Bad Bones (Claire Morgan) (35 page)

One good thing, and there weren’t many good things going on at the moment, was that Bud and Laurie had no doubt already found her missing and were searching for her by now, thank God, and they would find the tracks they were leaving. But in the meantime, this tough guy was a serious menace that she had to deal with on her own. No rescuer flying in at the last minute this time. Not a chance. She had already decided that he wasn’t out to kill her, or he would have already shot her dead with his long gun when she went down under that first brutal shove. So she still had a chance to survive, albeit not one of high percentage, and if she didn’t freeze to death on their way to whatever hellhole to which he was taking her. Lady Luck had been pretty good to her thus far in her life, but she had a feeling that lady had gone south for the winter and wasn’t coming back to check on her any time soon.

When a dark mass that looked like a towering black mountain loomed up in front of them, he shoved her again and she slipped and sprawled forward, landing on her knees. When she gained her feet again, he prodded her toward a narrow crevice down low on the rock cliff, or whatever it was. At that point, Claire’s heart absolutely stood still, because then she knew for sure. He had to be Bones Fitch, had to be. If all the scary stories about him were true, and they most likely were, then she was an absolute goner. She did not want to duck into that low hole that led to God knew where. Unfortunately, she had no choice.

Once inside, however, she realized that it didn’t look like a cave, but maybe a mine shaft or something. When the guy behind her switched on a high-beam flashlight, she saw low tunnels leading off in three different directions. Despite the howling wind and pelting sleet outside, now that they were inside, it was very dark and very cold and very quiet. As he pushed her down through a passage that was so low that she had to bend over to walk through it, they finally ended up in a large open room that looked like it probably had housed a staging area for miners many years ago. A large fire pit encircled by stones was blazing high and warming the interior, and the smell of smoke was strong and caustic from the pall that drifted up and hung along the ceiling. It was furnished in a way, with an old couch and a couple of easy chairs, and a card table with two folding chairs. There were lanterns hanging around on the walls, providing a dim, flickering light. It was set up like a campsite with a Coleman’s stove and two small pup tents with sleeping bags and air mattresses inside. What Claire stared at, though, were the small metal cages lining one wall. The guy prodded her at gunpoint to the nearest one.

“I’m not getting into that cage.”

He didn’t answer, just knocked her to her knees, shoved her inside with his foot, slammed the door, and set the padlock. After that, he stood outside her cage and stared down at her. He was dressed entirely in heavy winter camouflage clothing and wore a black ski mask and fur-lined cap.

He finally said something. “Know what? Thomas Landers really truly loved you. He told me he did. He cried about you sometimes. I promised him that I’d go get you, if anything ever happened to him. Then the bastard screwed me over, anyway.”

Oh, God
, Claire thought. Even in death Thomas Landers was putting her through hell. What had he been? A demon? And she had no doubt now. This guy was Bones Fitch, and he had brought her there to kill her.

“You shouldn’t’ve ever had your boyfriend kill him. He was my best friend over in that hospital. And now Bones is really mad at you, too, now that I told him what you did to my friend.” All riled up, it seemed, her captor jerked off his hat and ski mask and hurled them down on the ground, very angry, shouting angry words down into her cage.

Okay, he wasn’t Bones at the moment. He was the other personality, the nicer one. The one he called Punk. But when she got a glimpse of his face, Claire’s heart plummeted like a stone in a well. For such a raging, murderous, lick-happy lunatic, Bones/Punk Fitch didn’t look half bad. In fact, he looked exactly like the buttoned-down, preppie-polite, Bud-friendly Patrick Parker himself. As she watched him warily, he shed all his outer wear and threw it aside, apparently the I’m-Gonna-Talk-Your-Arm-Off-Before-I-Beat-You-To-Death kind of psycho. “But you know what else, lady? It’s been a real good night out there huntin’ prey so far. Storm’s a helpin’ me sneak up on people. Caught me two real different types tonight. But you? You’re the real prize. Bones is gonna love to get you. We can catch one of those goddamned Fitches any night of the week, but you’re real special. Too bad Thomas can’t be here.”

Claire wondered if he could be reasoned with, or if he was too far gone. “Okay, I get it. You’re not really Patrick, are you? You’re Preston Parker but everybody calls you Punk.”

“You’re pretty smart, aren’t you?”

