Devil's Kiss

by William W. Johnstone

  He fantasized himself saving her from—it. Outlaws, maybe. He would beat them up. Then Joan would kiss him and maybe give him some. He got a slight erection just thinking about it.

  She stopped their movement and his erotic thoughts with an arm across his chest. “You hear something?”

  They listened. Whatever Joan had heard—if anything—was silent. Then a low growl reached them.

  “Yeah,” Larry said. “A dog, I think.”

  A twig snapped behind them, spinning them around, hearts beating heavily in their chests. They could see nothing. But the smell—it was awful.

  “Smells like someone who hasn’t bathed in a long time,” she said. “Or maybe never.”

  Larry forced a laugh. “Aw, come on, Joan. You’ve been seeing too many monster movies. Maybe it’s The Thing?”

  “You jumped, too,” she reminded him. Her breath was ragged.

  Her heart was beating too fast. “Don’t talk about monsters, Larry. Not out here. Okay?”

  “Okay, I’m sorry. But I just jumped ’cause you did, that’s all.”

  “How far back to the truck?”

  “ ’Bout a mile and a half, I guess.” Shit! she wants to go home. I’ll never get any. I’ll be a virgin all my life.

  “I want to go home, Larry. Right now!” Edges of panic in her voice.

  A snarl from the timber, just a few yards in front of them. A snap of heavy jaws.

  She grabbed his hand. “Come on, Larry—Run!”

  A scream touched them, a howling. A shriek of such hideousness it forced all thoughts of sex from Larry’s mind. Together, the young couple ran blindly through the night.

  A snarl in front of them, a thing looming up from the night. It roared at them, reaching for them, its breath fouling the air. They changed directions, running toward the timber. Branches whipped at them, cutting flesh as they ran, panic driving them deeper into the dark timber.

  Larry screamed, jerking the girl to a stop. “Oh, my God!” he pointed.

  Grotesque figures surrounded them, encircling them, eyes red and wild. Fanged jaws dripped stinking drool. The creatures reached for the young people. Larry peed his shorts.

  Joan wailed her terror as the creatures pawed at her, touching her private places. She was too numb to run. This one, they knew was a breeder. They ripped the clothing from her, leaving her naked. The creatures moved about the teenagers, touching them, prodding them with sharp-clawed fingers. Breeding could wait for a time; they were hungry.

  One of the creatures moved, swiftly sinking its teeth into Larry’s neck, severing the jugular, loving the taste of blood.

  Joan whirled around, running out of the timber, two snarling, snapping Beasts after her. She ran naked past the small lake, terror making her strong. She ran faster than she ever imagined she could.

  She stumbled, falling over a root, bruising her knees. The Beasts were on her, trying to drag her back. She screamed, rolled to her feet, and raced into the night.

  The Beasts were large, longer-legged, but they were clumsy, and Joan was driven by blind fear, the adrenalin pumping through her. She gained on them as she raced up the hill, out-distancing them as she ran down the other side. She scrambled over the fence, cutting her legs, then dropped to the other side, running for her life, never looking back.

  The Beasts had stopped at the fence, watching the female run into the night. There was disappointment in their low growls. They could not venture past this fence—not yet. To pursue her, they knew, meant the chance of meeting man on the dirt road less than two miles away, and they had been forbidden to leave this area.

  The Beasts loped back to the timber, hoping the others had left them some meat. They had not been awake long, only a few weeks, and they had been asleep for a long, long time. Years. He had awakened them, and the Beasts were tired of eating fish and berries. They wanted raw meat, and the sweet, hot, salty taste of blood.

  In the timber, they found only scraps of meat, and they were angry. The pair snarled over the scraps and bones, fighting for a moment before realizing the Master would not like them to quarrel. They quieted, then shared what was left, snapping the bones, sucking the marrow.

