“You’re very helpful,” Tyler said.
“I try to be.”
She touched the water. It felt right. “What about your trunks?” she asked as she twisted the shower handle.
“That’s your job.”
The spray came down. Straightening up quickly, Tyler yanked the shower curtain almost shut. She reached through the gap to test the temperature. Abe, standing beside her, moved a hand down her back and rump. “It’s ready,” she said.
“Ladies first.”
Tyler climbed into the tub. She passed through the spray and backed up against a tile wall. Abe stepped in. He closed the curtain and turned to face her, one eye squeezed shut against the pelting shower, a rather silly smile on his face.
Tyler eased into his arms. The water rained down on their faces as they kissed. His body was slick against her. His hands roamed down her back, caressed and plied her buttocks as if he was fascinated by the firm mounds. Then they slid up. They opened the ties behind her back, behind her neck. Holding onto the neck cords, he stepped away and peeled the bikini down. He let it fall to their feet. He gazed at her streaming breasts. He explored them with his hands, stroking and holding and squeezing, clasping the nipples between his thumb and forefingers, pinching them gently in a way that made Tyler catch her breath and squirm.
Crouching, he rubbed his face on them. She felt his nose, the tickle of an eyelash, the rasp of whiskers, kisses, the soft circling tip of his tongue, the firm pressure of his lips, the edges of his teeth. Tyler clenched his hair as he sucked. His mouth felt huge and powerful, drawing her in until it almost hurt, then going to her other breast and doing the same. As the mouth released her, she pulled his hair to make him stand. She latched her mouth against his, and writhed in his embrace.
Turning so the spray was on her back, she wiped the water from her eyes. She rubbed Abe’s slippery shoulders and chest. She looked down at his bulging trunks. The narrow gap was there between the waist band and his belly, as she’d seen it on the path to the beach. Now she slipped her fingertips into the gap and drew the band toward her. Forehead resting on his chest, she stared down at him. His hands were motionless on her shoulders. She reached into the trunks, curled a hand around his thickness, and explored its hard length. Crouching, she pulled the trunks down his legs. He stepped out of them. Tyler’s hands moved up his thighs. She gently squeezed the furry sac of his scrotum. She wrapped her fingers around his shaft, slid them lightly up and down, then kissed the slitted head. Her tongue swirled around the silken skin. Holding his buttocks, she licked down the underside, feeling the solid heat of him against her cheek. Then she took him in, lips stretching around his smooth flesh, tongue stroking. She drew him in deeply until her mouth could accept no more. He squirmed, clutching her hair, his rump flexed taut under her hands as she sucked.
“Better stop,” he warned in a husky voice.
She slid her mouth back, kissed the swollen knob, then sheathed him again.
“Tyler.” He pulled gently at her hair. She sucked hard as he eased her away. Then her mouth was empty and she rose and embraced him, feeling the hardness against her belly.
“I want you now,” she gasped into his mouth.
“Here?”
“Yes.” She lay down in the tub, pressing her knees to its walls, and Abe lowered himself onto her. The hot shower smacked her face. Then Abe’s head blocked the spray. He was light on her, braced by his elbows and knees. As he kissed her, she felt a touch between her legs. He moved slowly, the head of his penis stroking her cleft. She flinched as it nudged her clitoris, squirmed and moaned as it stayed there, rubbing. Then it moved lower and very slowly slid in. She wanted it thrusting deep, but Abe held back as if to torture her. He withdrew completely, and she groaned. She dug her fingers into his rump. He pushed her opening. He entered. He suddenly shoved in fast and deep, spreading her, driving in farther and farther until she thought it impossible for there to be more—but there was more and it filled her.
They lay locked together, Abe deep in her body as if part of her. Neither of them moved. Tyler understood—and maybe so did Abe—how close they were to orgasms that would mean an ending, at least for now, to the terrible aching need for so deep a joining. She wanted to prolong the moment, to savor it.
The water was spraying down. It dripped off Abe’s face onto Tyler’s face as he kissed her lips, her nose, her eyes.
