The Evil Returned

by Richard Raven

  Jeff nodded. “I kind of thought you’d feel that way. I’ve been staying in a motel since I got out of here. I can hardly stand to walk into my own house.”

  “That’s not the only problem, though. What about my job? It could be weeks, maybe longer, before I’m comfortable enough to go back to work. Then there’s all the bills I’m running up here. My insurance will pay some of it, but I’ll still have a mountain of debt. And I don’t even have a car anymore. I never want to lay eyes on that Cobalt again. I swear, Jeff, I really don’t know what I’m going to do.”

  “First of all,” Jeff began, “as long as I’ve got a business, you have a job, whenever you’re ready to come back to it. I’ve also filled out all the paperwork for you to draw Worker’s Comp. As far as where you’re going to stay, I think I might have an idea.” He released Janice’s hand and reached into his pocket. What he took out of it he held to that she could see it.

  “A key?” She was frowning and it hurt to do it.

  “It’s the key to a little house that my friend and lawyer Daren Evans and his wife own on Lake Nimrod. You know where that is, right?”

  “It’s about an hour north of here.”

  “I’ve decided to let my house go and get whatever I can for it. There’s also the insurance I had on Angela. It looks as though I’m going to get it, in time. I’ve got a little left in the bank, too. When the insurance comes in, after I’ve finished paying for Angela’s funeral and Damon’s cremation, I should have quite a bit left over. So here’s my idea.”

  Jeff placed the key in Janice’s hand. She looked at it, then up at him.

  “When they kick you out of here, what would you think of spending the rest of the fall and maybe the winter with me on Lake Nimrod?”

  Janice’s eyes brimmed again. “Do you really mean that, Jeff?”

  “Yes, of course, I do. Janice, I haven’t been here for you very much until now, but I’m going to be from here on, or as much as you’ll let me. The best way to do that, as I see it, is to have you close…and together, we’ll get through this. So what do you say?”

  Her hand closed into a fist around the key. “I say this and you are the answers to my prayers. You really have no idea what this means to me, Jeff. Now, I want you to lean down to me so I can hug you.”

  “Janice…your ribs, there’s no need to hurt yourself.”

  “You let me worry about my ribs. You just get your butt close enough so I can get my arms around you—and this time, you’re going to get that kiss I mentioned before.”

  Jeff got the promised hug and kiss. Afterward, neither of them seemed any worse for wear.

  “Is there anything you need from your place?” Jeff asked, again holding her hand.

  “Actually, yes, there is. Several things. I’ve got nothing but this little thin gown and nothing under it— it’s one of those peek-a-boo gowns, too. I’d love to have the robe that’s in my bathroom and a pair of slippers. Then there’s my make-up and, God, what I’d give to have my hairbrush.” She hesitated, looking sheepish. “I’ll also need some things of a rather delicate and personal nature when I leave here.”

  Jeff shrugged. “Just tell me what you need.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Janice, I once had a wife, remember? You might be amazed at the things of a delicate and personal nature I did for her. I’ve got no problem with it.”

  Janice smiled and she barely felt it. “Know what I’d like?”

  “What?”

  “To go down to that little balcony at the end of the corridor and soak up some of that sunshine. It’s looks so wonderful outside.”

  “In that peek-a-boo gown?” Jeff asked dubiously.

  “There’s a robe of sorts in the closet over there. It’s not much, but it’ll cover me and I’ll be decent.”

  “I’ll get a nurse and wait outside.”

  Janice held on to his hand, looking thoughtful. “Can I tell you something?”

  “Sure, you can.”

  “You know,” she said slowly, “I’ve got a little secret that I’ve had for several months now. If we make it through the winter okay…I might let you in on it.”

  Jeff returned her thoughtful look. “It’s funny you mention a secret because I’ve got one, too. If the time’s right and you tell me yours, I just might tell you mine.”

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Miles away across the river to the north, a man sat dejectedly on his front steps.

  The house was the last on a short and narrow street that ended at a double set of railroad tracks. The house was little more than a dump, yet in better condition than any that shared the street. Except for his hovel, only one other had occupants, and then only when some of the local working girls needed a place to ply their trade or to crash for the night. That house was two away from his. The roof had caved in on the one closest to his, all the rest boarded up and abandoned.

  The man was tall, slight of build and rail-thin. He was watching the sun set with a hard, bitter scowl. His gray-blue eyes held all the warmth of a blizzard as he noticed two of the working girls getting out of a car and scurrying inside the house down the way, with them a rough-looking guy he had never seen around there before. Those same two girls had once visited him on a regular basis, but now they barely let on like they knew he existed. These days he was lucky to get a glimpse from them or any of the others.

