Seven Deadly Tales of Terror (7 page)

Moses stared up through the branches at the moon as the nun kneeling before him continued to suck blood from his ruined nether regions. He thought about Valerie and how much she would miss him. Deep regret overwhelmed him in that moment.

He sighed as things started to turn fuzzy.

Really wish I’d gone home drunk for once. Fuck me with a serrated tent-pole
.

He was dead a few minutes later.

Later that night, he and the other castrated man were buried in unmarked graves in the cemetery behind the church, joining hundreds more men who’d fallen victim to the vampire nuns of St. Seyrig.

SOUTH COUNTY MADMAN

Tennessee

1987

The dogs were barking again. Luke Benson’s eyes snapped open in the darkness. He was flat on his back in the little twin bed in his room. A glance at the glowing blue numbers on his Panasonic VCR told him the time was a hair past one in the morning. He remained still a few moments longer, waiting for the last vestiges of unconsciousness to slip away. The dogs kept right on barking. The sound wasn’t unusual. Hell, they were dogs. Dogs barked. He lived on an isolated patch of land right on the edge of the woods in his single-wide trailer. Now and then a squirrel would go scampering across the property, never failing to set off Jasper and Harley. The two Dobermans were chained to spikes driven into the ground behind the trailer. They were sweet, loving animals, but the fearsome reputation of the breed effectively kept away anyone who might wish to do him harm. And the sad truth was, there were quite a few folks around who’d like to see him six feet under.

The barking wasn’t letting up, the way it usually did after a wandering squirrel or possum had the good sense to get gone from the area. If anything, it was becoming more shrill and strident. That shrillness bugged Luke. It bespoke an unusual, worrying level of agitation, which stirred his paranoia. Years had passed since that business with the dead girls, enough time to start hoping the worst of that ugliness was truly behind him. But deep down he knew better. He thought of Stump Wilhoite, saw the old man’s scowling, bitter face in his mind, and remembered the vow of vengeance he had sworn in the wake of Luke’s acquittal. It had been an emotional moment and Stump had been speaking from a place of monumental rage. You couldn’t blame the guy. Some sick bastard had done quite a number on his teen daughter. She was violated and dismembered prior to being dumped in the woods a scant two miles from Luke’s trailer.

One of the dogs—he thought it was Harley—yelped.

Luke rolled onto his side and reached under his bed, curled a hand around the grip of his .357 Magnum, and got out of bed. He pulled on jeans, stepped into shoes he left unlaced, grabbed a flashlight, and hurried out of the trailer.

“Jasper! Harley!”

The dogs were straining at the ends of their leads, continuing to bark in that overly agitated, shrill way as they faced the woods. Luke snapped on the flashlight and aimed the beam at the line of trees bordering the property. Seeing no one there, he swept the beam around the barren yard and still came up empty. Didn’t mean there wasn’t someone lurking out there deeper in the woods, but he wasn’t about to go stumbling around out there at this dark hour. Even if there was a trespasser in the area, Luke was confident the ferocious response of his animals would prevent the skulking son of a bitch from coming any closer.

He approached the dogs and knelt between them, setting the gun and flashlight on the ground in order to reach for the scruffs of their necks. They kept straining and barking a few moments longer, but began to settle down as he cooed at them and kneaded the furry flesh between their shoulders. Jasper was the first to fully relax. He sat next to Luke and lapped happily at his face with his gritty tongue. Harley soon followed suit and within moments he was overwhelmed with canine affection. He laughed softly and tried halfheartedly pushing them away, but they immediately came back for more slavering attention.

The smile died on his face as he spied something on the ground a few feet to his right—it was a hunk of raw meat, what looked like a slice of store-cut steak. His chest tightened and he couldn’t breathe for a moment. There was only one possible reason it was there. Someone had attempted to poison his dogs. Thankfully, the sliver of meat looked like it had not been touched, a miracle he could only chalk up to the dogs’ agitation at the intrusion of a stranger. The thought of someone trying to harm his animals supplanted the terror he’d felt upon spying the meat, igniting a fury that had him clenching his teeth and reaching for his gun.

