Poaching Grounds: A gripping psychological crime thriller (Carolina McKay Thriller Book 4)

by Tony Urban

  He felt himself harden at her touch. He wanted her, wanted to be with her, inside of her. But he already had a plan for the night, and there was little time to waste.

  After his most recent hunt, he’d been too tired to seek out a new dumping site and had left the corpse in the vicinity of Silver Gap. He hadn’t seen any evidence of police presence there, but he couldn’t take any chances. He needed to move the body to throw them off his scent.

  His internal monologue’s pun made him break into a broad grin.

  Gina took that as encouragement and stroked his hardness with more vigor. He felt ready to tear through his slacks and knew, if he let it go any further, he’d be unable to stop. So, he brushed her hand away.

  The look on her face signaled her disappointment, but as always, she was compassionate. “No play time?” she asked.

  He shook his head. “Can I get a raincheck, one to be redeemed very soon?”

  She crouched beside him and took his face in her hands, studying him with a pout. “Why?”

  “They’re calling for a hard rain through the night and I really need to get a tarp on the roof of the cabin. I haven’t finished patching, and if that floor gets drenched again it’s going to be past the point of salvage,” he said.

  He’d been telling her stories about fixing up the cabin for months. They weren’t complete lies. There was a myriad of repairs to make and more still to go. But none of that was on the agenda tonight.

  She sighed, her bottom lip jutting and petulant. “How long will that take?”

  “Maybe two hours,” he said.

  The eager grin returned to her face. “I can work with that. But you have to promise me you won’t be too tired when you get home.” She unbuttoned the top of her blouse to entice him.

  “I promise,” he said.

  “You’ve been working so hard on that cabin. Your dad would be proud,” she said. “You’ve got to take me there soon, so I can see it.”

  He loved this woman so much. He wanted nothing more than to tell her what he was becoming. But he knew she wasn’t ready yet. His true nature might scare her.

  “I will. I just need to make sure everything is perfect first,” he said.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  The streetlights had disappeared nearly an hour ago, transforming the narrow, winding road into a mysterious path like something out of a Brothers Grimm fairy tale. The trees seemed to close in, not wanting to let go. Not wanting to grant access to the outside world. Their branches scrabbled against the side of the van as Carolina drove.

  She followed the taillights far in the distance, tapping red every so often, signaling another turn coming and the drunk posse twisting in another direction. Occasionally she could catch the headlights of the truck the four men had piled into, but she kept enough distance to go unnoticed.

  Not that they were observant. These men were on a mission, lost to tunnel vision. They had one goal and it lay dead ahead.

  After what seemed like an eternity, her phone rang in her lap. She checked it and saw Hank’s number come up. She lifted the phone to her ear and skipped the pleasantries.

  “Where the hell have you been?” she asked.

  “Sleeping off a migraine with the help of a Xanax. It’s fucking late. What do you want?” Hank asked, voice thick and groggy.

  “Oh, not much. I’m just following four of Hopkins’s dumbest citizens to the poaching grounds,” she said, twisting the wheel with one hand as it jerked.

  “Why the hell are they going there?” Hank asked, now more alert.

  “As they put it, to do your job.”

  “Goddammit. How far out are you?” he asked.

  “I’m not sure, but we can’t be far now.”

  “Soon as I put on my pants I’ll be on my way,” Hank said.

  “Hurry the fuck up,” she said. “But don’t skip the pants. No one wants to see that.”

  “McKay?” Hank said, ignoring the jab.

  “What?”

  “The good ol’ boys around here are neither good nor boys. Keep your distance from them. Stay in your van until I get there, all right?”

  She knew they were nearing the literal end of the road. The spot beyond which neither their truck nor her van could proceed. They’d have to head out on foot from there. Was she really supposed to sit in her van and wait for the cavalry in the form of Hank Kolazarek?

  Of course, if what everyone said about Silver Gap was true - that almost no one visited it - what harm could they cause?

