Creekers

“I know, and, yeah, it is a little scary. I’m gonna keep my distance from Natter. You never get the kingpin deadon, you get to him through his flunkies. I’m used to being real careful.”

He took her just out of town, to an old family-owned crabhouse with the absolutely ridiculous name, Captain Salty’s. “Oh, this is beautiful,” Susan commented when he took her out onto the back deck. Their table offered a vast view of the bay. “I never knew about this place. What a find.”

“We lucked out,” he admitted. “I wasn’t sure if they were even still in business. Great steamed crabs, though, if I remember correctly. I—”

What had he been about to say? Was he out of his mind? I used to bring Vicki here a lot. “I used to come here a lot back in the old days,” he quickly caught himself. “Sometimes the watermen will bring their boats right up to the dock and unload fresh bushels of crabs and oysters.”

Susan seemed taken by the view. A slight breeze played with her pure-blond hair. Phil couldn’t help but steal a glance; he, too, was taken by the view—but not of the bay.

Of her.

It assailed him—her plain and simple beauty. Her casual grace. Her unadorned demeanor. Again, it occurred to him that her attractiveness was the opposite of Vicki’s. It seemed more honest, more genuine. It seemed to reflect all of her at once with no veneers. No makeup, no designer clothes, no fronts; she didn’t need any of that. Phil felt lured to her.

And guilty as all hell.

How much of a chance would he stand with Susan if she knew about what had happened last night with Vicki?

He ordered a pitcher of iced tea, a dozen oysters, and a dozen steamed crabs. “I’ll pass on the oysters,” Susan said, leering at the plate. “I don’t quite have it in me to eat things that are still alive.”

“It’s all a matter of conception, my dear,” Phil said, and then sucked one down whole right out of its shell. “I guarantee you, that oyster didn’t feel a thing.” When the crabs arrived, Phil gave her a quick lesson in technique. “There’s only one way to eat crabs,” he cited. “Like a barbarian.” He tore one open in his hands, then methodically began removing the meat. Throughout their meal, Phil avoided work-related topics. Instead, they talked more about her classes, her upcoming degree, her plans for the future. In a sense, he envied her; she had things to do and places to go. Just like I did, about ten years ago, he thought dryly. I hope she has better luck…

But she seemed to enjoy the restaurant, and the messy frolic of crab-eating. She also seemed to enjoy his company. Phil knew he needed to take this easy. He wanted her to be comfortable with him, and he wanted her to like him. He wasn’t quite sure what he foresaw—he just hoped it would be something good.

But something remote bothered him throughout their meal; he was too distracted by Susan to acknowledge it. He kept pushing it back—whatever it was—shoving it away. But when Susan excused herself to use the ladies’ room, the awareness socked Phil in the face—

Vicki.

And the things Mullins had implied…

Was he exaggerating, or did the chief know more about Vicki than he did? Mullins had solidly stated that it was Vicki who’d given them the phony tip the night they’d been set-up. But…

Could that be true? he wondered.

Phil slid his last crab away, reflecting. He hoped Mullins’ implications were an overstatement, but one thing that couldn’t be overstated were the goings-on last night. Christ, Phil thought. Right there on the front seat of my Malibu… Images felt charred into his head like emblems from a branding iron.

Vicki had been voracious.

He’d been surprised, even shocked. Her seduction was an avalanche; she’d assaulted him with her sexuality, baked him with it, smothered him. One minute they’d been sitting there talking, the next they were a naked tumult entwined in the front of the car. Each second seemed to proceed in a breathless succession of images—the shimmering sweep of her hair, the curve of her hips, the lines of her face—like cutaways in manic film. Her bare, hot breasts squashed hot against his chest; her skin sliding over his as if oiled. The darkness cocooned them there, the drenching heat glued them together. Her hands plied at him, desperate, quick, but knowingly precise. Her tongue churned in his mouth, her teeth nipped at him, her arms and legs tied him up securely as a mistress’s bedropes. Each touch and each caress, each moan and kiss and lick, made Phil feel another step closer to a precipice. At any second he might fall…

Vicki did things to him she’d never done in the past—things, in fact, that no other woman in his life had done.

She was wild, but—

Too wild…

She was like a predatory beast; Phil’s desires, and her own, were things she hunted down and devoured…

And when it was over, he lay exhausted, debauched, wrung out and used up. He doubted that he’d ever felt so primal in his life. As intense as the experience had been, it scarcely even felt real. There’d been no meaning in any of it, no passion. They were just two phantoms run amok in the moonlight.

And now, sitting here amongst a pile of crabshells, watching the late-afternoon sun sparkle on the bay, he regretted it all even more. The last ten years had trained Vicki well. Her life had a new master now—a cold and very dark master, an alchemist of spirits. It had turned her dreams to fodder, and her heart into a desperate, pleading little thing that had nothing to rise to, nowhere to go.

And then the black voice returned, a voice he’d been hearing a lot lately, sniping the truth he’d been aware of all along but never wanted to face:

She’s nothing now but a coked-up whore…

Phil winced into the sunlight.

And it’s your fault, isn’t it, Phil? You left her cold. You threw her to the wolves. You tossed her love back in her face and let Natter turn her into a junkie roadside hooker. Good job, Phil. You’re a first-class guy.

“Get off my back,” he whispered to the voice.

Yeah, you’re a piece of work, all right. Not only did you fuck her, you lied to her, you’re pumping her for information, you’re using her, Phil. You don’t care about her, all you care about is your goddamn case.

“Eat shit, voice.”

And look what you’re doing now. You’re on a date with a real woman, not some busted whore. What would she do, Phil? What would Susan do if she knew you fucked a whore last night, a junkie?

“Shut up…”

Are you gonna fuck her, too? Are you gonna fuck Susan like you fucked that whore last night?

“Go to hell!”

I’m already there, the voice replied. So where does that leave you?

Then it drained away.

The voice, of course, was his own, the part of his psyche that couldn’t stand himself for what he’d done and was doing. Was he really using her? Were the ruins of Vicki’s life really his fault? And was he really using those ruins, taking advantage of them for the benefit of the case?

He didn’t want to know.

His guilt stuck to him, like an incessant gnat buzzing round his ear. He felt dried up, as mentally ragged as he’d been physically last night, after his venture with Vicki.

“That was fun,” Susan said as they walked back to the car. “We should come here again sometime.”

“Yeah, it’s a great place,” Phil replied, slightly stunned. Maybe her comment was just a casual one, but if she didn’t plan on seeing him again, why would she be making such a suggestion? At the very least, he could take this as a good sign that their first date had gone well.

But it was still early, and now that Phil could pretty much set his own hours, he didn’t need to be going into work by eight p.m.

Where do I take her now?

“Hey, Phil,” she said, “I know this is going to sound really lame, but—”

“Let me guess,” he said, and opened the car door for her. “You have to go home early tonight.”

“No, I have to go to the library.”

“The library?” Phil’s face crinkled. “What for?”

“I left some of my school books there last night. I want to pick them up before somebody rips them off. Do you mind?”

Phil almost laughed. At least now he didn’t have to think of a place to go next. “No problem. Next stop, the library.”

He started the car, was about to pull out, when she added, “And thanks for dinner.”

Then she leaned over and kissed him very lightly on the lips.

— | — | —

Eighteen

The trip to the county library, in Millersville, had taken them back down the Route, across town. “Look, more Creekers,” Susan pointed out when they cruised past the intersection of the Old Governor’s Bridge Road.

Phil spotted them.

Two figures trudged along, a boy in his late teens and a much younger girl, probably his sister. They dragged old burlap sacks behind them, no doubt full of discarded bottles and cans which they’d scrounged from beneath the bridge. Lots of the local punks parked just off the bridge at night, swilling beer and chucking the empties over the side into the water. The litter eventually washed up onto the creekbed, where hillfolk, mostly Creeker kids, would pick it up and sell it for pennies per pound to the recyclers. Picking up junk was all the employment most of these kids would ever have.

Susan, in remorse, turned her face away as they passed. “Christ, that’s sad. Those poor kids.”

“Yeah,” Phil agreed. “I see them all the time now, collecting garbage, or fishing off the streams with strings in the water.”

He’d caught only a glimpse of the pair, filthy, disheveled, in threadbare clothes going to rot. The little girl had no right arm, while the boy possessed arms that were overly long, his hands swinging down past his knees. Their misshapen heads turned, two pairs of tiny scarlet eyes glancing up hopelessly as Phil’s car drove past.

“Some Creekers seem a lot worse off than others,” he observed. “Like those two there—Christ.”

“The way I understand it is it’s kind of like a genetic potluck,” Susan said. “The more these little societies inbreed among themselves, the more deformed they are. Some of the reproductive genes are more defective than others.”

Last night’s excursion into Sallee’s backroom was good proof of that. The Creeker girls Phil had seen dancing were obviously birth defected, yet they also had inherited plenty of normal, and even beautiful, physical traits. Some of them, in fact, couldn’t even be distinguished as Creekers at all, until he’d looked hard.

“And the strangest thing is Natter himself,” Phil went on, following the Route down to the turnoff onto the county expressway. “He’s so big and deformed, but I also remember him being very smart.”

“I don’t know that much about it,” Susan said, “but I did take a sociology class a few years ago on dissociated cultures. Inbred societies aren’t that uncommon, even in this day and age. It’s typical for certain members to have extraordinarily high I.Q.’s while being physically deformed at the same time. And it’s these people who are always the leaders.”

“That fits Natter to a tee.”

“Well, if you want to know more about it, we’re going to the right place.”

Yeah, he realized. The library. Natter was a Creeker, and his PCP operation was run by Creekers. It would be a good idea for Phil to find out as much about them as possible. Then he could deal with them more effectively and with more cognizance.

The library was antiquated: a file card index system instead of a computer, which he was used to from his college days. Susan helped him find his way around after she retrieved her books. They located several titles on the subject, from the very basic—Inbred Life in Appalachia to the very clinical—Genetic Reproductive Defectivity and the Human Genetic Transfection Process.

Phil appraised the stack of books in his arms as they walked back out to the Malibu.

“No Doonesbury for me tonight,” he said.

««—»»

The end of their date had been cut a bit short; Susan, after all, had to work tonight, too, but her hours weren’t as lenient as Phil’s. A goodnight kiss was all he’d gotten at her door, but it was all he’d expected. To push for anything more would’ve been a bad move—even a fatal one, if he hoped to continue seeing her.

Which he did.

And, anyway, it was a good kiss.

Yeah, I really like her, he told himself, walking back to his own room. She’s…cool. It came hard to believe that they were hitting it off this well, considering her original concept of him. She probably still had some doubts, though; who wouldn’t? His Metro record would be a blot on his life forever, despite the fact that the whole thing was a lie. But at least it seemed to him that Susan truly believed him.

Give it some time, he thought.

There was no need to change for work; jeans and T-shirt would do for undercover at Sallee’s. But he still had some time to kill, so he sat down in his busted chair and began to read.

««—»»

Just a little bustin’up, Blackjack thought. That’s all he had time for tonight; he had to make a major pick-up at Rip’s lab out in Tylersville by midnight. But I still got me an hour, he reminded himself, looking at his watch. I’ll make it quick.

It never took Blackjack long to put a good busting on a girl.

He followed the fucked-up kid’s truck up through an old logging road off the Route. The price was right, and Blackjack had heard that you could buy a Creeker girl once you got to be known at Sallee’s. And that chick he’d seen in the backroom?

Yeah, Blackjack thought.

Once he’d gotten a look at her up on that stage, he knew he had to put a busting on her. He’d heard that the kid with the big head was the one you dealt with; Blackjack figured he must be Natter’s pimp; that’s why he watched the door. “Fifty fer a half hour,” the kid quoted. “Sev-tee-five fer a full hour. More fer special.”

Blackjack read the scene right. “Special, huh?” He laid two c-notes on the kid. “How’s about a little bustin’ up?”

“Shore, just don’t’cha cut her none, or kill her. Cody’d be pissed.”

Cody, Blackjack thought. As in Cody Natter. That big ugly fuckin’ Creeker was one dude even Blackjack didn’t want to fuck with. These Creekers gave him the creeps, and everybody knew they looked after their own.

When the kid had taken the green, Blackjack noticed that he had two thumbs on one hand.

“Just foller me,” the kid had said. “‘Tain’t far.”

The rutted road wound through the woods, then sidelined a long grassy field. It was hot tonight, and muggy, but that’s the way Blackjack liked it. And he was getting hot himself just thinking about that Creeker chick he’d seen dancing the first set. A four-titter—He’d heard about them, but tonight was the first time he’d ever gandered one with his own eyes. And the tiniest little mouth, probably not even big enough to stick a cigarette in.

Yeah. Here was a girl he could bust up good.

See, there was no kick if he didn’t bust ’em up first. That was Blackjack’s style—going for the kick. Of course, sometimes he could get a little carried away. One time he’d picked up this little truckstop whore at the Bonfire. He slapped her around a bit first, and then he gagged her when she started to get too noisy, stuffed a big wad of toilet paper in her yap, then tied one of her stockings through her teeth.

Then he got to really punching her up.

He beat her face down to pulp—it looked like a busted open blueberry pie by the time he was through—then he got to giving her a good reaming. Only problem was she all of a sudden got real loose back there, and when Blackjack flipped her over to see what was wrong, he saw that the busting up he gave that pretty face of hers must’ve been a bit much ’cos she was stone-cold dead. Oh, well. In fact, he’d wound up killing several gals in the past—all accidents, kind of. And his part-time partner, Jake Rhodes? Now there was a dude who really went for the busting up, killed plenty of gals, and on purpose, too.

Funny, though, now that Blackjack thought about it, he hadn’t seen old Jake for damn near a month.

Probably out roustin’ more junkies, he figured. Lookin’ for a kick.

That’s all Blackjack wanted: a good kick. And this Creeker gal, all fucked-up like she was, that would make the kick extra special…

Blackjack was fully boned when the bighead kid’s truck pulled up an unpaved incline and stopped. Up ahead, against the woods, Blackjack saw the house, a big whitewashed old place with a long wood porch and sagging roof. The wash took on a kind of gray glow in the moonlight.

Okay, Bighead, what’s the scoop? Blackjack thought when he got out of his own truck.

The kid seemed to be staring up at the house.

“Hey, man? What now?”

“Oh, just go on up, walk right in,” the kid said.

“Where’s the girl?”

“She up there. She’ll be waitin’ fer ya in the front room.”

Blackjack’s rattlesnake boots crackled up the drive. The house looked weird—actually it looked ethereal, but Blackjack himself wasn’t the type to conceive of such a notion—the ghostly white wood glowing, fireflies blinking swarms of tiny lights. Oil lamps seemed to glow in the narrow windows, the haloed moon radiating high up in the crystalline sky.