He scooped up the hunk of meat, came out of his crouch and aimed the .357 at the woods, squeezing off three quick shots despite the absence of a visible target. The intent was intimidation, though an accidental lethal result wouldn’t bother him any. Any asshole willing to hurt his animals to get at him deserved whatever they got. The explosive reports of the gun got the dogs all worked up again, making them bark and strain at their leads some more. After a few moments, the ringing in his ears receded some and he began to perceive another sound just barely audible above the barking of his dogs.

Someone was crying out there in the woods. Whimpering and moaning. Calling out for their mama. Poor dumb bastard. Luke had gotten lucky with one of his shots. He didn’t feel good about it, but this was the chance you took when you intruded on a man’s property out here in the sticks, especially when that man had ample reason to mistrust intruders.

He carried the hunk of meat over to the steel trash can at the side of the trailer, lifted the lid, and dropped it inside. Then he wedged the lid back down firmly, secure in the knowledge that it was out of the reach of his dogs.

That done, he returned to the rear of the trailer and knelt next to Harley. He unclipped the wired, straining animal from his lead, gripped him by his collar, and pressed his mouth close to the dog’s ear. “Harley, find!”

He released his grip on the collar and Harley shot off into the woods.

After retrieving his flashlight, Luke stood and glanced at the other dog. “Jasper, stay! You watch over things here while Harley and I check this out, okay?”

The animal sat and gave him a bright-eyed, doggy grin. Luke scratched him behind the ears and took off after Harley.

Tracking the dog down wasn’t difficult. All he had to do was follow the sounds of growling and screaming. Keeping the flashlight aimed ahead of him, he threaded his way through a maze of trees, occasionally having to shoulder his way past vines and low-hanging branches. After just a couple minutes, the flashlight’s beam found Harley’s excitedly wiggling rear end. A shift of the beam revealed the tear-streaked face of a young man sitting with his back against the base of a tall tree.

The man held shaking hands in front of him in a pitiful attempt to ward off Harley’s snapping teeth. Luke noted that his hands were covered in blood, probably from where he’d been pressing them over the wound in his side. He gibbered insensibly and stared up at Luke with wide, terrified eyes. The guy looked familiar, though he was sure he didn’t know the man personally. It was something in the shape of his nose and the set of his eyes. The firm jawline, too. It reminded him strongly of someone else. His brow furrowed as he searched the nooks and crannies of his memory, straining to make a connection.

And then he had it.

He let out a breath.

Shit.

After making Harley heel, he aimed the flashlight’s beam right at the man’s face and said, “You’re Stump’s boy, right? Calvin, ain’t it?”

The young man grimaced as he sucked in a breath between clenched teeth. Then he glared at Luke. “Yes. I’m Emma’s sister.”

So he was the brother of one of the dead girls. It made sense. Luke figured most folks had let go of their outrage in the years since the trial. It was just the way life worked. People got wrapped up in the drama of a big thing like that, but public indignation over a supposed injustice had a short shelf-life. The furor died down and the general populace moved on with their lives. But it didn’t work like that with family. Luke knew that well enough. He was still clinging tight to decades-old grudges of his own. With family, you don’t ever forget, especially when it comes to murder.

Luke shook his head. “So what was the plan, Calvin? Kill my dogs, break into my trailer…and then what?”

A corner of Calvin’s mouth twitched, his eyes burning with defiance in the glare of the flashlight’s beam. “Was gonna slit your throat and watch you bleed out like a pig.”

Harley growled at the more aggressive tone, prompting Luke to gently nudge one of his hindquarters with the toe of a shoe. “Easy, boy.” The dog ceased growling and looked up at him, tongue lolling out as he panted. “Calvin, I didn’t k ill your sister. Didn’t kill any of those girls.”

That same corner of the kid’s mouth twitched again. “Bullshit.”

“It’s the stone truth, boy. I don’t know who killed Emma or any of the others, but it wasn’t me.”

The kid grimaced as his hands went to the wound in his side again. “You’re a liar.”

Luke moved closer and knelt beside him. He set the flashlight on the ground, but kept the .357 clutched in his right hand. “Let’s get a look at this. Lift up your shirt.”

“Get away from me.”

Luke sighed. “Kid, if I was gonna kill you, I would’ve done it by now. Now lift up the damn shirt.”

