Wildlife - A Dark Thriller

by Menapace, Jeff

  But now as he stirred, his senses filtering back little by little before the sudden burst of realization that he’d fallen asleep waking him like a good slap, Dan rolled off the recliner and hurried through the rows of sliding glass doors leading into the kitchen. There, Elizabeth and her parents were standing around a marble-topped island, a glass of wine for each of them.

  “Well, look who’s up and about,” Elizabeth said.

  Dan rubbed sleep from his eyes. He wished he could rub away the flush of embarrassment he felt burning his face. He did not address Elizabeth, but Russ and Vicky when he said, “I am so sorry for falling asleep.”

  Russ waved a hand at him. “Please don’t apologize. We’re happy you could relax.”

  “Any more relaxed and you’d have to check my pulse,” Dan said.

  Lame joke, but they laughed.

  “Something to drink, Dan?” Vicky asked. “We have wine, beer, scotch…”

  A scotch would have hit the spot and been the final seal on his anxiety, but beer seemed the more appropriate answer. Better to not let them think he wanted the hard stuff.

  “A beer would be great,” he said.

  Russ went to the fridge and returned with a bottle of Miller Lite. He handed it to Dan who thanked him.

  “I’d have gotten that for you,” Russ said, gesturing to the unopened bottle, “but my hands…”

  Dan twisted off the cap and said, “Oh, no problem.” And then, because Russ had brought it up: “What’s wrong with your hands?”

  “Arthritis.”

  “Yikes,” seemed like the thing to say. “How long has that been bothering you?”

  “Since I retired. You’d think retirement would have eased it some. If anything, it’s gotten worse.”

  Russ had been fortunate to retire at fifty-five. He and Vicky had been forty when Elizabeth came along. Now, with Elizabeth thirty and her parents seventy, she’d expressed to Dan that the age gap, while a non-issue as a child and teen, had been a subject of concern as the years went on and the unavoidable breakdowns of age accrued along the way.

  Russ shrugged. “Can’t fight father time no matter what you’re doing, I guess. Ask Vicky’s knee.”

  “Your knee still bothering you, Mom?” Elizabeth asked.

  “Oh yes,” she answered with an exasperated face. “It has become my nemesis.”

  Dan smiled.

  “Are you still taking the Celebrex, Dad?”

  Vicky answered. “He goes and gets these shots now. What’s it called, Russ?”

  “Enbrel.”

  “Is it helping at all?” Dan asked.

  Russ nodded. “I think so. I only just started.”

  “As long as he can still golf,” Vicky said with a roll of her eyes.

  “Big golfer, Russ?” Dan asked.

  “I like to think I’m still his first love,” Vicky answered for him again. “Some days I wonder.”

  Everyone chuckled.

  “You play golf, Dan?” Russ asked.

  Dan hated golf. Why he’d asked Russ about it with such vigor would be added to the spectacularly enormous Stupid Shit Boyfriends Say to Suck up to Dad file. “Does miniature golf count?” he asked with a sheepish smile.

  They laughed.

  Vicky said, “That’s more my speed as well.”

  “She’s now two up on you, Russ,” Dan said, daring to dig his way out of the infamous file. “My favorite is becoming less and less of a contest.”

  More laughter. They sipped their drinks. All was very well.

  Chapter 9

  The Roys initially wanted to do it back at their place. But then transporting live bodies would be more cumbersome. Better to do it here, and transport them after.

  Only Adelyn Daigle had been permitted a chair, Ida Roy happily holding a knife to her throat while Harlon and Tucker attended to the Daigle boys. Noah and Ethan were bound at the wrist and ankles, Harlon then shoving them into the corner where they’d fallen hard next to their father.

  Their father.

  Harlon and Tucker hadn’t even bothered with Ron; blood loss was the Daigle patriarch’s binds. The logs of meat that had once been his legs lay useless on the floor in a pool of red. His pallor had reached the final color in its palette of sickly whites before death would come and swap it out for degrees of gray.

  If the Roys didn’t hurry, they would lose him before he could bear witness.

  “Mama,” Harlon said. “Go on and give Tucker the knife. It’s him that needs to be doing this for Jolene and the baby.”