There she is, he thought when he stepped into the foyer. The four-titter. My oh my, am I gonna put a busting on this bitch but good.

To his right, a long hallway extended into darkness. He heard a distant thumping sound, then what seemed to be a muffled grunt. A tall grandfather clock ticked hypnotically at the rear of the foyer. Tick-tick-tick. Tick-tick-tick.

Oil paintings hung on the walls, but their faces were so dusty and old they looked smeared.

To his left a flight of banistered stairs rose, and halfway up stood the Creeker girl. A plain, very sheer nightgown made her hourglass body appear shrouded in mist. In her seven-fingered hand she held a brass oil lamp.

She didn’t speak—of course not. She probably couldn’t, not with that tiny, dowel-hole mouth of hers. Instead she gestured him to follow with her other hand, which sported eight fingers.

Blackjack took the stairs up, his groin thumping with his heart. He was getting antsy to put a good busting on her, and a good tweaking to those four little tits. On the second-floor landing, another more narrow flight of stairs led upward into pitch dark, from which heat seemed to eddie down.

“What’s up there?” he asked.

The girl, naturally, didn’t answer. She took him down the second-floor hall and turned into the first room.

A big old four-poster bed sat right in the middle. The walls, dark with moldy wallpaper, displayed more blotchy paintings. The girl set the lamp down on an ancient nightstand as Blackjack closed the door.

click

“You’re right pretty for a Creeker,” he said and promptly ripped the nightgown off her body. She trembled only vaguely. The lamp cast indistinct shadows on her paperwhite skin. Blackjack stood back to look at her, and smiled. Yeah, she was a cute little thing, and damn near perfect except for that tiny mouth, them fucked-up hands, and the four tits. But to Blackjack, those traits only increased the kick—they made for a better meal to feast on. Her ink-black hair shined, and those fishblood-red eyes of hers—they just looked at him.

Blackjack cracked her hard across the face with his open palm; he wore fingerless leather mitts that gave an extra snap! to the blow. The girl reeled back, her eyes rolling like little red marbles, and fell on the bed.

“What’sa matter, honey? Bighead outside said it was okay to put a bustin’ on ya,” he guttered. “And damned if I ain’t, what with the green I put in his fucked-up paw.” Blackjack’s eyes focused to pinpoints; his gaze painted her flesh. “Yeah, your bighead pimp, he told me I could do anything I wanted, ’cept cut ya or kill ya. Well, that leaves a lot in between, don’t it?”

He jumped on her.

He plied her breasts. He squeezed them like little bags. Each small breast had another breast underneath, like one pancake lain over another. The nipples were large and dark—pulpy. He bit into the top two, and the girl made a neat squealing sound. Then he lifted the top breasts and bit the more tender nipples on the two beneath. The girl bucked under his weight.

Blackjack liked that. It gave his loins the spark he sought. Her bare, pretty legs splayed beneath him; her flesh was suddenly chaos. It was soft, tender. It was wonderful. Her bristly plot shined like slivers of onyx.

Then those big mitted, boat-hook-sized hands of his girded the girl’s slender throat and began to squeeze. He watched her very intently. Each time he squeezed, her little red eyes bugged. Then he let go, and she gasped through her tiny mouth. He did this for quite awhile, pawing her double breasts each time she blinked away. Squeezing a sponge in a pail of water, then releasing it to let the water soak back in—the sponge was her brain.

He stood up. She lolled on the bed, her face looking like a limp freak-mask. Maybe I’ll bust that little mouth of yours, he made the serious contemplation. But then he thought better of it; he remembered what the bighead kid outside had said. If he busted her up too bad, Natter would be pissed, and Blackjack sure as shit didn’t want that.

“How they feed ya, hon, through that teensy Creeker mouth? What, Bighead outside, he let ya suck pigslop up through a straw? Bet he does. And I bet he puts a good fucking on ya, too, anytime he wants. Bighead out there, he gotta big dick?” Blackjack laughed. “Shee-it, I’ll’se bet he got two, just like you got four tits.”

So he slapped her in the face again.

Whap!

Then he rolled his big hand into a fist and punched her in the face.

Whap, whap, whap!

She moaned as best she could, her eyes fluttering.

“Like that, sweetheart? Bet’cha do. All women do, just they never tell ya. I know the only way ta get any of ya hot is ta beat the shit out’cha.”

He punched her a few more times, enlivened by the sound. The girl was barely conscious, so he bit into her nipples again, one at a time, until it put some jump back in her. Couple of times, he bit into them big meaty nipples like ta bite ’em clean off. Give her somethin’ to remember old Blackjack by. Yeah, that would be a trick, wouldn’t it? Just bite off all four of her nips and eat ’em like big, sweet gumdrops…

Then he flipped her over.

And dropped his jeans.

“Now, hon, I’m gonna choke you out full, and when ya wake up, I’ll be giving you an assin’ like you never dreamed. And don’t tell me ya don’t want it, ’cos I know ya do. All you floozy bitches do. Ya act like yer all highfalutin’ and snotty, but watch’cha all really want is a good ass-fuckin’ after ya been choked out by the Blackjack.”

Gonna be kinda like corin’a apple, he thought. Then a different thought ganged up on him.

Just like my daddy cored me…

She lay docile on her belly. Blackjack straddled her, and slapped his big hands about her throat. Then he squeezed down.

She bucked at first, then kind of shook.

Then she went limp.

He grabbed a big handful of her pretty night-black hair and pulled it back like horse reins.

A dull whap! resounded behind him.

Blackjack glanced up in a kind of mindless, sudden awareness. But he didn’t know exactly what he was aware of here.

What the goddamn hell happ—

Then a blossom of pain exploded at the base of his skull.

— | — | —

Nineteen

Sallee’s was rocking. Heavy metal power chords from the jukebox shook the walls. Strobe lights flashed and hammered the stage in multicolored pandemonium. As rowdy patrons barked for more beer, waitresses hustled between the aisles like gymnasts on high wires.

The crowd was in an uproar.

Christ, Phil thought.

It was Vicki.

She danced through her set with an unmitigated prowess, each step of her high heels in perfect synchronicity with the pounding music. Green eyes scanned the crowd like highly faceted emeralds; her carmine g-string glittered. It was clear—Vicki owned the stage, as well as the crowd, whenever she danced. This was her domain, totally. It must be an odd feeling of power for a woman, through her mere sexual presence, to command the attention of everyone in her midst. But it also must be pretty depressing, Phil considered. When she was up there, naked save for spikes and a g-string, she was an icon of flesh. Not really even a human being anymore, but an entity stripped down to its sexual bones.

Phil tried not to stare.

Her red hair spun to a blur. The strobes seemed to highlight her body in split-second fragments which flashed, then disappeared, all within the pulsing, sonic scape of the music. The crowd howled in frenzy at each step, each move, each sweep of a leg and toss of a shoulder. Glitter and sweat sparkled in the cleft of her bosom…

Phil couldn’t help but let his contemplations crumble. He knew he didn’t love her anymore, yet still, it was not an easy thing to watch one’s ex-fiancée dance topless in a strip joint. The crowd’s predatory revel rose like waves, while Phil’s spirit plummeted. That black voice returned, to ask the question he couldn’t stand to face:

How many guys is she gonna fuck tonight, Phil? Two, three? Five, maybe? Maybe more, huh? A bod and a set of tits like that, shit, I’ll bet she bags a bundle off these redneck slimebags. But cheer up, buddy. At least you got to fuck her for free…

Phil felt even worse when he took a closer look; something glittered more fiercely on her bare chest. Aw, Christ, he thought when he realized what it was.

A tiny diamond on a sheer gold chain.

A Valentine’s Day gift he’d given her over a decade ago.

“Another beer, pal?” asked the odd barkeep.

“Yeah, why not?” Phil replied.

“You look like someone shot your dog.”

“Well,” Phil said, “actually I’m pretty bummed that there’s no wrestling on tonight.”

“Grappling,” the keep corrected. “It was on earlier. Nature Boy Ric Flair knocked Sting’s lights out. It was glorious.”

“Damn, I miss out on everything,” Phil said.

Then the ever-familiar slap impacted his back; Eagle Peters stood up to the rail, his long blond hair swaying. “What’s up, man?”

“Just hanging out.”

Eagle cast a quick gaze to Vicki onstage. “Yeah,” he replied rather darkly, then wisely saw fit to change subjects. “Hey, you feel like going in the back room?”

Phil looked up with a wince. “I thought you hated the back room?”

“I do, but I gotta talk to someone.” Eagle paused. “Gotta talk a little business.”

A little business, huh? Phil thought. It seemed another great opportunity had just landed in his lap. “I’m always game for the back room,” he said, remembering his cover. “Let’s go.”

“And another thing.” Eagle lowered his voice. “You interested in a little sideline work? We gotta little run to make tonight, but we need a driver.”

“What are you running?” Phil asked.

“Just don’t worry about that. It ain’t risky. We can lay a couple hundred on you for an hour’s work. You interested or not?”

Was Eagle testing him? Phil didn’t know. But what he did know was that Eagle had an arrest record for running PCP, and he’d just asked Phil to be his driver. This was every undercover cop’s dream…

“Like I said, man, let’s go.”

Just play it cool, Phil, he told himself.

They got up and wended their way to the entry. Druck, the Creeker doorman, gave them both a hard look, then nodded that they could pass. Inside seemed even darker than last night, and quieter. A deformed dancer moved slowly up on the stage in a veil of blood-red light and droning music. Thank God it was dark in here; Phil didn’t care to see the details. All he could tell was that her head seemed bulbed in three humps…

Eagle whispered something to a cryptic waitress with large breasts and one foreshortened arm. Then she seated them in a back booth.

At once, another figure joined them.

“This here’s Paul Sullivan,” Eagle introduced. “My pal, Phil Straker. Don’t worry, he’s cool. Says he wants to drive for us tonight.”

Alarms were already ringing in Phil’s head at the name. Paul Sullivan. That’s the guy with the rap sheet for dust, the guy who filed the missing person report. “Hey, Paul, good to meet ya,” he said and offered to shake the guy’s hand.

The guy didn’t shake.

Paul Sullivan had a face like a beaten anvil, a beady-eyed, unpleasant wedge. Shortish dark hair and a toughened build. “I don’t know, man,” Sullivan complained to Eagle. “I ain’t never seen this guy before.”

“Relax,” Eagle assured. “I told you, he’s cool; I known him for years. You said we needed a new man since Kevin blew town.”

Sullivan shrugged. “Awright, I guess we can try him out. So long as he don’t ask no questions.”

“Hey, man, you want me to drive, I’ll drive.”

Sullivan sort of smirked, then began trading whispers with Eagle. Phil couldn’t make out much of what they were saying, but he figured it best to try to pick things up a step at a time. Instead he pretended to watch the stage. The Creeker girl with the cloven head had lain down on her back, her legs rising in a sleek V. Her bare feet, with but three toes on each, roved slowly in the dark-scarlet light.

Earlier Phil had read a little bit about inbred physiology in the books he’d gotten at the county library. The phenomena proved much more intricate than he’d thought.

The more intensive the inbreeding, the more damage to the reproductive genes, and the higher the rate of defective births. Scarlet eyes and black hair were common traits, and so were enlarged heads, missing or extra fingers and toes, and uneven limbs. But Phil quickly assumed that these Creekers were extraordinarily inbred, bad genes passing down not for years but for whole generations, because a lot of the deformities he’d seen were gross extensions of those detailed in the books. One of the books had pictures, and they weren’t nearly as severe as the Creekers here.

Phil looked closer at the dancer’s head. It seemed split by a hard fissure of flesh. But—

What’s she doing now?

The dancer remained flat on her back with her legs raised.

Then her hips seemed to…shake.

In a few seconds it became apparent what she was doing.

She’s dislocating her hips, Phil thought in grotesque astonishment. It was true. Her buttocks, completely bare save for the tiny g-string, began to flex, sleek muscles churning beneath the white, stretched skin. Phil grit his teeth; the macabre act hurt just to watch.

Eventually her labors alternately worked her femurs out of their hip sockets with a resounding double pop-pop!—

Hooooly shit, Phil thought.

—and then the dislocated legs ranged back all the way to the floor.

She lay the back of her head in her feet as one might do with their hands while lying in bed. Phil couldn’t imagine anything more unnatural—that is—until he saw what she did next.

Her feet rose back up, turning at impossible angles as the trained muscles of her legs twisted expertly this way and that. Soon, then, she was caressing herself with her feet.

Her toes trailed up and down her abdomen. Her heels rubbed her pubis. And then, with the arches of her feet, she began to caress her breasts as deftly as if they were hands…

Good God Almighty, was all Phil could think.

“Come on, man,” Eagle said. “Time to go.”

Phil rose, gulping at the final image: the girl slipping her feet beneath the diminutive g-string and fondling her sex. He followed Eagle and Sullivan out the back door.

“Like that Creeker freak-show shit, huh, bub?” Sullivan asked him.

“Yeah, it’s a trip,” Phil lied. They walked across Sallee’s gravel lot. Phil could tell he didn’t like Sullivan right off, the tone of his voice, the mean look in his small eyes, but Phil had to keep that at bay. “Yeah, they’re all a bunch of fucked-up whores in there,” Sullivan continued. “Them chicks up front too, cokeheads, cocksuckers. ’Specially that hot-shit Vicki Steele. You see her, bub?”

“Yeah, I saw her.”

“She’s the only one of them whores who charges more’n a hundred. Fuckin’ stuck-up, ritzy cokehead whore is what she is, thinks her shit don’t stink, thinks that just ’cos she’s Natter’s cooze she’s somethin’ special. Ain’t nothin’ but redneck scum just like all the rest of ’em. Boy, I’ll tell ya, I’d fuck that cokehead whore so hard her brains would slop out her ears.”

Phil swallowed these words like a mouth full of rocks.

“Hey, Paul, give it a rest, will ya?” Eagle kindly suggested without elaborating that the woman he so explicitly referred to had once been engaged to Phil. “You wanna fill our new partner in, or what?”

Sullivan chuckled. He solidly filled out his jeans and light flannel shirt with a body-builder’s physique, and that unpleasant, beat-up face of his only steepened the image. A tough customer. But Phil didn’t let that intimidate him; Sullivan was flesh and bone just like everyone, and just as vulnerable. The guy went on, “Okay, bub, me and my buddy Eagle here, we gotta make a pickup tonight, and we need a dupe to drive us, ya know? A dummy who’ll dummy up and not ask a lot of questions.”

Phil smiled vaguely. Sullivan was testing him, all right, to see just how much shit Phil could tolerate. Fine with me, Phil thought to himself. “Hey look, man, I’m just along for the cash. I could shit care less what you guys are moving.”