  When they had finished, they dragged the bloody clothing of the boy and the girl to a hole in the ground, deep in the timber. The Beasts slipped into the opening of the deep cave, traveling far into the earth. They did not fear the darkness—they knew it well. They had lived here for a long time. Thousands of years. They had walked this earth long before what is now called man came to this place. But when man came, both before and after the flood, he had hunted them. The Beasts had been hunted with everything from stone axes to guns. But they had—thousands of years before—joined forces with the Master, and He protected them, awakening them from time to time. Now, He had awakened them again.

  The Beasts passed one of the ever-awake sentries, growling a greeting, then slipped deeper into the bowels of the earth.

  Joan managed to start the truck, killing the engine several times in her hysteria. She was cold, and there was not even a jacket in the truck to cover her nakedness. Her hysteria moved into shock as she bounced down the rough dirt road, driving too fast. She cried with relief when she spotted the sheriff’s patrol.

  The deputy licked his lips as his eyes traveled over her naked body. He patted her on the shoulder, covered her trembling body with his jacket, and led her to his car. She slid in next to his partner, very conscious of the short jacket and her body. The seat was cold on her bare rump.

  “I’ll drive the truck,” his partner said. “Follow you.”

  A mile down the road, the deputy turned to the right.

  “Aren’t we going the wrong way?” Joan asked.

  Short cut,” the deputy said.

  He drove to an old fishing camp in the back country, near a lake in the Bad Lands. There, ignoring her screaming, the men took turns raping her.

  Just before dawn, while Joan lay sobbing on the dirty floor, a car pulled up outside the shack. “Walter,” a deputy said, looking out the boarded-up window.

  “Sink the truck in the lake,” the acting-sheriff told them, his eyes taking in the lushness of the teenager’s body. He knelt down and squeezed a soft breast.

  “No!” Joan screamed. “Please help me!”

  Walter beat her into submission, then raped her. When he had finished, he tied her securely, put her in the back seat of his car, and drove to Tyson’s Lake, dumping her over the fence. He backed off, up the hill, watching the Beasts lope toward the girl. They dragged her into the timber. Her screaming lasted a long time as the Beasts took turns mounting her.

  Then the timber was silent.

  Walter knew the girl had become one of Them, a rapid metamorphosis taking place after she had been bitten on the neck, the infection spreading through her. Walter knew this because the Master’s agent had told him how it was done. Then he had taken the acting-sheriff to meet the Beasts.

  That encounter had been one of the less pleasant experiences of Walter Addison’s life.

  Addison drove back to Whitfield, to his apartment. He showered, shaved, put on a clean uniform, and went to his office, waiting for the call from anxious parents. He was very solicitous as he talked with the parents of Joan and Larry, promising them he would do everything he could to find the missing kids.

  After hanging up the phone, he looked at a couple of his deputies. They all wore medallions under their uniform shirts. “Some kids disappeared last night,” he said. “Parents are all worked up about it.”

  And they all laughed.

  TWO

  The corruption that almost completely destroyed the town of Whitfield did not occur swiftly. Rather, like a slow-moving cancer, it worked with stealth, insidiously spreading, until the knife could but momentarily halt the propagation, not cure it. Only death would check the dispersion of evil.

  The purulence-filled cavity of disgust leaked over into the light one day, dribbling just enough filth to alarm one man and one
young woman who loved that man. To jog their sense of outrage. To move them into action.

  The minister, Sam Balon, and the woman, Jane Ann Burke.

  The forces of evil must have screamed their hatred when Sam began to gather facts, spreading them out in his mind, sorting them into neat little piles of truth.

  Most men do not know their limits, their capabilities, their own minds. Sam Balon did. The devil despises the Sam Balon’s of the world, and would prefer to stay away from them.

  Sam was no lace-pants preacher. He’d been tested many times, and was as tough as wangleather, understanding the temptations of this world. He had tasted the bittersweetness of evil, and knew that all humankind was susceptible to enticement.

  The devil is wary of these kinds of ministers. For these types of men are tough. The Sam Balon types, upon seeing that prayer will not work, will ball their fists and come in swinging. This type of minister does not set himself up as a paragon of virtue, for all to follow their example. They know they are human.

