Into the Woods (Anomaly Hunters, Book One)

by J. S. Volpe

  He had to try.

  Cynthia seemed to sense some subtle shift in his body or his emotions. Her hand stopped stroking, and she gave a small, puzzled frown, the smooth skin between her eyebrows buckling into a trio of folds. God, she looked so cute when she frowned like that.

  He looked from her eyes to her lips to her eyes again. Her frowned deepened, then smoothed out as her expression went blank.

  His heart hammering, he drew in a breath and leaned forward, propelling his lips toward hers.

  Her eyes went wide. She jerked backward and thrust her hands up, palms out.

  “Calvin, don’t.”

  “What? But…”

  “Just…don’t. Please.”

  “I…” His face burned. “I’m sorry. I—I just…” He shook his head. “I’m stupid, I know. This isn’t the right time, what with your sister and everything…”

  Her shoulders slumped. She looked at him with a mix of pity and…was that guilt?

  “It’s not that,” she said. Then after a pause she added, “Or it’s not just that.” She opened her mouth to go on, but nothing came out. She shut it.

  “What, then?” he said.

  She continued staring at him a moment longer, then looked away at the file cabinets. She shoved her hands into the back pockets of her jeans, then pulled them out a moment later and folded her arms across her chest. She swallowed. The click from her throat was audible in the otherwise silent room.

  She was scared of something, he realized with surprise. But what?

  Calvin remembered her odd reaction to the painting of Anna May in the toga. Did Cynthia have some kind of problem with sex, or men? Had she been raped or something?

  She shut her eyes, heaved a shaky breath as if preparing herself to do something she didn’t want to do, then looked at him again.

  “If I tell you something, you have to promise not to tell anyone. And I mean anyone. Okay?”

  “Um, yeah. I promise.” He felt nearly certain she was about to confess to having been sexually abused.

  She continued staring at him in silence a moment longer with large, frightened eyes. Then she took another deep breath and blurted out, “I’m a lesbian. I like girls.” She closed her eyes and shook her head. “That’s redundant, isn’t it? God, I sound like a fucking idiot.”

  Calvin didn’t say anything. He couldn’t think of anything to say. He just stared at her, his mouth slack, while in his mind all the beautiful romantic fantasies he had constructed over the last couple of months came crashing down in awful, lonely silence. It felt as if a giant fist were slowly squeezing his chest.

  He sat down on the edge of the desk, his eyes on the floor. He sensed Cynthia looking at him. He turned his head away from her. He felt small and embarrassed and resentful. He knew he shouldn’t feel that way, but he did. He couldn’t help it.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I know I should’ve told you before. I mean, I could kind of tell that, y’know, that you liked me. But I just…I didn’t know how to tell you. I’ve never told this to anyone before. I—I don’t know how to do this.”

  A quaver in her voice made him look up at her. Her eyes were glimmering with tears. Seeing her distress, all his bad feelings vanished in a rush of empathy.

  “You don’t need to apologize,” he said softly. “It’s okay. I understand. This must be… difficult for you.”

  She gave him a small, sad smile. “It’s difficult for both of us, I guess.”

  “Yeah,” he said, giving her a small, sad smile right back. He felt proud that he was handling this in such a calm and mature manner. Still, he knew that he would probably cry himself to sleep tonight.

  He turned to gaze at the movie poster again. She sat down on the edge of the desk an arm’s length away and likewise gazed at the poster. Neither of them spoke for a while.

  She broke the silence first. “So, um…are we…” She cleared her throat. “Are we still friends?” Her voice was small and nervous.

  He looked at her, surprised.

  “Of course,” he said. “You’ll always be my friend. That’ll never change.”

  She started to say something, but her emotions welled up and choked off her words, so she only nodded.

  There was another, longer silence.

  Then she looked at him with a smile. “Don’t worry. A guy like you should have no trouble finding tons of eligible and interested women. I’m sure someday real soon you’ll bag some supercool, smokin’-hot girl who’s a million times more awesome than me.”

  “Yeah,” he said. But he thought: Not possible.

