by Ann Charles
“I don’t think the bounty hunter is here yet,” Cooper said. “That ghost only showed me the Nachzehrer.”
Natalie scowled at him. “You of all people are going to rely on a ghost as a bounty hunter barometer? Who are you and what have you done with Detective Cooper?”
He pointed at me. “It’s Parker’s fault.”
I wasn’t even going to try to defend myself because that was actually true. Although he’d been following me too closely yet again when he’d been “blasted” open to the ectoplasmic world, but now was not the time to fling monkey poo back at him.
“What if the bounty hunter is waiting inside the cave for me along with the Nachzehrer?” I asked. “What if it’s just one big trap?” The one Reid and I had taken out had been trying to lure me in, too.
“Yer best chance is still to go in after it,” Harvey said. “It’s like wranglin’ lost cattle. Best to lead them into a box canyon where you can corner the critter.”
Doc stared at me, his brow tight. “Well?”
I sighed. “So, what’s the plan, Cooper?”
“I’m thinking that you, me, and Nyce go in after the Nachzehrer.” When Natalie started to protest, he held up his hand for her to let him finish. “Nat and Uncle Willis wait out here in case it manages to get past us.”
“Or in case we need to make a run for it,” I said. “You guys can have the getaway vehicle running and ready to tear ass out of here.”
“Ah, damn. I left Bessie at home,” Harvey said, sounding forlorn about it.
Cooper nodded toward his police rig. “I have a couple of my own personal firearms I can lend you two.”
“Okay, fine,” Natalie said quietly. “But how will we know what’s going on? I doubt the walkie-talkies will work from inside a cave.”
“You won’t,” Cooper said, taking her hand in his and giving it a squeeze. “You’ll just have to keep an eye out, be ready for all hell to break loose, and shoot straight if anything comes barreling down the hill toward you—especially if she has crazy curls and screams like a baby.” He gave me a smartass grin.
I glared at him. “I’m going to feed you to the Nachzehrer before I kill it, Cooper.”
Harvey snickered. “It’d probably spit him back out. The boy’s too hard and gristly.”
Doc peered out the windshield at the hillside. “If we’re going to do this, let’s get it over with.”
Five minutes later, I gave Natalie a hug and patted Harvey’s shoulder. “Be safe, you two.” I looked at Natalie. “If that thing comes at you, it will move fast, same as last time.” To Harvey I said, “Aim for the head, like Reid did.”
Cooper gave a handgun that he’d pulled from the back of the police rig to his uncle. “You know how to use that, right?”
“Well, I should smile,” Harvey said with a big grin.
Cooper groaned. “You and that damned Zane Grey book.”
He handed Natalie a shotgun. “I know you know how to use this.”
“How does he know that?” I asked her. “Is playing with shotguns one of your weird sex games?” Instead of a black cat suit, did she dress in some camouflage-print negligee and blow a duck whistle at him while cracking the whip?
“No, you big dork. Coop and I went to the shooting range together, remember?”
Oh, yeah, I’d forgotten about that. I really wished Cooper hadn’t blabbed about their sex life in that haunted jail the other night. That was going to plague me more than dealing with that banshee.
“Switch me coats,” Natalie said. “You don’t need to ruin your Christmas present from Doc.”
I shrugged off my trench coat and took her fleece-lined parka. It smelled sweet and citrusy, her favorite perfume. I hoped it would disguise my scent from the Nachzehrer.
Cooper gave Doc another handgun. “You’ve used this one before.”
Doc checked the safety on the weapon and then put it in his coat pocket.
Criminy. Cooper was giving guns away like they were party favors. “Did you bring a portable armory along?”
“In my line of work, it pays to be prepared for the worst.”
I crossed my arms. “We can’t fire guns in a cave.”
He held up his own Colt .45. “This is in case we end up back outside chasing after that thing.”
“Fine.” I held out my hand. “Where’s mine?”
“Right here.” Doc handed me the ax that he’d stored in the back of my SUV after Reid’s and my run-in with the Nachzehrer.
