by Tony Urban
“Fred?” the voice called again. “Where you at?”
He had a kill in front of him, but there was more danger nearby. Someone else who meant to attack him on his land. Someone else encroaching on his territory.
He crouched on all fours and headed toward the voice. To the place where the wind bounced off differently in the trees because there was a foreign body in its path. That same wind carried the scent of a man drenched in sweat and alcohol. It flooded from the man’s pores, crying an alarm to alert Mitch of his presence.
Mitch crept through the trees toward the scent of the intruder. It cut through the thick air, easily overpowering the clean smell of the coming rains and the earthy dirt floor beneath him. It settled on the back of Mitch’s tongue with each breath, and he could almost taste him.
He stalked closer and closer to the man until he came into view. His back was turned and he stood staring off into the distance, searching for his friend who was now dead on the ground and partially in Mitch’s stomach.
The stupidity of men, thinking they could come into a predator’s space...and for what? To scare him, to kill him?
The hubris.
They had no idea what they were dealing with.
“Fred?” he called out again. But Fred did not, and would not, answer.
The man stopped scanning the forest with his eyes and instead looked to the ground. Then came the rustling of fabric, a zipper unzipping, and urine raining onto the dirt.
The hot stench of urine ignited ferocious rage inside Mitch. How dare this man mark his territory?
Mitch took flight on all fours, charging. He was close, but not close enough that the sound of his steps in the dirt and the rustling of bushes against his clothing didn’t alert his prey.
The man spun around, his stream making a half-moon in the dirt, and set his eyes upon his soon-to-be attacker.
“What the fuck?” the man said, letting go of his little prick.
His hands went to something at his hip tucked under his shirt.
Mitch continued forward, leaping in the air, claws and fangs ready for the fight.
The man brought his hand back out, something metallic clutched in his grip.
The human part of Mitch kicked in, recognizing the gun. But the Wolf that had taken over didn’t understand. Didn’t care.
A loud explosion echoed, deafening Mitch. He felt a nip like a stinging bite, but it wasn’t enough to stop him.
“Dear Jesus, he--!” the man screamed, lifting his free arm up to protect himself.
Mitch hit his prey, knocking him backward and biting into the man’s thrashing arm. The man responded by yelping in pain and rearing back, leaving Mitch with a mouthful of forearm.
Mitch tasted the brine of his sweat, the bitterness of the urine splashed on his skin, and the copper flavor of his blood. They hit the ground together, Mitch on top of him, triumphant, dominant. He was ready to show this intruder his true nature, but before he could so much as go in for another bite, the man began to convulse.
Mitch examined the spasming, writhing mess in front of him. His head snapped to the right over and over like a broken metronome. And that’s when Mitch saw the wet blood on the jagged rock.
The man’s skull had connected with an exposed stone in just the right place and position. Like cracking an egg against the edge of a pan, his skull split down the center in the back, spilling its contents in a messy puddle. Instead of a bright yellow yolk, there was a gray, gummy ooze.
As his body continued to convulse, his hand lifted, but there was no direction intended. A muscle memory, perhaps one of protection. But it only wavered in the air like a morbid signal of greeting.
Mitch bared his teeth and made the kill, sinking his fangs into the man’s throat. Ripping his head sideways and rearing back, he brought a mouthful of flesh with him.
All that was left was a gaping hole where the Adam’s apple once was. Blood spurted out in increasingly smaller splashes as the heart beat slower and slower and slower.
Then stopped.
Mitch took a deep breath, knowing he had protected his territory. Knowing he was the ultimate predator in those woods. That nobody could come take what was his.
He was so washed over in ecstasy that he never heard the person behind him. The other was downwind from Mitch, so the scent never hit his nose.
“Holy horseshit!” the man exclaimed.
It was deeper and guttural. From the sound of it, he was much larger than the man Mitch squatted over, and bigger than the one he had killed before that.
Mitch spun around, snapped out of his trance. Alert and ready to fight again. And then he smelled yet another intruder. One coming from the opposite direction.
The big man behind him pulled out a large revolver and leveled it, ready to shoot. Mitch knew there was no time to mount an attack. He would have to run.
He dove to the side, scurrying into the brush that surrounded him. And a gun went off, sending a bullet whistling through the foliage, so close Mitch felt the breeze as it passed by him.
That was followed immediately by a second bang, but the subsequent shot was further away, slightly to the west. That blast was followed by an agonized scream.
Mitch crouched from the cover of the trees, catching glimpses of what had happened. The man with the revolver was on the ground, sprawled on his side, his face pointed in Mitch’s direction. Their eyes locked.
The man, bald with a long beard, stared at Mitch intently, curiously. He wondered if, in his dying moments, the man could see him for what he really was rather than the skin suit he was forced to bear.
“Can you see what I am?” Mitch whispered.
Then the man’s eyes went unfocused and blank as death washed over him.
A brief reprieve of silence was immediately replaced by howling moans.
“Stu!” a man’s voice wailed. “Oh fuck, Stu! Don’t be dead!”
Mitch watched as the newest arrival stepped into the scene. He dropped to his knees beside the bearded man’s now-lifeless body. He held the shotgun in one hand, while the other reached and shook his fallen friend, trying to imbue life into the dead man.