  The Sam Balon’s of Christian ministry are rare breeds. They enjoy a cold beer after mowing the lawn. They might smoke a pipe or a few cigarettes a day. They enjoy wine with the evening meal. They understand changing times, moving with the flow, not against it. They are not pulpit-pounders or screamers. The young people usually like them.

  The devil hates them. For as attractive as Satan makes sin, the Sam Balon’s are almost always impervious to it. They cannot be possessed, so they must be destroyed. And the devil sits and scratches his head, wondering—How?

  Satan cannot destroy the Sam Balon’s at the outset; that would anger God, and the devil knows only too well the wrath of God. Satan has felt God’s boot on his butt too many times, and that has made him wary. So the devil must work quietly; he must work around the Sam Balon’s, hoping the man will not discover the evil until it is too late—until the man is alone, almost defenseless.

  In Whitfield, the devil almost succeeded.

  “I guess the kids just took off,” Walter Addison told the mothers of the missing teenagers. “They will do that, you know. We’ve had an APB—that’s an All Points Bulletin—out for more than a month.”

  “I know you’re doing all you can, Walter,” the mother of the missing girl said.

  “Well,” the sheriff said, standing with his cowboy hat in his hand, “I hate to say this, but kids do funny things nowadays. I personally think it’s all that rock and roll music they’ve taken to listening to. It’s got something to do with it. I just don’t know, ladies. There is gettin’ to be so much sex in the songs and in the movies. No tellin’ what it’ll be like twenty years from now.” He shook his head, a humble man, overwhelmed by the enormity of it all. “We’ll keep trying’, ladies, I can promise you that.”

  Sam had stood listening. Walter had ignored him, refusing to speak to him.

  Crap! the minister thought, watching the sheriff walk away. Pure undiluted cow chips.

  Sam said goodbye to the ladies and then stood for a moment on the corner of the street.

  You’re a liar, sheriff! Sam mused. You said you called the FBI, and the FBI came in and looked around, investigating a possible kidnapping. But the FBI never came in here, never questioned anyone, because you never called them. And I’d like to know why.

  I know they didn’t come in here, sheriff, because Joan was a member of my church, and they didn’t question me. Larry worked part-time for Chester, and they didn’t question him. Larry belonged to the Episcopal Church, and they didn’t question Glen Haskell. the principal of the high school, Bill Mathis, said they talked with him, in his office at school. But Jane Ann said the day they were supposed to have talked with him, he was out of town, at a meeting in Lincoln. So add that all up, partner, and that makes you a liar, and it makes Bill Mathis a liar.

  But why?

  And why all the recent grave robbing? Where are the bodies? And there is something very strange going on at Glower’s Funeral Home. I’ve heard whispers. Even Doctor King is suspicious, although he won’t talk with me about it. Not yet.

  And the people in this town. They’ve become . . . different, somehow. What’s going on, Sheriff?

  “You’re deep in thought, Sam,? the voice jarred him out of his musings. He looked into the violet eyes of Jane Anne Burke, and a warm feeling spread over him.

  “Yes, I am,” he smiled at her. “Or was.”

  She looked up at her minister. He was almost a foot taller than her five four. A big man, Sam Balon, who did not in any way fit the minister stereotype.

  Sam looked more like a mercenary; a soldier of fortune; a pirate. Dark brown hair, almost always unruly. Massive shoulders and barrel chest. Heavily muscled arms. Huge wrists. There were scars on his knuckles and two faint scars on his face, one just above his right eye, the other on his chin. She’d heard he got one scar in a barroom brawl in Kansas City, the other scar in a free-for-all in a bar in Korea. Sam had emerged from that war a much-decorated hero, but he never talked about it.

  She’d heard that Sam had been part of of an experimental combat unit in Korea. Something called Special Forces—guerrilla fighters.

  Jane Ann was in love with her minister, and she knew he knew. But she was very careful never to be alone with him. If they were seen together, it was always in public places.

  “How is Michelle?” she asked.

  “Just fine.”

