It had been a mistake to leave the farm and return to Grady Spencer. His master had been angry. He had beaten Cal daily. It was his lesson, Grady had said. A lesson to learn how rejection felt.
Weeks later, when he’d finally been granted freedom from the cage, Cal had gone wandering, exploring the hotel while Grady napped, or sneaking outside into Briar Wood. One evening, he’d returned with Noah.
Grady had mistakenly thought Cal had chosen the boy to be his first kill. But Cal had been lonely. He’d needed a friend to play with. And Noah had reminded him so much of Jago.
Like the front of the farmhouse, the windows at the back were boarded up. A cat, flea-bitten and malnourished, sidled up to Cal and rubbed against his calves. Cal bent down and gave the animal an affectionate scratch. The cat purred and spun a full circle.
Grady had handed Cal a large kitchen knife. “This is a rite of passage,” he’d said. “The boy becomes a man.”
And Cal had almost done it. He’d pressed the knife to Noah’s throat until a thin red line had appeared in his skin. Part of him, the part that had become like Grady, had wanted to press harder. Just like when he’d practiced on those animals.
But he couldn’t do it. Noah was good and kind. He did not deserve to die. Cal should have taken him to the farm, where he would have been safe from the evils of the world. Where he could learn about the new dawn that was coming.
Cal had refused to kill Noah. Grady had said he wasn’t ready. That he was a disappointment.
He’d brought the knife to him again two weeks later. When Cal had failed to use it once more, Grady had beaten him until the room went dark.
Then, when Grady had returned a third time with the knife, and had held Noah upside down like a chicken on a butcher’s hook, Cal had become afraid.
A voice had whispered in his mind: Kill him.
He’d run from the basement, leaving Noah alone with Grady Spencer. He’d run through the tunnel, down and down, until he’d reached the sea. And he’d stood there for the longest time, swaying in the wind, wondering what kind of a boy he was becoming.
Once he had cared for an injured bird that he knew would die. He had given it comfort, held it in his hands until its time came. Now, he’d put a knife to a little boy’s throat and had wanted to open him up.
Standing at the mouth of the cave, Cal had listened to the sea calling him. He had let it take him. It should have swept him far out, where pirates sailed the seven seas in search of buried treasure.
Instead the sea had rejected him, spitting him out onto the beach. Because the sea had known exactly what kind of a boy he was.
Margaret Telford shouldn’t have saved him. That was why he’d punished her. He hadn’t wanted to be saved.
At his ankles, the cat let out a long, whiny mewl. He would bring it scraps of food, if he were welcomed back. If not, he and the cat would go hungry together.
Pacing up to the old red door, Cal’s hand hovered over the handle. He hesitated. Then knocked.
He waited. The cat lost interest and sauntered away.
Finally, he heard footsteps shuffling inside. Locks were drawn back. The door opened. A woman, tall and round, with a lined face and a ruddy complexion, stared out at him. Her expression was stern, her eyes hardened.
“Well,” she said. “Here’s a face I didn’t expect to see again.”
Cal lowered his head and stared at the ground.
“Grown tired of you, has he?”
Cal shook his head.
“Found himself a new toy?” The woman ran a hand through her short, red hair. “What is it, then? Grew tired of being treated worse than an animal, did you?”
Shame burned Cal’s cheeks. Grady’s dead eyes stared at him from the shadows.
“Spit it out, boy. Or does the cat still have your tongue?”
Cal looked up. Tears brimmed in his eyes. The woman’s face softened. She grew worried. “Something’s happened.”
He nodded.
“Something bad?”
He nodded again.
“Best you come in, boy, and talk to Jacob. No one followed you, did they?” The woman hovered for a moment, glancing over Cal’s shoulder at the farmland beyond. “Come on now. Don’t be shy. This was your home for a time. It can be again.”
Cal remained on the doorstep, peering into the farmhouse with nervous eyes. He should never have returned to Grady’s house. But his mother didn’t want him. He knew it, no matter how much she tried to convince him that she did. All she cared about was her new family and finding Noah.
