The Beast of Brenton Woods

by Jackson Thomas

  While it would be easy to assume the attacks were perpetrated by the same person, Dennis’s gut screamed otherwise. DNA found on the lower half of her body pointed them to local roughneck, Eric Shepard.

  He admitted to having sex with Britney, but claimed the act to be consensual.

  “I fucked her, so what? She was a horny bitch in heat,” Eric said.

  Dennis knew better. He’d known that little girl since she was knee-high. And everyone that knew her couldn’t talk enough about what a caring and sweet person she was. She never had a boyfriend, as she was focused on her academics and high hopes of getting into Cornell.

  When Dennis talked to Deuce Cantwell, he got another piece of the puzzle.

  “Damn them Shepard boys. Ain’t one of them worthy of walking God’s green earth.”

  “What did you see, Deuce?” Dennis asked.

  “He’d been in here last two weeks, grabbing at her, trying to get her to leave with him. I even had to walk her out to her car the last few nights.”

  The old man had tears in his pale blue eyes. “I shoulda been there last night, too, but I…I …I’d had a rough night myself. Barb, she’s threatenin’ to leave me, Dennis.”

  After a moment to collect himself, Deuce stood and looked Dennis in the eye. “That son of a bitch wasn’t gonna quit ’til he got what he wanted. One way or another. Like a damn pitbull that way. Every one of them boys is. Brit didn’t want no piece of any boy, let alone that pile of shit. He took her, Dennis. He did this. I’d swear upon my mother’s grave, rest her soul. You got the monster responsible for this.”

  And those words held more power than Deuce knew.

  Standing behind Eric Shepard, brimstone practically pouring off the shit-heel, Dennis did what he knew he could, what was best for the community and for himself. He grabbed Shepard in a head lock, his bicep cutting off the rapist asshole’s airway.

  “You raped that sweet girl. She was a virgin. Never had a boyfriend. Didn’t want to give a scumbag like you the time of day. You forced her into your piece of shit car and stole her innocence. And then, like the sick puppy you are, you decided it wasn’t enough. Knew no one in town would believe your story over hers, so you killed her.”

  Dennis could see the guy’s face turning purple.

  “You raped her, then you killed her, then you tore her up.” He let go. Shepard fell forward his head smacking the table as he gasped for breath. “And you’re about to spend the rest of your pathetic, insignificant life in jail.”

  Dennis kicked the chair out from under him, and watched as the thug collapsed to the floor.

  “If it were up to me, I’d just kill you here and now. Save the state some money.” Reaching into his back pocket, Dennis produced a straight razor. He set it on the floor in front of Shepard’s face. “Why don’t you do us all a favor, huh?” He stood and walked to the door. “I’ll be back in five minutes. You won’t see the outside world again. I’ll see to it. And when those big Mexican boys find out what you did, they’ll make you their bitch. You’re fucked. Do us both a favor.”

  When Dennis returned, his deputies were dragging Shepard out of the interrogation room. White as a ghost, blood flowing from the dipshits wrists, Dennis smiled as they called for help.

  Shepard was dead by the time the ambulance arrived. In all the chaos surrounding the rape and murder of a young girl, and the capture and suicide of the dirtbag responsible, Dennis returned to the crime scene, his father’s rifle and silver bullets in tow, and waited.

  Eric Shepard had raped that girl, maybe even tried to kill her, but he wasn’t the only monster with Britney that night. The white wolf, the Beast of Brenton Woods was here and he was going to lay the fucking thing to rest.

  Dennis hovered around the woods for weeks, waiting for a glimpse of the monster. And it was nearly three weeks from the night of the girl’s attack that he finally got the break he’d been anticipating.

  A truck parked on the side of the road under the full moon. The driver got out and walked into Brenton Woods.

  Shocked at who it was, Dennis stepped from his patrol car and followed.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Johnny left his work van behind and walked out to the trailer park. He needed the time to clear his mind. He’d been trying Bryan’s cell since he climbed out of bed shortly after nine o’ clock this morning. It had taken him hours to fall asleep last night. Every time he closed his eyes he saw what was left of Paul Clukey. Saw his sister’s heart drop to her ankles. He heard the awful sound of the monster responsible echoing through the night.

