Ravenous (36 page)

“Do me a favor and just go, okay?” Hurley said to Shana Myers.

She smiled and said, “Sorry, Sheriff, but I am doing my
job
, after all.”

They stood in front of the double-parked news van, in the glow of its headlights, surrounded by pools of pulsing red and blue light. Deputies were about to finish putting yellow crime scene tape around the front yard and the house. A moment earlier, it had begun to sprinkle a little, and the drops glimmered in the van's headlights like tiny gems. Shana's cameraman stood in the van's open driver's side door, getting his equipment together.

“I realize that,” Hurley said. “But at the moment, there's simply nothing to report.”

She tossed her head back and laughed. “Sheriff, it looks like nearly every deputy you
have
is out here tonight. With all these deputies running around, how can there be nothing to
report
? Also, there've been reports of police activity and gunfire on this street. Is all this for just one wild animal?”

He did not respond, just turned his head and looked into the throbbing blue-and-red glow all around them.

“Is there more than one?” she said. “Just what
kind
of wild animal gets this sort of attention, Sheriff?”

Hurley sighed, then opened his mouth to reply, but he stopped when he saw George Purdy's van pull up and double-park in front of the house beside a cruiser. He turned to Shana again and said, “Look, stick around if you want, but I can't let you anywhere near that house, and I have no comment for now.”

“But how can you—”

“I
told
you, I have nothing to say. I'll talk to you when I have something more to offer.”

As he walked away, the van from Channel 7 drove up.

“Damn,” Hurley muttered.

George killed the engine and lights, then he and his young male assistant got out. George came around the front of the van to meet Hurley while the assistant hung back and waited.

“What've you got?” George said as they stood close, his voice low.

“A couple more just like Emily Crane,” Hurley said. “Same condition. A reaction to silver.”

“You mean, silver
bullets
.”

“Of course. One's in the house, the other's out in the woods across the street, on the other side of those houses. Go in the house first, cover that thing up, and get it out of here as soon as you can. Whatever you do, don't let these reporters get near it, understand? Don't even let them
see
it. Once you've got that one under wraps, you can take care of the one in the woods.”

“Gotcha.”

“C'mon,” Hurley said as he went to the tape cordon and lifted it up. He and George ducked under it and headed across the yard.

“Sheriff!” called Mike Wills from Channel 7. “Could I have a word with you?”

Hurley did not even turn around. He turned his head slightly and called over his shoulder, “No comment right now.”

“You know what you're going to tell them yet?” George asked as they went up the porch steps.

Hurley laughed. “Are you kidding? I don't have any damned idea.”

 

* * * *

 

The smell of Ella Hurley's meatloaf cooking in the oven filled the house. It was a warm smell, rich with seasonings. Farrell loved her meatloaf. The recipe had been passed down from her grandmother to her mother, and then to her, and Ella had given it to her daughter. Along with its particular blend of seasonings, it included chili sauce instead of the usual ketchup, sliced mushrooms, and a spear of dill pickle buried in the center of the loaf.

Outside, it began to rain hard enough for Ella to hear the sound of the rainfall. It was a constant soft whisper that surrounded the house. She stood at the stove in a creamy cashmere sweater and colorful, flower-print broomstick skirt.

It was twenty-four minutes after seven. Broccoli steamed and rice pilaf cooked on the stove. Ella did not even know if Farrell would be coming home in time for dinner. Even so, she'd decided to go ahead and cook. As good as it was fresh out of the oven, the meatloaf was even better later on cold sandwiches, and that was Farrell's favorite way to eat it. She would cook the meatloaf, have some for herself with the broccoli and rice pilaf. Then she would put it away in the refrigerator—he could have a sandwich when he got home, however late that might be.

As she took the broccoli off the burner, glass shattered somewhere in the house. Ella froze, her eyes suddenly wide.

Something thumped loudly in the house and Ella gasped. The breaking glass had been one thing—a branch or a thrown rock could've hit a window, or perhaps someone outside the house had broken something—but the thumping was
inside
the house.

Someone had come in.

Ella turned around and crossed the kitchen, went through the doorway to the hall, then stopped and listened.

Another sound, this one indistinguishable, so quiet and nearly inaudible that it made Ella wonder if she had heard it at all. But if she
had
—if there really
had
been a sound just then—it was unmistakably the sound of movement.

She headed down the hall toward the front of the house. As she passed the closed door of the downstairs bedroom, she heard what she thought was the floor creaking on the other side. She stumbled to a stop and jerked her head around to look at the closed bedroom door, lips parted, brow creased in a frown. Her right elbow was bent, her hand frozen at the level of her throat.

A heavy silence stretched out, interrupted only by the sound of the falling rain outside.

Ella was not quite sure what to do. If someone was in the bedroom, should she go to the phone and call Farrell, or should she simply get out of the house immediately? Then again, what if she the sounds she'd heard were not inside at all and she had merely allowed her imagination to run rampant? She would be mortified if she ran out of her house in a panic for nothing.

She stood there unmoving for what seemed a long time. After a good length of silence, with no sound at all, the tension began to ease out of her. She started to turn around to go back to the kitchen, started to think to herself that it had been her imagination after all, when the bedroom door was jerked open. Framed in the dark doorway was a hulking, silver-eyed beast.

A horrible animal growl filled the world. Ella did a couple of things at once. She screamed, but beneath the horrible growl, she could not hear her own voice. At the same time, she jolted her body back around and broke into a run for the front of the house.

Something clamped onto her hair and jerked her backward.

Ella screamed, but she did not panic. She threw herself forward with every ounce of strength she had.

Her scalp burned as hair was ripped out of her head by the roots. She gulped the pain down like acid reflux and kept running, until she got to the stairs. She spun to her right and took the staircase two steps at a time.