“I didn’t mean to shoot you!” The words came out between racking, drunken sobs. He dropped his head onto his knees, like a man in deep prayer.
Mitch knew, in the man’s distracted grief, he could be on him in seconds, his presence undetected until it was too late. But he found this scene so fascinating that he preferred to wait and watch.
The grieving man spun the shotgun backward, aiming the barrel at his own head. The carbon steel came to rest against his right cheek, just beneath his eye.
Without taking a second to think or to change his mind, the man squeezed the shotgun’s trigger. The top half of his skull ripped away in a flash of fire and smoke. Blood and brains splattered against the nearest trees. It sounded like a hailstorm.
With four men now dead and no sounds or scents to warn him that others were coming, Mitch took a moment to examine what felt like a bee sting on his arm. His shirt sleeve was saturated and crimson, a small, ragged hole at the center. He tore the hole, tripling its size and baring his skin.
He saw the inch-long graze where the bullet had carved a shallow channel across his tricep. Blood oozed from the wound, but it was minor. One that would require a bandage rather than stitches.
A battle scar, Mitch thought. He smiled, his teeth glinting in the moonlight.
He wanted to feast on the men, to see how they tasted, but they weren’t his kills. It would have been wrong to partake of them when he hadn’t ended their lives. Doing so would have lowered him to the level of carrion.
He’d leave these bodies for the bugs and the crows. Let them fill their bellies. The Wolf had no need for scraps.
Chapter 35
“Fucking shit,” Carolina muttered, surveying the aftermath of the slaughter.
Hank stood with her, unspeaking. Shocked silence was the other response she had considered. But, from whe
re she stood, fucking shit seemed the better fit.
Shifting her attention from the bodies over to Hank, she found a weary man who looked like a soldier fresh off a hellish battlefield. But it wasn’t his mute silence that bothered Carolina. It was the hollow vacancy in his eyes. He didn’t look surprised or aghast or disgusted. Hank looked defeated.
Katie Eddows’s corpse lay half-strewn on a tarp that whipped in the hard wind that had blown into the area as they arrived. A couple of yards from her was Fred Volchko, one of the instigators at the bar. He lay on his back, his throat completely torn out. A few more bites of his flesh had been taken, too, like a picky toddler had been sampling various entrees.
Carolina shone her flashlight at the wounds of the man and squatted next to him. She could smell the iron of the blood along with the foul scent of fecal matter. Although unwilling to check, she’d have bet money that he’d shit himself in fright. And, surveying his remains, she couldn’t blame him.
She’d been sitting in her van, doing as she was told, when she had heard the gunshots. It could have been the drunken men shooting at shadows. Or maybe even plunking beer bottles for sport. Wasn’t that what men did in places like Hopkins? They did in Dupray, and as far as she’d been able to tell, the two counties were kissing cousins.
But her gut suspected the worst. Her gut had ordered her to go toward the gunfire, to trek into the black woods despite not knowing what waited. To be the hero or die trying.
It was the rational part of her mind, the part that was getting more use these days, that had reminded her she wasn’t a cop and had no business marching into a potential crime. This wasn’t her rodeo, and these weren’t her clowns.
So, she’d stayed in the van until Hank’s high beams blasted her rear windows. Only then did she exit the vehicle and tell him what she’d heard and point him in the general direction of the commotion.
She was surprised when part of her, a rather large part, wanted him to say they’d both stay there until more help arrived. But what help would really be coming? There was no SWAT team waiting to save the day.
No, things were as good as they were going to get, so she and Hank trekked into the forest. They hiked two or three miles, most of the time wandering aimlessly, until they followed a trail of broken branches and muddy boot prints that led them to the remains of Katie Eddows and Fred Volchko.
Reminded that Hank was someone near and in charge, Carolina scanned the area for him to ask a question only to see the man disappear through a thicket of mountain laurel. She thought about telling him to be careful, but she didn’t want to be patronizing. He was a big boy sheriff and should know those things.
Turning back to Fred’s body, she hoped to find something, anything that could provide a clue. But all she saw was carnage. Shredded flesh, ripped skin, mauled body parts. The wounds were clearly bite wounds, not something made by a knife or tool. And there would doubtlessly be DNA evidence - saliva, hair, skin cells - just like there was on the first four female victims. But in those cases, the DNA had turned up no matches and there was no reason to believe this would be any different.
“Carolina!” Hank called from out of sight.
She drew her pistol and hurried toward the sound of his voice. When she got close, she realized his call wasn’t for help, but for her to see another crime scene.
Three bodies lay in the dirt of the forest. Carolina also recognized these men from the bar. It was the rest of the drunken posse which had been so intent on stopping the killer. And all they did was add more bodies to his list.
Thunder roared, and Carolina saw the flash of lightning through gaps in the canopy of leaves in the sky. The air felt even heavier than before and suddenly she felt the droplets on her face.
With that, the sky opened, unleashing a torrential downpour that hit the ground with such force it sent dirt and detritus ricocheting in every direction. The crime scene, such as it was, turned into a mud pit before their eyes.