  Sleep found him sometime after the sun began to rise, but it was too late. The dreams were there waiting. Haunting him, denying him rest. By the time he woke up, he just wanted to get out. He needed to walk. Wendy’s door was shut. He didn’t want to bother her. Some of that was to give her space to deal with everything, but the other part was selfish. He didn’t want to talk about it this morning. He needed to get out.

  As he was five minutes from the Peterson’s Mobile Home Community, he tried Bryan one last time and got no answer. There were only two things that made getting ahold of Bryan impossible: he’d broken another cell phone or his father had kicked the shit out of him. Bryan answered the door with two black eyes and a crooked nose.

  “Fuck, man. Is he here?” Johnny whispered.

  “No, went out to the creek with his rod.”

  The thought of the white wolf walking the creek this morning and slicing Barry Smith up like Paul Clukey almost made Johnny smile, but the thought of Paul spoiled the feeling.

  “Oh shit, man, it ain’t that bad. Ain’t like I haven’t been here before,” Bryan said. “Come on in. Let me grab some sunglasses or something.”

  Johnny followed him inside. The place reeked of hamburger grease, stale cigarettes, and bad body odor. The smell always stirred a fear and anger in him. He hated this house.

  Bryan appeared from the cramped hallway wearing the mirrored shades he’d wore as part of his Halloween costume two years ago. He went as Deputy Rutherford. He’d wore a nasty fake moustache too. Everyone loved it. Bryan had a great sense of humor. I guess you had to be able to laugh when you grew up in constant fear.

  “Where do you wanna go?” Johnny asked as they walked out the front door into the sun.

  “Well, shit, I guess we can’t go to the cabin—”

  Johnny hadn’t even told him about Paul.

  “And there’s no way I’m gonna get laid looking like Rocky the Racoon.”

  “We can chill at my place,” Johnny said.

  “Fuck it, at least your sister’s seen me like this before.”

  Johnny didn’t need to ask him a thing. They’d been through this routine enough in the last fifteen years.

  “I’m guessing you didn’t hear about what happened last night?”

  “I guess not,” Bryan said.

  “Paul went back out to the cabin. He must have felt like a shitty person leaving Wendy out there.”

  “What happened?”

  “He’s dead, man. The beast…it was out there. It fucking got him.”

  ‘How do you know it was the beast?”

  “I saw him. What it did to him.”

  “Did Wendy?”

  Johnny heard his sister’s gut-wrenching wail. Saw the heartbreak crack her face.

  “Yeah.”

  …..

  Wendy crawled from her sheets, shocked to find her underwear missing. She found them wadded up on the floor next to the bed.

  What the hell is wrong with me?

  She tossed them to the hamper next to her closet and took her robe from the rack on the door. She tied it at the waist and stumbled down the hall to the bathroom. She turned the faucet on, splashing her face with cold water. Facing the mirror, shame wriggled through her. Those dreams…she’d never had such vivid dreams before in her entire life. She felt the heat flood her face as she dropped her chin, flashes of the sweat-soaked dream of her getting it on with a man she couldn�
��t make out. She saw herself glistening, heard herself moaning, closing in on her orgasm. She felt the shadow man’s fingers on her clit as he thrust into her from behind. Even now, she felt the mix of shame and excitement crash into one another, awakening something new, something dormant within her. The horniness crawling over her seemed wrong but oh so goddamn right.

  She needed to get the hell out of here.

  She pulled her hair up and hurried back to her room, grabbed some clean panties, cut-off jean shorts, and a t-shirt, then slipped on her sneakers and burst out her room, down the hall, and out the front door.

  Jesus, she was even breathing heavy.

  Down the road, destination unknown, she hurried along. Her thoughts were mangled. One moment she saw Paul, reaching out for her, crying that he loved her, his arm hanging from his shoulder with blood-drenched spaghetti, then next she was bent over the coffee table in the cabin, a shadow behind her thrusting and shoving its way into her, his dick so big that it hurt, yet she cried out at the pleasure in every movement.