  As much as she wanted to confront the assholes, one woman against a multitude of armed men in the middle of nowhere would be a bad move. And Carolina wasn’t the same person she used to be. Not being on Oxy helped her make better decisions, including not putting herself directly in harm's way.

  “Fine. Just hurry the fuck up.” She dropped the phone into the passenger seat and saw brake lights glowing a hundred yards ahead.

  They had arrived.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  The soil beneath his feet was soft and damp. It was like the earth could sense the coming rain, already soaking up the humidity from the air. Preparing for saturation and letting the vegetation drink up, bringing life all around.

  Mitch wasn’t there to hunt, so he stayed dressed aside from removing his shoes. He relished the feel of the earth underfoot, the ground and its hazard toughening the soles of his feet.

  Thoughts of his wife ran through his head, urging him to finish so he could be with her. He was eager to return home, but he had work to do.

  As he made his way through the darkness of the forest, memories of the hunt that had brought him there in the first place flashed in his mind. The woman, frightened and panicked. The steaming hot blood that gushed when he sank his teeth into her flesh. The calm that came over him after the adrenaline wore off and the feast was over.

  He spotted the body. Or what was left of it. The carcass was pale, almost ghostly in the night, a specter sprawled on the ground waiting to be found. Waiting for a savior.

  Instead, the monster had returned.

  One of her arms had been ripped from its socket and now lay in the dirt at her feet. Gaping, black wounds covered her torso, places where skin had once been. Both of her breasts were gone. Consumed. In their wake were empty holes teeming with maggots. Her body was already bloated and swollen. Her skin had become a balloon nearly at its breaking point.

  Part of him knew it was dangerous being out here. Trying to move the body further away from his usual haunt was the goal, further away from the cabin. He knew it was the one thing that could tie him to the killings if it was ever found.

  He’d never expected the bodies of his prey to be discovered. He’d thought the odds a million to one. But that one had hit and now he had to be more careful than ever. He needed to take his latest victim far from here. Far away from his home.

  He unfurled a tarp, hoping to pile the body onto it and make transport easier. The coming rain would wash away any trails that he made. He just needed it done.

  He took her remaining hand, so cool to the touch. It felt like holding a bag of Jell-o. Carefully, he pulled her upper body onto the tarp when--

  “It’s darker than a coal miner’s asshole out here!” a voice yelled out.

  Mitch spun around, tensing at the sound. It was close. Someone was out there. Someone was with him.

  He snarled his lip as he listened, waited, and prepared.

  Chapter 33

  The air was thick and alive with buzzing insects. It felt like he was lost in some foreign jungle - like Nam, Fred thought, even though he’d never been there and hadn’t even been born when the war had ended - and not an hour away from his own home. His shirt clung to him where it was soaked through with his sweat. His mouth was dry, and he longed for a big drink of water. Instead, he took a piggish swig from a half-empty bottle of light beer.

  The beer, having been cradled in his hand the entire drive, was flat and warm when it hit his tongue. The plan had seemed like
a good one at the time, but now Fred was achy and tired and out of breath. The booze had made him think he was invincible, but the hike had caused his body to betray him.

  Most of the men Fred came with seemed to be in similar distress. Stu was the only one who had a bit of energy. He’d barely started his shift and was the least drunk out of the four of them. But even he seemed to be flagging.

  “I don’t know what the fuck we expect to find out here,” Larry said in a fleeting moment of clarity. The guy had been determined earlier, but now the heat and booze were catching up with him, too.

  “Just keep your eyes open. See if that pervert’s lurking around,” Jay half-said, half-groaned. He sounded more winded than any of them, but Fred also knew Jay to be one stubborn motherfucker. There was no way anyone would talk him out of this idea since he had already committed to it.

  Fred lagged behind as they aimlessly wandered about, no specific direction in mind. No plan.