“Oh, Abe,” she whispered.
Behind the registration desk stood a portly, red-faced man in a white shirt and bow tie. Strands of hair crossed his head like streaks sketched on with a black pen. He made a lopsided smile. “What can I do for you, folks?”
“We were guests last night,” Abe said. “We’d like to extend our stay, if you’ll be open.”
“Names?”
“Ours are under Branson,” Tyler said.
“Branson and Clanton,” Abe told him.
The man fingered through cards in a metal box. “I’ll be running the place for now,” he said as he searched.
“Have the police found out anything about the Crogans?” Abe asked.
“Looks bad. Blood in Marty’s car. I’m his brother-in-law, you know. We’ve got a piece of this place, so I’ll be seeing to matters. Hope my wife doesn’t let the pharmacy go to hell.” He pulled out two cards. “Here we go. How many nights will you be wanting to stay on?”
“One more,” Abe said. He tried to pay for all the rooms, but Tyler insisted on picking up the tab for hers and Nora’s.
“Will the restaurant be open, too?” she asked.
The man nodded. “We’ll keep it running.”
“I hope everything turns out all right,” Abe said.
“I do, too, but I don’t suppose it’ll be that way. We’ve had folks disappear before in this town. It’s not likely they’ll show up again.”
“Take care, now,” Abe told him.
“I’ll see your rooms are made up before long. I’ll take care of it myself if I can’t round up Lois. I think she knew I’d need her. That’s why she hightailed it. Probably off at the beach with Haywood.”
“We’re on our way to the beach,” Tyler said.
His eyebrows lifted. “If you see Lois, you want to let her know her father needs her over here? I’d appreciate it. She’s sixteen, long brown hair, wears this polkadot binkini she ought to be ashamed of.”
“If we see her,” Tyler said, “we’ll tell her to come by.”
He thanked her, and they left.
“She wasn’t the one we saw,” Abe said as they stepped down the porch stairs.
“No, but she might be there now. It’s been a couple of hours.”
“Doesn’t seem that long.”
She grinned, and Abe patted her rump. He opened the passenger door. She climbed in. “I hope Nora and Jack aren’t burnt to a crisp,” she said.
“If they are, it was for a good cause.” Abe shut the door and walked around to his side of the car. As he sat down behind the wheel, Tyler leaned over. She kissed him.
She rode with her elbow out the window, the breeze tossing her hair and fluttering the front of her blouse. The two top buttons were open.
“Eyes on the road, buster.”
“It’s not easy.”
She smiled and threw back her head. Abe glanced at her throat, the smooth tanned vee of skin below it, the pale slope of a breast as the breeze lifted a side of her blouse.
He turned away and watched the road. He felt very strange—pleasantly tired, happier than he could remember ever being before, yet troubled.
It couldn’t be going better, he told himself.
Maybe that’s the problem.
Some problem.
It’s gone too well, too fast. It started less then twenty-four hours ago when he first saw her face—spattered by that lunatic’s blood. When he first looked into her eyes, and felt as if he’d known her before. No, as if he should have known her before. As if she had always been out there, and he’d known it but not who she
was or where to look. It was like finding a part of himself that had been lost.
From that time on, she’d been a constant presence in his mind. He’d wondered about her, worried and hoped. Yesterday afternoon had been very bad, especially when she went looking for Dan. During dinner and later the threat from Dan had faded, but not completely, and he’d spent the night in a restless half-sleep, eager for the morning to come but dreading its arrival, afraid of losing her.
He nodded, realizing he’d discovered the source of his worry: he was still afraid of losing her.
The worry seemed unfounded. She’d apparently made up her mind in favor of Abe even before finding out about Dan’s death. She wanted him—maybe as much as he wanted her. But their lovemaking had brought such a closeness, such a joining that he now had much more to lose than he’d ever thought possible.
It was amazing.
But frightening, too.
“You’re looking mighty glum,” she said.
“Post-coital depression.”
She laughed. “How long do you expect it to last?”
