L O S T
By
R.S. Guthrie
Copyright © 2011 by R.S. Guthrie
Amazon Edition
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the author.
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Book art by Brent Dawson
Cover art: Pictures by iStockphoto
Author’s Note:
Most of the action in this novel takes place in the Idaho Panhandle near Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. Certain liberties have been taken in describing the city, its institutions, people, locations, history, etc. Most importantly, the references to all tribal language, traditions, beliefs, rituals, or any other references to the Coeur d’Alene Nation and/or its people (past or present) is entirely fictional. In fact, the entire world presented here is completely fictional, as are its characters, events, departments, legends, historical references, and other details. Any resemblance to actual incidents or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Praise for Black Beast,
Book One in the
Clan of MacAulay series:
“Kudos to R.S. Guthrie!! I started reading Black Beast and from the first chapter I couldn’t wait to find out where the story would lead — a real pager-turner full of suspense and intrigue.”
Becky Illson-Skinner, Mystery Writers Unite
~ ~ ~
“R.S. Guthrie is a marvelous storyteller…The development of his characters is awesome. You feel you’ve known ‘Bobby Mac’ all your life.”
Kathleen Hagburg, co-author of Getting Into the Zone,
a Course and Workbook For The Mental Game.
~ ~ ~
“[Black Beast] establishes Guthrie as a bona fide talent.”
Beth Elisa Harris, author of the literary blockbuster Vision.
Acknowledgements:
I want to thank my de facto editor, Elise Stokes. You are a fantastic author in your own right, and I owe you a deep debt of gratitude for working painstakingly through the final drafts of this book in the eleventh hour, never complaining yet always remaining impressively sharp. You were honest in dispensing astute, crucial editorial advice—more importantly, you did so because you cared so much about my book and my writing. I am profoundly grateful.
Thank you to Becky Illson-Skinner, Trish Gentry, and my lovely wife Amy for proofing my book. As a writer, it’s amazing how many mistakes we leave in the wake of our creation. Each of you helped me to minimize mine.
Finally, to my readers. Without you, I would not write. You are the ears for which I compose my song. That you honor me by reading what I have written, giving me such wonderful feedback, and waiting patiently for my next book instills in me the greatest pride an artist can attain. These books are always, ultimately, for you.
For my readers.
To authors, you
are the lifeblood;
we admire no one more.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Preface
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Epilogue
About the Author
Coming Soon
-PREFACE-
I don’t normally write a preface to my books, but I recently had a reader pick up the second book in a series and read it first. She loved the story but felt she would have enjoyed it more had she known the history of the returning characters better. I thought that was fair—once a writer has eight or nine books in a series, perhaps the need to inform the reader they are picking up book number four or five becomes less important, but when there are only two or three in the series, I decided it would be the proper thing to do to let you, the reader (or potential reader) know that this is the second in the Detective Bobby Mac Thriller series, so if you haven’t read the first one (Black Beast), you might consider it.
I do my best to give enough background story in any “series” book that a reader should be okay if they haven’t read the prior book(s), but I wanted to respect the woman who took the time to comment enough to put this preface in book number two of this series.
In fact, my editor, Russell Rowland, told me that Alfred Hitchcock distinguished Mystery/Thrillers by two different styles. The first was the traditional “whodunnit”. From page one the reader had no idea who the bad guy or gal was. I likened that to a boardgame of Clue. The second style he deemed “Suspense”. That would be where you pretty much knew (or thought you knew) who did what, but it was the getting there and the twists along the way that made the read a good one.
I tend to write the latter. I love twists. I also love putting something right in the reader’s face and daring them to believe otherwise. Because of this, however, I do work hard to make each book in a series capable (hopefully) of standing on its own as best it can.
For me, as a reader—and being a character-driven author—it is the relationships I develop with returning protagonists, ancillary characters, villains, etc. that make me want to read the books in order.
Whatever your preference, I certainly hope you enjoy L O S T as much as I enjoyed writing it. Cheers.
~Rob (R.S.) Guthrie, 2012
-PROLOGUE-
“Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And when you look long into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you.”
~Friedrich Nietzsche
OVER TWO thousand children are reported missing every day, the largest percentage taken by family members. In other words, people they know: estranged fathers and mothers, grandparents, aunts, uncles, even siblings. In some of these cases we can sympathize, if not condone.
However, there are abductions every day that are not the act of a spurned ex or a frustrated grandparent. In these cases, the most innocent amongst us are taken by monsters; evildoers with no intention beyond causing harm to their victims. Too often, the harm comes in the form of torturous, unspeakable acts.