“Good, bub, and make sure it stays that way, ’cos there ain’t nothin’ that pisses me off worse’n a nosy chump.”

“You can call me chump and dupe and dummy all ya want, brother,” Phil told him. “Like I said, I’m just lookin’ for the cash, and as long as yours is green, you can call me fuckin’ Captain Kangaroo if you want.”

Sullivan chortled and slapped Phil on the back. “You know somethin’, bub? I’m beginnin’ ta like you already—”

Boy, would I like to kick this guy’s ass all over the parking lot, Phil thought amusedly. Instead he just said, “We gonna gab all night, or should we get moving?”

“Your wheels, bub,” Sullivan instructed. “Cops might be wise to me and Eagle’s wheels.”

“Fine,” Phil said, approaching the Malibu. “I just hope I moved that box of dog shit out of the back seat.”

Sullivan guffawed. “Yeah, Eag, this pal of yours, he’s a friggin’ riot!”

Jesus, Phil thought. This guy’s some mental giant. Bet he’s got an I.Q. smaller than his belt size.

The three of them piled into Phil’s clunker, Sullivan riding shotgun. Phil put the keys in the ignition. “Where to?”

“Nowhere just yet.” Sullivan’s dark angled face turned; he seemed to be reaching for something in his pocket. Is this guy shaking me down? Phil wondered with surprising calm. Does he know I’m a cop? Phil had his Beretta .25 in a Bianchi wallet holster; it would be tough, but he thought he could get it shucked and cocked fast enough to beat Sullivan to the draw if the guy was pulling a fast one. Phil’s hand slid along his own leg, inching toward his pocket.

“Hey, Paul?” Eagle asked from the backseat. “What gives? We gotta get moving.”

Sullivan’s face looked like a mask of baked clay. He’d removed a small plastic bag from his jeans pocket. The bag contained several joints.

Phil sorely doubted that it was marijuana.

“What we got here, bub, is some of the best flake in the county, and just to show you what a class guy I am, I’m gonna let you have a toke.”

“Come on, Paul,” Eagle objected. “Put that shit away. He’s gotta drive for us.”

“Yeah, well, if your buddy boy here can’t drive with a buzz, then he must be a pussy, and we don’t want no pussies drivin’ on our runs.” Sullivan grinned in the dark car. “And besides, I don’t know this chump from a hole in the ground. How do I know he ain’t a narc?”

Then Sullivan handed Phil a lighter and one of the joints. Flake, Phil thought. PCP sprayed on pot or tobacco.

Sullivan’s voice seemed to flutter. “Go ahead, bub, light up and have a toke. And if you don’t, that tells me one thing.”

“Yeah?” Phil replied.

“You ain’t for real.”

Phil rolled the end of the joint in his mouth.

Here goes nothing, he thought.

He lit the joint. An acrid, nasty fetor rose with the thread of smoke off the joint’s end. The smoke coiled in the air, a ghost-snake, spreading, spreading…

Susan had warned him of this, hadn’t she?

He had no choice.

Phil began to take a long drag.

««—»»

Blackjack came to with a smeared glare in his eyes. The moon, he realized dazedly. Cloying, humid darkness becloaked him, but as he squinted up he noticed the moon in the window.

Wait a fuckin’ minute. What window? Where am I?

Memories straggled back, marching through his mind. Sallee’s. The backroom. And—

The trick. The whore.

That Creeker bitch done set me up…

When he tried to get up, a parade of pain rewarded him for his efforts. His left arm felt numbed, throbbing, and so did the lower-right side of the back of his skull. The darkness smothered his right hand when he raised it; he brought it down and touched his chest, his hip, his thigh, and realized he’d been stripped naked.

The bare, splintery wood beneath him felt warm; sweat trickled down his sides like crazed ants.

Good God, I feel like hell…

The darkness throbbed with his arm and leg, and with the roaring pain at the back of his head.

And more memories flitted back.

He’d been about to put a good busting on that Creeker whore. The four-titter, he remembered. The one with the tiny mouth. But what happened next?

He’d been choking her out, and—

Fuck.

That was all he remembered…

He clamped his teeth shut against the pain. Yeah, some son of a bitch fucked me up good, he deduced. It’s a scam Natter’s got going in there. The whore set me up, then I’ll bet that bighead kid snuck up behind me and put a wallop on my head. But what the fuck’s Natter got against me? I ain’t done shit to that ugly Creeker fuck. Don’t make no sense to whack me out.

One thing Blackjack did know:

I gotta get the fuck outta here.

Wherever here was.

The house, he thought. Yes, he must still be at the house. She’d taken him up to a small room on the second floor. But this couldn’t be the same room. It was hotter than embers here, and he remembered old carpet on the floor of the whore’s room, but this floor was bare wood.

Get up. Gotta move, he ordered himself. Gotta get out of this joint before Bighead comes back to finish the job…

It was nearly impossible not to cry out when he lifted himself to his hands and knees. He had to rest, shuddering. His brain throbbed like something fit to bust out of his skull. The only bearing he could make for himself was the shutterless, uncurtained window and the moon glowing in its frame. The smudged panes stood just above him to the right, but the pain made it seem hundreds of feet away. He could hear his sweat dripping onto the wood floor as he crawled forward, toward the flaking sill.

Goddamn, what a job they done on me!

His left hand was all but useless. His right grabbed the lip of the sill and pulled.

It was a concerted effort; Blackjack never would’ve thought that simply standing up would be so difficult. Nevertheless, after much wincing, gasping, and grunting, he stood on his own two feet, leaning racked against the wall.

He peered out the window.

Christ…

Yeah, this was the same house, all right. He recognized the front yard and that shitty dirt road leading down the hill. But the bighead kid’s rattletrap truck was gone—

Motherfuckin’ Creeker motherfuckers!

—and so was his own.

God knew how he was going to get out of here, and once he did, what would he do? Walk around the woods buck naked? He didn’t even really know where he was. Some unmarked road off the Route, then a couple of turns he’d never remember. But—

Fuck it, he concluded.

Better to walk around naked and lost than stay here and buy the farm.

Peering out, he figured he must be on the third floor, not the second. From earlier, he vaguely recalled a narrow flight of steps going up from the floor the whore’s room was on. The window was his only way out…

He’d have to crawl out the window, slide down the shingled awning, then drop to the roof. That would be tough in any case, but with his left arm and leg so numb they felt dead, it would be damn near impossible. Still, though, what choice did he have?

Just gonna have to do it, he told himself. Just gonna have to flop outta this window and get the fuck outta this freak-house.

Just as he tried to push open the window, he noticed—

Aw, fer shit’s sake, no!

—that it had been nailed shut.

But before he could think further…

Whuh? What the fuck was that?

Had he heard something?

Voices, or something like voices, seemed to tickle his mind. He stared back wide-eyed in the dark…

Ona…

“Ah-no-pray-bee…

Redeemer…

“Mannona-come…

Sanctifier…

“Save us—”

They were like words mixed with thoughts. Etched whispers melded to blobs of swarming head-sounds. But one thing was clear to Blackjack: Someone else was in the room.

“Wh-who’s there?” Blackjack challenged.

The dark stood before him, impenetrable, a solid black wall.

“I know someone’s there, so how’s ’bout tellin’ me what the fuck’s goin’ on?”

No reply. Just the grainy dark staring back.

Then—

Blackjack jerked right.

Did he see something? Did he see something moving there in the corner to his right?

Something seemed to have shifted. A wet slither behind something blacker than the darkness…

“Mannona-come…”

“Onnamann…”

Blessed Ona, we give thee thanks!

A scream froze in Blackjack’s throat when something slimy, humid, and hideous reached out of the dark and very gently touched his shoulder.

— | — | —

Twenty

Something hot seemed to insinuate itself along Phil’s nerves to his brain, where it then lodged and seemed to hum. At once, he felt edgy, disjointed, but at the same time tranquilized. He knew there was no way to fake it, not around these guys. They were pros. He’d taken most of the drag in his mouth, holding it, then snorting it out through his sinuses, and had actually inhaled only a trace.

But only a trace had been enough.

Goddamn, he thought, flabbergasted. What a buzz…

Sullivan took the joint back. “Hey, bub, don’t be a bogart.” Then he laughed and began to smoke it himself.

Thank God, Phil thought. The stuff packed a heavy wallop; he knew that if he had to smoke any more of it, he wouldn’t be able to stand up, much less drive a car. Got to shake this off, he told himself. He started the Malibu. “Decent flake,” he said. “Big buzz. So where are we going?”

“North up the Route,” Eagle said.

Once he got going, he began to feel better. He let the fresh air from the open window rush into his face. His brow prickled, dark splinters seemed to twitch at the farthest peripheries of his vision, and every so often he was touched by a chill that was somehow hot.

Sullivan finished the flake joint as though he were eating the dense smoke. “Okay, bub, now I know you’re for real. One of our partners beat town a couple weeks ago, so we need a new driver full-time. You’re it.”

“Sounds good,” Phil said.

“What we do is pick up the finished product from our supplier, then drop it off at our points. The money’s good, and the cops aren’t on to us.”

Oh, yeah? Phil thought. I can’t wait to send you up to the slam for five…bub. “What’s your circuit?”

“Just north county,” Eagle said from the back of the Malibu. “Millersville, Lockwood, Waynesville, thereabouts. Rednecks buy this shit hand over fist. Our product’s better and cheaper than the regular supplier. We’re gonna cut him out.”

“Who’s the regular supplier?” Phil asked, but he thought he had a pretty good idea already who they were talking about.

“Never you mind about that,” Sullivan griped. “You’re just the wheel-man, so get on the wheels.”

“Right,” Phil said.

Eagle directed him through several turns up roads he never knew existed. Most were dirt roads, rutted and potholed, often so narrow that overgrown brush swiped the car on either side. Eventually they came to a clearing, and Phil was instructed to stop.

“Fuckin’-A,” Sullivan complained. “The bastard ain’t here. Are we early?”

“We’re five late,” Eagle said.

“Then where the fuck is Blackjack?”

Phil just sat there and kept his mouth shut. He knew he’d learn more about the network in time. But Sullivan and Eagle seemed overly distressed, pressing themselves into long silences, jerking their gazes constantly about the car.

They sat there a half-hour, and no one showed up.

These guys are freaking out because their point man’s running late? Phil thought. It didn’t make much sense. Why are these guys shitting their pants?

Eagle nervously swept his hair out of his eyes, leaning forward from the back. “How many times has Blackjack been this late?”

“Never,” Sullivan hotly answered.

“So the guy’s late,” Phil offered. “What’s the big deal?”

“Tell him the big deal,” Sullivan said, waving a hand.

Eagle’s face in the rearview looked pale. “Lately a lot of our point men and distros have been disappearing.”

“Jake Rhodes, Kevin Orndorf, and now Blackjack,” Sullivan grimly recited. “And there have been others, and I mean a fuckin’ shitload of others.”

“Maybe the cops are on to us,” Eagle suggested, “and we’re just too stupid to see it.”

“You guys are moving local dust,” Phil jumped in. “The county and state could shit care less about it—dust is small time to them. They’re all out after scag and coke. And the local cops? Guys like Mullins? No way. Those town clowns can’t even write parking tickets; they’re too busy taking bingo graft and pad money. It ain’t cops, fellas.”

“The fuck’s going on then?” Sullivan shouted.

“Wake up and smell the coffee. You just got done telling me you’re trying to undercut the major dust supplier in the area, and all of a sudden your people are disappearing. What’s that tell you?”

“Somebody’s putting the whack on us,” Eagle said. “And we’re sitting here like three ducks in a bathtub.”

««—»»

What a couple of dupes, Phil thought, chuckling all the way back. No wonder the idiots had done time; they were just plain stupid. Fuckers couldn’t sell shovels to ditch diggers. He’d dropped them off at their trucks back at Krazy Sallee’s, and agreed to meet them tomorrow night. Mullins is going to love this. Gotta hand it to the guy, though. He called the whole thing right from the start.

The “other” dust supplier had to be Natter, and it had to be Natter who was putting contracts out on these new movers. So far everything fit.

Now I just got to plan my own next move, Phil realized, and it better be a good one.

It was past two when he’d dropped Eagle and Sullivan off. He drove around an hour just to make some leeway, then parked the Malibu behind the strip mall where they had the cleaners who did his shirts. Then he made a halfmile walk to the station.

“How was the rednecking tonight?” Susan asked from behind her radio console.

“Not bad,” Phil told her. “Maybe I really am a redneck at heart; I’m fitting in just like the real McCoy.”

“I was getting a little worried,” she said. Her bright blue eyes glittered up at him. Her blond hair shined. “I didn’t hear from you over your portable all night.”

Worried about little old me? Phil thought. Well, that was a good sign. “It’s hard to whip out the police portable when you’re driving on a pickup run with two PCP peddlers,” he proudly replied.

“You’re kidding. Who?”

“Eagle Peters and that guy Sullivan, the one who filed the missing persons a while back.” Phil smiled. “They’re both dust peddlers, and I’m their new driver.”

“That’s great!” Susan exclaimed. “Jesus, you’re really getting in deep, and fast.”

“It’s just my well-proven expertise, my dear. I can’t help it—I’m a supercop.”

“Yeah, well, Supercop better be real careful. The closer you get to these people, the more dangerous it gets.”

“Danger,” Phil said, “is my middle name. Oh, and you were right; I had to prove myself tonight.”

“What?” she asked very speculatively.

“I had to smoke some dust.”

“What was it like?”

“I only smoked a little, but it put a whack on me pretty fast, made me feel kind of mellowed out but hyper at the same time. I don’t know what the big deal is, though. The crap just gave me a headache after the buzz. But, anyway, these guys think I’m legit now, so I’m in.”

“What are you going to do now?”

“I’ve got a good idea, I think. What I need right now is for you to punch up Sullivan again.”

“Why?”

“I need his address.”

Susan looked doubtful. “What have you got cooking, Phil?”

“Just trust me, okay?”

She wavered at her console, then, reluctantly punched up Sullivan’s name on the county mainframe-link. Then she gave Phil the guy’s address.

“All right, see you later.”

“Wait a minute.” Susan got up and came toward him at the door. “You’re really spooking me. What are you going to do?”

“Hey, I told you, don’t worry about it. Let’s just say that I’m going to spin some grease and see how fast I can turn a tough guy into a stool pigeon.”

“Phil, I don’t like the sound of this. You can’t be screwing around with these people. At least let me go with you.”

“Forget it. I’ll talk to you tomorrow,” he said and turned for the door.

But before he could leave, she grabbed his shoulder and urged him around.

Then she kissed him.

