The Hunted

by Val Tobin

  “When I left him, he told me he had an important errand to run. Didn’t say what, and I didn’t ask. I assumed he wanted to get his car back. The cops probably impounded it. He didn’t seem bothered by anything—not anything more than the bother of being in jail.”

  “He brought that on himself.”

  “Yeah, which is why he wasn’t upset. He’d expected to end up there.”

  “Did he explain why?”

  “He wants to trigger an investigation into your father’s company.”

  “They won’t investigate Dad’s company over that stunt. They’d just charge Jeff with a misdemeanour or two. The company wouldn’t interest them at all except that the crimes were committed on company property.”

  Peter rose and crossed the room to stand in front of Rachel. When she shot a worried glance at her weapon, he crouched in front of her and took her hands.

  “I’m not here to hurt you. Jeff had plans to escalate things and keep the spotlight on himself and the company. He figured if he made enough noise people would want to see the truth. I’m investigating a story about the grendels and research Jeff had done. That’s all. I still want to take the hunting trip with you. Rachel, I want to learn how the grendels originated.”

  Chapter Nine

  “Ahem.” The sound made Rachel and Peter look to where Hound Dog stood scowling in the doorway. “Am I interrupting something?”

  Peter released Rachel’s hands and stood. “No. We’re just talking.”

  “He give you a good enough reason to release him, Frosty?” Hound Dog walked into the room and tossed Peter back the car keys. Peter snatched them from the air with one hand.

  “Thanks,” he said. “Dog.”

  “That’s Protector Ainsworth to you,” Hound Dog responded.

  “You rooted through my car. I’m not under arrest. Protector.” He returned to the couch and sat down. “Did you lock it up?”

  “I’m not your valet,” Hound Dog snapped. He glanced at Rachel. “But yeah, I locked ’er up.”

  “Take anything?”

  Hound Dog held up his hands. “Nothing in my hands, dude.” He rolled up each sleeve. “Nothing up my sleeves.”

  “Anything to report?” Rachel asked.

  Hound Dog strode across the room and took a seat on the couch farthest from Peter. “Looks as if he’s living in his car. Lots of luggage, food, cases of water. Electronics.”

  “I’m working on a story. I drove up here from New Jersey.”

  “You a Jersey boy, Pete?”

  “That’s Mister Sanderson to you, Protector Ainsworth.”

  “Fair enough.” Hound Dog laughed. “This clown talked you into letting him go?” His expression sobered. “What happened to Jeff, Mister Sanderson?”

  Peter shook his head in sorrow. “I don’t know. We parted company. I had an interview to chase down; he had an unknown errand to run.”

  Hound Dog continued the questioning as Rachel remained quiet, observing. “He say anything about where he headed, what he wanted to do?”

  “No. If I’d have known he planned to go into the woods, I’d have stopped him. He was alone when I left him. I went to my interview and then came right here. When I discovered Rachel gone, I let myself in and waited. Since I knew she expected Jeff to show up here, I figured she’d be back soon.”

  Rachel opened her mouth to point out the discrepancy in Peter’s story, but he jumped in before she could speak.

  “You called him as soon as he left the jail. I assumed you’d heard he’d been released. We made plans to meet here after he spoke to you. I listened in on his end of the call. He told you he needed to go home and shower and change. That’s true, I guess, but he didn’t tell you he had one other stop to make, and he didn’t tell me what that was either.”

  That he’d listened in on her conversation with Jeff gave his story a greater ring of truth and eased the knot of tension in her gut.

  “Did he call anyone else while you were with him? Or did anyone else call him?”

  “He tried to call a friend but didn’t reach her.”

  Rachel turned to Hound Dog. “We need to visit his place. Dog, you can go home. Thanks for your help, but I’ve got this. Peter can come with me.”

  Hound Dog studied the tall, skinny man and apparently found him lacking as backup. “The guy’s a beanpole. A strong wind could take him down.” He turned to Peter. “No offence.”

  “How is that not offensive?” Peter asked. “Muscle Head—no offence.”