  Ida Roy handed the knife to her son. “You do it right, Tucker Roy.”

  Tucker took the knife from his mother, took Ida’s place behind Adelyn’s chair, and held the knife to her throat.

  “Please…” Ron moaned from the floor. “It was an accident…”

  Tucker continued as if Ron had said nothing. He placed the point of the knife below Adelyn’s eye. Adelyn whimpered as Tucker tapped the steel tip against her lower lid. “Eye for an eye, ain’t that right, Ron?” Tucker said.

  “No…please no…”

  Harlon addressed his brother. “Maybe we should just keep her, Tucker. Left you without a missus to keep you warm at night, didn’t they?”

  Always the stone face, but the hate in his response seething, Tucker said, “They surely did.”

  “How is she, Ron?” Harlon asked with a grin. “She know how to please a man?”

  Ron writhed and grimaced as though the comment hurt worse than his legs.

  “Y’all have no right,” Ethan Daigle muttered next to his father.

  Harlon’s grin dropped. “What’s that, boy?”

  Louder now: “Y’all have no right. We were never in the wrong. Y’all got no one to blame but yourselves.”

  “You truly are a mouthy little shit,” Ida hissed. “And I will do your tongue.”

  Noah, long since losing the struggle to contain his tears, nudged and urged his brother to keep quiet.

  “Well, what do you reckon is fair then, Ethan?” Harlon asked with mock impartiality.

  Ethan answered all the same. “You letting us go, of course. Any wrong-doing you think needed fixing has been done with my daddy’s legs. You of all people should know the struggle that’ll bring a man, Mr. Roy.”

  Harlon burst out laughing. “The pair on this one! By God if I’m not starting to like the little bastard.” Harlon lifted his pant leg and revealed his prosthetic limb, dirty and worn with abuse. He rapped his knuckles on it. “You thinking your daddy’s fixing to get a pair of these now, do you?”

  Ethan’s disturbed expression was his reply.

  Harlon smirked. “Tell you what, boy: we can’t let you go, but because I like you, I’m gonna do you a favor…I’m gonna let you feed your daddy’s legs to my babies. How’s that sound?”

  Ida Roy’s sudden laughter was a cackle.

  Ethan’s bravado visibly sank. Noah’s crying became sobbing. Ron moaned and writhed and pleaded.

  Tucker waited until they were all watching before he slit Adelyn’s throat.

  ***

  Tucker Roy was washing the blood from his hands in the Daigle’s kitchen sink when Ida approached. Both Ethan and Noah could be heard crying in the den.

  “What’re you scrubbing for? Just gonna get ’em dirty again on them two,” she said, motioning towards the den.

  “We ain’t killing those boys,” Tucker said, switching off the faucet and reaching for a dish towel.

  “And just why the hell not?”

  “Because they’re boys, Mama.” Tucker finished drying his hands, tossed the towel on the counter, and headed back into the den.

  Ida followed close behind. “This one here is fifteen!” she said, jabbing a finger towards Ethan. “You was wetting your pecker well before that!”

  “We got our eye for an eye and then some. It’s done. Can’t just go around killing people without cause, Mama,” Tucker said.

  “Without cause?” She jabbed another finger towards the boy
s. “Them there are witnesses!”

  Tucker didn’t reply.

  Ida spun towards Harlon, threw a thumb back at Tucker. “Your brother’s proposing we leave ’em be!”

  Harlon shrugged. “His call, Mama. This was about Jolene and the baby.”

  Ida threw up her hands. “My boys are turning into a couple o’ faggots is what it is!”

  Harlon laughed.

  “I ain’t proposing we let ’em go, Mama,” Tucker said.

  “Alright then, just what the hell are you proposing?”

  “Put ’em to work for now. Make them row us back to our place. Bodies and all.”

  “And after that? We fixin’ to adopt, are we? Two more mouths to feed? Mouths I’d sooner shit in than place crumb one?”

  Harlon laughed again.

  “I don’t know, Mama,” Tucker said. “We’ll think of something. You should know your boy well enough to know he wouldn’t do anything to put this family at risk.”

  Ida looked Tucker up and down, a blatant sneer of judgment on her face. “Thought I did.”