“What was that for?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” she replied. “I guess I just felt like it.”

“Well, you can feel like it anytime you want.”

“Besides, my kisses are good luck, and I have a feeling you’re gonna need it—whatever this hare-brained scheme of yours is.”

Phil paused a moment, and took in the vision of her beautiful face. Don’t turn into a sap, he commanded himself. “Like I said, don’t worry about it. Talk to you tomorrow,” he said and left.

The kiss tingled on his lips. Yeah, I must be doing something right, he thought. So make sure you don’t get yourself killed now…

Sullivan lived in one of the big trailer parks just out of town; Phil drove straight to it. Hope Paul’s an early riser. It was close to four-thirty in the morning when Phil pounded on the flimsy aluminum storm door.

“Who’s that?” came Sullivan’s rocky voice after a good five minutes of knocking.

“It’s me, Phil.”

“Who?”

“Phil. You know, your new driver.”

“Whadaya want?”

“Come on, man. Open up. This is important.”

With further grumbling, Sullivan undid several safety chains and opened the inside door. He stood there groggily, dressed only in boxer shorts. “What? Ya find that bastard Blackjack?” he asked.

“No, man,” Phil said. “Sorry to wake you up, but this really is important.”

“Yeah, bub, ya already told me that.”

“I need to ask you something.”

Sullivan’s muscled chest flexed when he thumbed the sleep out of his eyes. “Ask me somethin’? What?”

“Well, I need to know which side of your face do you want me to bust first, the right or the left?”

Sullivan’s beady, sleep-puffed eyes stared at him. “What the fuckin’ hell you talkin’ ab—”

Phil punched right through the flimsy storm screen; his fist slammed into Sullivan’s big, wedgy face with a sound like a baseball bat to a heavy bag. Sullivan reeled backward, arms pinwheeling, and stumbled over a tacky armchair. He landed flat on his back.

Phil invited himself in. “Wow, Paul, great place you’ve got here. I love the Dart Drug furniture, and those carpet tiles?” Phil whistled. “I’ll bet they cost you a buck a piece at least, huh?”

Sullivan dizzily tried to rise; Phil kicked him in the chest with his pointed boot. “Oh, by the way, Paul, your previous trepidations were quite on the mark. I’m a cop. And one more thing… You’re under arrest for possession of and intent to distribute PCP.”

Sullivan looked up from hands and knees. “A cop? You chump motherfucker. I knew there was somethin’ fucked up about you.”

“Congratulations on your perceptivity,” Phil said. “And, let me make it perfectly clear—” Phil rammed the heel of his palm into the top of Sullivan’s head —whap!— “that you have the right to remain silent” —whap!— “and anything you say will be used against you in a court of law.” Whap! “You also have the right to an attorney. If you can’t afford an attorney” —whap!— “the state will be happy to appoint one to you at no cost.” With that, Phil picked up a flimsy, fiberboard coffee table and promptly broke it over Sullivan’s head—

crack!

Sullivan collapsed.

Phil looked around. The place was a dump, but that’s pretty much what he expected. Porno magazines were spread over the kitchen table; empty beer cans filled a plastic trash can. When Sullivan came to, he rose again on hands and knees.

“I got my rights, bub,” he growled. “You can’t just walk in here and assault me.”

“Yes, I can,” Phil said, and swept his pointed boot right up into Sullivan’s belly. “Please pardon my lack of proper law enforcement protocol, but you know, it’s a two-way street? I get great pleasure out of kicking the shit out of a dope-dealing scumbag like you. And you can tell the D.A. that I violated your rights till you’re blue in the face, but who’s he gonna believe? As for the bruises and, hopefully, broken bones, well…you should be more cooperative with the local constables, Paul. It’s not nice to resist lawful arrest.”

Phil then punched Sullivan in the side of the head so hard his knuckles hurt. Then he straddled Sullivan, and cuffed his wrists behind his back.

“Listen to me, Paul. I don’t like PCP, and I don’t like guys who sell it. You’ve been to the joint already, and I guarantee you, this bust will send you up for five to ten. I think the cellblock boys will be happy to see you again, wouldn’t you say?”

Phil grabbed Sullivan’s mussed hair and gave it a good hard twist.

Sullivan shrieked. “You can’t do this, man! You’re torturing me!”

“No I’m not, Paul.” Phil gave Sullivan’s hair another twist. “I’m ‘interviewing’ you, for relevant information concerning a local police investigation.”

One more twist, and Sullivan was a ludicrous sight, squirming flat on his belly in his boxer shorts with his wrists handcuffed behind his back. “But there is one thing you should know, Paul,” Phil went on. “There are times when I am mysteriously given to acts of leniency. In other words, you start running that ugly mouth of yours and tell me the stuff I want to know, then maybe, just maybe, I’ll drop the distribution charge and see to it that you don’t get more than eighteen months in the can. They’ll drop it to nine if you show them some good behavior, Paul. So what’s it gonna be? Nine months or ten years?”

Sullivan continued to squirm on his belly. “Why should I trust you?”

“Because to a lowlife, scumbag, two-time loser like you, I’m the most trustworthy guy in town.” Phil laughed. “I want to know who your supplier is, and I want to know where he makes his product. But more than any of that, Paulie, I want to know about your competition, this other local supplier you and Eagle are trying to undersell.”

Sullivan slackened. “I ain’t tellin’ you shit, bub.”

“Aw, Paul, don’t call me bub. Let’s try to cooperate, huh? Who’s that local dust supplier? Where’s his lab?”

“Fuck you,” Sullivan replied,

“Okay, be like that.” Phil got back up, kneeling on Sullivan’s back in the process. Sullivan shrieked again, then shrieked even more when Phil hauled him up by the handcuffs.

“Guess I’ll just have to get what I want out of Eagle,” Phil remarked, hauling Sullivan toward the door. “I’m taking you to jail now, that’s right, in your boxer shorts. How do you like that…bub?”

««—»»

Phil booked Sullivan into the county lockup, with an isolation request pending investigation—no visitors, in other words. He didn’t want Paul telling Eagle or any other cronies that Phil was the law. Let him sit in the lockup for a week or so, he’ll change his tune once he remembers what it’s like to be back on the cellblock. And as for Phil’s overall conduct—well, he didn’t feel too badly about it. If he’d learned anything at all on Metro, it was this: When dealing with scumbags, you sometimes had to be a scumbag yourself. Nor was he worried about Sullivan filing any brutality charges. The judge would take one look at Sullivan’s rap sheet and laugh harder than Slappy White, and Sullivan knew this. Pretty soon that lesser-charge offer Phil had made would be looking better than a pile of ground round to a wolf that hadn’t eaten in a week.

He was dog-tired when he pushed through the rickety front door at Old Lady Crane’s boardinghouse. What a night, he thought. Then his heart skipped…

Just as he passed the stairwell, a figure stepped out.

“Phil?”

“Jesus, Susan!” he nearly yelled. “Don’t sneak up on me like that—I was about to go for my piece!”

“My, aren’t we jumpy today,” she said. “I heard your car pull up, so I came down.”

Phil let his heart return to its normal beat, then smiled. “Didn’t mean to yell,” he apologized. “But I’m getting so deep into the local dope circuit, it’s making me edgy.” Only then did he take full note of her. Her bright-blond hair was tousled, and she stood bare-legged and bare-foot, dressed solely in a long white nightshirt. Her blue eyes looked at him groggily; she’d obviously been sleeping, and this only reminded him of the ludicrous schedules night-workers kept. “It’s almost ten a.m.,” he joked. “Isn’t that past your bedtime?”

“I couldn’t sleep. I was too worried about you getting your ass shot off,” she came back. “What happened with Sullivan?”

Again, Phil was flattered that she actually worried about him. What did that mean? “I busted him,” he told her. “Come on, I’ll fix us some coffee and tell you all about it.”

She padded behind him to his room. “My room’s hotter than a steambath. How about ice water instead?”

“Coming right up.” He went to his cubby of a kitchen and plunked ice into two glasses. “Anyway, like I was saying, I went to Sullivan’s place and busted him on a distro charge. You should’ve seen how ridiculous the guy looked standing in front of the booking sergeant in his boxer shorts. It was great!”

“Did he give you any trouble?”

“Not after I broke the coffee table over his head.” He gave her the glass of water, then they both sat down on his busted couch. “They took me on to drive for them, and Eagle verified that they’re trying to undercut another dust distributor in the area—”

“Natter?”

“I’m sure,” Phil said. “And they also told me their point people have been disappearing right and left, so that just verifies our suspicions even more. We were supposed to meet some drop-man named Blackjack last night, and the guy never showed. I’m convinced now. Natter’s putting contracts out on anyone trying to move dust on his turf.”

Suddenly Susan looked distressed. “Phil, you’re getting too close too fast, aren’t you? This is really getting scary.”

Phil wasn’t sure what she meant. “How so?”

“How so? Natter’s hitting the outside competition, Phil, and with you driving for Eagle, that makes you as big a target as any of them. If they catch you with Eagle, they’ll kill you.”

“And if I flash my badge—”

“They’ll kill you anyway.”

Phil shrugged at the undeniable reality. “I’ve been doing stuff like this for years. And I’m very careful.”

“You better be,” she whispered more to herself than to him.

It seemed strange, the way she was acting, but by now it was occurring to Phil very clearly that something was up. As always, her plain, honest beauty was tuning him up. Here she was, in an old nightshirt, her hair mussed, and her eyes puffy with fatigue, but she still seemed more beautiful to him than a thousand centerfolds. She’s gorgeous even when she’s a mess, he thought. He could tell she was braless beneath the nightshirt, and probably pantiless too, judging by her obviously conscious effort to keep her legs closed. Any other guy, he knew, would be making a move now, but Phil also knew that Susan was not a woman men made “moves” on; she didn’t live by typical social games and sexual tactics. He’d like nothing more right now than to take her to his bed and make love to her. But…

“You look tired,” he said.

Her sleepy blue eyes fluttered. “Yeah, I guess I am. Getting used to midnight shifts is harder than I thought. Anyway, what’s your next step with Eagle?”

“I’m supposed to meet him tonight at Sallee’s. He doesn’t know that Sullivan’s busted—I’m betting that he’ll think the guy ‘disappeared’ like the others.” Phil grinned. “I can’t wait to see his reaction.”

“What did Mullins say about you busting Sullivan?”

“He—” Phil’s train of thought collided with a brick wall. “Damn it! I’m supposed to be keeping him posted on this, and I haven’t even told him yet. Be right back.”

Phil rushed to the den and dialed the station. The last thing he needed was the county detention center calling Mullins and asking him about the jurisdictional processing of a prisoner he didn’t even know had been arrested.

Fortunately, Mullins was at his desk when he called, and Phil gave him the rundown.

Mullins, once Phil explained his plan, was ecstatic.

At least I’m making things happen, Phil told himself. Hope it works out.

When he came back to the main room, Susan was asleep on the couch. He didn’t want to wake her; she’d been up for hours, worrying about him. So he put her legs up and turned off the light.

Before he went to bed himself, he went into the bathroom to take a quick shower. And while he was showering…

Susan, nude now, came into the bathroom. She didn’t utter a word when she got into the shower with him.

— | — | —

Twenty-One

Ah-no-prey-bee…

Ona-for-blood…

Gut shuddered.

The dream-words siphoned round his head. His eyes bugged open. He felt cold and hot at the same time; he felt drenched in sweat yet dry as pumice.

It was always dark in here, and the darkness was his nemesis. It seduced him with its comfort, then dropped the memories into his lap like freshly severed heads.

The darkness whispered the dream-words again and again as he lay helpless and churning…

But they weren’t really dream-words, were they?

Ah-no—

They were real…

prey-bee…

The hideous face, like a cracked mask, was always there, hovering in the dark. Day or night, asleep or awake—it didn’t matter.

It was simply…always…there…

Gut shuddered fiercer this time.

He peed his pants again.

The screams were there, too. How could he forget them? And how could he forget what they’d done to Scott-Boy?

Christ…Scott-Boy…

“Fergive me, God,” he whispered.

It had to be God, sending demons after ’em for their sins. Gut knew they’d done terrible things, all the razzin’ and dope-sellin’, sellin’ all that shit ta kids just ta turn a buck. Not ta mention all the rape and throat-cuttin’. He’d rucked plenty of guys for their green, and he’d laughed right along every time Scott-Boy busted some chick’s coconut with that hickory pick handle of his.

We deserved it.

Yeah, that was fer shore. He and Scott-Boy, they had done some down-an’-dirty things all right, and now God was gonna fix their wagons fer it, an’ He was gonna fix ’em so they’d never roll again. Tears streamed down Gut’s blubber face, glistening like slug trails. Aw, shit, God, I’se really sorry fer all the razzin’ we pulled an’ all the splittails we fucked with, an’ all them poor folks we hooked on the dust so’s we could git reg-ler scratch out of ’em. Yeah, God, I’se really shore’s shit sorry fer it all.

It was a fine time ta get religion. But maybe God had fergiven him ’cos, if not, weren’t He have let the same thing that happened ta Scott-Boy happen ta him, too?

Oh, yessir, Gut remembert what they up and done to Scott-Boy. One thing he remembert expressly was how one of ’em got ta whittlin’ the flesh offa Scott-Boy’s fingers like he was just plain whittlin’ bark off a pine switch…

Gut’s sweat turned rank as dead fish gone belly-up in a swamp. He felt grimy in his layin’-down-goin’-nowhere-sheer-fuckin’ terror, like somebody had throwed him smack-dab in a shithole and made him roll around in it fer awhiles.

And the memory of the face hovered.

We give you this day your daily flesh.

Yeah, ol’ God had sent demons.

Thing was, Gut reckernized one of ’em.

Yessir.

He shore’s shit did.

««—»»

Phil’s alarm went off at 4 p.m., another unwelcome reminder of his queer night hours. He turned irritated in bed, then noticed the unfamiliar warmth of the sheets on the other side.

Then he remembered the rest—

Susan…

She’d slipped into the shower with him. Neither of them said a word. Her gesture should’ve surprised him, but it didn’t. It was nothing like that at all. Their attraction to each other was self-evident, so perhaps he even, in some unconscious way, expected something like this.

Oh, jeeez…

Beneath the cool torrent, they touched each other as if they’d been lovers for years. The water cascaded; her denuded beauty shone like a beacon. They alternately kissed, sudsing each other with the foamy soap. Their tongues frolicked, their hands strayed through bubbles over each other’s flesh.

She was so soft, so wonderfully warm. Her breasts squeezed against his broad chest as she slipped her arms tight about his waist to desperately draw him closer. The cool water turned hot the instant it hissed against her skin.

