Contamination Box Set [Books 0-7]

by Piperbrook, T. W.

  “Are there any weapons in here—anything we could use in case that thing comes back?” he asked them.

  Kendall held up the baseball bat in response. Noah was silent.

  “That’s all we got. How far is the next town, sir?”

  “Well, there’s a rest area a few miles up ahead. I’m sure there will be people there with cell phones—or at the very least, a payphone we could use.”

  Kendall nodded in agreement, letting his gaze drift out the window. He clenched the bat with both hands. Sam returned his eyes to the road ahead, checking the passenger side mirror for any signs that they were being pursued. A few times he saw lights behind them, but they had quickly faded. It was as if any fellow travelers were already aware of the danger, and had stayed off the road.

  “What the heck was wrong with that guy?” Noah broke the silence.

  “Damned if I know,” Sam shook his head. “I’ve never seen anyone like him, and I’ve seen a lot of strange people pass through my little town.”

  “Did he k-kill that guy?”

  Sam swallowed. “Yes, he did. At first I thought he was trying to rob the place…but now, I’m not sure he cared about the money at all.”

  Noah blinked hard. “What did he want, then?”

  Kendall and Sam looked at each other. Neither had an answer.

  PART TWO – THE WAYFARER

  8

  Delta Monroe hit the cruise control button and let her foot off the accelerator. This would free up her right leg, which had started to ache. She’d been driving for several hours, passing one desert town after the next, and she needed to clear her head.

  She rolled down the window. The New Mexico air drifted into the car, giving her a much-needed breath of fresh air. She brushed a lock of brown hair from her face. She tried to think of what she would say to him when she got there.

  She pulled a worn photograph from her pocket, tracing her thumb over the smooth surface. Delta had seen him once, from across a courtroom. She hadn’t met his gaze—partly out of shame, partly out of guilt. Nothing she could have said would’ve provided comfort to the broken man.

  She’d discovered the picture underneath her father’s mattress, wedged between a sock and a crushed homemade cigarette. The rest of the cell had been spotless. Aside from a few personal effects, there hadn’t been much to sort through after his death.

  Delta rolled the picture in her hand, keeping one eye on the highway as she examined the back.

  Sam Cook, White Mist, NM.

  The words were inscribed in a neat, deliberate cursive, as if someone had taken great care in writing them. A lump formed in her throat, and she fought back a wave of nausea. She tried to convince herself that the words were written by a monster, and not her father.

  For two years she’d tried to reconcile the fact that David Monroe, the loving man who had raised her since birth, had become a convicted murderer and arsonist locked in the Oklahoma State Penitentiary. A few months ago, she’d received word that he was terminally ill. Although she’d called to check on him, she only spoke with the prison staff, never requesting to speak with him directly.

  What would she have said?

  The evidence for his crime had been damning. The prosecution had provided security tapes, receipts, and eyewitness testimony, creating a sickening picture of what had happened that night. Her father’s defense team had rested quickly, unable to dispute the facts of the crime. Instead, they’d simply appealed to the jury’s sympathy, asking that their client be spared the ultimate punishment.

  Delta was convinced that he had received worse. A year into his prison sentence, he had been diagnosed with stomach cancer. Within a few months, after several excruciating bouts of radiation and chemotherapy, he’d succumbed to the disease. His passing did little to relieve her guilt. Even now, she felt the burden of his actions weighing on her conscience like hardened cement.

  Which was why she needed to talk to Sam Cook. He deserved to know that her father was dead.

  Aside from the roar of the open window, Delta’s car was silent. She had turned off the radio a while ago, though she couldn’t remember when. Perhaps back in Oklahoma? Music had no appeal right now, anyways.

  She glanced in the rearview mirror, watching for activity on the barren highway, but saw only the open road and her own blue eyes staring back at her.

  There were few cars sharing the road. In fact, it’d been about a half hour since she’d seen anyone on I-40. It was just as well. Her only concern was that her 1988 Chevy Impala would survive the ten-hour journey.

  In the distance, a green and white sign loomed ever closer.

  White Mist, New Mexico—2 Miles.

  She was almost there. Delta tensed up. Her chest was sore from the seatbelt. In fact, her whole body seemed achy. She unlatched the belt, watching it retract across her gray tank top and back into the car. She also wore a pair of tight blue jeans and black flats, but carried little else with her. In fact, she didn’t own much else.

  Several weeks prior, Delta had let the rental agreement to her apartment lapse. In the trunk, she had a few bags and suitcases, which contained almost all of her personal belongings. Although she wasn’t certain what the future held, she knew there was nothing more for her in Oklahoma City. And there probably hadn’t been for the past two years.

  For most of the drive, she had been trying to formulate the right words. Now, with only a mile left to go, her stomach tightened with anxiety. She still wasn’t sure how to approach him. And she only had a few minutes to figure it all out.

  9

  Since leaving white mist, Sam hadn’t seen a single car on the highway, which seemed odd. Although traffic tended to thin out at night, he normally saw a steady stream of truckers rolling through town. Usually they had a deadline to meet.

