Black Mist (Corps Justice Book 19), page 1
BLACK MIST
A Corps Justice Novel
C. G. COOPER
JBD Entertainment, LLC
CONTENTS
Dedications
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Epilogue
A Letter To Readers
Also by C. G. Cooper
About the Author
“BLACK MIST”
A Corps Justice Novel
By C. G. Cooper
Copyright © 2023 JBD Entertainment, LLC. All Rights Reserved. Unauthorized reproduction is prohibited.
This is a work of fiction. Characters, names, locations and events are all products of the author’s imagination. Any similarities to actual events or real persons are completely coincidental.
This novel contains violence and profanity. Readers beware.
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DEDICATIONS
To my talented team of beta readers:
Anne
Bob
Carl
Don
Earl
Gale
Glenda
Judith
Larry
Michael
Nidza
Paul
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
CHAPTER ONE
DR. PETER LIN
It wrapped around his ankle slowly, steadily. It would've been lovingly if it had been a woman, only he knew it wasn't. He tried to look down, but his eyes would not go that way. He tried to reach, but his arms would not move. He tried to scream, but his voice failed him. The air in his lungs felt like it was being squeezed from him, steadily, like a slow leak in a balloon. Now up his calf it went, and soon it was tight around his knee. From the depths of his soul, a blood-curdling scream rose, but nothing audible escaped his lips. It continued climbing, moving higher and higher. It was reaching for his throat but taking its time.
And that's when he heard it: a low hiss, long and drawn out, quiet at first, building to a shrill screech.
"Peter," the thing called to him.
How did it know his name? He moved then, but not of his own accord. Something pressed his shoulder.
"Peter," the voice came again, and that's when his eyes snapped open.
He almost struck the face hovering in front of him, smiling.
"You fell asleep," his coworker said.
"What? I—oh, the tea."
The kettle was screaming at him. That had been the source of the hiss, not the monster in his dreams. He pulled the kettle off the fire and set it on the log that now served as a chair.
Jian took the chair next to him and unwrapped his tin foil breakfast: rice, beans, and a bit of scrambled eggs.
"I wish we could have real food," the man said, grabbing a fork from the Ziploc bag and taking a tentative bite. He winced. "Not this Styrofoam."
"That is real food," Peter Lin said, grabbing his own package of tin foil and unwrapping it. Someone had seen fit to include a bit of charred plantain. At first, Peter had despised the fruit, but he’d soon learned to love the burnt sugar on the outside and the sweetness on the inside. The flavors perfectly complemented the rest of Costa Rica’s native cuisine. "Mmm, mm. Dig in."
"You wouldn't know real food if it hit on you from a barstool,” Jian said, even though he was almost through with his eggs. “You know, you'd think they'd let my mother send us something." He muttered something in Mandarin. The language was forbidden in their new home, but there was no one else around to hear it. It was just the two of them on the early shift.
"I wouldn't attempt to ask," Peter said.
He liked Costa Rica. He liked the people. And he didn't hate the work. Sure, there was plenty of backbreaking labor, but the locals never complained, so why should he?
Today he was supervising in the fields. The workers were planting a new crop that he had invented. He had high hopes for a plentiful yield. Last season had fallen below his expectations, but his superiors had seemed pleased nonetheless, and that was good.
He forked a bit of rice, beans, and eggs, capping the mini feast with a nub of plantain. He popped the bit in his mouth and savored the taste. Yep, the locals had their food down here.
"You should speak more Spanish," he said in Spanish.
Jian looked at him, grinned, and spouted out all the Spanish expletives he'd learned in the previous months. He was new. It was his first season, and he was here to learn under Dr. Lin.
Peter's coworker paused to examine his meal. He carefully extracted a mosquito and held the thing up for personal inspection. Grimacing, he tossed it into the fire, where it met a quick death. "Why don't we live in one of the nice houses?"
"You'll get used to it," Peter said.
"Used to what? The mosquitoes or the heat?"
Peter chuckled. "You never get used to the mosquitoes. But the heat?" He shrugged.
"What does that mean?"
"What?"
"That shrug."
"The shrug is a shrug. Heat doesn’t bother me. And it shouldn't bother you either.”
