Tom slashed out with his knife, cutting Sturgis across the chest. Then he got to his feet and ran.
Out of the room.
Down the hall.
Digging the light stick out of his pants just in time to see Ol’ Jasper blocking his path.
Mal
Mal was having a hard time believing he was trapped in another psychotic nightmare fearing for his life.
Even more incredible was the sad fact that he’d volunteered for it.
After fleeing from the library, they’d somehow wound up underneath the house, in a labyrinthine maze of dirt floors and wooden support beams and low lighting supplied by old, bare, dim bulbs. Mal hadn’t ever been in an underground mine, but he assumed this was what one looked like.
Frank Belgium was on the ground, unconscious, his arm bent in such a funky angle that it hurt Mal to look at it. Sara was kneeling next to him, an expression of shock on her face. The same look graced Deb, and Mal bet his face was damn near the same.
The only one who seemed to be handling this well was Pang, who was sitting on the stairs, digging through his bag of equipment, humming something softly to himself.
“We need to fix his arm,” Sara said. She first looked at Deb, who didn’t respond, and then to Mal.
“Sara…” He tried to keep his voice from cracking. “It will take a whole team of orthopedic surgeons hours on an operating table to fix that arm.”
“It’s bent the wrong way. We need to bend it back and put it in a sling before he wakes up.”
“If we touch it, we could make it worse.”
Sara barked out a semi-hysterical laugh. “Worse? Look at it, Mal!” She pointed at Belgium’s arm, which looked like a swollen letter N. “How can that get any worse?”
Mal chewed the inside of his cheek. He wanted to run. Grab Deb, run up the stairs, make a dash for the front door, and get the fuck out of there. They’d just met Sara and Frank a few hours ago. They didn’t owe them anything.
But that was the coward in Mal talking. The part he hated. The part that had taken over his life to the point where life wasn’t good anymore. Maybe they could escape, but to what? More insomnia? More sleepless nights? More fighting with Deb because they were both so goddamn terrified all the time?
Why couldn’t he just be brave?
That was the irony, wasn’t it? The only time it was possible to be brave was when you were scared out of your mind.
“Please help him!” Sara cried.
Mal took a big breath. Blew it out. He took a last lingering look up the stairs, to potential freedom, and made his decision.
I’m done being this guy.
Time to be the man I want to be.
“Deb.”
His wife didn’t reply.
“Deb, can you help Sara hold Frank down?”
She used the wall to get down on all fours, then crawled to Frank.
“Both of you, put your bodies on top of his. Pang, can you come here?”
“Hmm?” he looked up from his tech stuff.
“They’re going to hold Frank down. We’re going to yank on his arm, try to get the bones aligned.”
“Bro, if we pull on that arm, we might pull it right off.”
“We have to try.”
Pang shrugged, set down his bag, and came over.
Mal got on his butt and placed his feet against Belgium’s ribcage. Pang sat behind Mal, straddling him like they were on a log flume ride. Mal grabbed Frank’s misshapen wrist, and Pang grabbed Mal’s arm with both hands.
“Now!”
Mal and Pang pulled, hard as they could, straightening out Frank’s wrist.
There were popping and snapping sounds, followed by Frank waking up and screaming so loud it hurt Mal’s ears.
When Mal released him, the screaming continued.
“It’s okay, Frank. It’s okay,” Sara stroked his cheeks, trying to sooth him, but Frank was lost in a world of pain.
Worse, if he kept howling like that, he was going to attract some unwanted attention.
“Try to keep him quiet, Sara.”
“Shhh, Frank. We have to keep it down.”
“Anyone have a wallet? Give him something to bite on.”
Deb patted down Frank’s pants, found a leather billfold, and crammed it in his mouth. Frank clenched down on it, still screaming in his throat. Mal didn’t know what to do. Knock him out? If only they could give him something.
Moni. She had that syringe filled with heroin.
“Did Moni have her purse when Deb was in the exam room?”
He tried to picture her when they were all in the hallway.
“No,” Sara said. “She didn’t have one.”
“She’s got some heroin in her room. And I’ve got a gun in my room.”
Deb met his eyes. “What are you saying?”
“I guess I’m saying I’m going to go get some drugs and a gun.”
“I’m going with you,” his wife said.
“No.”
“Mal—”
“It’s stairs Deb.”
Deb could do triathlons, but stairs were her nemesis.
“I got down here fine.”
“Down isn’t the same as up. You don’t do well going up.”
“I’m still coming.”
There was no way in hell he was going to let Deb go back into the godforsaken house.
“You’ll slow me down, Deb.”
Mal saw a flash of anger.
“I’m coming, Mal.”
“No, you’re not. And if I have to wrestle your legs away from you and take them with me, I’ll do it.”
“You’re being an asshole.”
“I’m being the man you deserve, Deb. Because I don’t deserve to have such a wonderful, strong, loving woman in my life.” He smiled. “But that changes right now. I’m going to do this, and when I come back we’re all going to get out of here. I love you, Deb. And I’ll die before I let you go back up there with those… those things.”
Deb’s eyes got glassy. “Mal… we’re a team.”
