WHAT
VENGEANCE
COMES
A WOLF HAVEN NOVEL
ANTHONY M. STRONG
West Street Publishing
WHAT VENGEANCE COMES
Published by West Street Publishing
www.WestStreetPublishing.com
www.AnthonyMStrong.com
This is a work of fiction. Characters, names, places and events are products of the authors imagination. Any similarity to events or places, or real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.
Copyright © 2015 Anthony M. Strong
First Published December 2015
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission.
ISBN 9781-942207-03-0
For S.
even though these things scare you
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The author is grateful to Jeanne Andrus for her keen eye in editing, Lisa Harrington for her invaluable advice, and Sonya Sargent for never letting me stop.
A word from the author.
The Lupe Garou, sometimes referred to as a Rougarou, is an old Cajun French werewolf legend. Often used as a method of gaining obedience, the wolf-like beast may hunt down Catholics who don’t follow the rules of Lent, or might come for misbehaving children.
Other variations of the myth describe a person who changes into the Lupe Garou for 101 days, able to switch between their human form and beast. Unlike other werewolf myths, the beast is not directly affected by the full moon.
In Cajun legend the Lupe Garou roams the forests and swamps of Louisiana around New Orleans, as a product of witchcraft, with either the witch herself turning into the monster, or cursing others to become the beast.
Table of Contents
The Remnants of Yesterday – Excerpt
Author Bio
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Prologue
32 Years Ago
THE WAITING ROOM WAS COLD and clinical. An odor of disinfectant clung to the air, cloying and pungent. Concealed fluorescent lighting, set into the ceiling behind yellowed plastic grilles, bounced a cool white glow from the dull gray walls, giving the appearance that the whole room was somehow overexposed, making everything appear almost painfully bright.
A row of hard plastic chairs lined the wall, empty except for one, upon which perched a ten-year-old boy, his curly black hair cropped short, a small bruise over his left cheek where a badly thrown baseball made contact two Saturdays before. He rocked back and forth on the edge of the seat, nervous and fidgeting.
Voices, low and muted, drifted through a set of white double doors. The boy had no idea what the occupants of the room beyond the doors were saying. Despite his attempts to listen in, he could not hear them clearly, but even so, he knew it was not good. Nothing had been good for days.
The boy wiped away a pear shaped tear that pushed from the corner of his eye and meandered down his cheek. He rose to his feet and counted out the steps to the double doors, looking down at the ground to make sure his feet remained within the confines of the light blue tiles as he walked, careful not to let them land in-between, over the grout lines. Todd Jenkins two houses down had told him it was bad luck to step on the lines between the tiles, and he didn’t need any more of that, not right now.
When he reached the doors he put a hand out and pushed them open just wide enough to catch a glimpse of what lay beyond, but could not make sense of anything. He eased them wider, careful not to make a sound, until the room came into view, and what he saw froze him to the spot.
His mother lay on a hard aluminum table. A strange circular light hovered like a weird alien spaceship above her. He knew it was his mother because an arm had slipped down and now dangled, fingers pointing toward the floor. Upon that arm, near her wrist, was a heart shaped tattoo with a set of initials inked into it - his father’s initials. He’d heard the story of that tattoo so many times he knew it as well as he knew his own name. She’d gotten it a few weeks after she met his father, to prove her love on a whim. The tattoo left no doubt who occupied the table, even though her body was covered with a white sheet, the fabric stained crimson in places like some grotesque Rorschach test.
He stood transfixed, horrified yet unable to move. The men in the room were still talking, but then, as if sensing the pair of childish eyes invading the forbidden space, one of them turned, a look of deep sadness upon his face.
“You shouldn’t be here Johnny boy.” His father said, crossing the gap between them. “You need to stay in the waiting room. I’ll be out very soon, I promise.”
John eyed him, somehow relieved that his view of the mortuary table was blocked, that he was unable to see the nightmare that lay upon it, the bloody thing that was once his mother. Instead he saw his father, stiff and weary, his sheriff uniform uncharacteristically wrinkled. And he saw the gun in its leather holster, right there, just waiting.
For a moment John wondered if he could snatch it and turn it upon himself, pull the trigger and join his mother in heaven, which was surely where she was. He ached to see her again, but Father Gregory, his Sunday school teacher, said suicide was a mortal sin, and sinners went to hell, not heaven, so it would be a pointless endeavor.
It was too late now anyway. His father was steering him backward, closing the double doors, locking them.
John turned back away, hands deep in his pockets, and started to weep, ever so softly.
1
Present Day - Wolf Haven, Louisiana
SHERIFF JOHN DECKER steered the police cruiser along the winding, muddy trail toward the cabin in the woods.
In the passenger seat Beau Thornton, Mayor of the town of Wolf Haven, leafed through a pile of paperwork resting on his lap.
“I sure do appreciate you bringing me out here at such short notice sheriff,” he said in a thick southern accent, never once looking up from the stack of papers. “I know you have a lot on your plate.”