  “Because I’m stating a fact. Have you any training in self-defence? Do you have a permit to carry a weapon? I can answer that one myself—no, because you’re not in law enforcement.”

  “I have a gun permit—and a gun.”

  Rachel silently watched the back and forth between her partner and the man who’d saved her life when she was a thirteen-year-old child, hoping they’d sort it out. Finally, she had enough.

  “Guys. Stop.” She rose from her chair and paced the living room. The distance she covered with her long strides meant a short run, but the movement helped ease her stress. “Dog, I can take care of myself. I’m taking Peter with me for personal reasons.”

  When Hound Dog’s brows furrowed and his lips curled into a snarl, she said, “Don’t get offended. I’m not leaving you out of any big loop. I just don’t have time to explain. If there’s anything to find in his house, I want to get to it before anyone else does.”

  “Like who?” Hound Dog asked as Peter said, “Who’d do that?”

  She stopped in front of the couch and glanced from Peter to Hound Dog. “Investigators. Whoever killed him. They might’ve gone through Jeff’s place already. Maybe they kidnapped him from there, which, if they did, could have evidence to indicate that.”

  “The hell with this, Frosty. You’re not going alone.”

  “She won’t be alone,” Peter said instantly.

  “With you, she might as well be.”

  Rachel ignored the pissing contest. Still facing Hound Dog, she said, “It’s your week off, Dog, and I don’t want to drag you into anything more than I already have. The investigators will take over, but I have to do what I can to get a jump on them. I need to know what happened to Jeff.”

  This time, Hound Dog ignored Rachel and talked over her to Peter. “She’s a perfectionist. Has to control everything.” To Rachel, he said, “Don’t insult me. I’m coming with you. If you’ve got a problem, boss, I’ve got a problem.”

  In the end, all three of them piled into Hound Dog’s pickup truck and headed to Jeff’s house.

  ***

  Jeff Needham lived in a two-bedroom bungalow on the edge of what was technically the town of Cavan-Monaghan, Ontario, on the outskirts of Peterborough. It’d been a while since Rachel had visited him there. Most of the time they got together, either he came to her place, or they met at a restaurant or bar.

  They rolled up to his driveway after sunset, which at this time of year was a few minutes past seven o’clock. Leaves covered the front lawn, deposited by the maple, elm, and birch trees scattered around the yard, and the various bushes growing across the front of the house.

  “You going to break in or you got a key?” Peter asked as Hound Dog parked in front of the garage.

  “Key,” Rachel replied. “You and me first, Dog.” She wouldn’t allow Peter to step foot from the truck until they knew the house was clear. Hound Dog nodded his understanding but Peter protested.

  “I can help you.”

  “You’re in here until I tell you. Got it?” She hated to sound abrupt, but her senses were on high alert. The dark house appeared deserted, but that didn’t mean it was empty. If an intruder had heard the vehicle pull up, he or she could’ve cut any flashlight and hid.

  The understanding finally dawned in Peter’s eyes. “Yeah, okay. Be careful.”

  “Take this gun,” she said, handing him the weapon she’d brought for him to use.

  “Okay.”

  “Don’t shoot. It co
uld be me or Dog running out. You need the protection in case things go south in there.”

  “Got it.” He took the Smith & Wesson Model 29. “That’s a big gun.”

  “Try not to shoot yourself.”

  “Let’s go, Frosty.” Hound Dog opened the driver’s door and hopped out. He left the keys in the ignition.

  Rachel exited the front passenger seat and beckoned Peter from the back. “Turn the vehicle around so it faces the road. If we need to haul ass, I want you ready to drive us out.”

  He jumped out and climbed into the driver’s seat without comment, slamming the door shut as Rachel waved for Hound Dog to cover the back. They both carried night-vision goggles and put them on. As soon as Hound Dog rounded the corner of the built-in garage, Rachel scurried to the front door.

