“If I was going to eat you by myself, then yeah, you’d be my kill. But I think the rest of my family would like a piece of you. And besides, I don’t want to mess up my clothes.”
Smiling, Scug ran his hands over the tanned human hide he was wearing, as if smoothing out the wrinkles.
Adopting a ready stance, Javier studied his opponents. These were not the same as the others he’d seen. He could tell that immediately. They were malformed, yes, but they seemed more symmetrical, more balanced. More normal. One edged closer to him. It was sleek and muscular, with a broad jaw line and a wide mouth filled with teeth. The eyes were spaced too far apart and had no whites at all, but only the massive dark pupils.
“Sic him, boy,” Scug said. “And some of the rest of you get upstairs and help Noigel. Tell him I want her skin, so he’s not to fuck it up. It’s been a long night, and I’m getting tired.”
The thing with the dark eyes closed the gap. It did not growl as it came toward him. It roared, the sound of its voice blasting around the cellar as it charged. The rest of the creatures shouted in response.
Javier acted purely on instinct, and that simple reflex saved his life. He dropped back as the mutant attacked, and kicked the slavering thing in the stomach. It slammed into the wall and then shook off the blow, prepared to attack again. Before Javier could react, a second cannibal came for him. Sharp teeth ripped into his thigh, slicing through the heavy denim of his jeans and into the skin and muscle beneath with appalling ease. Javier jabbed his elbow down and struck the back of the monster’s head. It was like striking stone. His elbow thrummed from the impact.
A third creature attacked, even as the second gnawed his leg like a dog with a rawhide bone. Javier threw up his arm to block it, but thick fingernails cut into his forearm. The strike happened so fast that for a moment he thought it had missed. Then the deep gashes started to bleed. The pain followed a second later—hot and nauseating.
Javier dislodged the thing gnawing on his leg, bringing more agony as he did so. He backed up to give himself room and immediately realized his mistake. In stepping away from his attackers, he’d moved closer to the rest of the things.
They seized him as one. Powerful teeth clamped down on Javier’s shoulder. Claws lashed across his face, running lines of fire over his lips and nose, flaying his mouth open, cutting into his gums and fragmenting his teeth in one savage stroke. He managed to reach out with his fingers and return the favor, slashing across the deep set eyes of the beast. Javier bared his ruined teeth in a grimace as the fangs in his shoulder dug deeper, pressing together deep inside the meat of his arm and drawing a thick spray of blood. More teeth sank into his thigh, his waist, and his breast. Something cold and jagged and sharp pierced his buttocks. He tried to scream, but there was something wrong with his throat. Blood spilled into Javier’s eyes, blinding him. He shook his head from side to side in an effort to see.
His vision cleared in time to see a creature with a wide, hinged mouth lunge forward. He’d never seen so many teeth in a mouth before—multiple rows, all jagged and sharp. The thing snapped its massive jaws shut around his face. Javier jittered and thrashed as the mutant broke bones and pulped his jaw and forehead, carving a massive trench down the front of his skull.
He had time to think one last thought before he died.
Wait for me, Heather. I’m coming. I’m—
twenty-three
Leo and Perry reached the foyer and huddled together in front of the metal door, waiting for Dookie to return with help or for more of the house’s weird inhabitants to show up. Leo prayed for the former but was dreadfully certain it would be the latter. So when a door suddenly opened and a female figure stumbled out of the darkness, he leaped to his feet, ready to fight. Mr. Watkins sprang up beside him a second later, an unlit cigarette tumbling from his open mouth. Both men yelled in surprise and fright.
So did the girl.
They stared at each other. Leo frowned and blinked, trying to understand what he was seeing. She was dressed like one of the kids that had run away from him earlier in the evening, but she couldn’t be one of them. The girls in that group had all been white. This girl was red. Scarlet. She was covered in blood from head to toe. It matted her hair and crusted on her cheeks and stained her clothes, and although he could see some superficial wounds on her arms and face, Leo was fairly certain that most of the blood wasn’t hers. Leo shook his head slowly, and reached out a hand.
“Hey. Are you okay?”