  “Fuck,” she screamed out to no one. She kicked dirt from the shoulder of the road and yelled out again.

  “Here…”

  The voice startled her. She turned around. The road remained empty.

  “Over here…,” it said again. The voice sounded as if it were coming from under water.

  A red sweatshirt slipped between the trees.

  “Who’s there?” she cried out.

  “Help….me….” The voice sounded like it was right beside her.

  In a trance-like state, Wendy left the side of the road, her feet carrying her into the shade of Brenton Woods.

  She should turn around. Go back home. Go find her brother…

  “Please…this way….my friend is hurt,” it said.

  Entering the woods, she caught sight of the red sweatshirt and moved swiftly in pursuit. Deeper and deeper she disappeared, forgetting where she’d been, what she was feeling, solely focused on the plea for help.

  …

  “Wendy?” Johnny yelled, but there was no reply.

  Where the fuck had she taken off to? All this bullshit going on and she picks now to disappear.

  Just great. Just fucking great.

  “You don’t think she’d go back out to the cabin, do you?” Bryan said

  “Jesus fucking Christ I hope not.” Johnny kicked a pile of unfolded laundry by the sofa. Placing his hands on his hips, he bowed his head. “I swear to God, she’s trying to kill me. She sure as hell ain’t here. That means she’s hoofing it out there somewhere, trying to figure this fucking shit out.”

  He knew she’d go back. She blamed herself for what happened to Paul. She’d venture back to the cabin, even if it took all day. She’d go back and try to see what she thought she did. She’d try to kick her own ass for Paul’s death.

  Johnny climbed into the truck after Bryan.

  “Let’s go, man. Fucking hit it.”

  There was supposed to be a full moon tonight. The thought floated like a premonition across his mind. If they didn’t find Wendy, she was as good as dead.

  Johnny pulled out his cell and dialed Wendy’s number.

  It went straight to voicemail. She was the worst at charging the damn thing.

  “No luck?” Bryan asked.

  “Nope.” He kept his eyes focused on the road. She couldn’t have gotten too far.

  There was plenty of sunlight left in the day, but right now, Johnny could feel the darkness coming down hard.

  …

  “Hey, stop!” Wendy said.

  The person she’d been following had been hurrying up the incline and disappeared over the crest. When she reached the top of the hill, the person was gone.

  “Hello?” she yelled.

  There was no answer. She was out of breath as she glanced around to see where she was. She had no idea. The realization made her want to puke.

  “Hey,” she called again, “Where are you?”

  She reached into her shorts and pulled out her phone. It was dead.

  “Fuck me.”

  The sound of breaking branches came from the other side of the hill. She started down when she saw the flash of red moving farther and farther away. She looked back. She wasn’t sure she could even find her way back to the road, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to go any deeper, especially since whoever this was wouldn’t even answer her.

  She turned back the way she’d come.

  “Please,” the voice said. “She’s over here.”

  She still couldn’t tell if the person behind the voice was a man or a woman or a child. What if it were some mountain person? What if they really needed help?

  What if there is no they?

  “I can’t,” she said. It came out as a whisper. Her gut instinct swirled with fear. She shouldn’t have come out here.

  She didn’t bother looking back. She hurried down the hill, nearly taking a tumble as she did.

  She tried to follow the general direction she’d ventured out in. There was a path, but it looked as though it was hardly ever used. At times it was hard to discern if she was actually still on it. She grew more anxious by the second.

  Oh god, what if I’m lost?

  She found a cluster of plywood and an old beat-up seat from a pick-up truck. She hadn’t come this way. She was off the trail.

  She stopped and scanned the surrounding area for something…hell, she didn’t even know what.

  Something shuffled beyond the trees to her right.

  A man, the man in the red sweatshirt. His face, horribly scarred, his light blue eyes sunken into his skull. He looked like a survivor of a nuclear holocaust.

  “Please don’t hurt me,” Wendy cried.

  “I don’t want to…but that’s beyond my control.”

  He stepped forward, reaching for her with his palsied hands.