Her skin felt like fine, warm silk…

It was a dreamscape of sensation and cool rain. Of timeless kisses and wet, caressing hands. Of undistracted love. Phil was aware of nothing else in the world but her. This was his only world right now, a world of her beauty and his desire, a perfect domain where the only inhabitants were the two of them, and where the only sounds were their ardent breaths, their moans, their gasps, and their sighs, and the endless hiss of the water.

Dripping wet, they hauled each other from the shower. They kissed and fondled and stumbled across the hot room and fell onto the bed in one another’s arms.

She was beautiful. He’d always known that, but never in his life did he fully understand the meaning of the word until now. It was so much more than her body, so much more than her gleaming blue eyes, her damp silver-blond hair, her face. It was everything ineffable about their being together like this.

His passion became palpable. His passion delved into her, explored her every inch. His hands ranged over her perfect skin as a novice sculptor might touch a masterpiece. He touched and kissed and licked her everywhere, from her eyes to the tips of her toes, to her most secret and private places. Her ardor gave; second by second she opened herself to him.

But first, before he demonstrated his passion most fully, she stopped him, whispered into the crook of his neck—

“Phil. I—I need—”

“What?” he asked, trailing his tongue up the sleek, damp slope of her throat.

“I need to know something…”

“What?”

He kissed her, tasted her, reveled in her.

“I need to know…if you’re still in love with…with…Vicki,” she finished.

“No. I’m not,” he promised her, and it was no lie. If he was in love with anyone, if he ever could be in love with anyone, it was with Susan.

“I swear,” he said.

They made love for hours. It was beautiful. She explored him as he explored her, in every manner thinkable, by every position they could devise. Time and time again, they spent themselves with one another…

But—

Phil, now becloaked by the fervid memories, felt around in the bed.

Where is she now?

Did she leave? Did she go back to her own room while he slept? Or—

Oh, no.

Had he talked in his sleep? It was something he knew he did. It was something past lovers had made him well aware of. All too aware.

Had he muttered Vicki’s name in his sleep?

Jesus, don’t let it be so.

He couldn’t imagine it.

Despite the happenstance of the other night, Vicki meant nothing to him compared to Susan. He still cared about her, yes, he still wished her well and hoped that she could shed her addictions and make something good for herself, but…

He didn’t love Vicki. He knew that.

I love—

He got up, wrapped a towel around his waist, and rushed out of the bedroom, then sighed and leaned gratefully against the wall.

There she was, back in the long nightshirt.

Thank God.

She sat placidly at his cheap little desk in the den, her legs crossed. She was reading.

Phil came up from behind, kissed her on the neck. “Good morning,” he said. “Or I should say, to those of us on night shifts, good afternoon.”

She kissed him back very matter-of-factly, as though it were something commonplace, something expected. Something purely and honestly natural.

“What are you reading?”

“These books you got out of the library,” she said. “They’re really interesting.”

“Yeah, I know. I was reading some of them last night. It’s bizarre, but a little too technical for me; a lot of that genetic stuff went right over my head.”

“It says here that there are inbred communities in some parts of the world that are hundreds of years old. They’re rural or mountain settlements, completely cut off from the rest of the world for centuries. And it makes for a completely isolated gene pool. The inbreeding becomes so intensive that normal births almost never happen. It mentions one settlement, somewhere in Russia, where there hasn’t been a normal birth since the early 1800s.”

“And it’s all exponential,” Phil remarked from what he remembered reading himself. “Not only does the rate of normal births decline the longer the gene pool remains isolated, but the genetic defects become more severe. One of those books has pictures, but don’t look at them if you’re squeamish.”

Susan clearly wasn’t. She turned to the book with color plates. “Look at this, red eyes. Just like the Creekers.”

“Evidently, red eyes and jet-black hair are typical genetic signs of prolonged inbreeding,” Phil told her.

“Prolonged,” Susan repeated in a low murmur. Then she glanced up at Phil. “I wonder how long Natter’s Creeker clan have been inbreeding among themselves.”

“Who knows?” Phil replied. “Maybe centuries.”

««—»»

Eagle looked haunted when Phil met him at the bar.

And Phil knew why.

“Hey, Eagle.” Phil ordered a beer from the keep, glanced back at the stage to spy a trim, long-legged blonde doing splits. “You ever get ahold of Blackjack?”

“No, man,” Eagle morosely replied. “And lemme tell you something else. I haven’t been able to get ahold of Paul either.”

“Don’t fret it. He probably just went out somewhere.”

“All fuckin’day? When he knows our points are waiting on that pickup? This is serious biz, Phil. I tried to get Paul on the phone for hours, and there was no answer. So then I went to his place…

“Yeah?”

“The whole joint was busted up, looked like there’d been a riot in there.”

Phil smiled to himself.

Eagle went on. “His truck was there, but he wasn’t. What do you make of that shit?”

“Doesn’t sound too good,” Phil said, sipping his Bud. “But maybe we’re worrying a little too soon.”

“Shit, man,” Eagle objected. “I told you, his joint was wrecked. Shit layin’ all over the place, furniture busted.”

Don’t worry, it was crummy furniture. “I catch your drift. Blackjack disappears, and now Paul disappears.”

“I just don’t like it— And Paul’s a big guy, strong as an ox. Probably took four or five guys to drag him out of there.”

Phil smiled to himself again. No, just one. “Well, look,” he suggested. “There’s no point in us just hanging around here doing nothing. Have you been by Blackjack’s place?”

“No, I only tried to reach him by phone.”

“All right, then let’s drop by, see if his pad’s busted up like Sullivan’s. And, who knows? Maybe the guy’ll be there. Maybe this isn’t as bad as we think.”

“Yeah, I guess it can’t hurt.”

They left Sallee’s and hopped into Eagle’s pickup, then followed the hot night north up the Route. “So where’s Blackjack live?” Phil asked.

“The boonies. He’s got a shack up in the hills.”

Phil cranked down his window, let the breeze sift his hair. But as hard as he tried to keep his mind on business, the more his thoughts kept trickling back to Susan.

Do I love her? he asked himself. It took all of about a half-second to conclude that he did.

Does she love me?

Well, it might take a bit more than a half-second to determine that.

But at least I’ve got my work cut out for me.

They’d made love one more time before he left, slow, lazy love right there on the floor of his den. Each time with her was better, and each time he looked at her, or even thought about her, the more beautiful she was.

My God, it just occurred to him more powerfully. I really am in love…

“Keep an eye out,” Eagle instructed. He’d just turned up another long dirt road through the woods. The headlights pitched back and forth over interminable ruts. “We’re in hillfolk country now. They don’t take too kindly to folks driving their land.”

“Blackjack’s hillfolk?” Phil asked.

“Sort of. And he’s big and nasty, so if it turns out that he is there, don’t cross him.”

“Got’cha.”

Phil didn’t know anything about this guy Blackjack, but whether he was in or not, knowing where he lived was something he could follow up on later, and if Blackjack really had been whacked by Natter—all the better. Phil could go through his place on his own, and maybe find an address book or something with more names and info. Best of all, busting Sullivan was keeping Eagle on pins and needles—the guy looked absolutely paranoid behind the wheel—and the more discreet pressure he could keep on Eagle, the better.

I’ll get what I want eventually, Phil felt sure.

The roads narrowed as they progressed, and the woods grew denser and darker. They passed a couple of old shacks and lean-tos, and several ragged trailers up on blocks. Mucous-like spiderwebs hung like glistening nets in the trees; every so often the headlights picked out the orange glints of possum eyes. Creepier still was the mist; it had rained earlier, but the rain had just been a quick drizzle. Now the hot night sucked tendrils of fog out of the damp woods. It wafted up like steam.

Suddenly, everything looked remote, unearthly…

And Phil began to feel weird.

He knew what it was. The decrepit scenery was triggering memories, taking him back…

To that day. And—

The House.

“Hey, Eagle,” he asked, wiping sudden sweat off his brow, “how’s your Uncle Frank doing?”

“All right. He retired. Moved to Florida.” Eagle cast him an odd glance. “I’m surprised you even remember him.”

“Oh, I remember him. And the spook stories he used to tell us. Remember? He was always warning us not to go into the woods, that there were ‘things’ in the woods that kids shouldn’t see. And remember what we overheard him saying one night? You remember that story?”

“Which story? Frank had enough bullshit to fill a couple of fifty-five-gallon drums.”

Phil rubbed his face. “You know. The story about the big old creepy house way back in the woods—”

“Oh,” Eagle livened up. “The Creeker whorehouse.”

“Yeah. You believe it?”

“You’re shitting me, right? It’s just an old local legend. Frank liked to push that one ’cos he liked to scare the shit out of us.”

And Frank did a good job.

“So you never really thought it could be true?” Phil queried.

“Maybe when I was a ten-year-old snot-nose punk, but not now.”

“But it could be true, couldn’t it? I mean, what’s so unheard of about it? Christ, Natter’s got Creeker girls stripping at Sallee’s. And they’re all hookers, too. Wouldn’t it make sense that they’d have a house to work out of somewhere?”

“And you must be smoking dust,” Eagle laughed. “Those girls are roadside whores, Phil. They turn their tricks in the parking lot. The Creeker whorehouse was just a bogeyman story, that’s all.”

“I don’t know.” Phil was sweating profusely now; he was jittery. His voice filtered down. “I think I saw it once.”

Eagle gaped. “Now I know you’ve been smoking dust. What, you’re telling me you saw the Creeker whorehouse?”

“Yeah. At least I think I did. It was back when we were kids. Remember how we used to prowl the woods every day when school was out?”

“Sure,” Eagle said. “Shit, we’d find all kinds of stuff in the woods. Old shotgun shells, beer, porno mags.”

“Right. And there was one time when you got grounded for beating up on your brothers, so I went by myself that day. And I got lost…”

— | — | —

Twenty-Two

Yes, ten-year-old Phil Straker got lost…

The woods were a tangled maze, as terrifying as they were mysterious in their heaped detritus, skeletal branches, and dense hanging vines. Then he’d stumbled upon the little Creeker girl, her big red eyes staring at him through ribbons of black hair. Phil was afraid at first—he could see her deformities: the misshapen head, the uneven joints, and the wrong number of fingers and toes. Plus, he’d never forget what Eagle had told him—that the Creekers had teeth like Kevin Furman’s bulldog, and sometimes they’d bite you if you got too close…

But that was stupid. Phil could tell right off that this girl, though he hadn’t seen her teeth, wasn’t going to bite him. His fears dwindled away in seconds. She was like him; she seemed fascinated. In chopped speech, with her fallen hair puffing in front of her mouth as she spoke, she told him her name was Dawnie.

Then the voice cracked out of the woods, calling her home, and she quickly ran away.

But Phil didn’t want her to leave. So—

He followed her.

And was lost again in minutes. The dank woods seemed to swallow him whole. The sun beat down through the trees like a hot hammer; sweat drenched his Green Hornet T-shirt till it stuck to him. As his Keds crunched on through the brush, bugs buzzed around his face and shoulders, biting him as he vainly swatted at them with frantic hands.

And just as he feared he’d never get out, the forest opened up into a clearing where high sun-baked brown grass rustled in a dead, hot breeze.

And that’s when he saw the House.

Holy poop!

The big rickety three-story farmhouse sitting up on hill. Veins of gray wood showed through cracked white-wash, and the missing shingles on the steeped roof reminded him of Mrs. Nixerman’s missing teeth. The high black windows looked back at him like eyes…

It’s haunted, he felt sure. It’s a haunted house.

It had to be. It was the creepiest house he’d ever seen in his life, and if ever a house had ghosts, this was it.

This must’ve been what Uncle Frank meant. This house had to be one of the “things” ten-year-olds weren’t supposed to see.

So Phil did what any ten-year-old would do.

He went up to see.

The steps creaked under his Keds when he hiked up to the front porch. He could barely see anything through the screen door, just clunky shapes and murky darkness.

Then he tiptoed to the first window and looked in…

The sun baked down on his back as he leaned over further to squint. At first he couldn’t make out a thing, just more clunky shapes. But then his eyes began to pick things out: a big old couch, a cane chair, paneled walls and framed pictures hanging.

But—

No ghosts.

Aw, poop, Phil thought in the ultimate childhood disappointment. There ain’t no ghosts in there. It’s just an old house. Nothin’at all to be scared of—

Phil shrieked high and mighty when seven little fingers tapped on his back. He probably jumped a foot in the air, turned, then landed bug-eyed on his feet.

Dawnie was laughing; Phil felt like a wimp.

“You—you live here?”

“Yuh-uh-yeah,” she said.

And when she’d been laughing, Phil noted with more disappointment that she didn’t have teeth like Kevin Furman’s bulldog. She had just plain old regular teeth like everyone. Eagle was full of poop.

“They-uh-now goan,” she said.

“Huh?”

“Goan.”

Goan, Phil thought. Gone. She must mean that her parents were gone now.

“Come-up-on,” she said.

“Huh?”

She gestured him away from the window with her finger. “Come on. In-ah-side. Grot, er, got’s sunipin’ ta’s show-ur ya.”

Phil translated. She wanted him to come in the house. She had something to show him.

But what?

Part of him didn’t want to go—this was a Creeker’s house. She might have big ugly Creeker parents who’d want to whup him, thinking he was fixing to do something bad to Dawnie, like maybe even raking her like that girl Eagle told him about.

Yeah, Dawnie’s parents might whup him bad, or worse…

After all, they were Creekers.

Nobody knew Phil was out here, even Phil himself didn’t know where he was. All he could see were the girl’s big ugly Creeker parents chasing him around the house with big sharp teeth like Kevin Furman’s dog. But then he thought, Don’t be a little wuss. She just got done saying her parents are gone. And, anyway, she’s kinda neat…

“They goan. Come on.”

Phil followed her into the house. He stopped a moment and noticed the brass knocker on the opened front door. It was the strangest thing. The knocker was a face, only the face didn’t have any nose or mouth. Just two big blank eyes staring back at him.

“Commer-on, now. Don’t be scairt. I’se-uh tole ya, they’se uh-goan.”

They’se-uh goan, Phil mimicked in thought. Can’t hurt to just go in and look around. He could tell Eagle he’d been to the haunted Creeker whorehouse, that he’d gone inside. Then Eagle and his other friends would think he was cool.

The front room wasn’t that much different from his aunt’s. Regular furniture, chairs, a big wooden highboy in the corner, and a grandfather clock. It was just a little older, that’s all. He followed Dawnie up the stairs to the left. The stairwell was dark, and the hall upstairs was even darker. But this made sense ’cos he’d heard Creekers, like most hillfolk, didn’t have electricity. “Where we going, Dawnie?” he asked on the landing. “We going to your room?”

