Authors: William Bernhardt
What is happening?
she wondered. She felt the radiant heat of the explosion warming her, and for the first time became frightened. What was she doing out here all alone, separated from police, doctors, any semblance of civilization?
Up on the tree cutter, she heard the man scream. He was still alive! She looked up, and her eyes widened with horror. He was burning, flames radiating from every part of his body. He stumbled away from what remained of the tree cutter and began running in circles, as if desperately searching for something, anything to take him out of his misery.
And then all at once his howling stopped. The burning man stood still for a final moment, then crumbled to the ground. The human being was gone, replaced by a heap of charred flesh.
Tess pulled herself out of the mud, trembling. What happened? she asked herself. What have I stumbled onto? And—as her reporter persona reasserted itself—why the hell aren’t I taking pictures?
Idiot. She pulled the Nikon .35 millimeter out of her camera bag, turned it on, and peered through the viewfinder. It was much too dark. She knew the pictures wouldn’t come out, even with the flash.
She also had a palm-size Sony camcorder in her bag. She remembered that when she had checked it out, Chuck, the guy in Property, had explained that it had a twenty lux rating—meaning it could take decent pictures in candlelight.
Maybe it could do some good here, she reasoned. She yanked it out of her bag and started recording. The tree cutter was still burning, like a fiery funeral pyre. She videoed the destruction, then panned over to tape what was left of the burning man.
She almost had the corpse in her viewfinder when she saw Sasquatch reappear. He was moving forward, making a beeline in her direction.
He’d seen her.
Tess turned and ran. She avoided the slope and moved in the other direction, barreling past the burning metal and heading toward the safety of the woods on the other side of the clearing. If she could just make it to the woods, there was a chance she might be able to lose him. Might make it back to civilization to file her story.
She couldn’t be sure of much, but one fact was abundantly clear. Hairy Neanderthal evolutionary throwbacks didn’t pack pistols. Plus, when he had run at her, Tess had seen a face illuminated by the light of the flames. The mask was clenched in his hand. The conclusion was inescapable—Sasquatch was a human being.
A human being she’d just seen kill someone.
The heel of her shoe dug into the soft loam of the earth. Her ankle twisted and she fell crashing to the ground.
No!
she told herself. You may not give up that easily! She pushed herself back to her feet, leaving a shoe behind. She didn’t dare turn her head and look, but she could hear him behind her, hear him running, panting, grunting.
She had to keep moving, had to keep pushing herself. The other edge of the clearing was still hundreds of feet away. She had to make it.
She had to.
She could not give up.
All at once, she realized she didn’t care about getting a story anymore. She didn’t care about her clothes, she didn’t care about her hair, and she didn’t care whether she ever worked again at the
National Whisper.
She just wanted to live.
And she felt absolutely certain that if Sasquatch got his hairy paws on her, she wouldn’t.
B
EN KINCAID DRUMMED HIS FINGERS
on the card table set up inside the Magic Valley Mystery Bookstore. When he arrived, the table had held twenty copies of his first book,
Katching the Kindergarten Killer
. And now, an hour and a half after the book-signing began, the table still held twenty copies of
Katching the Kindergarten Killer
.
The owner of the bookstore, Fred Franklin, sauntered over to Ben’s table. He was stroking his pet, a large black and white tuxedo cat. “Slow day for autographs, huh?”
“I don’t seem to be getting much traffic,” Ben admitted. “Maybe if you put me in the back next to the café.”
“Nice try. We don’t have a café.”
“You call yourself a bookstore and you don’t even have a café?”
Fred smiled. “What can I say? Magic Valley isn’t really in the mainstream.” He picked up one of Ben’s books. “So I gather this is nonfiction? True crime?”
“Right.”
He skimmed the summary on the dust jacket. “Mmm. Serial killer. Cut the heads and hands off his corpses. Pretty grisly stuff. Why’d you want to write about this?”
“I wrote about it because I lived it.”
“You mean this really happened? Like, to you?”
“That’s why I wrote it. I thought people might be interested in reading a firsthand account.” He glanced at the unmoving door. “Guess I was wrong.”