The other man went back to poking around his foil. "So, what were you dreaming about?"
Peter froze for a moment, then ran his tongue around the inside of his mouth. "You don’t need to know."
Jian stared. "I didn't mean to offend you, Dr. Lin. I'm just—"
"I know," Peter said. "Don’t worry about it. It was nothing."
He was seized by the sudden urge to get back to his work. His other work, the thinking kind. He indulged in this fantasy often, pretending that a gifted biologist was all he was and nothing else, conducting imaginary interviews with newsmen following his Nobel Prize acceptance speech . . . One day.
But reality was the wall he eventually slammed into face-first. Peter could not escape who he was or where he'd been, or worse, what he was hiding.
What they would do to him if they only knew . . .
He shook off the thought and finished his breakfast. Now it was time for tea, the one Chinese tradition they’d been allowed to keep since coming to Costa Rica. Before he'd gotten used to the food, he'd made a habit of waiting until the end of the meal before pouring the tea, treating it like a reward. But eventually, routine had won over his strategic comforts. Now, when the tea was ready, he enjoyed it right away.
As he drank, he thought about what the future held. He needed to keep up his strength in every way imaginable. So, he would have to hydrate more. And he would have to eat more. And he would have to sleep more, even if that meant taking the sleep medication. He knew the clinic would prescribe it with no questions asked. It wouldn't do well for his work if he were to become lazy or misplace even one of the many details in his head.
Because for a man spying against the Chinese government, the details were what mattered.
CHAPTER TWO
ARMANDO
He had often prayed for the day that the men with the strange accents would stop coming.
They smiled and nodded like normal men. They spoke Spanish as best they could. They even brought treats for him and gifts for the village elder. But Armando knew that they frightened his mother. And on the nights they visited, he would ask if he could stick around. Maybe one night she'd allow him. But it was always the same routine: a stern yet loving look and a command to go out and play until she called him back in.
And then she'd go about setting the kitchen table, putting out an assortment of precious, though mismatched, glassware. Armando was never allowed to touch them. He had his own cracked earthenware mug to drink from and he was to be thankful for it. But here these foreigners were, allowed to get their mitts all over the good stuff. Once, he'd had the nerve to complain, which had earned him a stern hush and a guilt trip. Did he know other children had nothing?
She always acted grateful for the company, but she couldn't fool him. Not since the night when he’d thought La Cegua was braying outside his window. He’d crawled on all fours into her bedroom, not making a sound. She'd have been furious with him if he’d climbed into bed next to her, so he’d done the next best thing and curled up on the floor, hoping to be comforted by the rhythm of maternal breath.
"Lord," she’d whispered, "dear Father in heaven, please make the Chinese go away. Shield my son from their deeds, oh Lord. My God, my dear Father, never let him know what I have done."
Most of the time, Armando was on his own when he wasn't being educated twice a week at the local school. He enjoyed school, and he enjoyed learning, and most of all, he enjoyed the free food.
Even though there was no male breadwinner in the family—he'd never met his father—Armando didn't see him and his mother as being poor. Everyone he knew was like them, except for the fact that some might not have had a single mug to their name, according to his mother.
But these strangers, these Chinese, dressed differently, and they smelled like flowers and spice. And the gold chain around the village elder's neck was a constant reminder of their wealth. Maybe one day, Armando would be an elder and have a gold chain of his own.
"Go to Irma's house," his mother ordered as she ushered the two Chinese men inside.
He was about to protest, but he saw the command in his mother's eyes.
Or was it fear?
"Yes, Mama," he said, even though the last thing he wanted was to spend a night with Irma.
The old bat was nasty and liked to hit him with a wooden spoon for the least offense. It was said that Irma had once had her own children. They'd either gone off to live somewhere else or died. Armando often suspected they’d been murdered. Death by wooden spoon. Whatever the case, they’d left behind a cruel woman who liked to take her anger out on the village children. Armando didn't know why his mother was sending him to her.
He pretended to walk away, then stopped out of maternal sight and considered his options, thinking maybe he would go down to play in the dried-up fountain in the center of the village. But it was going to be dark soon. And if los duendes—the tiny wandering goblins who preyed on children—were out and about, he'd fare better by lingering close to home.