I made a face and took it. “It’s not fair, you know. I always have to get my hands the dirtiest.”
“You’re the one always saying that bullets are no good against these creatures,” Cooper reminded me, stuffing his police baton in his belt holder next to what looked like a stun gun.
“Shut up, Detective Know-It-All.”
Doc held the mace he’d bought me for Christmas in his other hand. “Ready if you two are.”
“You have your Kevlar vest on just to be safe?” Cooper asked him.
Doc patted his chest and gave a thumbs-up. He must have had that stored in the back of my SUV, too.
I felt underdressed for the party in just Nat’s coat and Doc’s shirt.
Doc looked at me. “Do you want to wear my Kevlar vest?”
I shook my head. “You and I know that will just slow me down in the thick of battle. Besides, I got it for you, not me.”
Cooper grabbed Natalie and pulled her close. “Don’t be a hero,” he told her and gave her a quick kiss.
“Same goes for you,” she whispered up at him with a worried brow.
“Hey, where’s my smooch, boy?” Harvey said when Cooper let her go.
“I’ll let Nyce give you a good-luck kiss tonight,” he said, and clapped his uncle on the shoulder.
Natalie turned to me. “You know what you need to do.”
“Strike first, ask questions later?”
She hugged me. “Just keep your eyes open when you swing.”
Doc caught my hand and tugged me toward the trees. “Come on, Killer. Let’s go wrangle a Nachzehrer.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
We let Cooper lead the way to the Nachzehrer hoedown. He kept his light on the ground as we hiked in silence up the hill. Too soon, we stood at the base of a large rock outcropping, two stories high.
I shivered, probably as much from the task before us as the cold wind rattling the trees overhead.
“Can you smell anything?” Doc whispered to me.
“That’s funny. I usually ask you that.” I sniffed, shaking my head. “Just pine trees, fresh air, and Natalie’s perfume on the collar of her coat.”
Cooper aimed his flashlight beam on a dark opening between two very large rocks that were leaning against each other, like huge, crooked teeth. “It went in there.”
The crevice was about four feet wide at the bottom, tapering to an arm’s length over my head.
I took a step toward the opening, trying to gear up mentally for what might be waiting for me in the dark. “I’ll go in first.”
“No.” Doc caught my arm and tugged me back. “I’ll go. When I give you a signal, then you’ll follow.” He didn’t wait for a committee vote. Leading with his flashlight, he turned sideways and slid between the rocks. And then he was gone.
“I shouldn’t have let him go first,” I said, worrying my lower lip.
“He’s a big boy.”
“Yeah, but—”
“Make sure your cell phone is on silent mode,” Cooper said, checking his walkie-talkie. “We don’t want that thing to realize we’re in there until we know the lay of the land.”
I checked and tucked my phone away in Natalie’s coat pocket. “There’s a chance it can’t hear anything. Maybe the implantation of the Nachzehrer egg in the human ear causes deafness, I don’t know. I think the tongue is used as one of its senses, though, sort of like a snake.”
He grunted. “Best to be safe. Act as if it can hear us.”
“All clear,
” Doc whispered from the shadows.
“Did you hear what Parker just said about its hearing?” Cooper asked Doc.
“Yeah. Let’s go.”
He lit the way for me as I slid between the rocks. On the other side was a narrow passageway that required Doc and Cooper to duck slightly. There were no timbers holding up the ceiling or any other sign of mining activity. Maybe this was a natural cave. There were a bunch around the hills, several of which doubled as popular tourist attractions.
Doc gave us a hand signal to follow and started down a long slope. Cooper brought up the rear. We moved without a sound through the rock-lined throat, heading into the bowels of the Earth. The air was warmer in here than outside, at least, but still cool and damp and musty. Sounds were muted, like we’d been closed inside of a big coffin in the ground.
I shuddered and tried to think of something less macabre.
The tunnel sort of reminded me of the one between Calamity Jane Realty and the courthouse, via what had come to be known as the “Hellhole.” Only that tunnel had more width and formal arches … and a couple of creatures that I hoped not to run into ever again. Especially that one with the red arm.