“Probably till we coit again.”
“Can it wait till after lunch?”
“If it must,” he said. He turned onto Beach Lane.
At the end of the dirt road, parked next to a pickup truck, was a long, gray Mercedes.
“That looks like Hardy’s,” Tyler said. “I wonder what Mr. Wonderful’s doing at the beach.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
“My father, he’d been living with the guilt more than thirty years, and he told me he couldn’t abide it any longer.” Captain Frank raised the can of Bud to his mouth. He shut his eyes against the sun as he gulped.
Gorman took another can from the six-pack he’d brought along to lubricate the old man’s tongue, and popped open its top. Captain Frank mashed his empty and tossed it. Gorman watched it drop a long way to the ground.
“It was then he told me, for the first time, all about Bobo and how Bobo must still be alive and murdering.”
“Have another,” Gorman said.
Captain Frank accepted the fresh can. “Much obliged.” He settled back in his lawn chair and took a long drink. “Well, I begged my father to let me go with him, but he’d have none of that. Wanted me to stay behind and look after Mother. It was as if he knew he’d never come back, and he didn’t. He was a mighty fine shot with that Winchester of his. I ‘spect Bobo must’ve snuck up on him, caught him from behind.” With his free hand, the old man savagely clawed the air. “Just like that.”
“Was your father’s body ever found?” Gorman asked.
“No, sir. I ‘spect it’s buried over yonder, more than likely in the cellar.”
“The cellar of Beast House?”
“That’s what I figure.”
“If the beast actually killed him, as you believe, wouldn’t the Kutch woman have put a replica of your father on display for the tour.”
“Could’ve, but she didn’t. You ask me, the old bat’s mighty careful who she exhibits. You look at who’s in there. Take the Bagley kid, for instance. His friend, Maywood, got out alive and went running to the cops. Now how’s she gonna deny the killing? She doesn’t. She turned it to the good by having dummies made up. Same goes for the three last year. One’s Danny Jenson, the cop. How’s she gonna pretend it never happened? But let me tell you.” He squinted an eye at Gorman. “There’s plenty of folks just up and disappear. I figure Bobo got most of them. But old Maggie, she’s not gonna put them on display when she’s got a way to cover up. She’d have a whole house full, and how’d that look?” He took a long drink of beer.
“Four people disappeared last night,” Gorman said. “The Crogans, who run the Welcome Inn…”
“Oh, dear Lord.”
“And a friend of mine.”
Captain Frank scowled at the top of his beer can.
“The Crogans’ car was found abandoned this morning on the road to the highway.”
“Well, it got them. I was you, I wouldn’t count on seeing my friend again. Or the Crogans, either. Their girl, she gone too?”
“Yes.”
He let out a long sigh. “She was such a cute thing. Used to see her down at the beach. Always had a kind word. Goddamn, they should’ve known better. You just don’t go near that house, not after dark, not unless you’re looking to get yourself killed. They should’ve known that.”
“Does the beast actually leave the house?”
“Sure does. Unless Wick or Maggie are grabbing folks. One look at that pair, you know they’d be hard put to get away with it. Bobo’s gotta be prowling around. In the hills back of the house. Down on the beach. Some twelve years back, we even had a gal disappear from the cabin next door.” He nodded to the right. “Ry, that’s her husband, he come home late from the Last Chance and she was gone. Folks all said she’d run off ‘cause he was always whumping on her. But I knew different and told him so. He called me a screwy old fart and said to stay out of his business.”
He peered at Gorman and raised a thick white eyebrow. “You think I’m a screwy old fart?”
“Not at all,” Gorman assured him.
“Well, lots of folks do. They’ll change their tune one of these days when I hand over Bobo’s body.”
“You plan to kill it?”
“I’ll get Bobo, or it’ll get me.”
“Have you ever gone after it?”
“Why, sure. I’ve gone and laid ambush for it—oh, more times than I can count. But it’s never showed up.”
“You’ve never seen it?”
“Not a once.”