The terrified girl jumped at the sound of his voice and shrank away from them, cowering against the wall. She whimpered, but did not speak.
“It’s okay,” Leo murmured. “We ain’t gonna hurt you. We’re stuck in here, just like you are.”
“Are you hurt?” Mr. Watkins asked her.
She stared at them, wide-eyed, but still refused to speak. Her chin trembled.
“Where are your friends?” Leo asked. “Them kids who ran in here with you? Are they okay? Do they need help?”
The girl flinched as if slapped. Then she opened her mouth and moaned. It was the most heartbreaking sound Leo had ever heard.
“Sssshhh,” he whispered. “Don’t do that, now. You’ll lead them right to us. We need to be quiet and shit.”
“Help is on the way,” Mr. Watkins explained. “Somebody went for help. They should be here any minute.”
As if in verification, they heard muffled voices from the other side of the door. It sounded like there was quite a large crowd outside. A moment later, Dookie yelled to them.
“Yo! Leo? Mr. Watkins? You alright?”
“Yeah,” Leo called as loudly as he dared. “We’re fine. Just get us the fuck out of here, dog. And hurry!”
“I got everybody out here. Angel and the crew and Mrs. Watkins and—”
“Dookie,” Mr. Watkins yelled, “I don’t care if you got all of Blackwater out there, along with a Navy SEAL team. Just get us the hell out of here. Now!”
“Get back from the door,” Dookie shouted. “Angel’s got a blowtorch!”
The men backed away. The girl hesitated, her eyes darting from them to the door and then back to them again. After a moment, she stepped toward them.
“That’s it,” Leo urged. “We ain’t gonna hurt you. What happened earlier was just a misunderstanding. It’s all gonna be okay now.”
Through the steel barrier came the hissing and spitting sound of the cutting torch. Within minutes, the smell of scorched metal filled the air. Then they heard something else. Footsteps.
From inside the house.
A lot of them, judging by the sound.
“Oh, shit,” Leo yelled. “Hurry up, y’all! We got company!”
“Quiet,” Mr. Watkins said. “They’ll hear you.”
“They’ll hear us anyway,” Leo countered. “You telling me they ain’t gonna hear the others outside or smell that blowtorch?”
“Coming in,” Dookie called. “Just hang on!”
There was a great commotion as the men outside on the porch grunted and jostled and shouted orders to one another. Then, slowly, the metal door was hauled away, revealing dozens of faces peering in at them in shock and concern. Dookie stood at the front of the crowd, arms crossed over his chest defiantly.
“Told you I could do this shit,” he said, grinning. Leo and Mr. Watkins hurried forward. The bloody girl limped along between them. They hovered in the doorway, shrugging off the multitude of hands that reached for them.
“Damn,” Leo said. “The whole neighborhood is here.”
“Seems that way,” Mr. Watkins agreed, grinning as he spotted his wife amidst the throng.
Dookie’s eyes widened when he saw the bloodstained girl. “Are her friends still in there?”
“We don’t know,” Leo said. “She ain’t talking. I think she’s in shock or something. Way she’s acting though, I’m betting that they’re all dead.”
Behind them, the pounding footsteps thundered closer, seeming to come from all directions and behind every door. The walls and floorboards vibrated with the sound. Dust drifted down from overhead. The lights swayed.
Mr. Watkins snapped his fingers in front of the girl’s eyes and got her attention. She stared at him blankly.
“Are the rest of your friends alive?”
She blinked at him. Mr. Watkins glanced at Leo, frowned, and then looked back at the girl.
“Listen to me, girl! Are any of your friends still in there?”
She shrugged almost imperceptibly and whimpered, low and mournful.
Mr. Watkins turned to Leo. “Take her outside and get her some help.”
Leo flinched. “What are you gonna do?”
“I’m gonna do what somebody should have done years ago. I’m gonna finish this place once and for all.”
“Are you crazy? They’re coming.”
“Do as I say, now, Leo. Get her to safety. It’s time to start cleaning this neighborhood up.”