“Don’t jump to any conclusions. It’s early yet. Wait till people start getting off work. Folks aren’t too used to book signings here in Magic Valley. I’ve been trying to get those publishers to send me an author for over a year, since I opened. And you’re the first one I’ve gotten.”
Lucky me, Ben thought. “It’s been the same story every place I’ve gone. This is my eighth signing in six days. And every one of them has been dismal.”
“Hey, at least your publisher is touring you. Most first-time authors don’t get that.” He stroked his cat, who responded by curling up against Fred’s neck and pressing her wet nose against his cheek. “You should consider yourself lucky.”
“If you say so.”
“And it’s gotta be better than practicing law, right? Every lawyer I know wishes he was doing something else.”
Ben decided not to comment. “Nice cat you’ve got there. Think he’d like an autographed book?”
Fred laughed. “Margery isn’t really the literary type. She’s more the feed-me-stroke-me-get-out-of-my-way type.”
“Sounds like my cat, Giselle.”
“You an animal lover?”
“Well, the cat was a present from a friend. But yeah, actually, I am.”
Fred looked up abruptly. “Oh, look, someone’s coming in. Let me get out of the way.” Fred skittered toward the back of the bookstore, cat in tow.
The woman who approached Ben’s table was, in a word, bizarre. She was dressed in a helter-skelter, crazy-quilt fashion—wild bright colors, mismatched layers of clothing. Her steel-blond hair was just as wild; it jabbed out in straight lines like she’d just been electrocuted. She was inhumanly thin, almost skeletal—like something out of a grim Grimm fairy tale.
“Are you the author?” she asked.
“I am,” Ben said, holding out his hand.
“Are you sure? You seem so young.”
“Everyone says that.”
“Except for the bald spot on the back of your head, of course.”
“Of course.” He picked up one of the books on the table. “Can I interest you in my new book?”
“Oh, I’ve already read it.”
Ben did a double take. “You have?”
She grinned. “Don’t act so surprised.”
“Well, it’s just—I’m not sure I’ve ever met anyone who’s actually read my book before. Other than a close personal friend.”
“Oh, I did. I read every word of it.” She gazed deeply into his eyes. “And the whole time I read it, I couldn’t help but think about you.”
Ben coughed. “About—about me?”
She reached out and brushed his shoulder. “You were so brave. Chasing after the maniac the way you did.”
“Well, I had to do something after that corpse turned up in my car. If I hadn’t, they probably would’ve sent
me
up the river.”
“And that horrible chase sixty feet up in the air—you must have nerves of steel.”
“Actually, I was scared to death.”
“It wasn’t just the story you told. It was the way you told it. It was—inspirational.” She took his hand and clasped it in both of hers. “I just wanted to hold the hand that penned all those magnificent words.”
Ben cleared his throat. “Well … that’s very kind.”
She did not release his hand. She inched closer to the table. “I felt such a magnetism when I read your book. I kept thinking, ‘This man must be someone very special.’ ”
“Oh, not really.”
“I kept thinking, ‘This is the man I want to spend the rest of my life with. This is the man I want to father my children.’ ”
Ben’s lips parted. “This is—you want—”
She sidled next to him at the table, her steel bristle hair tickling his cheek. “So, tell me, Ben. I
can
call you Ben, can’t I?”
“I suppose.”
“Is there someone special in your life?”
“Uh … yes. Yes, there is. Most definitely.”
Her face fell. “There is?”
“Yes. Several people, actually.”
“Several?”
“Well … yes. There’s my mother. And my sister.”
“Silly. I mean like a girlfriend.”
“I have some friends who are girls.”
“You know what I mean.”
“You want to know if I’m in a relationship?”
“I want to know if you’re having sex. Because if you’re not, have I got something special for you.”
Ben’s throat went dry. “I think perhaps you’ve made a mistake.”
She wrapped her arms around him. “Don’t fight it, Ben. This was meant to be.”
Ben’s face turned a bright crimson. “This was not—this is moving a bit too fast for me.”
“Life is short. Why wait?”
“I really couldn’t possibly—”
“When I read your book, I realized we had a connection, a bond that transcended the boundaries of time and space.”
Ben scooted out of his chair. “I’m not prepared …” He tried again. “I’m just here to sign books, you know?”
The woman appeared crestfallen. “Just to sign books?”