  Not so many weeks before he was living in, what was for him, fine style. It didn’t matter that he lived in one of the worst neighborhoods in the County; he had a steady bitch who could fuck and suck with the best of them, and she had a job and the best source for crack and meth he had ever come across. With her gone almost every day to work, he could play around with the local girls all he wanted, and he had all the drugs needed to keep them hanging around.

  Best of all, he could always count on a taste of the good stuff. That was bitches who didn’t reek all the time of dope smoke and sex. The kind that smelled of perfume—expensive shit, too—and who wore jewelry and nice clothes. The kind that really got a man going and made him want it. He didn’t get a taste of that too often, but when he did, it was worth the wait.

  What the fuck more could a man ask for?

  Then he lost his bitch, and he had been sliding downhill on his ass ever since.

  As he watched the sun sink lower, he dreaded the night that was coming. It had been warm that day, but the night promised to be chilly, and the man had no heat. Had no lights either or water. All he had were a couple of old and threadbare blankets to wrap up in, a mattress that had no sheets, an old oil lamp he found in a trash pile that was low on fuel, and an empty belly that had been calling him every name in the book for the past two days. It had been over a week since he last changed clothes; he wasn’t sure when it was going to happen because he had nothing else to put on. He didn’t even have a coat or even a jacket. He had lost everything…

  …and it all started with his bitch.

  But she had to go. She was making too much noise and all the wrong kind. It wasn’t the local girls that had her ass in the air; it was because of the good stuff and some shit she never should have found from one of them in the house. When she started asking questions and dropping hints that she might go to the cops, that was it for her ass.

  Lucky for him, there was someone around—had finally returned—who knew how to take care of the problem. The bitch had simply gone away. She, most of her shit and her car, all gone. The cops had come around right after that, asking about her. The man told them she had packed her shit and took off. It was all he could think of to say; he really didn’t know what had become of the bitch and, what’s more, he didn’t want to know. One look at the house and the neighborhood and the cops bought his bullshit quick enough and they, too, went on their merry way. Seemed only too happy to get away from there.

  Only now the bitch had come back, literally rising from the dead. That she was dead didn’t surprise him nearly as much as the fact that the cops hadn’t yet bee
n back around, asking their damn questions.

  Yet even that wasn’t the biggest surprise.

  The man could only shake his head. He still couldn’t believe it. Never would have thought it possible and yet it had to be true. Hell, word of it was all over town. He had managed to even catch some coverage about it on the news.

  “Just proves you can never believe everything you see and hear, right?”

  “Goddamn!” the man yelled, leaping off the steps like a shot of electricity had hit him in the ass. The voice had come from behind him. He spun around…

  …and there, standing in the opened door of his house, grinning like a cat eyeing a bird in a cage…

  “Hello, Toby.”

  “W-What the f-fuck?” Toby Felton spluttered, unable to believe his eyes. “Y-You’re dead! I-I saw your fucking p-picture on the news!”

  “Pull your damn eyes back in your head, Toby,” Damon Walker drawled, “and listen up.” Damon’s eyes were blood red and blazing furiously. “I’ve got a lot to tell you and there’s a lot you’re going to help me with…and you’re going to help me with it because you owe me. You damn well fucking owe me.”

  THE END

  About the Author

  Richard Raven, who has also written under the name Jackson Sullivan, embraced horror in all forms at an early age. He is an avid reader and a fan of such writers as Stephen King, James Herbert, Clive Barker, John Everson, Joe R. Lansdale, Edward Lee, and many others. His stories range from the supernatural to hard-edged horror to murder mysteries, going to whatever dark place the inspiration takes him, so his readers are never sure what the expect from him. He likes it that way.

  He has three published novels, The Evil Returned (Death’s Head Press), His Debt to Her (written as Jackson Sullivan), and From Out of the Fog (coming soon to Audible), and a collection of his Richard Raven short stories, The Order and Other Tales of Terror, which includes two of the stories he wrote with Richard Long from the UK, Indiscretions and The Haunted Ones. His story, In a Blood Red Haze, first published in the anthology Demons, Devils and Denizens of Hell, Volume 2 From HellBound Books Publishing (2017) is also available at Amazon as a stand-alone eBook. He has stories in eight anthologies (a ninth by the end of 2019) and in five issues of the ezine Deep Fried Horror from Deadman’s Tome.

  Raven lives and writes in the southern U.S. not far from a house that has an old tombstone in the front yard, and he revels in the legends and ghost stories that abound in his part of the world. All of which fuels his overactive imagination; he leaves it to his readers to decide if that is a good thing or not. Readers wishing to learn more about his work are invited to follow his links:

  https://www.amazon.com/Richard-Raven/e/B0759WXYHV

  https://facebook.com/richard.raven.5648

  https://twitter.com/richardraven11