He settled into a little nook next to a palm tree and let his imagination run its course. He closed his eyes, and suddenly he was straddled on a dolphin, complete with reins and a saddle. He rode the thing, clutching tightly as it breached the surface and went under again, breached and went under, until at last he reached a magnificent ship. He hopped off the dolphin's back and scrabbled up the high mast like a chimp, and when he was finally at the top, he screamed at the top of his lungs just to hear his voice. Then he stepped off the mast and sprouted wings. Down he went in a peaceful, spiraling glide.
All this he did in silence, smiling at the fantasy. When he opened his eyes, evening had arrived.
He blinked two times. There was an inky darkness near his home. Darker than the night; darker than the moon and the stars overhead would allow.
Armando watched in wonder and horror as the darkness, deep and impenetrable, spread up the path toward the house. He heard laughter from inside his home, the clanking of glasses, but there were no windows, so he could not see inside. The wooden door that creaked in the morning was shut and only a couple rays of light poked through. The darkness touched the house and wrapped itself around, enveloping away the light. Soon the entire house was covered.
Armando was frozen to the spot. He knew what this was. He'd heard the legends from the elder himself. He began a prayer.
The first scream made him jump. It was a screech of death. It made him pray faster. He wanted to shut his eyes to the impenetrable darkness but could not resist gazing into it.
A hand emerged. Then a face, and then a foot. It was one of the Chinese strangers who’d come to visit his mother. The man was screaming, his face twisted in fear. He struggled against the darkness, gasping for air amidst his sobbing screams. A second hand, this one blacker than the night, reached from the shadows. It gripped the stranger by the throat and pulled him into the darkness. But it was no hand. It was the mist itself that had reached out and grabbed him. Then the screaming was over and there was only silence. The darkness drifted away.
Armando finished his prayer, even though he didn't really know what he had prayed about. He crept back to the house, expecting to see ruin in the wake of the darkness, but all appeared normal outside.
"Mama?"
There was no answer. Maybe his prayers hadn't worked. He opened the door cautiously and peeked inside. It was then that he saw the blood. And in addition, the overturned table, the broken glasses . . .
"Mama?" he said again, his voice squeaky with trepidation.
His mother appeared then, a broom in hand. "Come, help me clean up. Come on. Don't lag."
"But Mama, the men."
She fixed him with a gaze that he could not break. "You will speak nothing of them ever. Do you understand?"
He nodded without understanding why he was nodding. She'd never spoken to him this way. He helped her right the table and sweep up the shards of her precious glassware. Strange how calm and steady she was, not the least bit upset over the glass. This calmness was something he could hardly remember ever seeing in her. She'd always been so jumpy.
"Mama, are you okay?"
She took him by the hands and looked into his eyes. "Armando, I want you to remember this. Prayers do work. Our Lord and Savior is listening. He sent the black mist to save us."
Then she reached into the waistband of her skirt and pulled out something he'd never seen before: a stack of money so thick that it made Armando's eyes bulge.
"Shhh," his mother said. "Go to your room and pack your things. You're going to meet my sister soon."
"Your sister?"
She smiled. "That's right, you have an aunt."
When was the last time she had smiled? He couldn't remember. It was both painful and lovely to look at.
"Go pack your things," she said. "We leave before dawn."
She was true to her word. They left the next morning.
And the black mist moved on to answer another woman's prayers.
CHAPTER THREE
DR. PETER LIN
He sipped his ice water as he sat in the corner booth watching the tourists enjoy themselves. Rounds of spiked, sugary drinks were raised in the air. Someone turned up the music, a weird techno-reggae hybrid that he didn't recognize. At least no one was looking at him. He was dressed like a tourist, sporting a loose, button-down shirt; shorts; and a pair of well-worn flip-flops.
He'd already been seated for thirty minutes when the man he was waiting for arrived. The tardiness did not enthuse Dr. Peter Lin.
"Hey, what do you say, Doc?" The American spread his arms wide and came in for a hug.
Peter suppressed a grimace, having detected a morning full of alcohol in the hug.
"Come on," Prescott said, "let’s get us a coupla brew dogs."
Peter nodded and sat back down.