  A rustling noise came from over his shoulder, and he spun around, holding the beer in one hand and a large, serrated hunting knife in the other. It was hard to see as the trees overhead created a canopy to block what little light the moon provided.

  But nobody was there.

  “Fucking hearing things now,” Fred muttered, heading in the direction of the imaginary sound. “Must be drunker than I thought.”

  He pushed through a snarl of grapevine and continued, not noticing that he was putting a greater distance between himself and his friends. He drank the last of his beer, the flavor reminding him of piss on a hot day. Then he reared his arm back and pretended he was still the JV quarterback from his middle school glory days, sending the bottle soaring into the abyssal night.

  He scrunched his eyes and nose, tensed his shoulders, waiting for a crash, or a breaking of glass that never came. And that disappointed him because a little demolition was always good for the soul. Instead, he heard a hollow crunch.

  “What the fuck?” he said, moving to investigate. After another few minutes of blindly plunging into the darkness, he found the bottle. And something one hell of a lot worse.

  Fred’s beer bottle had come to rest on a blue tarp beside the decomposing remains of Katie Eddows. He’d never met the woman in person, but he’d seen her picture plastered all over the evening news. Even though her face was swollen and distorted - and looked like what his dad would have called ten pounds of shit in a five-pound sack - he knew it was the missing woman without a sliver of doubt.

  Her face was pale and gray. Her eyes open and staring at nothing in particular. Her hair was a tangled mess mixed with twigs, dirt, and blood. She was naked, and her clothing was nowhere in sight.

  Her stomach had been ripped open, spilling a gooey, slimy mass of guts and organs. As a lifelong hunter, Fred was used to such a sight. Dropping the guts of a freshly killed deer was common practice. It lightened the load you needed to drag out of the woods and hoist into the bed of your truck.

  But he’d never seen a person look like this. Her arms and legs were mangled and twisted together, tying her into a human knot. One of her limbs was missing, but in his drunken haze, with the dark and the mess she was in, he wasn’t even sure which one.

  And then, he couldn’t hold it back anymore. He dropped to his knees and planted his hands in the dirt with the sudden realization that it was all coming up. Then it was more than up, it was out and his stomach contents splashed on the ground, splattering at his shoes. The bile was bitter and acidic. He could count the number of beers he’d drank that night from the gallon that puddled in front of him.

  He wiped his mouth with his sleeve, smelling the rancid vomit as he did. He nearly upchucked again but doubted there was anything left to come out. He was wrong.

  After three more waves, he was running on empty.

  It was worse than anything he could imagine. That poor girl. Nothing like this had been mentioned on the nightly news. He knew the other women had been killed, but he didn’t know they were butchered and mauled and left looking like something that barely resembled a human being anymore.

  There was no helping Katie Eddows. She was long dead, and he wanted nothing more than to be away from this place. Out of these woods. He wanted to be in the truck, traveling as fast as the old Chevy would go as they hauled ass back to town.

  They weren’t hunting a sick pervert. They were hunting something much worse. Let the sheriff deal with this mess. Fred wanted no part of it.

  He was still on his knees when he heard a branch break and leaves rustle behind him. And he stayed on them as he turned, shuffling on all fours like an old dog, making a one-eighty.

  Feral growls rolled from within the cover of the brush. It almost sounded like thunder, deep and cacophonous emanating from the blackness. But, Fred knew the difference between nature and animal.

  It’s a damned coyote, he thought, remembering a large specimen he’d found feasting on a deer a few Novembers prior. He’d shot that mongrel and hadn’t even felt bad about it. Now one had come in, drawn by the smell of Katie Eddows’s corpse. Come to eat.

  Fred fumbled for the gun holstered in the small of his back, his hands clumsy and slow from the lingering drunk. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t unsnap the small piece of leather that held the gun secure.

  That left him with just his knife. The knife he’d only ever used on dead things or to cut a piece of rope or loosen a rusty screw. He’s never used it for its intended purpose. Never used it for killing.