The crowd parted, allowing Leo and the injured girl to get through. People gasped when they saw her condition. Most of the assembled throng followed along behind them, shouting questions. Perry shook hands with Angel, the chop shop owner.
“Thanks. Glad you brought that cutting torch along.”
“Don’t mention it. What the fuck is going on, Mr. Watkins?”
“Can I bum a smoke off you first?”
Sirens wailed in the distance. The mechanic fumbled out a crumpled pack of cigarettes and handed one to Perry. He popped it into his mouth, unlit. The sirens drew closer. So did the commotion from inside the house. The hurried footsteps were accompanied by a chorus of howls and grunts now. Perry saw Dookie shudder at the sound.
“The police finally decided to show up?” Perry asked him.
The teen nodded nervously, his eyes flicking over Perry’s shoulder. “Yeah, they said they were on the way. We’d best go, Mr. Watkins. Don’t you think?”
Angel frowned at the increasingly louder noises coming from inside the house. “What the hell is that?”
“Call 911.” Perry took the blowtorch from the chop shop owner’s hands and stepped back into the house. “Tell them we’re gonna need the fire department, too.”
Perry adjusted the flame so that it was low, and lit his cigarette with it. He closed his eyes and inhaled.
“Ah, that’s good.”
“Are you fucking crazy?” Dookie shouted. “Get the fuck out of there, Mr. Watkins.”
Perry ignored him. “Go do what I said. Call 911 now. Get some fire trucks down here.”
Without another word, he turned the sputtering blue flame up high and touched it to the walls. As he’d suspected, they went up quickly, despite the pervasive dampness. Perry tried not to think about the other missing kids. Judging from the girl’s condition, they were probably dead. Most likely they’d been slaughtered the same way Markus, Chris, and Jamal had been.
“They’ve got to be dead,” he whispered around the cigarette. “They’ve just got to be.”
He repeated it to himself over and over again, trying to assuage his conscience. This had to be done. How many years had this place been a blight on the neighborhood, spreading its poisonous roots through concrete and steel? How many people had gone missing in here over the years? It had to end. If the kids were alive—and he doubted very much that was the case—then they’d be the last victims the house ever claimed.
Perry bent over and applied the torch to the carpet and floor, feeling a serene sense of peace as the bloodstained floorboards blackened and smoked, then erupted into flame. Thick smoke curled toward him. The fire grew louder, drowning out the footsteps and growls. Perry caught a glimpse of something on the upstairs landing—a diminutive, naked figure, horribly deformed. Then the smoke obscured it. He stepped back and ran the blowtorch all around the front door’s splintered frame. Then, finished, he handed the torch back to Angel and Dookie and hurried them down the porch.
“Thought I told you to go call the fire department. I guess it doesn’t matter, though. Maybe we should just let it burn down into the ground first. Then we’ll call.”
Angel stared, dumfounded. Dookie shook his head and grinned.
“You are one badass motherfucker, Mr. Watkins.”
“Thank you. And watch your mouth, son. No need to talk about my mother.”
Only when they’d reached the street and he was holding Lawanda in his arms did Perry turn around. The open doorway was choked with thick, black and white smoke, and already the blaze was flickering higher, touching the roof overhanging the porch and climbing toward the second story. Within minutes, he expected the entire structure would be engulfed in flames. He thought he saw several deformed shadows in the doorway, dim against the swirling clouds of smoke, but when he looked again, they were gone.
Perry guided Lawanda and Dookie through the crowd, refusing to answer anyone’s questions, including his wife’s. When they reached Leo and the girl, the five of them looked back at the inferno.
“You set it on fire?” Leo asked. “Ain’t the cops gonna know it was you, Mr. Watkins? All these people saw you do it.”
“Maybe,” Perry said, smiling sadly. “But I suspect they’ll keep it to themselves. That’s the way things are down here.”
“True that,” Dookie agreed. “And besides, ain’t nobody here gonna be sad to see that place gone.”
“If they ask,” Perry said, “I’ll just tell them that I don’t know who started the fire. We’ll blame it on one of the killers. After all, the place was old and rotten. A real firetrap.”