  A gust of wind rattled the windowpane behind the desk, making Calvin glance over his shoulder at the window. As he started to look away, his gaze fell on the map of the woods and the black pin Mr. May had inserted into the clearing.

  “All right,” he said with a sigh, then pushed himself off the desk. “Let’s get back to finding Emily.”

  Chapter 30

  Red on Yellow

  1

  “This is a wild goose chase, you know,” Officer Ronald Carter said as he and Officer Bob Thompson pulled out of the May Civic Administration Building’s parking lot in Patrol Car Five. Carter flipped down the sun visor above the passenger seat and examined himself in the mirror on its back. He turned his head left and right, trying to see his thin face from every angle. “This psychic stuff’s a bunch of crap.”

  “I dunno,” Thompson said. “I’ve heard stories about Wendy Crow.”

  Carter snorted. “Yeah, they’re stories. That’s the point.”

  Thompson shook his head, then watched as Carter licked the tips of his forefinger and middle finger and used them to swipe back a lock of his blond hair.

  “What’re you preening for anyway?” Thompson asked. “It’s not like you’re going on a date. We’re just going to check out the freezer Cynthia Crow called about.”

  “It’s not preening. It’s about public relations. It’s about the fact that we as officers of the law are the law’s public face. We need to look our best.”

  “Dude, you think about this shit way too much.”

  “Well, at least someone’s thinking.”

  “Fuck you.” He glanced at Carter, who was examining a tiny reddish spot on his chin. “You look beautiful. Mr. Grey is gonna be so impressed, he’s gonna wanna give you a big wet kiss.”

  “Fuck you right back.” Scowling, Carter flipped up the sun visor and settled back in his seat. He watched the suburban homes on Potts Road slide past. A few of them had their drapes open, and happy families could be seen basking in the glow of TV sets as they digested their dinners. “It’s kind of late to be doing this, isn’t it? I mean, it’s already after seven.”

  Thompson shrugged. “I dunno. I guess Krezchek felt too much time had passed already. Besides, I think he really has a lot of faith in Wendy’s abilities.

  “So what are these amazing stories about Wendy Crow, anyway?”

  “I dunno. Just…stuff. She just saw some stuff, and it all came true.”

  “‘Some stuff’? You don’t even know?”

  “Not specifically, no. It’s just…look, you didn’t grow up here. Everybody knows about Wendy.”

  “Yeah, well, I’ll believe it when I see it. I mean, what, she says, ‘a yellow freezer’ and this is supposed to be evidence?”

  “It’s not evidence necessarily. It’s something we need to check out. And it wasn’t ‘a yellow freezer’; it was ‘a yellow box.’ I think.”

  “That’s only more vague. It just proves my point. Psychics spew out a bunch of shit and then everybody acts all gosh-wow surprised when a few things amid all the spew turn out to kinda-sorta resemble something in reality. It’s a lot of bunk.”

  “Yeah, well, Krezchek doesn’t think so.”

  “But Agent Rowan does.” Carter chuckled. “Man, you could smell the love between them.”

  “Yeah.” Thompson shook his head. “I thought Krezchek was gonna have a stroke when he found out Cynthia Crow cal
led yesterday and Rowan didn’t even mention it till now. And, hell, I can’t blame the Chief. A lead’s a lead. We need to follow it up.”

  Carter rolled his eyes. “It’s not a real lead. It’s not based on anything solid. Rowan didn’t want to waste resources—us, that is—on some pseudoscientific nonsense when we could be out there looking for Emily.”

  “We are.”

  Carter flung up his hands and gasped in exasperation. “I mean in a useful, realistic way.”

  Thompson smiled. He enjoyed riling up Carter. It was almost too easy, though.

  “Here we are,” he said, pulling into the driveway of a small white house and parking behind a gray Ford Focus. “452 Grace Road.”

  “Let’s hurry this up so we can get back to some real work,” Carter groused.

  2

  Roger was rinsing off his dinner dishes when he heard Emily say, “They’re coming.”

  He spun around, splashing water all over the counter. Emily Faux stood in the middle of the kitchen, her eyes fixed on him.