“Naw,” she said, facing him. Again, he noticed her bubs; they were little but sticking out real nice through the old sundress she wore, and actually she’d be kinda pretty if it weren’t for the messed up hands and feet.

“Foller uh-me.”

Then she took him by the hand and led him up another, even darker, flight of stairs.

Jeez, it’s hot, he thought. Twice as hot as outside, and a lot more muggy. Once they got on the third-floor landing, Phil was so hot he felt like he was cooking. Up here was a smaller hall; more old framed pictures hung on the walls, but they were too dark to see. The only light came from a small, high little window at one end, and then he noticed a line of lights—tiny white dots shooting from each door in the hall.

Keyholes, Phil realized.

Dawnie seemed winded with some weird kind of excitement. Phil could see the grin behind the black ribbons of hair.

She squeezed his hand.

“Wanner, uh, wanner-see-um?”

“See who, Dawnie?”

“Er-um, my-um sisters?”

Her sisters? Phil didn’t know about this. He didn’t know if he wanted to meet Dawnie’s sisters. What if they were real messed up and ugly? What if they didn’t like him?

And what would Dawnie’s sisters be doing up here in all this darkness and heat?

Her hand was hot and moist. She squeezed his own hand harder.

“Wanner, uh, wanner-see-um doin’ it?”

Doing what?

All of a sudden, Phil didn’t like this. He could get in trouble. He wasn’t even supposed to be here, and he didn’t even really know where he was.

He wanted to leave.

But Dawnie pulled excitedly at his hand. Phil wanted to pull away, but for some reason he couldn’t.

She took him to the first door.

“Git-er on down,” Dawnie said and put her hands on his shoulders.

Phil knew what she meant. She wanted him to get down on his knees.

She wants me to look in the keyhole.

Phil knelt as her excited hands on his shoulders pushed harder. The bright light from the keyhole blazed on his face.

Dawnie’s hand nudged his head.

“Look-it. Looker-on in-nair.”

Phil felt woozy, kinda sick. He hadn’t felt good for the past coupla days, and right now he felt real bad. His stomach quivered, and even though it was so hot, he suddenly shivered against a chill. He knew he was coming down with the flu or something, or maybe some stomach bug he got from eating his aunt’s awful stuffed peppers.

Plus, he was scared.

“Hey, Dawnie, I’m not feeling too good. I better get on home now.”

But Dawnie wouldn’t hear of it. Her fingers tightened on his shoulders, and she nudged him again.

“Go-on. Look-it.”

The keyhole blazed.

Chills coursed up his back.

Then ten-year-old Phil Straker took a deep breath, put his eye to the keyhole—

Jesus Jesus Jesus!

—and looked in.

««—»»

Eagle seemed duly amused by Phil’s recital of the story. “Yeah? So what did you see?”

“I don’t know,” Phil foolishly confessed, his elbow propped out of the truck window. “That’s the last thing I really remember, kneeling down and looking in that keyhole. Sometimes I think I remember more, sometimes I dream about it, but the only stuff that comes to mind are just little pieces, glimpses of things, like a hand or a foot, or part of a face in the shadows. Anyway, next thing I knew, it was a couple days later. I was in bed with a hundred-and-four fever.”

Eagle laughed. “Ya probably didn’t see anything; ya probably just dreamed it all on account of you were sick.”

“Yeah, maybe you’re right,” Phil said, but he didn’t really believe that, even though the doctor said that fevers frequently caused hallucinations and morbid dreams. Phil knew he could never prove it, but he also knew that the whole thing really had happened and that the House—

Phil blinked hard.

The House was real.

I just wish I could remember. I wish I could remember what I saw in that keyhole. Not just the glimpses I’ve dreamed about. Everything. Why can’t I remember it all…

“Time to forget about your haunted Creeker whorehouse,” Eagle said. He pulled the truck up another rutted, narrow road, and stopped. “We’re here.”

Blackjack had a little hovel of a cottage with clapboard shingles. It sat jammed back into the woods amid a bed of high-reaching weeds and gangling vines.

Strings of mist from the previous rain floated off the ground.

“Wasted trip,” Eagle cited. “His truck ain’t here. I knew something happened to him. I’ll bet you and Paul were right. Somebody put a hit on him.”

Phil peered through the moving mist. “Keep your shirt on. You ever think that maybe it’s just that his truck blew a gasket, and he’s got it in the shop? And look.” Phil pointed out the window. “That back window—there’s a light on.”

“Blackjack’s bedroom. Well, maybe the fucker is home after all. Come on.”

They disembarked. The night sucked up the heavy chunks of Eagle’s truck doors closing. The mist parted as they moved forward, swatting at mosquitoes and gnats. Phil seemed to inhale the thick fog, the air’s humidity sopping him at once. Pulsing nightsounds throbbed from the woods which backed the shack.

Eagle began to rap on the front door but stopped when the door, ajar, swung open. “Shit, now I know he’s here. No way Blackjack’d leave his place with the door open. He’s got guns and shit in here.”

“Guns?” Phil asked with some concern.

“Yeah, so we better announce ourselves good and loud.” Eagle stuck his head in. “Hey, Blackjack, you here? Don’t shit a brick. It’s me, Eagle.”

They waited a moment. The shack responded with silence.

“Blackjack! Come on, man, wake it up and shag ass. It’s Eagle, and I got our new driver with me.”

Nothing.

“Must be asleep or stoned,” Phil guessed.

“Yeah, come on.”

They edged inside. The place was a dump, but it wasn’t wrecked. “At least there’s one good sign. Ain’t all busted up like Paul’s joint. Wait here. I’m gonna go check out the bedroom.”

Phil nodded, glancing around. I’ve seen better-looking shithouses, he reflected of Blackjack’s interior decorating tastes. He crossed his arms, waiting, but then—

What?

Some sound, ever-faint, seemed to slowly leaven itself into his ears.

What is that?

A hum, etchy yet so slight he could barely detect it. It seemed to originate off to the right.

The kitchen, he realized, noticing old enamel-white appliances standing in the dark.

Phil walked over, looked in.

The shifting hum rose.

Phil’s hand padded up the wall and flicked on the light.

His stare locked downward…

“I don’t believe this shit, man,” Eagle complained, coming up from behind. “The fucker ain’t here.”

“Yes, he is,” Phil croaked.

Then he pointed down to the fly-covered corpse sprawled across the kitchen floor.

««—»»

“Dream On” by Aerosmith ended Vicki’s set amid a rowdy cannonade of applause. Sure, dream on, she thought beneath her best “dance-face.” Dream forever—

Dream till you’re dead.

She could swear Sallee’s walls actually shook, they were clapping so hard. It sounded like a storm. And when she stepped down through the stagelights and endless, moving sheets of cigarette smoke, she always felt the notion that she was stepping down into hell.

Maybe I really am, she considered.

She took a final bow, then left the stage and the noise and the crowd behind her, perhaps in the same way she’d left her dignity and self-worth behind her so many years ago—with a cold turn of her shoulder.

Druck stood at the entrance to the back room, a deformed sentinel in overalls. Vicki could feel his warped gaze sliding down her naked back as she quickly passed and slipped into the dressing room. She noted a trickling sound the moment she entered; it was coming from one of the toilet stalls. Someone douching, she guessed at once. One of the Creekers. Cody forbade the Creeker girls from using condoms—hence the necessity to douche. The rednecks paid more to forego protection. What did they care? Men couldn’t get pregnant, and were at much less risk of contracting diseases. There’d only been a few occasions when, servicing a special client, Cody had ordered her to not use condoms, but on those nights she’d been too coked up to really care. She got tested every two months at the county clinic and had so far tested negative. It seemed a miracle, considering the extent of her prostitution before she’d married Natter. Anything for a line, she thought in utter grimness. She’d done things she couldn’t believe…

The stall door opened and, as predicted, one of the Creeker girls emerged, immediately looking down when noticing Vicki there. The Creekers treated Vicki with an almost queenly respect; they were afraid of her. After all, she was the king’s wife now. The girl, who only had one arm, limped past and out the door, her black hair lifting in her wake.

Jesus…

Vicki knew the Creekers were powerless against Cody’s exploitation of them. Still, she subtly despised them. The Creeker girls were an ultimate reminder of the depraved backwoods underworld that Vicki’s life now tightly revolved around.

They reminded her of her own powerlessness against Cody Natter. They’re retarded and deformed and terrorized, she thought. At least they have an excuse.

But what’s mine?

She knew there were no excuses. She had no one to blame for the wreckage of her life but herself.

Dozens of one-dollar bills stuffed her tip garter, along with a few tens and twenties. It all went to Cody, just like her trick money. She knew he made a fortune off her, and God knew how much he made off the Creekers. She transferred the cash to her purse, then, as she did every night after her last set, turned to face herself in the mirror.

It was an accuser’s face that peered back, or a ragged Doppelganger’s. Her red hair didn’t shine like it used to, and her green eyes had lost some of their emerald luster. Crow’s feet encroached, and the tiniest threadlike lines. At least my tits aren’t sagging yet, she indelicately noted of her bare, thrusting bosom.

But what of the rest of her?

The truth compiled every day. Her lean, nimble physique was a little too lean now, and beginning to show signs of depletion. Sometimes, when she woke up, she looked absolutely emaciated. The coke stole not only her vitality but also the simple common sense that she should eat better. Each day of her life took another little fleck away.

And the flecks were adding up.

Yeah, I’m starting to really look beat, her thoughts informed her reflection. Pretty soon I’ll be lucky to pull a couple five-dollar blowjobs per night.

Not much of a destiny.

And what would Cody do then? There was so much she had seen, so much she knew…

She tried to think of a time when her life hadn’t been in so many pieces. She knew when it was: during her engagement to Phil. She’d been a different person then; she’d had a real future, and real ambitions. Where had it all gone? To hell, she thought. To hell in a handbasket and straight up my nose. The diamond pendant glittered between her breasts—Phil had given it to her a decade ago. For the past few nights she’d been wearing it again, but—Why? she wondered. Did she think that he would notice? And so what if he did? Phil’s own life, it seemed, had taken the same fall as hers; he was hanging out with Eagle Peters now, a known dope runner. He said he was doing dust. And the other night? I was just another fuck, like I always am. She must be out of her mind thinking that he could somehow save her from Natter. Why would he even want to? she asked herself in steepening self-hatred. My whole life is in the pits…

She’d never even bothered telling Phil the real reason she’d married Natter. He’d never believe it; it would just sound like the typical self-pitying bullshit of any whore. It was best to simply let him think what anyone else would would think: that she’d married Natter for convenience, for free coke and fewer tricks. Those were parts of the reason, but the main reason was that Natter, in exchange, agreed to pay for her father’s heart-valve operation. She’d bartered her flesh, and now Cody had his prize. It was almost medieval.

Her father had died a few years later, but at least her effort had given him some extra life.

No, Phil’s necklace was nothing more than a dead icon, another reminder as to how flagrantly she’d let her whole life slip away from her.

Then another reminder reared.

“Damn it!” she whispered aloud when she reached into her purse and withdrew the tiny vial. It was empty.

The vial was an icon too, a perverted censer by which she worshipped her own demon. She was enslaved, and it was hard to clearly remember back to the time when she wasn’t…

Rap-rap-rap! the hard knocks resounded on the door. Oh, God damn it, she thought. She knew who it was; it was Druck. And just when things were looking like she wouldn’t have to turn any tricks tonight. At least being married to Natter had one benefit: he only reserved her now for higher-paying clients, which amounted to two or three tricks per week instead of five to ten per night. Having as his wife the highest-priced hooker in the club was Cody’s prestige, like a pimp’s “top-drawer” girl. The other girls provided the standard grist for Natter’s mill, and the Creeker girls, of course, catered to the kinkier clientele. Vicki was on a pedestal in a sense. The Queen of Sallee’s, she thought. Cody Natter’s fuck trophy, the grade-A prime of the redneck underground…

Rap-rap-rap-RAP!

“What, Druck?” she nearly screamed through the door.

“’Scuse me, Miss Vicki,” the halfwit voice came back. “But ya about done in there?”

“Yeah. Why?”

“Cody wants to see ya.”

“What for, for God’s sake?”

The slow voice behind the door paused. “Don’t rightly know, Miss Vicki. But ya best git finished up ’cos he been waitin’ on ya fer awhile’s now.”

“I’ll be out in a minute,” she replied, all the bite gone from her words. Yes, she knew. One last glance in the mirror, and she nearly broke out into tears.

Who did she hate more? Natter, or herself?

She swiftly put on her jeans and blouse, and left.

Druck waited outside, cracking his strange doublethumbs. “Yessir, yer shore lookin’ mighty perdy tonight, Miss Vicki.”

“Where’s Cody?”

The smile on the warped face looked like two fat worms lain together. “He’s on back in the office.”

Druck’s uneven red eyes gazed at her bosom. The smile squirmed. His gaze felt like a molestor’s hands freely kneading her breasts.

Scumbag.

She went down the hall, her stiletto heels ticking, and entered the back office. At once she noticed two of the less-defected Creeker dancers, nude save for their g-strings, standing against the wall. Their ebon-haired heads were bowed as if in the presence of a deity.

Which, in a sense, they were.

Cody Natter sat at the desk.

“So lovely, so beautiful,” came his familiar, creaking voice. “And how was your night, my love?”

“Peachy. Druck said you wanted me for something.”

Natter sat half-cloaked in darkness, which somehow made his twisted visage even more terrible. “Merely a minor arrangement; it shouldn’t take too long. But there are three gentlemen who would very much like the pleasure of your company.”

She looked aghast. Three bigshot rednecks, no doubt, chock full of cash from a recent dope deal. “Aw, Cody, come on, I don’t do groups anymore. I hate doing groups.”

“Well, certainly I’d never expect you to engage upon such a task on your own. You’ll have some assistance.” And with that disclosure, Natter’s dark blood-red eyes looked across to the two Creeker girls.

Vicki gaped at them, then gaped back at Natter. “What? Them?”

Natter’s crooked brow rose. “What of them?”

“They’re Creekers!”

The room fell silent. Vicki knew she shouldn’t have said it, but it slipped out. And there was no taking it back.

Natter stood up. He seemed to do so in increments, more or less unfolding to his nearly seven-foot height. The dark office corner released him; he began to walk forward.

“Cody, I didn’t mean it,” she rambled. “I—”

His long, three-fingered hand blurred, reached out, then snatched her throat.

And his voice seemed to flow, like a brook full of dark water. “Yes, my love, you are right. They’re Creekers. But then…so am I.”

His hand felt like an iron cuff. His face was hideous, a gaunt framework of pocked and lined flesh, the enlarged head and uneven ears. Lumps could be seen beneath graying-black streams of hair, genetic protrudements of his cranium.