  She tried opening the door without the key first and verified it was locked. She unlocked it and tucked the key back in her jacket pocket. With her left hand, she turned the doorknob, keeping the weapon in her right hand raised. She flung the door open and scanned the room. When the door banged against the wall, she stepped back from the entrance, listening, scanning.

  Nothing stirred.

  “Police. Freeze,” she shouted into the dark. A lie, sure, but anyone in the house illegally wouldn’t know it, and it might flush them out.

  The house had an empty feel. She quickly stepped into the entryway and scanned the living room. Room by room, she searched the house. Nothing had been disturbed. Had Jeff come home at all after he left the jail? When she checked the master en suite bathroom, she ran her fingers along the shower walls. They were dry.

  Without the need to turn on lights, she moved quickly and confidently. When she reached the sliding doors in the dining room off the kitchen, she unlocked and opened them. After giving Hound Dog the all-clear, she waited for him to step inside. Once he was in and ready, she said, “Main floor is clear. There’s a basement. Let’s take it together.”

  “Roger that.”

  She let him lead, and together they made their way down the stairs. All seemed dark, quiet. They found nothing until they reached a locked door off the rec room.

  “His lab,” she whispered.

  “He has a lab in his house?”

  “Relax. He doesn’t keep live animals or anything in it. It’s similar to a home office but with microscopes.”

  “We’ll have to break it down unless you have the key for it on you,” Hound Dog said.

  “He didn’t give me a key to his lab. I’ll do it.” Who broke down the door to Jeff’s lab didn’t matter, but for some reason, she felt as if letting Hound Dog bust in was a betrayal. Jeff would want her to do it—at least, that’s what her conscience told her.

  “Stand back.”

  As soon as Hound Dog stepped away, Rachel kicked the door. The first attempt caused a splintering sound, so she reared back and tried again. This time, the door swung inward.

  She’d been wrong when she’d told Hound Dog Jeff didn’t keep live animals in his lab.

  “Dog,” she said, “we’ve got a problem.”

  Chapter Ten

  On the far side of the room sat a large cage containing a grendel. The creature slammed its body repeatedly against the bars, baring its teeth and snarling at the two protectors. Drool sprayed from its lips.

  “Christ, Frosty, I thought you said he didn’t do live experiments here.”

  “He didn’t the last time I was here.”

  “What’ll we do about this?” He placed a hand on her shoulder. “It’s illegal.”

  “Yeah, Captain Obvious, I know.”

  Damn it. What the hell had Jeff been trying to accomplish and why hadn’t he been trying to accomplish it at work? He had a fully equipped, completely legal laboratory at the university in Lakefield, constructed specifically to study grendels.

  “We’ll have to report it,” she said.

  Hound Dog pulled out his phone, but before he could place a call, she stopped him. “Hold up. I want to search for his notes first.”

  “We can’t take anything.”

  “Right. But we can look and take pictures. I want to know what he was doing here with that thing. This might be what got him killed.”

  She yanked her night-vision goggles off and flicked on the lights.

  “You going to let the reporter in on it?” he asked as he removed his goggles.

  She considered. “Yes. I trust him.”

  “No kidding? You haven’t seen him in how long? And you trust him more than you trust me?” The hurt in his tone seemed genuine, so she refrained from jumping on what he’d said.

  “I trust you, which is why I called you when I couldn’t find Jeff. Why I brought you along. I could’ve sent you home.”

  “No, I insisted on coming along. You had no choice.”

  “We’re not arguing about this now. A monster’s in that cage. We can’t kill it. If he experimented on it, there’s no telling what he’s done to it.” She smoothed a hand across her forehead, trying to tame a pending headache. “Go get Peter and tell him what we’ve found. I’ll scour through Jeff’s stuff. So far, it looks as if no one searched this place yet, and that’s a bonus, but they might be only minutes behind us. I want to see what we can find and then report it. Once we do that, this place will be crawling with investigators.”

  “Yeah, and the captain will be all over us again.”

  “We aren’t cowboying. I’m allowed to enter my brother’s house. If the cops aren’t investigating his death as a murder, someone has to.”