  He sucked in a sharp breath. She had said that when he saw her again he would have to give her his decision. But he still wasn’t sure what to do.

  “Is—is this it?” he said. “Is it time?”

  “There’s no time to talk. Two policemen are on their way here. If you want to make it through this okay, you must do exactly as I tell you.”

  Roger shut off the water and toweled his hands dry. Part of him resented the influence she had over him and was appalled at how ready he was to jump through whatever hoops she told him to. But she had helped him time and time again, hadn’t she? She had earned his trust.

  But if that were true, why did he balk at killing the two kids?

  He shook his head. This wasn’t the time for questions or analysis. He had more urgent matters to deal with.

  “What do I do?” he said.

  “Get a knife. A big one. A sharp one.”

  He opened the cutlery drawer and pulled out a carving knife. It was the longest, sharpest knife he had.

  “Is this good?” he asked.

  “It’s fine.”

  The doorbell rang.

  Roger looked toward the front door, then back at Emily. He felt that he should be nervous, but he wasn’t. Not with Her here.

  “Hide the knife,” she told him. “Tuck it under the back of your shirt. Then let them in.”

  Roger lifted the back of his shirt and slid the blade down the back of his pants, flinching a little at the metal’s cold touch. He headed to the door. Thanks to the knife, he had to walk stiff and upright lest the blade bite into his skin. The knife’s handle was a hard column against his spine.

  The doorbell rang again just as Roger reached the door. He opened it to find two cops on the front steps—a skinny one with blond hair and a plump one with brown hair and a mustache.

  “Be pleasant,” Emily said beside him, unseen and unheard by the cops. For the thousandth time Roger found himself wondering what she, or it, really was. “Do what they ask. Give them no cause for suspicion.”

  “Can I help you?” Roger asked with the sort of concerned smile he figured a normal citizen would adopt in a situation like this.

  “I’m Officer Thompson,” said the plump one. “This is Officer Carter. How are you this evening?”

  “Um, pretty good. Is this about the other night, when those kids broke in?”

  “Not exactly, sir.” Officer Thompson nodded at the living room behind Roger. “May we come in?”

  “Sure,” Roger said. He opened the door and led them into the living room. “Would you like to sit down, or—”

  “Actually, we don’t plan to be here long. We were just hoping to take a quick look at something, and then we’ll be on our way, if that’s okay with you.”

  “Sure. What is it you need to see?” Roger felt sure he already knew the answer.

  “We understand you have a yellow freezer in your basement,” Officer Thompson said. “Mind if we take a look inside?”

  Roger glanced at Emily. She nodded.

  Roger’s heart began to pound. What was she doing? Was she planning to betray him to the cops after all? But no: If she meant to do that, why would she have warned him? Why would she have told him to grab a knife?

  “No problem,” Roger said, somehow managing to keep his fears and doubts from his face and voice. “Follow me.”

  He led the cops to the basement stairs. He made sure to walk upright and with a slight bow to his back so the contours of the knife handle wouldn’t be visible under his shirt.

  Halfway down the stairs, Roger realized that Emily wasn’t with them. Where had she gone? Had she abandoned him? His heart pounded harder than ever. He felt sweat collecting along the top of the knife handle and trickling down the length of the blade.

  When Roger entered the workroom and saw Emily waiting for them next to the chest freezer, he breathed a silent sigh of relief.

  “Tell them to take a look inside the freezer,” she told Roger. “And stay behind them when they do.”

  “Well, there it is,” Roger said, stopping about six feet from the freezer and waving a hand at it. He hoped neither of the cops noticed how sweaty his palm was. “Take a look if you want, but there’s nothing in there except some frozen meat.”

  The two cops stepped up to the freezer, Thompson on the left, Carter on the right.

  “Get out the knife,” Emily said.

  As Thompson lifted the lid of the freezer, Roger reached back and slid the knife from his waistband.

  The cops looked into the freezer.

  “Holy shit!” Carter began. “That’s—that’s—”

  “Stab him here,” Emily said, pointing at a spot on the back of Thompson’s shirt. Right about where the heart was.