And, of course, his eyes.

The huge blood-red eyes…

“And…” The eyes slid down to the V of her blouse. “What have we here?”

The long thumb and forefinger of his free hand plucked up the pendant about her neck.

Oh, no, Vicki thought.

“Who gave you this, hmm?” queried the cracked voice.

“Yuh-you did, Cody,” she lied.

His lips stiffened. “I did? Are you sure?”

“Yes, yes, don’t you remember? You gave it to me before we got married.”

“Hmm. Well.” He jerked the pendant away, snapping the tiny gold chain. Then, right before her eyes, he rolled the gem and mount between his fingers. Eventually the mount broke, and the diminutive diamond fell to the floor.

His big booted foot ground it into the dust.

“Then I guess I’ll just have to buy you a better one.”

This secretly infuriated her, like everything else she’d made her life subject to. His eyes slid back up to hers, boring in like drill bits.

“You have a job to do now. Are you going to continue to make a nuisance of yourself, or are you going to do as you’re expected?”

Something happened then, something dangerous. Some remote part of her psyche seemed to snap like a dry, tiny twig. Her terror shook her, and the deeper she stared into the corrupted face, the more she saw the ruination of her own life. A simple wave of his stonelike hand, she knew, could send her to the hospital.

He could snap her neck at will.

But suddenly, if only for a mad, exploding moment, she didn’t care.

“You son of a bitch,” her throat rasped the words. “You want me to be in a six-way orgy with three redneck dope peddlers. I’m your wife!”

“Indeed, you are.” His grasp about her throat tightened. “And why is that? Tell me, my love. Why are you my wife?”

By now she couldn’t answer. Her eyes began to swell forward as her husband’s twisted hand exerted more pressure against her windpipe and the arteries leading to her brain.

He answered for her. “You’re my wife only because I allow you to be. Yes? Am I right?”

Vicki’s fear returned in just one beat of her heart. She forced herself, tremoring, to nod in the affirmative.

Natter’s black voice flowed on. “Yes, you’re my wife. But there’s something else that you are, yes? And what is that?”

The cuff of Natter’s hand lifted, squeezing tears out of Vicki’s eyes like water from a rag. Her heart squirmed in her chest…

His hand was lifting her off her feet.

She gasped, choking to get the words out. “I-I’m a—”

“Yes?”

“I’m a, I’m a—”

“Hmm? Tell me, my love. You’re a what?”

“I’m a whore!” she finally hacked out.

The clawlike hand released her. Vicki fell to the floor.

“You’re a whore,” he repeated. He loomed over her, dizzyingly tall. “Yes, a whore. You always have been, and you always will be.” Then his voice receded to its absolute darkest pitch. “Now go and do what it is that whores do.”

Vicki wheezed air back into her lungs, coughing. Suddenly Natter was leaning down.

“But one more thing, my love. Isn’t there something, you need?”

Vicki squinted up, her head reeling. She’d barely heard what he said.

Something… I need…

“Hmm?”

His misshapen hand opened right before her face.

Her eyes widened.

She gulped.

In Natter’s queer palm lay a baggie full of cocaine.

— | — | —

Twenty-Three

“Jesus Christ, man,” Eagle observed. His eyes looked peeled open. “The guy’s been skinned.”

“It’s a tough piece of work,” Phil said.

“Shit, who knows how much we missed ’em by.”

“We didn’t miss the guys who did this; they’re miles away by now, Eagle. Ain’t no way they did this here.”

“How do you know?”

“Take a look, man.”

The corpse lay sprawled, scarcely even resembling a human. It was the same job they’d done on Rhodes. The thing at their feet appeared coated with clotted blood, its complete surface showing sinuous crimson muscle. Flies, hordes of them, pecked over the corpse.

“There’s no blood,” Phil told him. “If they’d done this here, there’d be a lake of blood on the floor. There’s almost nothing here. The guys who did this, they did it somewhere else, then brought Blackjack’s body back here and dumped it.”

Eagle straightened out; he looked confused. “But that don’t make no sense. Why go to the trouble? Why didn’t they just bury him somewhere, or dump him in the woods where he’d never be found?”

“Why do you think? They want him to be found,” Phil said.

“Why?”

“To send a message out, man. The people you’re dealing against know what you’re doing. They left this here so you would see it, and get the gist quick.”

“To lay off,” Eagle said.

“That’s right. They want you off their turf, and they left this little reminder here to give you good reason.”

“Christ, man.” Eagle backed out of the kitchen, dizzied by the sight. “This ain’t my ballpark. I’m just a small-time dust runner; I ain’t into this shit. I mean, look what they did to Blackjack. They fuckin’ skinned him.”

“Yeah,” Phil agreed. “And we’re next. We’re in a stew pot of shit, and it’s just about to start boiling. What are we gonna do?”

“Boogie,” Eagle offered. “That’s what we’re gonna do. Look, I was just trying to make a living, but this… Fuck it. It ain’t worth it.”

“Why don’t we hit back?” Phil tried to egg him on.

Eagle looked at him as though he’d just been told that the Pope was Jewish. “Are you fuckin’ crazy, man? Hit back? These people mean big-time business, Phil, or can’t you see that? We try to hit back on them, we die.”

Don’t chicken out on me now, Phil thought. He needed Eagle to be pissed, to want to strike back. That was the only way Phil would ever find out the location of Natter’s lab.

“And I guarantee they did the same thing to Paul,” Phil lied. “You want to take this shit? We gotta fight back. We gotta hit your competitor harder than he just hit you.”

“Hey, they didn’t hit me, they hit Blackjack, and that’s hard enough. I’m out of this business, as of right now.”

“Come on, man. Who’s the other supplier?” Phil dared to ask. “Let’s show them who they’re fucking with.”

Eagle laughed incredulously. “Fuck you, man. Like I said, I’m just in this for the bread. I’d rather pump gas than have to deal with guys who’d do something like this. Come on. We’re out of here.”

God-DAMN! Phil thought. Each time he got close, it shot out of reach. If he didn’t push Eagle, he’d never find the location of Natter’s lab, but if he pushed too hard, Eagle would smell cop in two seconds.

Guess I’ll just have to work on him some more, Phil concluded. Give it more time. Plus, there was always Sullivan. Perhaps by now the county detention center was loosening up his mouth.

“All right. Let’s book.”

The hideous buzzing of the flies faded behind them as they tracked back through the house. It sounded unreal. Phil tried to shake off the after-image of the corpse. It was hard to fathom that the thing in there had once been a man.

Phil’s mind wandered, over the sheer grotesquerie.

No man deserved to die like that, not even a dust dealer, not even the world’s worst scum. Phil tried to technically contemplate the task. One of Natter’s Creekers, perhaps even Natter himself, had actually sat down with a blade to flense away all of Blackjack’s skin. How long had the job taken? Had the skin made a sound while being cut away? How long had the man been dead?

How could someone do such a thing?

The empty bungalow echoed their footsteps. Eagle opened the front door to leave, then—

“SHIT!”

—ducked just in time to miss the swoosh! of a small sickle. “Look out!” Phil yelled, then came another swoosh!

A big Creeker kid, late-teens and probably six-five, had been waiting for them just outside the front door. “Holy fucking shit, man!” Eagle screamed and ducked yet again. A third swipe of the sickle missed Eagle’s scalp by a fraction of an inch, whereupon the sharpened tool’s point—

crack!

—sunk into the wall.

Phil was already down on one knee, shucking the Beretta from his wallet holster. “Get out of the way!” he shouted at Eagle, who was bungling backward in total shock. “I got him!”

The kid, trying to tug the sickle from the wall, gaped back dumbly. Then—

pop!

His cleft head whipped back. Red eyes crossed as blood squirted from the shiny new hole in his bulbous brow. Then he collapsed.

Phil rose, lowering his pistol.

“Man, where’d you get that?” Eagle asked, astonished.

“It’s my good luck charm. Now quit jabbering and let’s get out of here.”

“Yeah, yeah. Out of here,” Eagle frantically repeated, and scrambled for the front door.

“Not that way!” Phil shouted and suddenly lunged. “The back!”

Eagle turned. “Whuh—”

From outside, a muzzleflash erupted like a split-second of daylight, then a great shotgun blast exploded through the room. A ragged hole the size of a dinner plate tore into the back wall.

Phil had pulled Eagle out of the doorway just in time. “Come on, come on!” They pounded toward the bedroom, while rounds from a pump shotgun tore up chunks of the floor behind them.

“Man, you said they weren’t here!” Eagle screamed. “You said they were miles away!”

“Well, I guess I was fucking wrong!”

They dove into the bedroom, slamming the door behind them. More shots rang out, punching through the door panels.

“Holy shit, man!” Eagle was babbling hysterically. “Holy ever-lovin’ motherfuckin’ shit!”

Phil slapped him in the face. “Shut up! Get a hold of yourself!”

“What the hell are we doin’ holing ourselves up back here?”

Phil slapped him again. “You said Blackjack had guns—help me find them!”

They turned the little room upside down. Rapid footfalls could be heard entering the house. “Hurry!” Phil kept his gun trained on the door while he yanked drawers out of the dresser with his free hand. His heart felt like it was skipping beats.

Eagle tipped the bed mattress off the box spring, then slid off a sheet of plywood. “Here, man!”

The motherlode! Phil thought.

The box spring had been cut out, like a hollowed book. Inside lay a cache of guns—pistols, shotguns, rifles, and even a couple of sub-guns—plus ammunition.

“Dig in!” Phil commanded. “Just grab something and start shooting!”

Eagle picked up a 9mm Browning. “It don’t work!” he screamed when he pointed it at the door and squeezed the trigger. Phil took it from him, cocked it, and threw it back.

“Now it works!”

Eagle, with grit teeth and closed eyes, discharged the weapon at the closed bedroom door. The gun coughed out fourteen rounds, to the extent that Phil’s ears were ringing.

“How do like that, ya fuckers!” Eagle celebrated.

Then a single massive shotgun blast blew the door out of its frame.

“How you like-uh dat, white trash boys?” an unearthly voice queried in response.

Then three more shotgun blasts ripped into the room, pulverizing the plasterboard behind them.

We’re definitely in some shit, Phil thought. He tossed his Beretta .25 to Eagle, who squeezed off its remaining four shots at the hole in the door. The shots sounded miniscule compared to the shotgun, and Creeker laughter rose from the outer room. When they laugh at your gun, you know you’re in big trouble, Phil realized. “Come on, man, come on!” Eagle prompted, his hands shaking. “They’re coming down the hall, I can see ’em!”

Meanwhile Phil was busying himself with a MAC-10 machine-pistol. The 30-round clip felt loaded; he snapped it in the mag well, then fumbled for the charging handle.

“Come on, man! Don’t you know what you’re doin’?”

“Can I help it I ain’t Gun Digest!” Phil cracked back. He wasn’t very familiar with the weapon, but finally he was able to snap the charging handle back. Then—

“Shit, I can’t find the fuckin’ safety!”

“Oh, man, hurry!”

Eagle ducked. Two more shotgun blasts vollied into the room, backed by what sounded like pistol fire. The room vibrated.

Then two Creekers barged in.

“Oh, man, oh, man!” Eagle whimpered.

Both had great bulbed heads, enlarged jaws, canted teeth. The one with the shotgun held the weapon with hands that were but thumb and index finger. The other one, who quickly reloaded a Smith revolver, had what appeared to be two knees on his left leg and a right shoulder which dipped down nearly to his waist.

And through shags of coal-black hair, their crimson eyes burned at Eagle.

“Hey-uh, blondie,” one mouthed. “Where yer buddy?”

“We gonna’s fucks you whens yer dead,” the other enlightened. “Fucks ya sumpin’ fierce, white-trash boy.”

“An’ eat-cha’s then.”

The Creeker with the shotgun was lowering his weapon to Eagle’s head when Phil sprang out from behind the other side of the bed. Amid a terrifying sound like a lawnmower, Phil squeezed the MACs trigger.

The sub-gun vibrated in a way that was almost eloquent. The burst of .45 bullets caught the Creeker in the belly, then literally picked him up off his feet and pushed him back out into the hall, lines of blood swirling in the air.

Phil jerked his wrist, then squeezed off another short burst at the other Creeker. He danced jerking as big, meaty holes restiched his chest.

“Phil!” Eagle shouted. “Behind you!”

Glass shattered; two shots whizzed by Phil’s head. A third Creeker was climbing in through the window.

The MAC buzzed again, and blew the Creeker right back out. “Grab that piece!” Phil ordered, pointing to the revolver on the floor. “Follow me!”

Eagle foundered for the dead Creeker’s pistol, then he and Phil tumbled out the window into waist-high grass. “Quiet, quiet,” Phil whispered, holding the MAC at the ready. He quick-peeked around the side of the cottage. “It looks clear. I think maybe we got them all. Come on, fuckin’ run like fuckin’ hell to the truck and get the fuck out of here.”

The front yard was wide open, which was good—less concealment—but the moon shined bright, which was bad—it highlighted them as targets. Their feet beat down the tall grass as they tramped forward, each step dispersing swarms of gnats and other insects.

When they arrived winded at Eagle’s truck, Phil checked the perimeter. Nothing. But—

“Awwww, shit—”

“What’s wrong?” Phil snapped. “Get in and start this thing so we can get out of here.”

“Awwwwwww, shit,” Eagle moaned. He stood stockstill, staring. The hood of the truck stood partly open. Wires hung out like entrails.

“They trashed the truck, man…”

We’re fucked, Phil came to the delightful conclusion. “All right, so we gotta run out on foot. Let’s g—”

Suddenly a sound like metallic rain began to circle them—plink-plink-plink-plink!—and small holes began to appear in the truck’s fenders like strange magic. “Someone’s popping caps at us!” Phil shouted. “Get down!”

He dragged Eagle to the dirt. Christ, how many of them are there? His peripheral vision caught the white dots of muzzleflash on the far side of the house.

A fifth Creeker was running toward them, firing a pistol.

Phil ripped another burst of .45 off the MAC…

The Creeker went down with a garbled howl.

“Got him!” Eagle shouted with glee.

Then a sixth Creeker, much taller and less coordinated, turned the corner and advanced on them, too.

He was firing a pump shotgun.

“Jesus Christ!” Phil complained. “What, did they charter a fucking bus!” And when he aimed the MAC and squeezed—

“Shit, man!” Eagle shrieked.

—nothing happened. The bolt locked open. The clip was empty. Phil swore under his breath. A mere few seconds had expended the MACs magazine. I wish to hell these things would shoot for as long as they do in the movies! He snatched Eagle’s revolver and, using the truck as cover, drew a bead on the advancing Creeker. Steady, steady. This would be tough. Just when he’d acquired a decent target, the next shotgun round blew out the windshield. Another shot socked into the side of the truck, spraying pellets across the hood, then another tore through the passenger and driver’s windows.

