Graverobbers Wanted (No Experience Necessary) (29 page)

   I tried to remember what I'd heard from the game. I stood there, concentrating, trying to recall any piece of conversation that indicated who might play a hunter.

   A flash of dialogue ran through my mind.

   "...I'll add his head to my trophy case..."

   "It's Farley!" I exclaimed. "The mighty hunter is Farley! He has my kids!"

   I turned and started to bolt for the door. "Hold on, wait a second!" said Dominick. "Should we call the police?"

   "No police! That's the recurring theme of Farley's threats! I have to go after him myself!"

   "Okay, we don't need to involve the cops, but I'll come with you!"

   "You're not going anywhere!" Linda protested. "The guy is insane, can't you tell?"

   Dominick shook his head. "There's always been something about Farley
thatcreeped
me out. I have no problem at all believing that he's a kidnapper."

   "And a murderer," I said. "He buried Michael alive and chopped up Jennifer."

   "Jennifer's dead?" Dominick took a few seconds to digest that information then continued. "Okay, if what you say about Farley is true, then you can't just confront him with a kitchen knife. But you may also be completely wrong, so I'm not sending you after him without supervision. I mean, you could've really hurt Linda and she had nothing to do with this."

   "I don't need supervision," I said.

   "I think you do. And if you take me along, I can arm you to the teeth. I've got an incredible collection of weapons in the other room, not all of them legal, if you get my drift."

   "Well then, why don't you tag along?" I suggested.

   "Good idea. Let's go
getsomestuff
."

Chapter 22

    THERE WERE no cars in the driveway as we pulled up alongside Farley's home. It was a fairly nice place, if a bit small. Personally, I would've figured Farley to be the kind of guy who still lived with his parents.

   The three of us got out of Helen's car. I'd told them the whole story on the way, to make sure they understood just how dangerous things could be. Linda had refused to let Dominick go without her, and all three of us were wielding crossbows. I also had a belt from which dangled two vicious-looking knives, and a quiver containing a combination of about twenty arrows and bolts, everything from one with an explosive tip to a razor-lined one that I was supposed to handle very, very carefully.

   After we each placed a bolt into our crossbows and pulled them back, locked into place and ready to fire, we walked up to the front door and I knocked. "Farley, it's me," I called out.

   No answer.

   "I know that you're the mighty hunter," I said. "Open the door and let's talk."

   Still
nothing.I
tested the doorknob and found it unlocked. "You guys ready?" I asked.

   Dominick nodded. Linda shook her head.

   I turned the knob and pushed the door open. "Come on out, Farley!" I shouted into the darkness. I reached inside and flipped on the light switch. The living room looked a lot like the Ghoulish Delights office—a shrine to horror movies. The walls were covered with posters, and all sorts of masks, models, creatures, and other assorted morbid props were carefully placed for maximum gruesome impact.

   More interesting were the six or seven cables that stretched across the room just inches below the ceiling, one end of each fastened to the wall at our right, the other end disappearing into a hallway.

   "Theresa?" I called out. "Kyle? Can you hear me?"

   No response, not that I expected one.

   Then I saw Boo-Boo. The skull was at the far end of the room, resting on top of a television set, an envelope in his mouth.

   "I need to get that envelope," I said, pointing. "You two stay put. Cover me."

   Dominick and Linda raised their crossbows in a position to best shoot any assailant. I moved my own slowly, from side to side, and then began to move forward. The first cable was only a couple of feet away.

   Three steps later there was a loud squeaking sound, and then suddenly a corpse burst out of the hallway, hanging from a pulley attached to the cable. At least a dozen blades protruded from the body, and I barely jumped back in time to avoid being
sliced.The
corpse slammed against the wall and dangled there, bouncing and swaying like a flesh-and-blood puppet.

   It was a man, and he'd been completely dismembered. The pieces were now held together with wire, with inch-long gaps in between each chunk. Except for the
head
,which
hung a good six inches above the rest of the body.

   I turned around. Dominick and Linda both looked ready to keel over, but neither of them screamed.

   "I won't be offended if you want to wait in the car."

   "Just get the fucking envelope!" Dominick snapped.

   From this angle, I still couldn't see into the hallway. The toes of the corpse dangled about a foot above the floor, so it would be too dangerous to try to crawl over to the envelope if another body shot out. I took another step forward, then another, and then leapt back as I heard a second series of squeaks.

   Another corpse burst out of the hallway. This time dodging was unnecessary, because the wire snapped and the body dropped in a heap on the floor. Only the head, adorned with several fishhooks, slammed against the wall.

   Okay, I was wasting time. I braced myself, and then ran at top speed across the room. Out of the corner of my eye I saw four corpses shoot out of the hallway, one after the other. I reached Boo-Boo and snatched the envelope out of his mouth as the corpses bashed into the wall.

   I looked at them. All had various weapons protruding from them, from a long spear to a non-running chainsaw. Two of the corpses hadn't been reconstructed properly, their body parts switched around in some appalling mix-and-match game.

   "Welcome to the mind of Farley," I said. Dominick and Linda had nothing to say to that.