  Tucker said nothing.

  Harlon clapped both hands together once as though breaking a huddle. “Alright, enough of this. You boys ready down there?” He nudged both Ethan and Noah with his foot. “Ethan, I reckon you take your daddy, seeing as how you’re the biggest. Noah, you’ll be taking your mama.” Then, with a little smile: “And don’t you boys go using up all your strength with the lifting, you got some rowing to do after.”

  Chapter 10

  “We won’t be back late,” Vicky Burk insisted.

  “Mom, it’s fine,” Elizabeth said.

  Dan gestured around the luxurious home. “Yeah—we’ll manage somehow.”

  Vicky smiled and went to give Dan a hug, then stopped mid-action. “You gonna behave this time?”

  Dan, who was now pretty sure the Burks were awesome, still burned another red face. All the same, he managed: “It won’t be as fun, but okay,” and gave her a hearty hug.

  “We won’t be long,” Russ said. “We bought tickets for this thing months ago. Long before we knew you were coming.”

  “Dad…”

  Russ nodded and hugged his daughter.

  He gave Dan a handshake and a pat on the shoulder. “Glad you’re here,” he said.

  Those words; the way he said them. Dan felt like Russ was Santa telling him he’d been good all year.

  Once they’d left, Elizabeth turned to Dan. “Be right back.”

  Dan shrugged and wandered about the kitchen. He thought about grabbing another beer, stopped, then said screw it and opened the fridge. When he shut the fridge door, Elizabeth was standing there in just a towel. He flinched a little.

  “Damn…sneaky girl.”

  A coquettish smirk. “Mr. Rolston, I understand you’re down here researching a book?”

  Dan, no fool in the blessed ways of role-playing, responded: “I am, yes.”

  “How do you research the love scenes?”

  “Very thoroughly.”

  Elizabeth headed out the row of sliding glass doors towards the hot tub. She let her towel drop, and the tub’s bluish glow cast a tease of swirling light and shadow over the profile of her naked body. She eased into the bubbling water, turned, and beckoned Dan forward with a single finger.

  I love my job, was the last PG thought Dan entertained before joining her.

  Chapter 11

  Whiskey woke Ethan and Noah Daigle.

  Harlon Roy, standing over the Daigle boys, both bound and strapped to the same bed, was spitting grinning mouthfuls of warm whiskey into their faces until they woke.

  When Ethan had opened his mouth to object, Harlon managed a healthy spit of whiskey into the fifteen year old boy’s mouth. Ethan had instantly choked, as did Harlon, on laughter.

  One window existed in the room, the shade drawn. Sunlight was rimming the edges of the shade, but it was weak. Ethan guessed it just past dawn. What time had they fallen asleep? Better still, how had they fallen asleep? Mama and Daddy had been killed before their very eyes, the boys forced to lift their bodies, row them back here, to the Roy place. The notion of sleep after was ludicrous. And then it became quite clear to Ethan that they hadn’t fallen asleep; they’d passed out, their bodies shutting down with enough horror and exertion to fell any man, let alone boys.

  Boys.

  Ethan was no boy. Tall and strong for fifteen, he was nearly a man, and in the demanding environment in which they lived, some might say a man.

  But Noah was a boy. At thirteen he’d yet to reach puberty, still held the strength and voice of any girl his size. He’d bested Travis Roy in their fight because Travis was of similar pre-pubescent stature; no physical advantages lay with either boy. Skill had won the day, to which Ethan, a renowned scrapper growing up in his nook of the Everglades, had been more than generous in sharing with Noah throughout the years.

  Except teaching your brother to punch and duck was, well, teachable. How could he teach his little brother to endure something like this? A boy could give up after one too many thumps. The damage on his face could and would heal. What about the mind? How many thumps could the mind take? Ethan was certainly no psychologist, but he was intuitive enough to know that damage to the mind didn’t heal as quickly as a good shiner did—especially when the shots being thrown were this debilitating.

  “Busy morning, boys, busy morning,” Harlon said. “I promised you could help feed your daddy to my babies, didn’t I? Make a promise, keep a promise.” He grinned. “Two birds, one stone.” He then paused in thought, scratching his scraggly chin. “Let’s see if I can get one more. Early bird gets the worm? Nah—don’t fit. How about, early gator gets the arm? Or leg? Or head!?” He burst out laughing and left the room.