When we read about such heinous, willful disregard for young life—or for any life at all—we’d like to deny that the Universe could possibly contain such evil. Unfortunately, we all know that it does. What is more shocking to contemplate is where this evil exists—in other words, inside of whom? The church pastor? The manager at the supermarket? The nice teacher from the school down the street? How many times do we see people on the news, talking about yet another “average” neighbor being escorted from his or her home in handcuffs?
Amongst us at any given time, either feigning innocence or hiding undetected in the gray fog of the peripheral walks raw, consecrated evil. We break bread with these people. Invite them into our homes. Too often, entrust them with the care of our children.
The sane mind wants to know if it is possible for such evil to have evolved from within our own h
uman ancestry. The answer is a complicated one. People are unique in this capacity; nowhere else in the animal kingdom do beasts wantonly torture and kill their own for no greater need than self-pleasure. Nowhere else do predators turn to evil for the sake of evil. Instances of death outside humankind are almost benign, so tied are they to nature’s will to survive. Food. Protection. Advancement. These are the motivators behind killing for other species.
So how is it that some human beings have evolved into pure specimens of evil? It is impossible to answer such questions without first engaging the possibility of evil as a force—an entity completely outside human existence; an external force in and of itself; a force as real as those in physics, except that this force is exerted constantly upon the human mind, heart, and, eventually, its very soul.
And, like the laws of any physical force, there must be an opposite. For there to exist such inordinate forces of evil, there must also exist counterbalancing forces of good. One cannot exist without the other.
So if we accept that there are forces of good and evil in the Universe, there is another unavoidable maxim:
It is on the game field of good versus evil that humans play out their finite existence.
-CHAPTER ONE-
A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.
King Solomon, Proverbs 17:17
MY BROTHER Jackson and I have not spoken much over the years. The reasons are complicated, but in the end, it is in large part because we are far too alike. Human beings have such incredible difficulty coming to terms with their own imperfections; it is no surprise that we tend to clash hardest with those most like us.
It’s not that Jax and I don’t love each other. I certainly love him, and I know he would be there for me if the walls were ever to come crashing down. Both of us believe family is always there for you. Forever. No matter what you need.
We are only a few years apart. I am the oldest. We’d been friends, off and on, for many years. Through most of our young adult lives, in fact. But things eventually changed. We didn’t exactly grow apart. It was more like old wounds stopped scabbing over, instead remaining diseased and festering.
That has been the hardest truth for me to accept; two brothers who were once so close—the kind of friends that shared their innermost secrets—having become so irrevocably distant. Yet we had. Over the years we fabricated our own personal war—battles and skirmishes would appear and be waged at a moment’s notice, and it seemed over the years that after such conflicts we receded into the frailty of friendship less and less often. Eventually we had to make some kind of peace; we were forced to face the fact that the emotional hurt we caused ourselves and those around us outweighed the value of the friendship.
Scotsmen tend to war within their own borders as well as without, and it is a wise general who recognizes the moment that a campaign becomes untenable.
So it had been a number of years since Jax and I had spoken regularly. We exchanged the obligatory greeting cards and holiday phone calls. I couldn’t speak for my brother, but I learned a long time ago to release my heart’s yearning for the days of yesteryear when my younger brother looked to me as his boon friend and confidant. In other words, I learned to accept the significance of the silence that had permeated our lives.
Therefore, when I saw the message on my desk from the P.A.A. telling me my brother in Idaho called and needed me to get back to him ASAP, I assumed bad news. He wouldn’t call me at work otherwise.
I took the elevator down to the first floor and exited into the bright, sunny bustle of downtown Denver. It was a gorgeous day—the heart of the city beating beneath a vast, baby-blue sky dotted with fat, marshmallow clouds and a seasonal fall warmth that reminded me why I would always live in Colorado.
The nearest city bench looked as good as any spot to digest whatever my brother needed to tell me. I sat, but I did not call him right away. When faced with the prospect of speaking with Jax, I always made an attempt to calm myself first.
Later came the decompression.
“Chief Macaulay,” the voice said.
“Hey, Jax.”
“Bobby. How are you?”
He didn’t seem upset. Unfortunately this realization did little to assuage the trepidation in my gut.
“Hanging in there,” I said. “How’s the family?”
“Trish’s doing great,” he said. “The little ones have grown. Celia is eight; Gracie just turned eleven.”
“Like weeds, right?” I said, wondering where this uncharacteristic chewing of the rag was headed.