   I opened the envelope, which was labeled "For Andrew" and read the note inside.

   "Congratulations, Andrew! You've done great! Okay, I can't say that for sure—it may have taken you too long to find this, and I may have slaughtered your kiddies out of boredom. But for now let's pretend I haven't. It's time for the moment you've been waiting
for.The
final
showdown.The
big explanation. Fun, fun, fun for the whole family! Can you handle this much excitement??? Follow the enclosed map and see what happens! As
usual
,do
it alone or I'll kill your
kids,yaddayaddayadda
. This time I mean it.
Your
verybestest
friend in the whole wide world, Farley."

   So really, Farley set things up so that I hadn't ever needed to solve that Morse-code-condom riddle. I could've just broken one of his precious rules and showed up at his house early. What a dickhead.

   "What does it say?" asked Dominick.

   I looked at the hand-drawn map. It was directions to a cabin, located not too far from the park where I'd dug up Michael in the first place.
Probably the cabin where I'd been tied up and listened to
Jennifermeet
her demise.

   "It tells where he is," I told him. "And I have to go alone."

   "I'm sorry to hear that," said Linda, not removing her gaze from the corpses.

   "
Watchyourselves
,
" I said. "I'm heading back."

   I ran across the room, expecting more corpses to come flying at me, but apparently they'd all been used in the first round. We left the house, closing the door behind us to keep any nosy neighbors from peeking inside. I really didn't need anyone else dropping dead of a heart attack this week.

   "Is there anything else I can do?" asked Dominick.

   I considered saying, "You can pray." But that seemed a little too melodramatic. So I said something that was more in tune with my personality.

   "Sure, you
canreshingle
my roof while I'm off saving my kids. I've got Popsicles in the freezer for when you take a break."

   Dominick didn't smile. "Seriously, I hope things work out for you."

   "So
doI
."

        FARLEY MAY have been an annoying psychopathic little geek, but he did know how to draw a map. This meant less time that I had to drive around lost, and thus less time for me to envision Theresa and Kyle hanging from a cable, their heads switched around and not quite connected with their necks.

   About six miles after driving
pastFleetPark
,
I reached the unnamed road marked on the map. It took another three miles before I reached the windowless cabin, which looked barely able to sustain its own weight. Firewood was stacked by the door, and a white Chevrolet was parked in the driveway. A bumper sticker read "Grandma
WentTo
Hell
And
All I Got Was This Lousy Bumper Sticker."

   I parked Helen's car, got out, adjusted the quiver on my back, and slowly approached the door.

   "Come on in!" Farley called from inside.

   I pulled the door open.

   "Before you try anything, make sure you take a good look at the setup here," he warned.

   I stepped inside the cabin, crossbow ready to fire. Farley stood near the far wall, about twenty feet away. Theresa and Kyle stood next to him, one on each side, their faces tearstained. I was overjoyed to see that they were still alive, but that joy vanished as I realized just how bad the situation really was.

   Farley held a brick in each hand with a wire wrapped around it. The wires stretched up to the ceiling, looped around a pair of hooks, then continued down to form something like necklaces for Theresa and Kyle. Necklaces lined with dozens upon dozens of razor blades.

   "See what we've got here?" asked Farley, lowering one of the bricks slightly. Theresa's necklace tightened just a bit and she let out a soft whimper. "I drop these bricks, and your kids get shredded throats. So I'd say it's in your best interest not to make me drop the bricks. You can go ahead and shoot me if you'd like, but things will turn out very messy."

   I set the crossbow down on the floor. "I won't do anything," I said.

   "Good boy." Farley looked at Kyle and grinned. "Your daddy likes you. You should feel happy."

   Kyle, frozen with terror, didn't say anything.

   "I hope you were a smart guy, Andrew," said Farley. "If you brought any cops or other friends and I see them, these bricks
aregonna
fall. If you hired a sniper or something, you may want to call him off before he gets an itchy trigger finger."

   "I'm alone," I said.

   "Good. So we can talk. Care for a seat? Your kids and I can't sit down for obvious reasons, but that's no reason why you shouldn't be comfortable."

   "I'll stand."

   "Suit yourself. So I guess the big question
is
,why
have I called you here? What's the meaning of all this nonsense with the riddles and the dismembered pieces of Jennifer in your friend's car and the charming videos and, oh, everything you've had to go through these past couple of days. Well, you're in luck. Here's where I explain everything."

   I noticed that Theresa's leg was starting to wobble. "She's not going to be able to stand like that much longer," I said. "Let my kids go. You can take all my weapons. I won't be able to try anything."

   Farley shook his head. "She'll
beokay
,
we just got into place a few minutes ago, after you set off the sensors. But I'm going to let you in on a cruel little secret. Your kids are history. Whatever happens, I'll eventually have to drop these bricks, and the razor blades will do what they do best.
It'sgonna
be
bloody, believe me. You can beg, you can plead, you can bribe, you can threaten, you can do whatever you want, but in the end the bricks are going to fall. So really, you might as well just pick up that crossbow and take me down right now. But you won't do that, because you're going to be searching for a way out of
this.Which
means I get to talk. "