And I was back to thinking about the macabre again.
A minute later, we rounded a bend and the tunnel opened wide. Doc stopped short, holding up his hand for us to do the same.
I peeked around him and my breath caught.
Holy shit. What fresh hell had we stumbled into?
Doc shined the light around the cavern, which was about the size of the dining room at Bighorn Billy’s. Mounted on the walls throughout the place were heads of all shapes and sizes. Some of the creatures I recognized as the usual predators found in many hunting lodges and wildlife exhibits—a bear, a mountain lion, and a wolf, to name a few.
But most of the creatures I hadn’t seen before even in books, and I hoped never to run into them in the future. Like that shaggy beast with two pointy horns poking straight out of its forehead. It reminded me of a Scottish Highlands cow in coloring, but it had three white eyes, a round flat face, and two long tusks reminiscent of a sabretooth tiger.
Next to it was a Bone Cruncher’s head. Its milky eyes stared out into the cave, its toothy jaws frozen in mid-crunch on a human skull.
I grimaced, recalling the night I’d faced off with one behind Harvey’s barn. I was still waiting for the second Bone Cruncher to come calling, since Mr. Black had warned me they typically hunted in pairs.
Across the room, stood a stuffed chimera. Its feathery black mane and long snout brought back visions of Slagton and the battle we’d gone through back there on that bright, sunny day … and then a short time later facing off with Kyrkozz in the dark once again. Lucky for me, Harvey’s old stick of dynamite had saved my bacon on that trip. The chimera in front of us was bigger than most we’d dealt with, though. The pack alpha, maybe. A true hunter’s prize.
As we tiptoed deeper into the cavern, I shined my cell phone light around, bouncing from one creature to the next. Cringing. Wincing. Swallowing gasps.
Several more creatures stood in attack poses. Some of them had four legs, a few had six. One looked like a centipede, but it was the size of a bobcat with a hyena-shaped head turned inside out and a slimy, scaly body.
There was a spider-like beast that looked to have been mixed with a bighorn sheep—its legs spindly and jointed, but its back broad and muscled. There were talons at its feet, rather than hooves. Talons with one especially long, sharp claw.
Standing next to that was another mid-sized creature that had scales down its neck and back, huge pointy ears, and two huge bulbous eyes—like a fly.
I blanched and switched my focus to the gremlin-like creatures positioned throughout with their wrinkly gray skin, thick flappy lips, and pinched angry faces.
Doc pointed out a mounted two-headed serpent with a cow-like tongue and what looked like extra-large gills for cheeks.
Next to it was a bat creature with wings and big ears on a small human body. White fur cascaded down its back and along its whip-like tail.
And then there was a raptor-looking creature with spikes on its beak.
And an imp-sized beast with floppy ears, a pig nose, and red eyes that glowed in the flashlight’s beam.
And below that, I spotted a wooden cask. Cooper joined me and shined his light into it. Shrunken human heads nearly filled it. At least I thought they were human. The faces of the poor victims were scrunched into exaggerated frowns. Skull raisins, I heard Harvey say in my mind and quivered. There must have been twenty heads in the cask, maybe more.
I hurried along, cringing at some of the creatures, trying to make sense of others. Things with tusks. Things with horns. Things with rows of sharp teeth. Things with deadly claws. Things with too many eyes. Things that didn’t even look like they had faces, just a conglomeration of fur, spikes, and antennae-like feelers.
“Help me,” a raspy voice whispered.
I froze.
Slowly turning, I looked from Doc to Cooper. Both were checking out different creatures with looks of wonder on their faces—not the good kind of wonder, either, like that inspired by a newborn puppy or a piece of pizza dripping with cheese fresh from the oven. Neither of them seemed to have heard anything.
Huh. Maybe that was the voice of reason in my head, reeling from horror overload.
I turned back to a mounted head that was surely some sort of troll with its wide, flat face; thick, fleshy lips; and tiny round ears. Or maybe an ogre. What was the difference between the two? I hoped to never find out firsthand.
“Help me,” the voice said again.