Now that he was calmer, he was glad she had found Noah. And surprised that Grady had kept him alive.
There could only be one reason for that. He’d been keeping him for Cal. Waiting to give him back the knife, so the boy could become a man. Made in his master’s image, empty and alone.
Stepping forward, the woman hooked an arm around Cal’s shoulder and pulled him toward the house.
“The Dawn Children welcome you back,” she said. “Back into the fold with open arms. Now, in you go.”
His heart racing, Cal stepped inside.
The woman closed the door.
“I’ll put some tea on, warm you up,” she said. “Then I’ll wake Jacob. And we’ll get to the bottom of your troubles.”
Cal nodded.
I am not alone, he thought.
I am not alone
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DESPERATION POINT (DEVIL’S COVE #2)
PROLOGUE
THE SCREAM WAS PIERCING and racked with pain.
Ross Quick’s snapped open and stared into darkness. He sat up, his head spinning. Somewhere below him, Meg’s barking was angry and urgent. Ross had fallen asleep in his clothes. An empty bottle of gin lay next to him on the bed. He was still drunk. Nausea and disorientation climbed his throat.
It took him a moment to remember the scream. He turned to look at the beside alarm clock. It was just after 2 a.m. Had he been dreaming? Meg’s incessant barking said no.
Swinging his legs over the side of the bed, Ross took a moment to find his balance. Cold air bit his feet as he staggered through the darkness to the window.
He had left the curtains open. This far out in the countryside darkness was absolute, and now winter had settled over the land like a death shroud, there was no escaping it. Darkness greeted him in the morning and whispered him a goodnight. It made the solitude of his existence on the farm even more of a void; made the allure of alcoholic oblivion that more tempting.
The scream.
Pressing his face against the glass, Ross stared into the yard. It was too dark to see anything. Downstairs, Meg was growing frantic.
“All right, girl!” Ross bellowed. “Settle down!”
The dog’s barking continued as he stumbled from the room. The cold was worse out here, attacking him through his clothes, freezing his breath in frosty plumes. Shivering, Ross flipped on the light switch and squinted at the low-ceilinged landing. A dull throb had started at the base of his skull and was now reaching up to drag nails across his scalp.
Taking the stairs two at a time and yelling at the damn dog to shut up for a minute, Ross descended into darkness. Mistiming the last step, he slipped.
His feet went out from under him. His right temple slammed against the wall. Ross lurched forward and hit the floor.
He groaned as pain shot through his body. The dog’s barking grew to an unbearable crescendo.
Ross pushed himself up to a sitting position and checked for damage. There was no blood, but a lump on his temple was already surfacing.
The drinking needed to stop. It had been getting worse lately; this need to lose himself at the bottom of a bottle each night. But what would he replace it with? He was alone out here. His evenings felt vast and empty, as if he were lost in darkness and waiting to die.
Allowing a minute for the farmhouse to stop spinning, Ross
hauled himself back onto his feet.
He staggered along the hall in the direction of the kitchen, Meg’s barking driving nails through his skull.
Throwing open the door, he flipped the light switch and stared across the cluttered kitchen.
Cold seeped through the flagstone floor and gripped his bones.
The black and white Border Collie was at the back door, her nose pointed upward as she filled the room with noise.
Lurching across the floor, Ross laid a clumsy hand on the dog’s head.
“Easy, girl. Calm yourself.”
Meg’s barking came to an abrupt halt and was replaced by a deep, guttural growl.
Pulling back the curtain of the kitchen window, Ross peered into the yard. Still unable to see anything, he reached across and flipped a switch. The exterior light blinked on. Shadows receded, hovering at the edges.
Ross cocked his head, trying to listen above Meg’s growls. The yard was still. He heard no more screams.
Perhaps it had been a fox that had woken him. It would explain Meg’s behaviour—she hated the animals. Ross wasn’t fond of them either; last year, one had broken into the coop and slaughtered half of his hens.