  The laws prohibited driving above a certain number of hours per day, but many truckers took advantage of the night hours to make progress without the interference of daily traffic. Apparently none had decided to do so tonight.

  Sam looked at the clock on the van’s dashboard. 9:48 PM.

  He felt a touch of hunger. He remembered reading that stressful situations affected people in different ways. Some would be stripped of their natural bodily urges. For others, the opposite effect could occur.

  Normally he ate a late dinner, usually timing his break when there were fewer customers in the store. Tonight’s meal would have been a salad. He’d prepared it earlier in the day and placed it in the refrigerator. He wondered briefly if it was still there.

  Sam looked around the van floor, where he noticed a few granola-bar wrappers and coffee cups. Kendall noticed his gaze.

  “We’re pretty broke, as you can tell,” Kendall said. “We just helped move a couple from Vegas to Albuquerque to earn some extra cash. We borrowed the trailer from Noah’s uncle. The van is a rental.”

  “Don’t remind me,” Noah chimed in, glancing at the dent in the back door.

  “This gig is going to pay our rent if we don’t spend it all on the way back,” Kendall smiled.

  Noah gave a nervous chuckle from the driver’s seat.

  “I’m sorry for all this. I bet you guys wished you had stopped at another exit. I’m sure glad you showed up, though—for my sake.”

  Kendall patted the back of his seat. “Don’t worry about it, man.”

  Sam wondered how long it had been since he had shared a vehicle with others. Despite the circumstances, it felt good to have some company.

  He stared out the window, taking note of an upcoming sign.

  “Arizona Visitor’s Center—3 Miles”

  Sam let out an apprehensive sigh. This was it. Help at last.

  Though the Arizona state line was just a few miles from White Mist, Sam rarely travelled across the border. It was hard to take a vacatio
n or road trip when you were the sole employee of a business. Besides, he preferred the comfort and security of his trailer home and store. He’d grown into quite the homebody over the past few years.

  Tonight, the little town had lost some of its appeal.

  He noticed that Kendall was still holding the baseball bat tightly in his grip. He doubted the kid would let it go anytime soon. Noah shook his head, clutching the steering wheel with unnecessary force.

  “We need a plan,” Kendall said. “We need to pull up as close as possible and get right to the payphone—wherever it is. And we should stick within sight of the van no matter what.”

  “I’ll get out. You guys stay here,” Sam insisted. “You’ve done enough.”

  The van plodded along the highway, the trailer bouncing behind it. The rearview mirrors revealed nothing was behind them. Another sign approached, marking the upcoming exit.

  2 Miles.

  Sam tensed up, but he wasn’t sure why. He doubted the scarred man had been able to follow them. It didn’t seem plausible that the thing would know how to operate the abandoned tractor-trailer that his victim had left behind. But that raised another burning question: how had he gotten to the store in the first place? There hadn’t been any other vehicles in the parking lot—at least none that Sam had seen. Had the attacker been on foot? Or had he somehow hitched a ride with the unsuspecting trucker?

  Nothing about the night made sense. For some reason, Sam pictured the twisted grin of the arsonist in the newspaper clipping on his bathroom wall, smiling through his gums. Sometimes, there was no sense to be had.

  Another sign flashed by. Only a mile to go, he thought. Something flicked against his eyes, and Sam sat upright in the seat. A pair of lights had appeared from behind them, illuminating the van’s mirrors. Something was coming up on them—and fast. The passenger side mirror shook uncontrollably, blurring the image of the car behind them.

  He felt his pulse speed up.

  He was pretty sure it was a car. He doubted a truck could accelerate so rapidly without creating a lot more noise. The vehicle gained ground, closing the gap between them.

  “There’s someone behind us,” Noah announced.

  “Just keep the same speed,” Sam instructed.

  The car continued to pull closer, and then its headlights disappeared. It was right at the back of the trailer. If they were to stop suddenly, their pursuer would surely collide with the van. Was it someone else in danger? Was it someone who intended to harm them?

  Up ahead, a sign announced that the Visitor’s Center exit was approaching. Noah looked at Sam for direction.

  “Take the exit.”

  The van curved onto the off-ramp. Their pursuer started to follow, then shot forward past them and continued on the highway. Sam was unable to get a good look at its occupants. The car’s headlights were turned off, and it weaved back and forth across the road.

  It was as if all common sense in the world had disappeared.

  10

  “Entering White Mist.” She had made it.

  Delta turned off the cruise control and tightened her grip on the steering wheel as she passed the sign. The gas pedal rose to meet her foot. A few minutes later, she turned off the exit and into the gas station. She pulled up next to one of the pumps and surveyed the area, heart thudding in her chest.

  Before leaving, she’d looked up the town online. The website proclaimed White Mist to be one of the smallest in the United States. A row of pictures had flashed across the site header, showing the town’s history and a lineage of its previous owners, as well as stories of the recent renovations.

  There had also been a picture of Sam Cook and his family. Apparently, no one had bothered to update the site.

  The last modification was on April 2, 2008.