“Damn it,” Carolina muttered, knowing any evidence would soon be washed into the ground, lost to the forest.
Hank snatched his cell from his pocket, snapping photos as fast as the smartphone would allow. Then they both ran back to Katie’s body which was more in the open, more exposed to the elements.
“We’ve gotta save that tarp,” Hank ordered. “Might be prints on it.”
Carolina was relieved that part of his head was still in the game, still a cop somewhere inside that shell-shocked husk of a man. And while she doubted the killer would be dumb enough to leave prints behind, she knew a slim hope was better than none at all.
They grabbed the tarp that Katie anchored down at the corner and yanked. Her corpse skidded across it like it was riding a ghoulish Slip-and-Slide, and the sudden shift of weight distribution caused Carolina to lose her balance. She tumbled sideways, smashing her hip into the remnants of a stump, then came down face-first in the mud inches from Fred’s remains.
“Get up and help me, damn it,” Hank ordered, and she turned to see him struggling to secure the sprawling sheet of blue polyethylene.
Gritting her teeth through the pain, Carolina hopped to her feet and grabbed the nearest corner. Both of them were drenched with the rain that poured from the sky and showed no signs of lessening. One side of the tarp blew up and into Carolina’s face, sending an accumulated wave of muddy water washing over her.
She stumbled back a step, her heel catching a slick patch of mud and fell again, that time sinking in a few inches. Her pants were covered in the brown muck of the forest floor.
An overhead flash of lightning illuminated everything around them, giving Carolina a brief interlude to see just how fucked they were. Then it was back to black. A roar of thunder clapped so hard it made the ground shake.
Then came the wind.
It barreled through the trees, ripping leaves from treetops and snapping off small limbs. It felt like their own private hurricane had landed.
The gale flew through with such force that it ripped the tarp from Hank’s grip. The blue fabric soared up into the air, dancing spastically back and forth before getting ensnared in the branches of a lifeless pine a good twenty feet or more above the ground.
The rain washed over them, washed over the bodies, and Carolina knew there was no saving anything from the scene now.
She found herself sitting next to the corpse of Fred Volchko, not even caring that the growing puddle around her wasn’t just water and mud, but the dead man’s blood, too. She was tired, she was frustrated, and she was sick of losing.
She clenched her fists and let out a long and loud scream. If she hadn’t done that, she might have actually cried.
Carolina pushed herself to her feet and trudged back to Hank. In his haste he hadn’t put on his uniform, and wore just jeans and a white undershirt that was practically see-through from the rain.
He looked at her, knowing there was nothing that could be done. She could see in his eyes that he was done and prepared to wave the white flag.
“That’s it,” he said. “I’m calling the FBI.”
She shook her head, wet hair flagellating her face. “We can figure this out,” she said, motioning to the bodies. “The killer was just here. He was trying to move Katie’s body because he knows we are onto him. He’s scared. This is a good thing.”
Hank’s tired eyes flared, albeit briefly. “A good thing? Five more people are dead because we dropped the fucking ball!” he screamed.
“That’s not fair,” Carolina said. “These idiots came up here of their own volition. We’re not responsible for this.”
“None of this is fair,” he said. “This isn’t about my career anymore. It’s about stopping this fucker. It’s about keeping the people of this county from being murdered. That’s all that matters.” He ran a hand through his wet hair, slicking it back and out of his face. “Maybe you need to remember that. Because, from here, it looks like it’s all about the win for you.”
Carolina heard the sirens in the
distance, rescue vehicles headed their way. But it was no cavalry, just the clean-up crew. And as much as she hated to admit it, maybe Hank was right.
The FBI taking over the case would send her to the sidelines. Maybe even back to Dupray. And she didn’t know if she could handle walking away discarded. She didn’t know if her ego could handle it.
Chapter 36
Mitch stepped through the door of his house, drenched from head to toe. He had watched the two cops, the sheriff and the woman that was working with him, find the bodies. He watched as they attempted to preserve the scene.
But they failed.
And now there was nothing they could use to find him.
He saw something else, too. The defeated look in the sheriff’s eyes. He was tired and outmatched. He’d accepted that Mitch was superior to him. The sheriff might be old, but he was smart enough to throw in the towel when he came across a predator like Mitch.
The rains had chilled him to his core. The blood that had once covered him was now gone, all washed away in the storm. He stood in his silent house, exhausted from the hunt but invigorated. Blood pumped overtime through his veins. The pure adrenaline of power.
He walked past his wife snoring on the bed, heading straight for the shower. He waited for the water to steam up before stepping into the hot stream.
The warmth covered his body, nearly burning due to the drastic change in temperature. But it felt exhilarating. His muscles longed for the attention the water brought. They relaxed from their previously tensed positions, and he glided his hand over his body, massaging every curve of every muscle that he had used that night.
He plunged his head under the water, closed his eyes, and relived every detail of the night. The animal inside of him had taken over, and everything happened so fast. But he could replay it like a movie inside his head. The way he moved through the trees when stalking them, the way he charged when attacking, each bite, each burst of blood that flowed into his mouth and down his skin. The feel of their flesh against his tongue. Their taste.