Phil sprang back up, aimed, fired.

The .38 caught the Creeker in the groin and dropped him, screaming, in the grass.

God, I hope that’s all of them.

Getting out of here on foot would be hell, but at least Eagle knew where they were. Phil turned. “All right, man, now we run our asses off—”

But when Phil turned, Eagle wasn’t standing there. Instead, he was lying there—

“Eagle! No!”

—gargling his own blood.

Frantic, Phil dropped to his knees. Eagle convulsed in the grass. That last shotgun round, Phil realized. It had blown through the passenger and driver’s windows and caught Eagle high in the chest. Eagle reached up feebly, shivering. Bubbles of blood percolated at the holes in his chest as he tried to breathe.

Phil didn’t know what to do. This was about the hardest type of wound to treat in the field. And moving him would be fatal. “Hang on, man,” was all Phil could say.

“Aw, shit, they really fucked me over,” Eagle’s voice gurgled. He hacked up some blood, which looked like black syrup in the moonlight. “Can’t move, can’t hardly breathe…”

“Just sit tight,” Phil implored. “If I try to carry you out of here, you’ll never make it. I’ll be back as soon as I can with an ambulance.”

Eagle’s hand shakily grabbed Phil’s shirtsleeve. His eyes were glassing over. “Pop me, man. I’m fuckin’ dyin’.”

Phil knew he was right. Eagle would be dead in minutes, drowned in his own blood.

“You’ll be all right, man. Just hang in there.”

Blood bubbled out of Eagle’s mouth with the words. “Kill me, Phil, I’m beggin’ya. Don’t leave me alive…for them.”

Phil stared down. “You’re gonna be okay,” he said, knowing it was a lie. “I got all the Creekers, so you just wait it out. I’ll be back as fast as I can… But, look, Eagle, you gotta tell me something first. You gotta tell me where Natter’s lab is.”

The dying eyes gazed back up. “Natter? Lab?”

“Natter’s dust lab. It’s got to be out here somewhere. Tell me where it is, Eagle. Then I can pay them back for this shit.”

“The…lab…” was all Eagle could reply with any coherence. A high, wet whistling sound ensued as his chest heaved. He mumbled some words unintelligibly, then twitched. The hand gripping Phil’s sleeve fell away…

Then Eagle died.

Phil sighed. Poor fucker. An array of feelings collided: rage, sadness, confusion. Things like this shouldn’t happen. Why did the world have to be so insane? Sure, Eagle was a penny-ante dust runner, a two-bit criminal who Phil was playing for a dupe, but he didn’t deserve this. In spite of Phil’s undercover role, and in spite of his unrestrained hatred of PCP, Eagle was still, in a way, Phil’s friend…

“Goddamn it,” he muttered.

click.

Phil’s heart seemed to stop mid-beat. The click had sounded at his head. Someone cocking a pistol hammer…

Phil, still on his knees, dropped his own gun. Very slowly, his eyes turned up.

Yet another Creeker stood before him, with odd, knuckly double-jointed hands that seemed to wrap around the revolver he gripped. The right side of his skull possessed a swell large as a cantaloupe, and his entire head seemed to hang off a thin, extended neck. His nose sported but one nostril.

The hard steel tip of the pistol barrel nudged mockingly at Phil’s temple…

I’m dead, Phil was able to contemplate. It was not an easy surmise to make, but Phil managed to do so with a surprising sense of calm.

But the Creeker kid paused. The scarlet eyes, which seemed twice the size of normal eyes, peered down at Eagle’s corpse and the massive, bleeding chest wound.

“Skeet-inner-to,” the kid said. “Ona-prey-bee.”

Creeker jibberish, Phil realized. The words oozed thick in their defect. But why doesn’t he just kill me now?

Then the weird red eyes moved back to Phil’s face. The gun, a Smith .38, wavered.

Mannona, the word suddenly drifted from the kid. And then another word: Onnamann.

Phil’s thoughts seized in a sudden static. He blinked. What eventually occurred to him was this: he hadn’t heard the words in his ears—he seemed to have heard them in his head.

The kid’s red eyes stared at him.

What’s he waiting for? Phil thought, but he didn’t think for long. He used the extra second to his advantage and quickly snapped his hands up. The disarm technique they’d taught him in the academy worked to a tee. His left hand grabbed the barrel, his right hand grabbed the Creeker’s wrist, then, simultaneously, he pushed, twisting the gun right out of the kid’s hand.

The kid’s face went wide with astonishment—the disarm had taken less than a second.

Phil stood up, training the gun between the Creeker’s crooked eyes. “Where’s Natter’s lab, you ugly fuck?”

Fat lips like tumors parted. The kid blinked.

“Mannona,” he repeated. Then he lunged.

Phil squeezed off a single round into the kid’s forehead. The back of his skull erupted, emitting a splat of gore which landed yards behind him in the high grass.

Phil stared through shifting gun-smoke. Goddamn. What a fucking night….

Then he turned for the path and jogged away.

— | — | —

Twenty-Four

“You were supposed to be fucking careful!” Mullins leaned forward over his desk and bellowed. “You could’ve gotten yourself fucking killed!”

Phil shrugged. “Hey, this ain’t Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood. I’m working undercover on a PCP case. Shit happens.”

“Yeah, shit happens. Well, your shit almost stopped happening!” Mullins reseated himself. Somehow, he looked fatter when he was mad. He seemed to tick behind the desk, an irate Jabba the Hut in a police suit.

It had taken Phil till well-past dawn to find his way out of the woods. Then he hitched back to Sallee’s for his car and made it to the station about a half-hour after Mullins came in, walking up, as always, from the convenience store so his car wouldn’t be seen. Obviously, the chief was not too pleased upon learning of last night’s bullet-fest at Blackjack’s shanty.

“Are you all right?” Mullins finally got around to inquiring.

Phil, for the first time, sipped some of the chief’s noxious coffee. It tasted like bilge, but after what he’d been through he didn’t really care. He needed something—anything—in his system with a little kick. “Yeah, I’m all right. Still a little shaky, though, but at least I wasn’t hurt.”

“Yeah, and you’re goddamn lucky, too. So what else are you trying to tell me? You’re telling me you killed three or four Creekers last night?”

Phil frowned, slumped in his chair. “More like five or six.”

“Jesus Christ,” Mullins exclaimed, peering at him. “Who do you think you are, Wyatt Fucking Earp?”

“Believe me, Chief, I’m not too happy about wasting all those Creekers, but it’s not like I had much of a choice. It was a regular firefight out there. They were all over the place, and they had enough hardware on them to start their very own armory show.”

“Shit,” Mullins grumbled. “I wanted to keep all this out of the papers for as long as I could. But with you blowing six of them away like a one-man killing machine, I guess I gotta call county Technical Services and have them pick up the bodies. After the job you did up there, those county fuckers’ll ask all kinds of questions.”

“Save yourself the hassle, Chief,” Phil pointed out. “You can bet Natter had all the bodies removed within an hour. And when I was jogging out of there, I could see a fire start up on the hill.”

“They burned Blackjack’s place, you mean.”

“Yep, and I guarantee you they took all their dead out, too. No bodies, no shack, no evidence, no nothing. Probably just a whole lot of spent brass which the county won’t give a flying fuck about because none of the Creekers have their fingerprints on file.”

“You got that right. And Peters, you sure he was dead when you left?”

Phil gulped at the recollection. “Dead as dead can be. He took a shotgun blast full in the chest. Died in minutes.” Phil’s thoughts darkened further. “I guess I feel pretty shitty about it.”

“Shitty? Why? The guy was everything you hate. We oughta give those Creekers a trophy for putting that asshole six feet under. Saves the state big-time tax dollars. He was a scumbag PCP dealer.”

But was that really it? Was there no gray area? “Sure, Eagle was a criminal. But he was also a friend, a guy I grew up with, you know?”

“Oh, boo-hoo. You need a hanky for your tears?”

Fuck you, Phil wished he could say. Part of the reason he’s dead is because of me. It was a strange concoction of feelings; Phil really didn’t know how he should feel.

“Only thing that pisses me off about the Creekers killing his dope-dealing ass is it cost you your only good tie to Natter’s PCP net,” Mullins said. “It took you weeks to get where you were. What are you gonna do now?”

“I still got Sullivan to lean on. The county’s putting him in general pop. Give him a few weeks there, and he’ll start singing like a canary.”

“Yeah? Well, let me tell you something, Phil. We ain’t got a couple of weeks. I can only keep a lid on this shit for so long. It’s too bad you couldn’t get Natter’s lab location out of Peters before he kicked the bucket.”

“I tried,” Phil lamented. He didn’t feel very good about that, either. Pressing a guy for info as he lay dying in the dirt. “But he died before he could say anything. And that last Creeker too…” The imagery of the scene reemerged in his head. “It was really strange. He kept repeating this word: Mannona, or onnamann, or something like that.”

“Creekers talk garbage all the time. Half of ’em can’t talk at all. Their brains are all scrambled from all that family fucking they do out there in the boonies.”

“Yeah, sure, but it was also pretty weird—I had a gun to this kid’s head, and he still lunged.”

“They’re retards, Phil. They’re all a bunch of inbred crazies. And you can bet your ass before Natter sends them out on a job, he’s got them dusted to the gills. You’ve seen what PCP does to people’s heads. Turns ’em crazier than bedbugs in a whore’s mattress.”

It was another legitimate point that Mullins made, however ineloquently.

“I just don’t know what the fuck you’re gonna do now that Peters is dead. Who else have you got to sap info off of? No one.”

“Relax, will you?” Phil requested. “I’m doing the best I can, which—and pardon me if this is offensive—is a lot better than before I came on.”

Mullins nodded smugly. “Go ahead, rub it in. I ain’t arguin’ with ya. You’re right, with you we’re closer to Natter’s dust op than we’ve ever been. But what good is that gonna do me—or you, for that matter—if you get yourself killed?”

“I’m not going to get killed, Chief. Trust me.”

“Okay, killer. But tell me this. What’s Susan gonna think when she hears about your little chopping party in the woods last night? Tell me that.”

Phil looked crookedly back at Mullins. It, too, was a good question, but— “What do you mean, Susan?”

Mullins guffawed, slurping coffee and spitting tobacco juice at the same time. “Like they say, with age there’s wisdom, right? Don’t bullshit me. You and Susan got something going; I can tell just by looking at her. She’s got big-time hots for you, boy. And you got the same for her, and don’t even think about telling me otherwise.”

Was it that obvious? Phil almost wished it were so. But Mullins had made a sound inquiry. Susan would raise hell if she knew how deep Phil had gotten into this mess. And if she found out about the firefight last night…

“So how about doing me a favor, Chief? How about clamming it up to Susan about this?”

“I hear ya,” Mullins said, smiling. “And why don’t you do me a favor, huh?”

“What’s that?”

“You look like death warmed up on my grandma’s wood stove. Go home, all right? Get some fucking sleep.”

Good idea. Phil got up. “Thanks for the coffee; remind me to never drink it again. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

Phil made for the door. But before he left, Mullins stopped him with a fat wave of hand.

“Oh, and Phil?”

“Yeah?”

“Tonight when you’re on the job?”

“Yeah?”

Mullins chuckled. “Try not to kill more than ten people, huh? Would ya do that?”

««—»»

Phil drove home numb. Morning sunlight glared like a great blade—an annoying scimitar—across the windshield. Only now were the realities sinking in. He’d killed men last night, a lot of men. Eagle had been killed.

And he’d nearly been killed himself.

All that adrenalin left him hungover now. He felt jittery, dry-mouthed. Two pinpoint headaches buzzed behind his eyes as he drove the Malibu down the Route, and he could swear his heart was still skipping beats in the aftermath of split-second terror.

When he parked at the boardinghouse and got out, he instinctively glanced up at Susan’s window. Her curtains were drawn. She’s asleep by now, he realized, and this depressed him. He wanted to sleep with her, not to make love, just to…sleep. After the frenzy of last night, he didn’t want to be by himself.

I want to be with her, he thought sappily.

Should he go up to her room right now and knock on her door? Should he wake her? Would she mind?

It didn’t matter; Phil never got the chance.

Just as he was about to go up the stairs to her room, the faintest sound wisped from down the darkened hall.

A moan.

Phil turned.

Something sat huddled right beside his door.

Susan? he stupidly thought. No, it wasn’t Susan.

The huddled figure moaned again. When Phil realized it was Vicki—and that something was very wrong—he ran down the hall to help her.

He knelt down; her hand reached out.

“Good God, Vicki. What happened?”

She was only partly conscious when he helped her up. Her hair was disarrayed, her clothes were torn, and when Phil looked at her face—

Oh, Christ, no…

—he could tell at once that she’d been beaten.

««—»»

“Calm down,” Phil said, gingerly daubing at the cut on her forehead. “It’s not as bad as it looks.”

Vicki flinched for probably the hundredth time. “That hurts, Phil!”

“Hey, I ain’t Dr. Kildare, the alcohol is going to sting a little—”

“A little? Jesus!”

“—but you don’t want it to get infected. So pipe down and let me do this,” Phil finished. There hadn’t been much blood, and the bruises weren’t too severe. It was easy, though, to see what had happened. Yeah, somebody gave her a pretty good knocking around, he observed. But why?

“How did you get here?” Phil asked, next applying a Band-Aid over the small cut.

“I walked,” she said.

“All the way from Sallee’s?”

She nodded groggily.

“That’s some haul.” Phil sat down on the edge of the bed while Vicki lay back on the couch holding a cold wet rag over her eyes. “How do you feel? Are you dizzy? Confused? Are you seeing double or anything like that?”

“Just tired mostly,” she murmured and sighed. “It was a long night.”

I guess it was. For you and me both. “Yeah, well, come on. I better take you to the hospital.”

“No, no—”

“Vicki, it’s a good idea. You could have a concussion or something.”

“I don’t have a concussion,” she complained rather testily. “I just got slapped around a little, no big deal. Just—” She sighed again. “Just let me lie here for a little while. Is that okay?”

“Sure,” Phil said. Actually, it wasn’t okay—what if Susan found out she was here? What would he say? How could he possibly explain it? But he couldn’t very well throw her out. Something serious had happened, and Phil wanted to know what. I’ll just let her calm down a little, he decided. Susan had classes this afternoon before work. She can sleep on the couch till Susan goes to school. Then I’ll figure out how to get her out of here.

“So,” he got on to the next question. “What happened?”

“It’s a long story, Phil. You don’t want to hear it.”

“You’re right, I probably don’t, but tell me anyway. Did your husband do this to you?”