“Have you ever gone into the house after it?”
“Now, that’d be trespassing.”
Gorman controlled his urge to smile. Obviously, the old man was afraid to enter Beast House. “It seems,” he said, “as if the house would be the best place to hunt it.”
Captain Frank squeezed his beer can and hurled it from the bus top. It hit a low-hanging tree branch and fell to the ground. “Say, young man, how’d you like to take a look at my book?”
“What book?”
“I been keeping track. Yes, indeed. You’d be surprised.”
“I’d like very much to see it.”
The old man winked. “Thought you might. You’re a lot curiouser than most.” He pushed himself out of the lawn chair, and walked unsteadily along the top of the bus. “Bring the beer along,” he said.
Gorman got to his knees and watched Captain Frank descend the wooden ladder. The moment the man was out of sight, he pulled out his pocket recorder. The tape was still running, but it must be near its end. The old geezer had talked for the better part of an hour—and what a story he’d told! Gorman couldn’t have been more delighted. Everything was going his way. Everything! His fingers trembled with excitement as he ejected the tape’s tiny cartridge, flipped it over, and slid it back into place. He returned the recorder to his jacket pocket. He grabbed an empty plastic ring of the six-pack. The two remaining cans clanked together at his side as he walked carefully toward the ladder.
He approached it with growing alarm. The ascent had been bad enough, but he suspected the descent would prove worse. The ladder was simply propped against the end of the bus, its highest rung level with his waist. What if it should tip over as he attempted to clamber on?
Gorman Hardy, noted author of Horror at Black River Falls, fell to his death…
Captain Frank was down below, gazing up at him.
“Would you mind holding the ladder for me?”
The old man shook his head as if he pitied Gorman, then stepped under the ladder and clutched its uprights.
If you’re such a stalwart fellow, Gorman thought, why are you terrified of going after the beast? A screwy old fart, all right. And a coward. But his story was gold, and Gorman’s fear subsided as he wondered about the man’s book. Carefully, he mounted the ladder. It wobbled slightly. The rungs creaked under his weight. His legs felt weak and shaky, but finally he planted a foot on the so
lid ground.
“And you’re still in one piece,” said Captain Frank.
Gorman forced a smile. He followed the man through a litter of beer cans alongside the painted bus. “Did you paint this mural?”
“That I did.”
“I’ve never seen anything quite like it. Would you mind if I took a picture?”
“Help yourself. I’ll just step inside and…”
“Stay here. I’d like you in the picture, too. The canvas and the artist.”
Captain Frank nodded. He moved to the open door of the bus as Gorman set down the beers and stepped away. In the viewfinder, the old man looked like a crazed tourist: Huckleberry Finn straw hat, red aloha shirt flapping in the breeze, plaid Bermuda shorts, spindly legs with drooping green socks and tattered blue tennis shoes. He held an arm out, a finger pointing at the mural.
Gorman took a few more backward steps to fit in the entire length of the bus, and triggered the shutter release. “Marvelous! Now step over that way.” He waved the old man to the left. “There. Right there. The ancient mariner and the albatross.”
“You know the poem?”
“Certainly. It’s one of my favorites.” He moved in close and snapped the shot. “Wonderful. Thank you.”
“Hope they turn out.”
“Shall we have a look at this book you mentioned?”
“Right this way.”
When the old man turned away to mount the steps, Gorman switched on his recorder. He retrieved the beers, and followed. He found Captain Frank in the driver’s seat.
“Look here, matey.” With a sly wink, he whacked the sun visor. It flipped down. Secured to its back with duct tape was a sheathed knife. He tapped a fingernail against the staghorn handle. “I’m ready for it, see? Just let old Bobo make a try for me.” He pushed up the visor, hunched over so his chin rested on the steering wheel, and reached under the seat. He came up with a western style revolver. “My hogleg,” he announced. Thumbing back the hammer, he stared at the weapon as if it were a stunning woman. “This darling’s an Iver Johnson .44 magnum. She’ll knock Bobo ass over tea kettle.”