I hurried to Doc’s side. “Do you hear that?” I whispered in his ear.
His forehead wrinkled and he shook his head.
“Someone is calling out for help,” I told him.
“I don’t hear it. Which way is it coming from?”
I pointed toward the other side of the cavern.
He firmed his grip on the mace and eased across the rock floor, keeping me behind him. Cooper followed, armed with his police baton.
A narrow tunnel led into thick shadows.
I sniffed and grabbed Doc’s arm, pulling him back. When he looked at me, I pinched my nose and mouthed Nachzehrer, pointing into the shadows. He nodded and then continued.
The stench of rotten flesh and sulfur grew with every step, making me glad I’d skipped the fancy hors d’oeuvres at the party. Although that caramel pecan–baked brie sure looked finger-licking good, and I’d never met a meatball I hadn’t liked.
I could see the glow of dim light up ahead, which made my heart rock and roll. I doubted a Nachzehrer used a flashlight, so maybe we were finally going to meet the bounty hunter. I had a feeling it was behind all of these freaky monster trophies.
Slurping and crunching sounds, along with grunts and snorts reached my ears. What the hell? Had we caught the hunter on lunch break?
We moved slowly, carefully, silently, watching where we stepped. I clutched the ax handle like my life depended on it, which it did at the moment, along with Doc’s and Cooper’s.
Then we rounded a corner and stopped on a dime. In front of us was a small room lit by a single lightbulb dangling from a hook in the rock ceiling. A worktable sat against the wall, cluttered with jars and hammers and picks and knives, along with a collection of tweezers, scalpels, stained rags, clippers, and sharp fishhooks on chains that still had pieces of something on the pointy ends. I didn’t want to know what those pieces were. Ever.
Help me, the voice wheezed in my head.
I stared at what looked like a body, mummy-wrapped in white gauze on a rock platform.
White gauze … Make that a cocoon.
Oh, dear Lord. There it was, just as Masterson had described. A Nachzehrer in the making.
Kneeling next to the cocoon with its back to us was the three-limbed creature. It was chewing on the lower half of the body like it was an ear of corn. Cooper had been right. The fourth limb wa
s growing back. In fact, it was nearly half-sized now, and its burned skin looked mostly healed, as far as I could tell. How was that possible?
Oh! Suddenly, it all made sense.
Eating the nutrient-filled cocoon.
Regenerating a limb.
Growing stronger.
Only the three-limbed bastard was devouring the shroud of another soon-to-be Nachzehrer.
I covered my mouth, gagging behind my hand.
The Nachzehrer paused and lifted its head. Its tongue uncurled and moved about in the air.
Oh damn.
It whipped around, staring right at me with those flat black eyes opened wide. Its jaw unhinged, and then it hissed at me.
I should have been scared, but I was far more disgusted by the stringy pieces of cocoon stuck to its face and dangling from several of its teeth.
I stepped out from behind Doc. “Hello, asshole.”
The Nachzehrer lunged at me.
Doc bumped me aside and swung the mace at it, delivering a skull-cracking blow to its forehead that sent it reeling backward.
The creature hit the wall and slid to the floor of the cave. Its head tilted to the side as blackish blood trailed from its lips down its fleshy neck.
“Your turn, Killer,” Doc said, patting my shoulder. “I told you my plan would work if you’d just give it a try.”
I resisted reminding him that his so-called plan had also included my blood, because I was glad we were able to skip that element this time.
We eased up to the creature. It was gnashing its teeth slowly, as if still chewing on the cocoon.
“I need a clear shot at the neck.”
Cooper grabbed it by the ankles and pulled so it lay flat. “There you go. On a silver platter.”
I stood over it, taking aim.
Gah! I hated this part.
“Hurry up, Parker. I want to get the hell out of here before something else shows up to the party, or we get stuck down here.”
“Quit yer caterwaulin’,” I told him, stealing his uncle’s line, and swung the ax. This time, I nailed it on the first try. Natalie would have cheered. We watched as the head and body quickly withered, leaving a small pile of dust amidst the pebbles.