long dark hallway stretched ahead. Off to the right, the lockers on a wall of the rear break room had been scratched up.
When he found more long scratch marks grooved into the hallway’s walls, he paused and whispered to himself, “Don’t go any farther, Randy. Wait for backup.”
“Help me, please, help me!” There were tears in the girl’s voice that called from the darkness. She sounded closer.
“Where are you?” Randy followed the beam of his flashlight down the hall. When he reached the carpeted dining area, he panned his light around dusty soda fountain dispensers, a popcorn popper machine with cracked glass, the concessions counter.
He heard a fierce growl, drawn-out and guttural, as if a wolf were inside the building.
As he turned his light toward the sound, a slash of claws sliced his extended hand. The flashlight flew to the floor, rolled away.
Randy yelped and grabbed his bleeding hand. He never saw what lunged from the dark.
Chapter Thirteen
The 6:00 a.m. phone call from the police chief sickened Sam. The news gripped his heart with a cold hand. The nightmare that had rocked their community in the past was happening again.