“Don’t mention it,” Decker replied. He might be elected, just like Beau, but Thornton still cut his paychecks. “I’m not sure why you need me though.”
“I thought it would be prudent to have a show of force on hand when I speak to Annie.”
Decker shot him a sideways glance and raised an eyebrow.
“Alright, you got me.” The mayor threw his arms up. “The damn woman gives me the creeps. Living out here in the middle of nowhere surrounded by alligators and mosquitos. People say she’s a witch you know.”
“You really believe that?” Decker knew the stories, just like everyone else who had grown up in Wolf Haven. The town kids had been calling Annie Doucet a witch since he was a boy, probably even before that. It was just nonsense, but the Cajuns took their superstitions seriously in these parts. “Just because she’s a little odd–”
“A little odd? Don’t make me laugh,” Mayor Thornton guffawed. “She’s certifiably crazy is what she is.”
“That still doesn’t make her a witch.” Decker swung the car off the track and pulled up in front of the cabin. “Here we are then.”
“You’re coming in with me, right?”
“Of course. Wouldn’t want you to face an old woman all on your own.” Decker opened his door and waited while his passenger climbed out of the cruiser. If the Mayor caught the sarcasm in the sheriff’s voice he didn’t show it.
They were about to climb the three worn wooden steps leading up to the cabin when the front door swung silently inward.
“Looks like she’s expecting us,” Decker said. “Almost like she
saw us coming in her crystal ball.”
“Not funny,” Beau responded as a frail shape emerged from the cabin.
Annie Doucet stood in the doorway, observing them with black beady eyes. “Wondered when you’d show up Beau Thornton.”
“Well hello there Annie,” the mayor replied, his face stoic.
“I see you brought your lapdog sheriff along for the ride.”
“Now don’t be like that Annie.”
“I’ll do as I will.” Annie turned and retreated back through the door. “You’d better come on in and say your piece, time’s wasting.”
2
THE INTERIOR OF the cabin smelled like old socks and mold. A kerosene lamp hung from a beam above their heads, the flame doing little to illuminate the dank one-room hut. “Good god, she doesn’t even have electric service,” Thornton whispered, covering his mouth with his hand as if that would somehow shield the fact that he was speaking. “What a way to live.”
“Shut up or she’ll never agree to sell you her land.” Decker cast his eyes around, picking out sticks of furniture in the gloom. A rocking chair occupied one corner, while a metal frame bed took up the other. In the center of the hut stood a table and two chairs. The only other thing in the cabin was a wood-burning stove with a belly that glowed red despite the humid weather outside.
Thornton turned to the old woman. “I have some documents for you to sign.” He held the sheaf of papers out. His hand shook a little. “Then we can put this nasty business behind us and move on.”
“What if I don’t want to sign?” Annie peered at them with hooded eyes set into bony sockets. “This land has been in my family for six generations.”
“I appreciate that Annie, I do, but this here is progress. The town needs that road out to the Interstate. Your land is slap bang in the middle of the route.”
“Not my problem.”
“See, that’s where you’re wrong,” Thornton said. “If you don’t sign these papers, take the money we’re offering you, then the State will purchase the land against your will.”
“The answer’s still no.” Annie didn’t raise her voice, but neither Decker nor Thornton could fail to miss the anger behind the words. “You take your papers, and your check, back where you got them.”
“I’m going to leave these here.” Thornton deposited the paperwork on the table and backed up. “Take a few days to look over them. You’ll see we’re making you a very generous offer considering your land is nothing but mosquito infested swamp.”
“You’ll regret this.” Annie’s voice was dry, rasping.
“I doubt it.” Thornton turned toward the door. “Come on sheriff. Why don’t you drive me back to town.”
Decker followed the mayor back into the sunlight, relieved to be away from the gloom inside the cabin. He wished he hadn’t agreed to escort the mayor up here. It seemed wrong to be forcing this frail old woman out of her home just so that they could build a road. But at the end of the day it wasn’t his call.
Annie Doucet watched the two men depart. She waited until the police cruiser was out of sight before turning back to the interior of the cabin, then scooped up the papers and threw them into the wood-burning stove. She watched the flames lick hungrily at the documents, reducing them to ash.
Walking to a shelf packed with old books, she selected a volume and laid it out on the table, leafing through dry brown pages as frail as she was. She paused at a page toward the middle of the book and stooped low to make out the text, running a bony finger along the paper, tracing the handwritten words as she read them.
Next, the old woman shuffled to her bed. She bent and dragged a chest out from underneath. She opened it and pulled out several mason jars, selecting each for the contents within, and a small copper bowl.
She brought the jars and bowl to the table and mixed the ingredients, careful to follow the instructions in the book, humming a tune to herself as she did so.
It wouldn’t be long now, and then she would show the good folk of Wolf Haven just what she thought of their road…
3
FLOYD BENSON LIFTED another jug into the flatbed and winced as a stab of pain shot up his back. He was getting too old for this kind of thing.