He’d since made the coop more secure. But foxes were sly. If there was a way in, no matter how imperceptible, they would find it.
As Ross stared into the backyard, he was struck by a sudden realisation. With all the noise Meg was making, the sheep were being unusually quiet.
Pulling back the locks, he opened the door.
Cold rushed in. Meg bounded out, shooting across the yard and disappearing into the darkness.
Ross yelled after her. That damn dog was going to be the death of him. Grabbing a wax jacket from the back of the door, he slipped his feet into a pair of boots then stepped outside. Motes of dust and frost drifted through the air. His teeth chattered. Very quickly, he was sobering up.
He turned his head, staring into the night. Meg was still barking somewhere in the near distance. If there was a fox on the property, the dog would chase it away. But if it was something else. . .
An uneasy feeling reached out from the darkness and coiled around him. Returning to the house, Ross grabbed a torch from the kitchen window and his shotgun from a locked cabinet in the hall. It was already loaded with two shells, but he filled his pockets with more.
Now completely sober, he switched on the torch, and with the shotgun perched over his right arm, he crossed the yard.
A narrow beam of light illuminated his mud-splattered Range Rover and an abandoned shell of an old harvester.
Meg’s barking echoed in the night.
Passing outbuildings, Ross pointed the torch in the direction of the chicken coop. He could hear the chickens clucking anxiously inside, unsettled by Meg’s barking, but the coop looked undisturbed and the ground was clear of feathers and blood.
Perhaps the fox hadn’t been able to break into the coop, after all. Perhaps Meg had scared it off.
Stumbling forward, Ross reached the large wooden barn. Meg appeared in the light. She glanced back at him, acknowledging his presence, then returned to growling.
After a day of bitter cold and rain, the sheep were inside for the night to dry off. They were eerily silent.
Meg’s head was down low, her teeth glittering in the torchlight.
“Easy, girl,” Ross said. “Easy now.”
Foxes rarely bothered with sheep, unless it was lambing season. Perhaps a stray dog, then?
His brain caught up with his vision. Ross tightened his grip on the shotgun.
Once, last week, he’d been drinking before bringing the sheep in and hadn’t closed the barn doors. The sheep had wandered all over the farm and it had taken him and Meg most of the next morning to herd them back to their usual field.
The barn doors were shut now. There was no stray dog. No animal of any kind.
An intruder?
It was unusual. People didn’t tend to trample through the countryside at night, especially mid-winter.
Unless they meant to cause trouble. Unless they meant to steal.
Staring at the barn doors, Ross remembered the scream that had woken him. He felt the sudden urge to wrench open the doors and rush inside.
The sheep were his livelihood. The food that he put on his table. The clothes he wore on his back. No harm could come to the sheep because if it did, harm would come to him.
Unnerved by the silence, he watched as Meg sniffed the bottom of the barn doors and scratched the ground with a paw.
Brushing her to one side, Ross tucked the torch under his arm and removed the latch.
The doors swung open.
His breaths came fast and heavy. Ross aimed the shotgun into the darkness.
Meg immediately began barking. But she wouldn’t go in.
“Someone there?” Ross called out. “You’re trespassing. I’ll give you ten seconds to leave or I’ll fire.”
The shotgun trembled against his forearm as he spread his feet and waited.
There were no sounds. No bleats. No shifting of wool or bodies.
He stepped forward.
The smell hit him; deep and coppery like rusted metal.
Lowering the shotgun, Ross lifted the torch and pointed it into the barn. Meg’s barking grew to a skull-splitting crescendo.
“Dear God. . .”
The torch shook in Ross’ hand. The shotgun swung limply by his side.
The sheep lay scattered across the barn, unmoving.
The blood was everywhere, splattering their white wool, soaking the ground, painting the walls.
They were dead. All of them. Every last one.
And not only dead. Parts of them were missing.
Ross stared at the massacre, his head swinging from side to side, his lips twitching up and down.
The stench of death was overwhelming.
A hundred sheep. Dead. Mutilated.