“Apparently not. You’ve got me locked up in a cage, don’t you?”

“You sure did fall for our little trick, didn’t you? You thought I was my big brother.”

“So you just made him up as a cover story after you escaped? That it?”

“Hell, no. Patrick was always my oldest brother, all through my whole life. Bones done killed him a long time ago, right where he sat watching the Rams play. We all look alike anyways. Everybody says so. Nobody could tell I wasn’t him because Pa always made us keep to ourselves. Nobody knew it was Bones, neither, when he was pretendin’ to be Patrick. Not even that Joe friend of yours.”

“And Percy and the rest of the guys didn’t notice your little charade? Not very observant little boys, are they?”

He grinned and sat down cross-legged on the ground right in front of her, the rifle across his lap. Like he was getting ready to tell her a campfire tale. “They knew, but they’re all scared spitless of Bones so they do whatever he tells them to. And he told them he was gonna be Patrick until I got outta that hospital, and they better play along or he’d beat the life straight outta them. Then when I finally came home, Bones and me took turns bein’ Patrick.”

“So it was you all along when Joe and I came out to the quick stop that first time?”

“Nope, that there was Bones. He told me all about you, though. He thought you was real cute, said he wanted to catch you quick and put you in this here cage. It was me, though, when you came back with Bud that other day. We look almost exactly the same, don’t we? We was gonna kill you both right then when you asked to go inside our trailer and make you pay for killin’ Thomas and nosing around our place. Couldn’t do it, though, ’cause I really did start to like that Bud guy you was with. Me and him are gonna be friends and hunt and stuff, once you’re dead and can’t tell him about me and Bones, and stuff like that.”

After listening to that rather eye-opening, psychotic rendition of friendly chitchat, Claire decided it would be wise to keep her mouth shut. This guy, both of him, was a legit, card-carrying member of Crazytown USA, no doubt about it. In the dim light of the fire and the lanterns, his eyes reflected little white spots of light, as if burning inside with insanity. Entering into some kind of a heated, suicidal argument with him would certainly not be prudent. Doing anything at all with him would not be prudent, even breathing the same air. And this psycho was supposed to be the docile half of the cuckoo duo? Seriously? Sure couldn’t swear that by her, no way. But if Punk was indeed the gentlemanly personality, the last thing she wanted was for his other, and hell of a lot more lethal, persona to come out of his sicko psyche and put the screws to her. She’d take her chances with Punk. Chances that wouldn’t be so good, either, but better.

On the other hand, Patrick aka Punk aka Bones aka Preston was completely at ease now, gun at his side, leaning back on his palms, all anger swirling away like water down a shower drain, gone quickly indeed. He was now acting as if they were back munching delectable fried chicken and drinking hot chocolate at his redneck quick stop. His tone was ultra-pleasant, but the questions he asked, not so much. “How the hell could you treat Thomas like that? He was crazy about you. And it was real, real true love. But you didn’t even care about him, did you? I hated his guts for leavin’ me behind and I’m glad he’s dead and all that, but listen, all Thomas wanted was a chance to be with you and make you happy. Just like I wanted to be with my girl. You oughta be ashamed of yourself. I knew you was a tease just like Landers said you was, trying to get men to look at you and take you to bed, ever since the first day you first came out to the store and asked Bones and the boys all those nosy questions. Even Bones fell for your crap.”

Claire listened to him, but she was also looking around and assessing her chances for escape. That’s when she saw another captive in a cage half hidden in shadows along the far wall. There was a man inside it, all right. A young man who looked a whole heck of a lot like a Fitch, but one she’d never seen before. At the moment, he looked as if he had been beaten into submission and couldn’t quite focus his eyes. He was still fully dressed, lying on his side, blood coming out of his nose and mouth and wetting the front of his yellow Missouri Tigers sweatshirt. His breathing was shallow and wheezing, as if his lungs weren’t quite working right.

Bones/Punk the Double Homicidal Maniac was still shooting the bull. “Know one thing I learned when those bastard Fitches put me in that god-awful hospital place? I learned that this feud thing goin’ on between the Fitches and the Parkers was really dumb. Lots of silly stuff goin’ on for no good reason. So I thought I’d come back here and me and Bones’d clean it up some, you know, help out our brothers a bit. Bones knew what to do, too. He said the only way to do that was to kill everybody in Fitchville. Just kill ’em all, everybody, men, women, children, and little babies. Just end it up right now, good and tight. Bones says that’s the only answer to that kinda grudge fightin’. So that’s what we’re doin’. He says they deserve it anyways, ’cause they’re the ones who put me in that hospital and kept me away from him.”