At no point did she look back, but she could hear the person—no, it was a
thing
—behind her in pursuit. It breathed heavily and made a moist, grumbling sound as it came after her. She picked up the smell of the creature—a heavy animal smell, gamey and musky—and somehow, that stirred more terror in her than anything else.

At the top of the stairs, Ella's toe hit the edge of the landing and she stumbled forward, almost fell, but waved her arms at her sides as she kept plunging forward, regained her balance, and did not stop.

The bathroom came first, to her right. She almost ducked in there, closed the door, and locked it, but a thought stopped her:

Telephone!

She had to call Farrell. He would either come himself, or send someone else immediately. The only phone upstairs was beyond the closed door of the master bedroom.

At the end of the hall.

 

* * * *

 

Jason reached the edge of the woods. He was fully transformed, lost in his animal self, following his laser-like senses of smell and hearing. The heavy darkness of the woods gently gave way to the soft glow that came from the windows of houses along the street.

The sound of rain falling pattered all around him, but Jason pushed that aside to listen for other smaller sounds. He could smell the group of people gathered around the Norton house some time before he could see them. Jason hunkered down low, and as he hurried through a back yard and along the side of a house, he instinctively broke down the smells to those of individuals in the group, one person at a time.

Jason stood at the corner of the house, pressed against the wall and concealed in darkness. Droplets of water clung to his fur, but he barely noticed the rainfall. His shiny black nose twitched as he frantically sniffed at the buffet of people in the street and on the sidewalks and in the yard of the Norton house.

His interest, however, was in one person alone.

Jason's eyes passed over all the activity in the street and in and around the yard of the Norton house, looking for Sheriff Farrell Hurley.

There. Standing on the sidewalk talking to three deputies. He seemed tense and preoccupied as he gestured with his arms, animated but at the same time a bit stiff.

Jason continued to sniff until he found Hurley's scent. He isolated it from the ocean of other smells, and locked onto it.

Andrea's face rose up behind Jason's glaring eyes. Something in his chest twisted until it ached and made his throat constrict. He flinched and pushed the pain away, made Andrea's face disappear. He turned his attention back to the sidewalk across the street and focused again on Sheriff Hurley.

Jason's thin black lips twitched, then pulled back slowly to reveal his glimmering fangs in what was almost a savage smile. The quiet rumble in his chest was like two rocks being ground together.

He had found his prey.

 

* * * *

 

Ella grabbed the doorknob and flung herself against the door as she turned it. In one smooth movement, she threw herself into the bedroom, slammed the door shut behind her, then spun around and locked it a fraction of a second before the creature slammed into it on the other side.

She was torn—should she push Farrell's dresser in front of the door or go to the phone first? She decided on the phone.

Ella ran to the nightstand on her side of the bed.

The thing slammed against the door again and again.

She took the phone from its base, turned it on, and hit the memory button for Farrell's cell phone. She put the phone to her ear and waited to hear the line at the other end purr.

The bedroom shuddered each time the creature in the hall slammed against the door.

Ella thought she heard the wooden door begin to crack.

 

* * * *

 

Hurley found himself standing in the rain on the sidewalk, alone for a moment, and he took the chance to close his eyes. He took a deep breath, let it out slowly. He was surprised there had been no more calls since the one that had brought them here to this house. He expected more—he
knew
they were coming—and, of course, just because there hadn't been another call yet did not mean there weren't people out there getting hurt and killed. Raped. Eaten.

George and his assistant came out of the house carrying the covered body on a stretcher. They put the body in the van, then George approached Hurley.

“Where in the woods?” he George said.

“I'll have someone show you,” Hurley said. Pointing across the street, he said, “It's beyond those houses, just a little—”

In his pocket, he felt his cell phone vibrate at the same that it chirped.

Hurley cocked his head and took a moment to frown, although he had no idea why. Then he took the phone from his pocket and opened it.

 

* * * *

 

Jason hunkered in the rain beside the house, watching, listening, smelling.

A high, mechanical, bird-like chirp cut through the night. Jason's pointed ears twitched and turned toward the sound—across the street. He watched as Hurley reached into his pocket, then put his right hand to his ear.

Jason waited.

A moment later, Hurley tensed up, bent forward slightly, and shouted something. He shouted a word again and again—

“Ella? Ella?
Ella
!”

—as he began to walk in a small circle.

Others turned toward him when they heard him shout.

Hurley took his hand away from his ear, returned it to his pocket. He turned to some of his deputies and barked orders, gesturing with his hand as he started toward his SUV at the curb.

Jason tensed, prepared to move.

Four deputies ran to two cruisers along with Hurley, who got into the SUV, slammed the door, and started the engine. The cruisers roared to life.

Still hunkered down, Jason moved away from the house, across the yard, and down to the sidewalk.

As Hurley and the cruisers pulled away from the curb, sirens wailing to life, Jason broke into a run. Forgetting the two cruisers, Jason focused entirely on Hurley's vehicle. Staying off to the side of the road in the dark, avoiding the glow of streetlights, Jason broke into a full run as he pursued the SUV. He moved with a speed and ease he'd never known before, blending in with the night.

The rain pebbled him, and the cold night air rushed over his face as he ran. Along with the hunger he hoped to satisfy soon, Jason felt exhilaration.

 

 

 

43

 

Jason and Hurley

 

 

The SUV came to a shrieking stop in front of Hurley's house. He shifted into park, killed the engine and siren, and jerked the key from the ignition before throwing the door open and lunging out.

Ella had been unable to say anything on the phone—she'd simply screamed his name again and again. In the background, Hurley heard a sound that had chilled his blood and made his intestines feel loose: Growling.