“Always and forever, babe. But you have to let me swagger a little.”
She nodded, tears on her cheeks, and Mal kissed her. Softly. Tenderly. With his heart as well as his lips.
Then he turned to the ghost hunter. “Pang!”
“I’m not going back into that house, bro.”
“Stay here, make sure no one comes downstairs.”
“I’m your man, bro.”
“You got an extra flashlight?”
Pang reached into his front pocket and took out his keys. There was a tiny LED flashlight on the ring, which he took off and gave to Mal.
Mal took it, then looked at his wife. A terrible, powerful thought popped into his head.
Could this be the last time I ever see her?
He rushed to her once more, taking her in his arms, and kissed her again. But this time it wasn’t soft or gentle. It was with all the passion, all the strength, of a man who loved a woman so much it practically consumed him.
When Mal broke this kiss he stared deep into her eyes and said with all the feeling he could muster. “I. Love. You.”
“Then you’d better come back to me.”
He winked. “You couldn’t keep me away.”
Then Mal headed up the stairs before he lost his resolve.
When he reached the top Mal put his ear to the door, listening for sounds from the hall. After twenty seconds of not hearing anything, he jammed the glow stick Tom had given him into the waist of his jeans, then snuck through the door. A quick press of the keychain light proved it was about as illuminating as a firefly, but the hallway seemed empty.
Mal moved quickly but carefully, heading for the great room. His original plan was to sprint up to the second floor and grab the drugs and gun. But when he saw the front doors, he realized he should check them to make sure they were open. His experience at the Rushmore Inn informed him that once the bad things started happening, it became increasingly d
ifficult to leave. Though Mal readily admitted he suffered from paranoia—a paranoia he felt he’d earned—Butler House was beginning to feel more and more like the Rushmore. So it was with a sick, sinking feeling that he approached the exit, willing to bet everything he had that it would be locked.
Wellington’s body had been moved, but the doors and floor were still splashed with his blood. Mal did a quick look around, making sure he was alone. Then—
—he stuck the key light in his teeth—
—put his hand on the door knob—
—turned and pulled—
—and it opened easily—
—revealing a shirtless man wearing a gas mask, holding a meat cleaver.
“Hee hee hee,” the man giggled.
Mal backed away so quickly he slipped and fell. He tried to get up, but his feet couldn’t get any traction on the bloody floor. At the same time, he couldn’t look away from the Giggler, as Forenzi had called him during dinner.
A masked demon who would mutilate himself…
Which was when the Giggler raised his cleaver, and sliced a line down his scarred chest.
Mal stared, the fear so absolute he ceased to be a human being. Exactly like when he was strapped to the table at the Rushmore Inn. Mal lost his personality, his identity, and was reduced to an animal state. The evolutionary fear response, a chemical cocktail millions of years in the making, took over his body until every cell screamed fight or flight.
Acting on pure instinct, Mal chose flight, flopping onto his belly, getting his one hand underneath him, and then bicycling his feet until his toes found purchase on the hardwood floor.
And then he was off and running, beelining for the group of chairs and sofas in the middle of the great room.
Which was where he found Wellington’s body.
The dead author had been stripped naked and was sitting in a chair, his severed head placed between his legs so he was giving himself oral sex. Stuck in his neck stump were a cluster of cattails, jutting out as if in a vase.
Mal kept running, trying to remember where the stairs were. He headed for the hall to the dining room and saw it had been blocked with a sofa. So he detoured and took another corridor.
He heard a high-pitched whining sound and realized he was the one making it. So ensnared in the throes of terror, he didn’t even know where he was until the hallway he’d sprinted down abruptly ended at a closed door.
Confused, out of breath, panicked and sickened, Mal turned in a circle, trying to get his bearings. He began to backtrack, to get out of this dead-end, when he heard a CRACK! from the darkness ahead. Like someone slapping their hands together. Or…
Or a whip.
The ghost of the one-eyed slave master, Blackjack Reedy.
Mal spun back around, reaching for the doorknob, opening it and easing himself inside, then closing it behind him.
The room smelled of stale mildew. Mal used his tiny flashlight to look around, and even though the beam didn’t penetrate very far, he realized he was in the laundry room.
He saw a large sink. Some rusty, metal wash basins. Clotheslines hanging on the walls. An old fashioned washing machine with rollers. A large pile of dirty clothes. Several washboards. A shelf full of antique detergent boxes.
But something about the room was… off. Though it didn’t look like anyone had been in there in decades, Mal had the uneasy feeling he was being watched.
He got his breathing under control and listened.
The room was silent.
Mal took a few steps into the room, noticing a door on the other side. Maybe it was a closet. Or maybe it was an exit. Old houses often had a laundry room next to an outside door, to make it easier to haul wet clothing outside to dry in the sun.
Halfway into the room, Mal heard something.
A moan.
He stopped, mid-step.
Had it been a voice? The wind? Some other, harmless sound? His imagination?
Once again he played the flashlight beam around the room.
The sink, old and filthy.
Rusty basins.
The washing machine, its pulleys misaligned.
A pile of clothing with an old coat on top, its buttons glinting in the light.
The stack of washboards.
Shelves.