“I hesitated to call, but I’ve got a situation up here.”
‘Up here’ was in Rocky Gap, Idaho—a small town in the panhandle of the state, not too far from Coeur d’ Alene. My brother was the Chief of Police.
“Let’s hear it,” I said.
“Well, I can’t divulge specifics. And I sure don’t want you thinking we need some of that big city detecting up here. But I have to admit I could use your counsel.”
“Go on.”
“A local fella up and killed some of his family. Wife and one young daughter. I don’t have to tell you how close that hits to home. Thing is, I know this guy. We all know him. He’s not the family-murdering kind.”
“It’s been my experience there’s no exact blueprint.”
“Well, that’s probably true in a lot of places,” he said. “But I can tell you, here in Rocky Gap, you get to know folks.”
“Understood,” I said.
“I heard a little about what happened down there last year,” he said.
“Heard what?”
“I have a couple of friends that moved down that way—beat coppers. Word of the village has it you all ran into some pretty nasty characters in relation to a double-homicide. Sounds like maybe that one played a bit out of bounds.”
“It was a strange one, all right,” I said. “Not sure how that relates, though.”
“You have any time coming?” he said. “I really could use you up here.”
“I’m a little busy with casework,” I lied.
“I’ve got this guy in my jail. He’s going to stand trial for the whole truckload. Probably face a needle, and God knows, if he did what it looks like he did, I’d push the plunger myself. But he’s got some pretty strange claims.”
“Maybe he’s thinking of an insanity defense,” I said.
“Maybe. We’ve got the feds from Coeur d’ Alene coming up here every other day, scratching at the back door wanting in. I’d like to get this thing taken care of locally—I know you get that.”
“Look, Jax, I don’t know what you’ve heard, but I doubt very much if anything that happened down here draws parallel to a guy going stir crazy in the sticks and taking out his entire family.”
“Part of his family,” he said.
“What?”
“I said part of his family. There’s one member gone missing.”
“Missing?”
“An eleven-year-old girl.”
“Jesus.”
“The father claims the Devil took her.”
I let the words hang there in the stratosphere a moment. I really didn’t want them to ever come down to earth.
“No kidding,” he said. “I don’t know what to do with this one.”
“I might be able to swing a week or two,” I said.
“This guy, he’s normally so sane it’d bore you to tears.”
“We all have our breaking point. This little girl, how long’s she been gone?”
“Three days,” he said. “We think she may be in the Coeur d’ Alene wilderness.”
I felt like throwing up.
-CHAPTER TWO-
MEYER WEST, my cousin, the ex-priest, convinced me to drive the 1,222 miles from Denver to Rocky Gap. He was right. Flying didn’t seem like a wise option. It was clear I needed to bring the Crucifix of Ardincaple—the family heirloom that had saved our lives in the forest around Grand Lake, Colorado. I still wasn’t sure that I wou
ld be able to command the power of the weapon again, mainly because I had no fucking clue how I’d mastered it the first time. It was more like the weapon mastered me.
But we needed to bring it. And we weren’t about to entrust its care to bag throwers at two different airports.
Meyer and I talked in depth about the night at Grand Lake. Calypso. Father Rule. The demon horde. Not easy things to reconcile. The mind is tempted when faced with the unbelievable to construct barriers of explainable alternatives. Meyer’s calm acceptance of the preternatural made my own acceptance less cumbersome, if not easy. Meyer helped me come to grips with what had happened, though he himself admitted to having his own doubts as to what really occurred. Time has a way of eroding our confidence and even adding false memories to events. But still, his camaraderie was important to me. I had become very close with my cousin in that past year. Because of my splintered relationship with my only brother, I believe Meyer’s companionship arrived at exactly the right time. Not only did I need a comrade, I also needed a friend.
Like Burke, my deceased partner, Meyer was an anachronism. Both of them were born out of time. Burke would have been much better suited to the era when men opened car doors without being scolded for it—a time when men were gentle and austere rather than triathlon competitors, weekend warriors, and Wall Street swindlers. And as for my cousin, how many children would tell you they want to be a priest when they grow up? All Meyer ever wanted was to serve the world in the name of God. The betrayal by his own mentor, Father Rule, had extinguished a light in him he believed could never flicker. Rule’s evil had not driven Meyer West from the priesthood because it made him question his faith (although it would be foolhardy to believe it had not)—rather, my cousin felt he had failed; he felt responsible for Rule’s successes. Meyer was shamed that he had not somehow seen through the ruse of the monster.
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