  That was a lie and they both knew it. Michelle, Jane Ann thought, is a bitch! The whole town knew Sam and his wife were having problems. They didn’t even sleep together. Lately, it seemed lots of people in Whitfield were having problems, mostly with their faith. Church attendance was way down.

  “Ministers aren’t supposed to tell fibs, Sam,” she gently scolded him.

  “Ministers aren’t human,” he returned the smile, thinking, Oh, boy, are we human. Jane Ann, if I weren’t a minister . . .

  An old lady hobbled by on arthritic legs, greeting them. “Jane Ann. Reverend Balon.”

  He smiled and nodded.

  Sam did not like being called Reverend. He maintained there was only one Reverend person to ever walk the earth, and He had been crucified. Call him Sam, call him preacher, call him brother, but please don’t call him Reverend.

  Walter Addison drove by, and Jane Ann watched her minister’s eyes narrow as they followed the sheriff’s car down the street. Addison had not waved at them. It was almost as if he was deliberately avoiding them.

  “He was a member of our church for as long as I can remember,” Jane Ann said. “Then suddenly he stopped attending. Strange.”

  “Yes, it is—among other strange things happening in Whitfield.” Sam swung his gaze to Jane Ann. “I’d better be going. Got to get back home.”

  Back to your slut wife! Oh, Sam, everybody in town knows she’s running around on you. “I’ll see you Sunday, Sam.”

  “Yes. Fine.” He started to walk away, hesitated, then said, “Jane Ann?”

  “Yes, Sam?” she almost called him darling.

  “Be careful.”

  “That’s an odd thing to say. Why did you say that?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t know. Forget it, Janey.”

  She watched him walk away, arms swinging by his side. A huge powerful man. A very handsome man. Not the pretty-boy type; the rugged type. Not at all a follower of fashion, Sam Balon. he wore what pleased him, not some men’s fashion designer. This was crew-cut or flat-top country. But Sam wore his hair longer than most. Chester Stokes had told her that Sam was once asked about the length of his hair—that it was out of style. The man doing the asking had said it with a smirk. Sam’s reply was, “If you don’t like it, jump in and try to change it, partner. Watch this ex-doggie bite.”

  Not your average preacher type, Sam Balon.

  Sam had turned more than one woman’s head, causing them to think very unchurchly thoughts of the minister.

  And I’m one of them, Jane Ann smiled.

  Fork County is one of the largest c
ounties in America—larger than some states. Thousands of square miles of sand hills, ridges, Bad Lands, valleys, hollows, and hundreds of small lakes. Some of the finest timber in the state can be found in Fork County. The land is dotted with cottonwoods and box elders. Very little farming in Fork County, mostly cattle ranching in the rolling hills and plains.

  There are only four towns in the entire county, the largest being Whitfield. Fork County is huge, and sparsely populated. If one wanted to hide, or be alone, or perpetrate an evil, Fork County would be ideal. Not because of the people, but because of its aloneness, its isolation.

  Whitfield sits almost in the direct center of Fork County, and while its chief law enforcement agent is called Sheriff, he is really a sub-sheriff, the elected sheriff having his offices in Atwood, some sixty miles away.

  Whitfield is not an easy place to reach; it has few visitors. One road in, one road out. State roads. There are several winding county roads, but most of them lead nowhere, or in a circle, and at times are impassable.

  A native of Fork once told a weary salesman who was attempting to get to Whitfield, “You can’t get there from here, partner. You got to go somewhere else to start.”

  He was only half joking.

  Fork County.

  Standard number of churches in Whitfield, standard mix of religion as found in any small town. The young people leave as soon as they can, unless they plan to ranch with their fathers. Whitfield has no industry. The ranches have passed from great-grandfather to grandfather to father to son. Old brands. Foreign investment in Fork County is nil.

  Only one Jewish family in Whitfield, Miles Lansky and his wife Doris. The Lansky’s walk a fine line. They live in a community full of cowboys and out-doorsmen. A community full of the Plains States’ version of the Southern Good Ole Boy. A less refined term is Redneck.

  “Them Jews is funny, you know that, boy? They ain’t like us.”

  A statement that surely brings great joy to the Jews.