“Hello?” he whispered.
Immediately after speaking, Mal regretted it. Who was he talking to? And did he really want someone to answer?
Thankfully, no one replied.
Mal wasted no more time getting to the door at the end of the room. He grasped the ancient, metal door knob and turned.
Locked. He gave the door a sharp tug. It peppered him with dust, but held firm.
Squinting at the bronze doorplate, Mal saw an old-time keyhole.
Could there be a key around here?
He looked behind him, back at the shelves. If there was a key, that seemed like the place for it. Mal crept over, scanning row by row with the flashlight. On the third shelf, next to a disintegrating box of Borax soap chips, was a tarnished skeleton key.
Mal reached for it—
—and heard another moan.
He spun, again taking in the room.
But no one was there.
Basins, washboards, sink, washing machine, clothes. There wasn’t anything else.
Then the pile of clothing blinked.
Mal was so shocked he jumped backward, into the shelves, old detergent snowing on him as the pile of clothing stood up—not a pile at all, but a figure in a dirty lab coat, what Mal assumed were glinting buttons had actually been its staring eyes.
Colton Butler.
Colton moaned again. He was clutching a leather medical bag in one hand, a curved surgical saw in the other, and he advanced toward Mal.
The fear was so absolute, it paralyzed Mal, pinning him to the spot. Colton raised the saw up.
“Time… to… operate…”
His voice was all messed up, like Jebediah’s in the library, and so shocking it snapped Mal out of his catatonia and he lurched toward the locked door. Key and flashlight in the same hand, he was trembling too madly to fit it into the keyhole.
“Maaaaaaal…”
The voice was so close Mal didn’t want to turn around, fearing that Colton was right behind him. He focused on opening the door, trying to block out everything else, putting 100% of his concentration into fitting the damn key into—
Colton hit Mal in the side of the neck with something, so hard Mal saw motes of light. Then there was a ripping sound, and a spike of pain like lemon juice on a paper cut, right across Mal’s right shoulder blade.
The saw.
Mal pushed himself backward, knocking Colton away, reaching up and feeling the jagged cut in his neck.
He tried to saw my head off.
His hand now slick with blood, Mal jammed the keychain light in his teeth and went back to playing bullseye with the key.
“Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaal…”
By some miracle, Mal got it in the keyhole. He twisted it, first one way, then the other, and when the bolt snicked free Mal yanked open the door and saw…
Stairs. Leading up.
He took them two at a time, breathing through his teeth as they clamped down on the flashlight, going up sixteen steps and then reaching…
A dead end.
There was no door. No room. No hallway. Just a wooden barricade.
“Maaaaaaaaaaaaaal…”
Below him, Mal heard feet begin to clomp up the steps.
Why have a stairway leading nowhere? What was the point? It made no sense.
He put his shoulder into it, pressing hard. Felt a slight bit of give.
Could this be some secret passage?
Mal held the keylight, looking for seams along the wall. On the right side, he found some old, rusty hinges.
Mal pushed again. No go.
“Maaaaaaaaaal…..”
Colton was closer, already halfway up the stairs.
Mal ran
his hands along the seam, looking for a switch, a release, a button. Anything that would open this sucker up.
“Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaal…”
Colton was practically on top of him. Mal’s heart was hammering so hard he could hear the lub-dub in his eardrum. A wooden splinter jammed under his fingernail, and he dropped the flashlight. Mal opened his mouth to scream in pain and frustration when his fingers brushed against a latch.
“MAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAL!”
Colton’s saw touched Mal’s leg just as the passageway swung outward. Mal fell forward, pulling away, then kicking the secret door closed. He looked around, pulling the glow stick from his pants, and realized he’d gotten to the guest room hallway. But it looked different in the dark, and he wasn’t sure which room was his.
The secret passage began to shake, and Mal got to his feet and ducked into the nearest bedroom. He quietly closed the door behind him, then took a minute to catch his breath. His neck throbbed, and he found a mirror on the wall and took a look.
In the green glow light, his blood appeared black. Mal probed the wound, wincing. It hurt, but wasn’t deep. Stitches probably weren’t required, but if he lived through this it would no doubt leave a jagged scar.
Squinting at his finger, he used his teeth to yank out a three inch splinter under his nail. He spat it out, and began to search the room.
The suitcase next to the bed wasn’t his, and he didn’t see any purses lying around. He checked the bureau drawers, and then the desk.
Nothing.
Mal crept to the door and put his ear to it. Then he opened it a crack, peering out. The coast seemed clear, and he quickly exited the room and entered the adjacent one.
Not his suitcase, but there was a purse on the desk. And inside…
Moni’s syringe. He pulled the purse strap over his head and shoulder.
Okay, that’s half the mission. Now to get my gun.
He remembered his room was next to Moni’s, so all he had to do was sneak into it and—
The doorknob began to turn before Mal could touch it. He quickly stuck the light stick back in his jeans and looked around for a place to hide.
The bed.
Quickly dropping to all fours, Mal scooted under it just as the door opened.
J.A. Konrath / Jack Kilborn Trilogy - Three Scary Thriller Novels (Origin, The List, Haunted House) Page 67