  Hound Dog left the room, his footsteps pounding up the stairs. She heard him bang through the front door and thud across the wooden front porch. In the meantime, she commenced her hunt through whatever files and notes she could find, snarls and howls from the grendel serenading her.

  At first glance, she found only a few sticky notes, reminders to perform certain routines at certain times—why he didn’t use his cell phone for that, she couldn’t explain, but that was Jeff. One note was a grocery list. She didn’t know why he hadn’t used his cell phone for that either.

  She sighed, loudly and long. God, Jeff, why didn’t you confide in me? What were you doing?

  She craved answers to those questions. He’d always been such a cute, lively boy. She still thought of him as a boy even though he was technically a young man. A tear trickled down each of her cheeks, and she swiped them away. No time yet to grieve. She must hurry and then call in the grendel’s existence.

  At the thought of the creature, she stopped her hunt through cabinet drawers and examined it from a distance. It looked like any other of its kind she’d ever seen: broad feet that slapped the ground when it walked; hard, grey, slimy skin and sharp teeth; a mouth that emitted hisses and snarls that sounded like a cross between a cat’s growl and a dog’s bark; long, skinny arms and legs; large, luminous eyes; spikes protruding from its back; sparse patches of hair covering its scalp; long, fleshy fingers; small, suction-like protrusions on its finger pads; and a pug nose that was a bump on a large head.

  If Jeff had tampered with this creature, it didn’t show in any way she could discern. She resumed her hunt, opening drawers, rifling through them and then closing them. Footsteps on the stairs alerted her to Hound Dog’s and Peter’s arrival. Peter entered the room first. He froze, jaw dropping, at the sight of the snarling, slavering grendel.

  “Oh, my God, Hound Dog told me it was down here, but I wasn’t prepared to actually see it so close. So real.”

  Rachel noted the use of Hound Dog’s nickname and that the protector let it slide. Perhaps the two had declared a truce.

  “Boss, here,” Hound Dog called out. He waved her over to the closet next to the door. “It’s locked. I assume anything useful would be stored in here.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure he’s not locking up his winter boots.” She hunted down a paper clip from Jeff’s desk next to the closet and unbent it. In a few moments, she had the door open. Shelves inside held neatly labelled storage bins.
<
br />   “This is helpful.”

  One box held tax files from previous years. Another was folders containing research notes. She lifted that box onto a nearby table and opened it up.

  “Help me go through these. Take pictures of what’s relevant.”

  “What would that be?” Hound Dog asked.

  Rachel and Peter exchanged glances.

  “You’ll know it when you see it,” Peter replied.

  “Where’s his computer?” Hound Dog scanned the room.

  “Good question.” Rachel checked the counters, the desktop. “He used a laptop. Probably carried it with him.” She turned to Peter. “Did he have one with him when he was arrested?”

  “If he did, they probably impounded it with his car. Evidence.”

  “He probably has a computer he uses at the office strictly for work,” she said.

  “They’d take that, too,” Hound Dog put in.

  Rachel agreed and pushed thoughts of computers and Jeff’s arrest from her mind. She focused on learning what they could from the hard copies of files he had in the lab. Together, they searched in human silence while the grendel continued its snarling tirade.

  A few minutes later, Peter spoke. “He’s trying to domesticate it.” As soon as the words were out, he corrected himself with a sorrowful glance at Rachel. “Was trying to domesticate it.”

  “How?” Rachel asked.

  “Talking to it. Feeding it dog food, rewarding it with treats. Tried to play with it using cat toys.”

  Rachel swallowed past a lump in her throat. “Does he say he had any success?”

  “Not according to this, but he wasn’t at it for long enough to draw any conclusions, and results on one subject don’t mean much. Plus, if Jeff’s been gone for two days, this creature must be starving.”

  They all stared at it. It continued to rave.

  “Don’t those things get tired?”

  No one replied to Hound Dog. The question had no answer. The creatures seemed to have inexhaustible energy, which was why the two creatures resting against the tree near where they’d found Jeff’s body made no sense.