“Get a move on in there Terry,” he called, glancing toward the makeshift toilet, which was, in reality, nothing more than a depression in the ground surrounded by stained tarpaulins. “Did you fall down the hole?”
“I’ll be out in a second.” The voice of Terry Boudreaux drifted from the latrine. “That’s the last time I order the Red Beans and Rice at Cassidy’s. Damn stuff went and gave me the shits.”
“Too much information Terry.” Floyd doubted it was the Red Beans and Rice. He’d eaten the same thing and he was just fine. It was more likely to be the days old Gumbo he’d brought with him and consumed cold on the drive to the camp. He doubted if Terry bothered to refrigerate it either. The boy was dumber than a box of rocks.
He lifted another jug, the liquid inside shifting when he heaved it toward the truck. He dropped it down on the bed with a grunt and counted his work. Sixteen containers loaded and ready to go. Not bad.
There was still no sign of Terry. If he didn’t get a move on they would be late for the drop, and that would not be good, not good at all. “Come on boy, for Chrissakes. This moonshine ain’t gonna drive itself.”
The flaps of the latrine parted and Terry emerged, a scowl plastered across his face. “Alright, alright. I’m coming. Quit your bellyaching.”
“You want a payday or not?” Floyd wished he could ditch Terry, find someone with a little more ambition, but he couldn’t. The boy was his nephew, and like they said, you can’t pick your family.
“Where we going tonight anyhow?” Terry approached the truck cab and hopped into the driver’s seat, pulling the door closed.
“Bellows Creek.”
“Shit, that’s miles away. We won’t get back before dawn.”
“So? You got a hot date or something?”
“Maybe I do.”
“Yeah, right. Don’t make me laugh.” Floyd chuckled as he took his place in the passenger seat next to his nephew. “Well, what are you waiting for? Let’s go.”
Terry put the truck in gear and coaxed the vehicle forward. He reached out and snapped on the headlights, their twin beams illuminating the patch of open ground nestled between the tall pine trees, the gin still nestled under a green tarp strung between the tree trunks, and the rows of empty jugs waiting to be filled with liquor.
“Shut those lights off you damn fool,” Floyd said, shooting Terry a sharp look. “You’ll have every cop in the parish down on us.”
“Alright. Sorry.” Terry killed the lights. “So how am I supposed to see where I’m going?”
“It’s a full moon you dipshit. There’s plenty of light.” Floyd exclaimed. “Just take it slow and easy.”
“Yeah, right. Just don’t blame me if we run into a tree.” Terry inched the truck forward until he was out of the clearing, then picked up a little speed when he reached the dirt track. He hunched over the wheel, concentrating as he steered the vehicle down the center of the trail.
They drove in silence for the next five miles. It was only when they reached the paved road and the lights of Wolf Haven appeared on the horizon that Floyd spoke again. “Take route 16. It’ll skirt the town.”
“That’ll take us miles out of our way,” Terry protested. “River Road is quicker.”
“And it goes right through the center of Wolf Haven.”
“So what? It’s 2am, who’s gonna see us?”
“Sheriff Decker for one. You think he’s tucked up in bed right now with a cup of cocoa and a good book?” If Floyd knew the full moon was the best time to move moonshine, then so did the sheriff. “Just do what I say.”
“Fine, but it’s not my fault if we’re late.”
“Hell, yes it is. If you’d helped me load the truck instead of spending the whole damn time taking a crap we’d have been on the
road half an hour ago.”
“Whatever you say.” Terry lapsed into a sullen silence.
Floyd settled back into the seat and looked out at the pinewoods, watching the trees slip by as they made their way toward town. When they reached a fork in the road Terry turned right, onto Route 16. They picked their way through the woods. Terry drove a little slower than Floyd would have liked, taking the curves at a painful pace, but he could not be bothered to complain about it.
He closed his eyes and yawned, overcome by a deep weariness. That was the problem with this business, you had to do everything after dark, and Floyd was not a night owl. He found it almost impossible to sleep when the sun was up. He wondered why he’d ever gotten into moonshining in the first place. Back then, in the mid-sixties, things had been different. The cops were easier to bribe, and the Alcohol and Tobacco agents didn’t have all the fancy gizmos they used today, like thermal imaging cameras and helicopters. Thank god he had a get out of jail free card in the form of a nice fat check from the state, courtesy of Mayor Thornton and the local Chamber. A year from now his land would have a few miles of blacktop running through it, and he would be living it up off the proceeds somewhere far, far away.
“Shit.”
Floyd was rocked from his slumber by a jolting lurch, as Terry slammed on the brakes hard, bringing the car to a halt in the middle of the road. “What in the hell are you doing now boy?”
“Holy shit on a shovel. Did you see that?”
“See what?” Floyd peered through the dirt-streaked windshield, but all he saw was empty road slicing through the pine trees, and beyond that nothing but murky blackness.
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