He stopped, and stared at her without blinking for so long that she felt he might have gone unconscious. No such luck. “I could’ve killed you, too, real easylike, after Bones and me followed you and that other guy to that cabin a few hours back. Bones’s out takin’ care of him right now. He won’t be gone much longer, though. He’s gonna walk him out back to our dump site where nobody can find him and then shoot him. After they left, I just waited for you to come outta that cabin so I could catch you. And I’m gonna keep you alive till last and see what Bones wants to do with you. He’ll be comin’ back any minute now. He told me to bring you in here. He said we’d have lots of fun with you.”

Well, Claire sure did hope that old Bones would stay somewhere in the back of this lunatic’s brain a mite longer. She also hoped that meant that Misha was not dead and might get away and come find her. But right now and since she was dealing with the good, or at least, better part of the split personality, maybe she could win him over before Bones decided to pay her a less chatty and more deadly visit. “They’re gonna find me, you know that, don’t you, Punk? I didn’t check in like I was supposed to, and so they’re gonna know I’m in trouble and come looking for me. Bud and the whole sheriff’s department and the FBI. I’m a police officer so they’ll mobilize the whole damn highway patrol to search for me. It’s only a matter of time before they find us here. Better let me go now before they track you down and lock you up again.”

“They aren’t gonna find us out here. Even Bud can’t, and he’s real smart, too. A good guy, and I’m sure glad he wasn’t with you tonight, or we’d have to kill him, too. Then he couldn’t go huntin’ with me. Nobody’s ever found us out here, not the Fitches, not our pa, not nobody. See, you gotta know the entrances, and Bones’s got ’em hidden real good. So maybe you just oughta shut your trap now. Bones isn’t gonna like your sass, no how. Just warning you. Better listen, too. Bones’s not as gentle as me. He’s gonna whup you up nice and hard, break all your bones up into little bitty pieces. That’s what he does best.”

Claire took that warning to heart, definitely. She felt shivers rising on her skin and skittering down her spine. She felt fear taking hold of her and not letting go. She had to get control of it. She was in a very bad spot, and she was completely on her own this time. She had better find a way out of that cage and out of that mine and in a great big hurry, too. As Punk moved away and headed for his other victim, Claire put her feet up against the bars and kicked the door as hard as she could. It didn’t budge. Across the room, Punk was now dragging the captured Fitch out of his cage. His hands were already tied together, but he had to be dragged, limp-limbed and only half-conscious, which was probably good. Punk hoisted the man into the air until he hung suspended from a hook drilled into the ceiling. His victim’s eyes remained shut, his breathing labored. Claire hoped to God that he was unconscious and wouldn’t feel whatever Punk was getting ready to do to him.

When Punk turned and looked at her, she stopped kicking on the barred door of her cage. “Hey, you, Claire Morgan, stop that kicking or I’m gonna cut off your feet.” He frowned. “Hey, you ever hear a bone break clean in two. That pretty li’l snap it makes. It’s like the finest music in the whole world. It’s like playin’ a fine-tuned instrument. That’s what we call you guys in the cages, our instruments.”

Then, and to Claire’s absolute horror, Punk picked up a claw hammer off a table, raised it up in the air, and then brought it slamming down in a brutal blow on the man’s left shin. She did hear the muffled sound of the bone giving way, and the pain brought the victim around. He shrieked in the most terrible way that Claire had ever heard.

“Stop it, Punk!” she cried desperately. “Just stop it!”

Punk did stop it. As if surprised, he turned around and stared at her, hammer still poised in his hand. “Why? Just ’cause Bones caught ’im don’t mean I can’t play on him some.”

Queasy and trembling, Claire realized in that moment that she was utterly, completely helpless to save that poor man’s life, or her own, and her voice showed it, wavering out weak and breathless and pleading and full of despair. “Yes, it does, yes, it does, Punk. Bones’ll be mad at you if you take his fun away. He likes to do it himself, doesn’t he? He won’t like this one bit. Put him back in his cage. Come get me. You caught me.”