  Delta opened the car door slowly, taking in her surroundings. She’d often wondered what this moment would feel like; she’d envisioned it in her mind at least a dozen times.

  The place looked run down. She hardly recognized it from the pictures. The lights underneath the gas station canopy were dim, the pumps and poles looked like they could use some paint. A yellow sign over the log cabin store was crooked, and one of the corners was bent over. Unable to read it, she guessed at the last few words.

  Welcome To White Mist, Smallest Town in the Southwest.

  The sun was setting, sending a few last beacons of light over the roof of the store. A tractor-trailer sat to the left of the parking lot. Delta looked for a silhouette in the driver’s seat, but saw none. She noticed there were two doors open in the lot—one to the gas station store and one for the trailer home adjacent to it. The first was a screen door, and it was swinging off its hinges.

  Something didn’t seem right.

  Without a doubt, the place barely resembled the pictures she had examined, but there was another aura here, one that shook her to the core. Perhaps it was the smell. The air felt as if it had been overlaid with a suppressant, metallic odor.

  It took her a minute to notice the body on the ground. When she finally did, she stifled a scream.

  Delta felt her legs propelling her toward the figure. She pressed her hand over her mouth. The man was coated in a layer of dust and dirt, as if the parking lot was intent on burying him. His face was a mess of caked, dried blood; his nose had been turned inward with such force that it had almost disintegrated. A large gash in his neck indicated that his throat had been sliced.

  Next to him, a red baseball cap stirred in the breeze, rising and falling. As she approached, her heart rose slightly.

  The figure didn’t look like Sam Cook.

  Delta fumbled in her pockets for her cell phone, hands shaking. She needed to call the police. She needed to find Sam. The phone skittered through her fingers and into the dirt, and she bent down to pick it up. Her heart filled with dread as she looked at the screen. There was no service.

  She swiveled in every direction, certain she was in danger. To her left, the tractor-trailer sat ominously, providing no clue as to who or what could be inside. In front of her, the screen door hung on one hinge, waving a banner of dried blood and bone. If someone was watching her, there were a multitude of places to hide.

  Her instincts told her to leave—and fast. But where was Sam?

  As the only resident of the town, she was certain that he must have been involved in whatever had happened here. He could be anywhere on the premises—perhaps injured and in need of assistance. Or worse.

  Then another thought struck her: what if Sam had killed this man?

  How much did she know about Sam Cook? Other than what she had read in the papers, or the few times she’d seen him during the trial, she’d never spoken to him. Maybe he had finally snapped after the death of his family.

  She shuddered at the thought and tried to dismiss it.

  In the event that Sam was injured, it could be hours before she would be able to bring back help. If he was here, she needed to find him. She owed him that much.

  Delta glanced back at the Chevy, picturing the contents of the trunk. First, she needed to defend herself. She pictured the objects she had packed in her luggage, but nothing jumped out as a potential weapon.

  “A tire iron,” she whispered to herself. She must have one of those.

  She stepped backwards, feeling for her keys. The figure lay still in front of her, offering no direction. The red baseball hat caught a gust of wind and rolled sideways. Something glinted from the corner of her eye, and she spun back around. About twenty feet away, in between her and the trailer, a rifle lay in the dirt.

  “Oh my God…” she whispered. She crept toward it.

  Like everything else, the gun was enveloped in a thin layer of dust. Was this the murder weapon? She looked back at the body. It didn’t appear that the man had been shot, though she
couldn’t be sure. His wounds seemed to have been manually inflicted, other than the slices across his neck. She wasn’t sure what had made those. She gagged slightly and looked away.

  Delta contemplated her next move. If she picked up the rifle, she’d be compromising a crime scene, and potentially incriminating herself in a violent situation. Then again, if she were dead, it wouldn’t make much difference, would it?

  She retrieved the gun from the ground, slid her fingers across the barrel, and held it upright. It was heavier than she had imagined. Of course, she’d never held a rifle before. Ahead of her, the trailer home was soaked in shadow. The blinds were down, and no light emanated from inside. She placed her finger on the trigger and moved towards the store.

  She’d check there first.

  Delta walked slowly towards the pumps, watching for movement. If someone were hiding there, they did nothing to give up their position. She stepped around the dead man, trying her best not to look down. The screen door hung sideways at the store’s entrance, and she ducked underneath to avoid touching it. The gun weighed heavily in her hands, and she pointed it in front of her.

  With a shudder, she realized it might not even be loaded. How would she even know?

  The interior of the White Mist store was a mess. Like the outside, it was a far cry from the pictures Delta had seen online. Shelves were toppled over, and the floor was littered with cans, dried goods, and supplies. One shelf unit had a gaping hole in the middle and fragments of wood spilling out of the back end.

  It looked like a bullet-hole.

  Her body stiffened. She continued to survey the room.

  Displays on the wall featured an array of White Mist merchandise. Rows of shot glasses and lighters lined the shelves, and a variety of t-shirts hung on the walls. One of the insignias caught her attention. ‘I’m a small-town hero in White Mist, New Mexico.’