  Ethan could still hear him laughing outside as he prepared his congregation of gators for breakfast.

  Chapter 12

  “Excited, Dan?” Russ Burk asked.

  Dan, in the backseat of the Lexus with Elizabeth as it cruised southeast down U.S. Route 41 towards the Everglades, swallowed a yawn and said, “Very excited.”

  “Sounds like he’s still asleep,” Vicky said from the passenger seat.

  Dan made an effort at a chuckle, swallowed another yawn and said, “I am the antithesis of your daughter when it comes to mornings.”

  Elizabeth smiled and rubbed Dan’s knee.

  “You still an early riser, Liz?” Russ asked.

  Dan answered for her with playful disdain. “Oh yes. Six-thirty every morning. No alarm. Not even caffeine once she’s vertical. I don’t know how she does it. It’s like she wants to be awake.”

  Elizabeth cozied up to Dan. “I want to be awake and be with you.” She burrowed her head into his shoulder like a puppy.

  Dan recoiled as if the puppy had never bathed. “Make her stop.”

  Russ and Vicky smiled.

  Elizabeth pulled away. “Fine. Can we get grumpy some more caffeine so he can start resembling the guy I like?”

  They’d had coffee at the Burk’s before leaving, but the blend was a weak half regular; half decaf. Dan wanted to cry when he saw the container on the counter—the axiom of perceiving something as half-empty never so apt—but didn’t think it appropriate to ask and see if they had something with more bite.

  So he’d had two big cups black, and hoped for the best. It was not enough, and his yawn machine refused to die. Ask Elizabeth, and she’d say his grumpy machine too.

  “Would you like some more coffee, Dan?” Vicky asked.

  To sound like a high-maintenance dick or not? “Uh, no that’s okay. I’ll be fine.” A martyr dick. Even worse, genius.

  Never one to miss an opportunity, Liz said: “Honey, don’t be a sissy. If you want coffee, just say so.”

  If he didn’t know his girlfriend’s dry wit better, Dan would’ve added emasculated dick in there as well. So he forgave her with a little shove, and said: “I suppose this sissy wouldn’t mind a little more caffeine.”

&
nbsp; “I wouldn’t mind a Diet Coke,” Vicky said to Russ.

  “There’s a little market about ten miles out from where we’re going. We can stop there,” Russ said.

  “You sure it’s not a bother?” Dan said.

  “Not at all,” Vicky said. Then, turning around to face Dan with spooky eyes and matching voice: “It’ll give us all one last look at civilization before we drift off into the unknown…”

  Dan returned a grin and said, “Still my favorite. Come on, Russ, you’re gonna need to show a little hustle.”

  “I’m driving and paying!”

  Chapter 13

  Harlon pulled the thick rope fixed to the wooden hatch and let the trapdoor slam open onto the deck. He peered down into the large square opening with a proud smile. Below were his babies. All six, often floating to the borders of the sizeable moat encasing them and the Roy home, were now crowded together in one spot, open mouths and endless rows of teeth skyward, waiting.

  It was feeding time.

  Behind Harlon, a giant white cooler like a refrigerator on its side sat humming. Inside the cooler was breakfast for his babies—chickens, small mammals, chopped deer.

  Next to that breakfast, stacked on top of one another, lay the bodies of Ron and Adelyn Daigle—blue-gray skin, rigid throughout, and still intact.

  Ida Roy appeared by her son’s side as he was reaching for the first chicken.

  “So what’s the plan then?” she asked.

  Harlon dropped the chicken and a tangle of jaws went for it. “What do you mean?” He dropped another chicken. A second tangle of jaws, more competitive than the last.

  “You know what I mean. With them in there.” She gestured towards their home, where Ethan and Noah remained.

  “Tucker and I was discussing it earlier. We ain’t decided just yet.”

  Ida became agitated. “You and Tucker was ‘discussing it’ were you? And just where the hell was I?”

  Harlon dropped a third chicken. “You were still sleeping, Mama. Wasn’t about to wake you.”