  But he’d have to learn fast because more branches broke. More leaves rustled.

  A maple sapling came tumbling forward in a green flurry, and then something came charging at him.

  It wasn’t a coyote. Coyotes didn’t wear clothes, but this thing did. But it didn’t move like a man either. It loped forward on all fours, bounding like an animal - like a wolf, Fred thought through his sheer panic – jaws gaping, mouth snarling, saliva flying from its toothy maw.

  At the last second, Fred raised his blade. The serrated hunting knife was big and sharp, but Fred was inebriated and terrified.

  The blade never had a chance to make contact. And Fred never had a chance to scream. The man lunged like he’d bounced off a springboard and vaulted at him.

  Their bodies collided in a crushing impact that sent Fred soaring backward, only stopping when he slammed into a tree. His head smacked against the dense trunk, ringing his bell. Everything went blurry and dark, even darker than the night. And all he could make out was movement.

  Movement that was coming at him.

  Coming for him.

  On top of him.

  Fred expected to be shot or stabbed or beaten with a blunt object. To be attacked in the way humans attacked their own.

  He didn’t have time to contemplate what was happening to him. Why this man was acting like some sort of animal. How-ill prepared he was to deal with him.

  Hot wetness gushed down his neck and chest, soaking into his shirt. He tried to fight back, to flail his arms, kick his legs, but he could barely move. He was confused as to why he felt so tired. The pain was there, radiating around his body, nondescript as to the cause.

  He peered down and saw he was covered in blood. He pawed at his shirt which was saturated and sticky with it. He looked at his arms, now drenched in the thick, red substance. Then he looked up and what he saw was even worse.

  In front of him, the man, now squatting on his haunches, was chewing on something. It was white and red, like the scraps a butcher might toss to the side because it wasn’t pretty enough to be packed for sale. Fred tried to yell but was too weak and lightheaded.

  His voice wouldn’t work.

  He raised his hand to his throat, only then realizing what was happening. His neck felt spongy and rough as he explored it with his fingers. He was reminded of being in the backseat of his Tempo with Patty Lindstrom back when he was in high school. His fingers had found their way to something soft and wet and warm, but it hadn’t been like this. No, not even close.
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  He felt the open wound pumping blood, blood that should be inside him but was now draining out like someone had forgotten to close off the tap. And his already foggy head felt heavier than ever. The field of vision in front of him darker than ever.

  He fell sideways, still confused and in shock. Still lost in an old memory. He was so cold, so very cold. He couldn’t stop shivering. The hotness of his own blood raining over him was his last vestige of warmth.

  He stared up at the moon through the trees just before it eclipsed, and the man straddled him.

  And in one final, small mercy, Fred bled out in the dirt before he felt any more of the coming pain.

  Chapter 34

  “Damn it, Fred, where the hell’d you get off to?” a voice called out.

  Mitch looked up from the body he was crouched over. He hadn’t planned on killing anyone tonight. Hadn’t planned on hunting. But this wasn’t hunting for the sake of a kill, or for sustenance. This was to protect his territory.

  A threat had entered his land. The land he hunted, the land he called home. A threat had come to find and destroy him. He could not let that stand.

  The man’s meat tasted old and gamey. Tough like a grizzled buck. It wasn’t his preference. The women he hunted were elegant fare. A fine veal or a succulent lamb. They were tender and their meat melted away in his mouth. A hot knife through butter as he dined on them.

  The man wasn’t like that at all. Mitch had to work hard for the meat. His teeth were sharp enough to rip apart the man’s flesh, but when he got down to the grisly muscle, it wasn’t so easy. He worked his jaw back and forth, back and forth.

  He was used to filet but had to settle for top round.

  He chewed on the meat, feeling an accompanying wet flap of flesh dangling against his chin. He slurped it up like a broad noodle and swallowed it down whole.