Calvin’s expression remained mistrustful, but he complied with Luke’s request, the pain from the wound evidently overwhelming his righteous fury. He was wearing a flannel shirt over a white T-shirt. His blood-stained fingers shook as he worked at the buttons of the flannel shirt. Once it was open, he tugged up the T-shirt, and Luke leaned closer for a better look.

The bullet had carved a pretty nasty groove along the side of his ribcage. Luke didn’t doubt it hurt like a bitch, but the kid had been lucky as hell. The bullet hadn’t actually entered his body. If it had, the little asshole might be dead already. “All right, let your shirt down.”

Calvin winced as he took his own look at the wound. “Oh, shit. Oh, shit, man.”

“Relax. You’re gonna live.” Luke snatched up the flashlight, stood up, and moved back a few steps. “Come on, now, get up.”

The kid braced his hands on the ground and tried to push himself up, but his face contorted at a fresh surge of agony and he fell back against the tree. Harley shifted on the ground next to Luke, looking up at him with anxious eyes. The look was one that always got to him. It was the dog’s way of asking him if everything was okay. That was one thing people who weren’t dog people didn’t get. They were actually expressive as hell and had many ways of communicating their feelings. Harley looked and acted like a tough critter, but he and Jasper were more like the kids he’d never had than actual guard dogs. He’d acquired the two of them from the same litter shortly after his acquittal, raising them from puppies. In the wake of his post-acquittal estrangement from damn near everyone he’d ever known, they were practically the only family he had left.

The train of thought effectively killed any sympathy he might have started feeling for Calvin Wilhoite. “Tell me something, kid. What kind of cowardly, sick piece of shit poisons animals?”

Keeping his back against the tree for support, Calvin again tried to get to his feet. This time he was more successful. Once he was upright, he fixed Luke with a sneering glare and said, “You ain’t got no right to talk, South County Madman.”

Luke pointed the .357 at him.

Calvin’s eyes went wide as he sucked in a breath and began to tremble. He extended a shaking hand. “No. No. Please…”

Luke couldn’t help feeling a primal satisfaction at seeing the fear in the boy’s eyes. For years now, he’d lived in the long shadow of that murdering asshole, wrongfully branded with the faceless, mysterious killer’s hateful nickname. The South County Madman, aka the middle Tennessee boogeyman. As far as many were concerned, he was the South County Madman, regardless of what the jury had decided. There had never been a shred of physical evidence linking him to the crimes. Other than the fact that all five bodies had been dumped in the woods adjacent to his property, there had been no evidence of any kind against him. But that hadn’t mattered to the citizenry, who were scared shitless and wanted desperately to feel safe again. So the law went looking for a scapegoat and found a convenient one in Luke Benson. From the beginning, his court-appointed lawyer told him the slipshod case the prosecution had put together would fall apart at the trial level. No self-respecting jury would ever convict on such flimsy evidence in a capital case. Even so, until the verdict was read, Luke remained convinced he had a rendezvous with the electric chair.

After all he had endured, it felt good—albeit in a deeply bitter way—to get some mileage out of his unjustly earned reputation. “What’s the matter, boy? You look like you’re about to piss your pants.”

Fresh tears spilled down Calvin’s trembling face. “Please…”

Luke lowered the gun. “Calm down, kid, I ain’t—“

His next words died in his throat as Calvin propelled himself away from the tree. The lunge happened too fast for Luke to dodge it, but instinct caused him to bring the gun up again, its barrel digging into the kid’s abdomen as he slammed into him. His finger squeezing the trigger was pure reflex. It was the last thing he wanted to happen, but there was nothing he could do to stop it. The gun went off as their entangled bodies began a descent to the ground.

Luke cried out in pain as his back hit the rocky forest floor and the kid’s dead weight settled atop him. A sense of helpless, bitter horror engulfed him as the irreversible grim reality of what had happened hit him. Another Wilhoite kid was dead and yet again he would be taking the blame. This time he’d actually done the deed, albeit by accident. But no one else would ever see it that way. The court of public opinion would decree Calvin Wilhoite the latest victim of the evil South County Madman. And this time there would be no calm, rational evaluation of the facts leading to another reprieve. He would be railroaded for sure. Hell, considering how high the blood-fever was likely to run amongst the locals, he might not even make it to trial alive this time. An assassination or a staged “suicide” in a holding cell seemed not just possible, but probable.