  Wendy bolted, but fell as the earth gave out beneath her. Landing on her back, the air rushed from her lungs, and she opened her eyes and saw the face gazing down. She was in a pit, maybe six feet down.

  A trap.

  A grave.

  “Oh, I hope I don’t hurt you…you’re the loveliest creature these wicked eyes have seen in years.” His smile revealed blackened gums and jagged teeth.

  Wendy screamed.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Kathy bolted upright at the knocking on her windshield. It took her a second to acclimate herself with her surroundings. The grinning face of Sheriff Decker peered through the windshield. She’d dozed off sitting in her cruiser. She’d come back to the Dresden Place around 2:30 in the morning. She let Bruce leave an hour later with Lloyd in tow. He left with two brutalized bodies. She thanked him for his long night of service and wished he’d taken Rutherford with him. Instead, Kenny hung around acting anxious as all get out. He finally split, leaving her alone just before dawn. His behavior seemed odd, out of place for him. She couldn’t put her finger on it. It was more than him just being an ass. He was nervous. She tried to pass it off as fear, but he had never seemed smart enough to be scared of anything. Whatever it had been, he didn’t like being here, at this property. Maybe he believed it was a wolf man, too.

  She stepped out of the car, wiping the drool from her chin.

  “Sorry, sheriff. I must have dozed off. What time is it?”

  “Almost noon, Kath.”

  “What? Holy shit. I thought I’d been out for a couple hours.”

  “What the hell you still doing out here anyways? Kenny said you wouldn’t leave?”

  “Sorry, sir. I just feel like we’re missing something.”

  “Way Kenny tells it, you had a couple people attacked by some wild animal. Probably the same one. Seems cut and dry to me.”

  “I thought you weren’t coming back until Monday?” she said, rolling her neck.

  His grin hardened. She watched his nostrils flare as his jaw tightened.

  “Well, I can’t have people in my town dying while a bunch of Podunk sheriffs talk my ears
off reliving their glory days for the hundredth time. I just about drank myself into oblivion after that first night.”

  “That bad, huh?”

  “Worse.”

  “How did you hear about what happened?”

  “Well, I thought, something happened like this, you’d be the one calling me.” He leaned his hind end against her hood and pulled a cigarillo from his shirt pocket.

  “Everything happened so fast, I mean, I just didn’t want to ring you until we had a clue what we were dealing with here. Hell, we just found out last night.”

  Rutherford had called and told him. She didn’t have to ask.

  “You need some rest, Kath. Why don’t you go on home and get some? Let me poke around here a bit?”

  “I’m okay, really, I wanted to get a look in the daylight—”

  “No, no, no,” he said, standing. “That’s not a request. It’s an order. You’ve done a fine job in my absence. Get that well-deserved rest. Go on.” He opened her door for her.

  “All right, but if you need me, call.”

  “I think I’ll be just fine. Now go.”

  She started the car and pulled around him, careful not to disturb the taped off area where they’d found Paul Cluckey’s body. In her rearview, the sheriff stood watching her go.

  She did need the rest, but this all felt wonky, too. First Kenny, now the sheriff. Maybe it was exhaustion. As she pulled onto the outlet road, she wondered how she had slept so long.

  She wasn’t tired anymore, but the sheriff demanded she go. Instead, she headed back toward the Yates place. She’d have another look there before the sheriff could make it over, then maybe she’d even check-in with the Cutter kid. Maybe ask him about these foolish legends. Something tore Conway Yates and the Clukey boy to shreds.

  …

  As the sheriff stood out back of the Dresden Cabin, over the spot he’d buried Scott Cutter’s body, he let his mind drift back to that day.

  He’d seen Scott Cutter in that damn ratty, red sweatshirt looking haggard as all hell waltz into Brenton Woods. Dennis could see Cutter’s truck tucked across the way on Elmwood Road. He checked his rifle to make sure it was ready. He wasn’t taken any chances with this son of a bitch. He was armed with his father’s ammo. If Cutter was the beast, he was in for a big fucking surprise. Monster or man, death at his hand would not discriminate.