  Not allowing himself time to think or hesitate, Roger did exactly as she said. He drove the knife in as hard as he could. It sank in so deep the edge of the handle thumped against the cop’s back.

  Thompson stiffened for a moment, then began to shudder as if he were being electrocuted. The freezer’s lid dropped from his hand and banged shut. Carter whirled around, his hand zipping toward his gun.

  “Push him into the other one,” Emily ordered.

  Holding the knife in place with one hand, Roger seized the back of Thompson’s shirt with the other and heaved the cop’s still-shuddering body toward his partner. Thompson’s body drove Carter against the freezer hard enough to make it rock backward against the wall. Pinned between the body and the freezer, Carter tried to elbow the body away, but Roger kept pushing it forward. After one final violent spasm, Thompson went limp, his upper body slumping over his partner’s as if trying to give him a hug. Carter grunted and strained against the dead weight.

  “Pull out the knife,” Emily said.

  Roger did. Blood gouted out after it, splashing Roger’s pants and shoes and the concrete floor.

  “Let go of the body.”

  Roger did. With a roar, Carter shoved his partner’s corpse off him. Thompson’s body crashed to the floor, the skull striking the concrete with a noise like a bat hitting a homerun. Carter’s hand fumbled for his gun.

  “Go for his throat,” Emily commanded.

  At the same moment that Carter tore his pistol from his holster Roger swept the carving knife across the cop’s throat.

  A lipless mouth parted in the middle of Carter’s throat, and blood geysered out in quick, rhythmic pulses.

  Blinking at Roger, Carter started to raise the gun. The muzzle rose one inch, two. Roger leaped back, fearing for one horrible moment that Carter would manage to shoot him after all.

  But then Carter’s arm went limp and the gun slid from his slack fingers and clattered to the floor. Carter’s eyes rolled up, showing white. His body sank and turned at the same time, spraying the whole basement with blood—the walls, the shelves, Roger, the freezer. Carter collapsed in a heap atop Thompson’s legs.

  Roger gaped at the carnage before him. He had killed two me
n in ten seconds.

  “There’s…there’s blood on the ceiling,” he muttered. Then his face turned the color of cottage cheese, and a hot frothy ball of vomit rose in his throat. He tried to swallow it back but couldn’t. He barely had time to lean over before it came gushing out his mouth. The sounds of his retches and of the vomit splashing into the puddle of blood on the floor were loud in the otherwise silent basement. The tan puke and the red blood mingled together in sickening swirls.

  When there was nothing left to puke, and when his throat stopped trying to puke anyway, he wiped the specks of vomit from his lips with the cuff of his sleeve, then straightened up and looked around for Emily. He avoided looking at the two messy corpses beside the freezer. He realized his hands wouldn’t stop shaking.

  Emily sat on the old wooden table, legs folded Indian-style. She flashed him a perky smile.

  “It’s time to make the magic happen,” she said. “We’d better hurry, though. There’s a lot we need to do.” She motioned at the dead cops. “First of all, get their guns…”

  Chapter 31

  Convergence

  1

  “So what’s our next move, then?” Cynthia said. She pushed herself off the desk and joined Calvin in the center of the office.

  “We need to get back into Roger Grey’s house and check out that chest freezer,” he said. “That should be priority number one.”

  She nodded. “Yeah. Especially if the cops aren’t gonna bother.”

  “We should probably call your brother and Violet and see if they want to join in.”

  She groaned. “I don’t know…”

  “They helped last time. He’s your brother, after all.”

  “It’s not him I have a problem with. It’s Violet.”

  Calvin shrugged. “I thought she was very helpful.”

  “Yeah, well, you don’t know her like I do.”

  “You don’t really know her that well either.”

  “I know enough.” She sighed. “Of course, I also know that if we include Donovan we’re gonna have to include Violet. If we try not to, she’ll tag along anyway.”

  “Well, do you want to make it just the two of us, then?”

  She opened her mouth, shut it, sighed again. “No, you’re right. We should call them over. This involves them, too.”