Meg barked and growled and scratched at the ground. Ross staggered back. The world spun around him.
An anguished, guttural sound climbed his throat and shot from his mouth, shattering the night.
1
AARON BLACK KILLED the engine of the silver Peugeot and stared through the windscreen. In the distance, heavy charcoal clouds rolled and churned above a foaming slate ocean. In the foreground, the beach was colourless and barren. A beach bar called The Shack was currently closed. Blustery winds battered its walls, flinging sand, dried seaweed, and shell fragments.
Bleak, Aaron thought as he leaned forward to observe the towering cliffs that flanked the cove. The Mermaid Hotel sat on top of the left cliff, its blackened exterior encased in construction scaffolding. On the right cliff, a rusty looking lighthouse stood like an ancient guardian, while behind it, the coppery-green canopy of Briar Wood was effervescent against the brooding sky.
Aaron’s gaze returned to the left cliff and slipped down to the arch of rock jutting into the ocean.
He shivered. Bleaker than bleak.
And cold.
The temperature inside the car was already beginning to drop, leaving icy tendrils to seep through the cracks. Buttoning his dark winter coat up to his neck, Aaron turned his attention to the rear-view mirror.
His was the only vehicle taking up space in the seafront car park. Behind him was Cove Road, which circled the town of Porth an Jowl like a hangman’s noose, providing the only way in and out by land. A row of old stone cottages sat on the other side.
No one was around. It was as if Aaron were the only person on earth.
A blast of wind hit the car, howling and whistling as it hurtled by. Aaron winced as he stared at his reflection in the rear-view mirror. There were faint shadows forming beneath his dark brown eyes. Days’ worth of stubble covered his usually clean-shaven face. His hair was a straggly mess, well overdue a cut.
He turned away, suddenly feeling decades older than his thirty-seven years. As soon as he got back to the hotel, he would have a hot shower, take a razor to his face, pe
rhaps pop a sleeping pill and sleep for fourteen hours straight.
But right now, he had a job to do.
Pulling his long coat tightly around him, he grabbed his bag from the back seat and opened the door.
The cold hit him like an open-handed slap. The wind howled. The sea roared. The sky grew dense and black; rain was on its way. In an hour, maybe two, darkness would fall.
Exiting the car park, Aaron stepped onto the faded pink promenade and stopped short of the protective iron railings. The beach lay below. Stone steps led down to the sand. Aaron thought about heading down there, but the cold was already eating into his skin and chewing through his bones.
From his bag, he pulled out a digital SLR camera, slung the strap over his neck, and removed the lens cap. Adjusting the aperture, he snapped pictures of the beach and the cliffs, the hotel and lighthouse.
He lowered the camera for a second, mesmerised by the view. He’d read Emily Brontë and the Poldark novels, and had expected to find a rugged, romanticised wild beauty. Perhaps at any other time of the year, such a view would have been possible. There were traces of that beauty still lingering, but Cornwall in mid-December, as he was quickly learning, was harsh and brutal; a world away from the sunny pictures found in tourism brochures.
Turning his back on the crashing surf, Aaron gave his attention to the town.
Porth an Jowl was a small community with a population of four thousand people, most of whom lived in rows of two-hundred-year-old cottages that climbed all the way to the top of the cove.
His research revealed that the town had started life as a busy fishing port, but as the years had gone by larger towns had sprung up, and Porth an Jowl had been unable to compete. Its fishing industry had gradually receded, and the place had morphed into what it was today: a reasonably popular tourist destination that sold surfboards and ice creams in late spring and summer, and became a veritable ghost town for the rest of the year.
Aaron took pictures of the stacked rows of cottages. The town was picturesque, he supposed, which seemed ironic considering the horrors that had taken place here just three months ago. When he was done, he followed the promenade with his eyes. At the far end, below the right cliff, he saw a small harbour and a handful of boats. He considered walking down there to get more pictures, but now the cold had seeped into his marrow.
The Cove: a shocking thriller you won't be able to put down (The Devil's Cove Book 1) Page 27