“I’m sorry, but—yeah.”
She pulled her copy out of her purse and dropped it on the table. “I guess some bonds are stronger than others.” She sighed. “Perhaps in our next lifetimes.”
Ben opened the front of her book, relieved. “Who should I make this out to?”
“Marjorie.”
He began to write. “ ‘To Marjorie—’ ”
“ ‘To Marjorie, whom I have always loved—’ ”
Ben paused. “ ‘To Marjorie, whom I have always loved’?”
“ ‘… in memory of that special night we shared, flesh to flesh, huddled close beneath the moonlight. I shall never forget you.’ ”
Ben applied his fountain pen to the title page. Why fight it? “… I shall never forget you.” He signed the book and passed it back to its owner, then redirected his attention to a burly, bearded man making his way through the front door. He was carrying a jumbo-size banker’s box, which, judging from the difficulty he was having carrying it, must be filled to the brim.
“Are you the author?”
Ben extended his hand, but the man still held the immense box. “I’m the one.”
“Are you sure? You seem so young.”
Ben sighed. “I have a very old portrait in my attic. Can I autograph a book for you?”
“Nah. I don’t have time to read. I’m a writer.”
“Ah. What have you written?”
“I’m glad you asked.” The man dropped the weighty box on the end of Ben’s table with a thundering thud. “I know you’re probably very busy, but would you mind looking at my manuscript?”
“Your …”
“It’s twenty-four hundred pages of rough first draft, but I know a competent editor could turn it into a masterpiece. So whaddaya say?”
The owner of the store had been right; after the sun set, traffic in the bookstore picked up. Ben had the pleasure of fielding a wide variety of comments and remarks:
“So, do you think you might ever write a serious book?”
“What’s next, the Great American Novel?”
“My six-year-old here is also a writer.”
“I’ve got a great idea for a book, but I’m just too damn busy to sit around typing all day long. Tell you what. I’ll give you my idea, you do the writing, and we’ll split the profits fifty-fifty.”
“So, is this fiction? Or is it a novel?”
“I’m sorry, your name doesn’t ring a bell. Have you done anything I should know about?”
“I don’t mean to pry, but how much do you writers make? You don’t have to give me any details. Just in round numbers. Six digits? Or seven?”
“Where do you get your ideas?”
Ben leaned back in his chair and smiled. “Cleveland.”
When closing time finally rolled around, Fred reappeared, cat still in his arms. “Well, Mr. Kincaid, I want to thank you for coming out tonight to sign.”
“It was my, um, pleasure.”
“I’m going to give Margery here a can of Feline’s Fancy. That’s her favorite, you know.”
Ben tickled the cat. “What a sweetie. Mind if I hold her?”
“Of course not.” Fred transferred possession of the tabby to Ben’s arms.
Ben stroked the cat’s neck and back. She squirmed and rolled under his touch, loving every minute of it, purring loudly. “What a nice cat.”
Fred grinned. “Actually, she’s a monster.”
“Excuse me?”
“She’s horrible. I can’t sit still for a moment but that she starts rubbing her wet slimy nose all over me.”
“That’s what cats do.”
“She gets cat hair all over the store.”
“It’s shedding season.”
“She’s always whining for attention or food or to be let in or out. Just drives me crazy.”
Ben held the cat tightly in his hands. “I’m surprised you ever took her into your home.”
“She was a gift from a friend. At least I thought she was a friend. And she’s never been in my home. She stays at the store.”
“Even at night? When no one’s here?”
“I’ve tried to get friends to take her on, but no one’s that stupid. Pound won’t have her. Frankly, I’m out of ideas.”
Ben held the cat close to his chest. “Well, in time, I’m sure the two of you will grow close and—”
“So tomorrow I’m taking her to the vet for the Big Needle.”
Ben’s muscles clenched up. “For
what
?”
“I’m having her put to sleep.”
“But she’s still young. She’s in perfectly good health.”
“She’s driving me insane.”
“Let me try to find someone!”
“I’ve been down that road before, and I know she’ll be back in my lap again by lunch time.”
“But you can’t just kill her!”
Fred put a hand on his hip. “Hey, back off, chump. She’s my cat and I can do anything I damn well please with her. Including putting her to sleep.”