“How is that?” Rich asked, finding some bugs still alive and stepping on them with a crunch. “Why would a storm make bugs go crazy?”
“I don’t know,” Sidney said, frustrated over the fact that she didn’t have a good enough answer. “It was just a friggin’ theory.”
“Best one we got, unless you’ve got something better,” Cody said, his attitude toward Rich rearing its head again.
“I’m not the animal expert,” Rich retorted, having picked up on the attitude. “I’ve just never seen anything like this before and—”
They all jumped at a thumping sound. Sidney believed, as likely they all did, that something had just been blown against the side of the house, but then it came again.
And again.
“What now?” Rich asked, slipping in the bug guts that covered the floor, but grabbing hold of the island’s edge before he actually went down. If things hadn’t been so tense at the moment, it almost might’ve been funny, but right then it just made the situation all the tenser.
There were multiple hits now. Loud thumps and bangs that seemed to be coming from all around the house.
Rich let go of the island and made his way toward the front of the house, careful not to slide. Sidney, Snowy, and Cody followed as the loud sounds continued.
Standing in the entryway, Rich listened.
“Is it just the storm?” he asked them.
The noises continued to pummel the home.
“I have no idea,” Sidney said, eyes traveling to the various points of impact.
“Maybe it’s hail,” Cody suggested.
“Seriously?” Rich asked. “Hail? That’s the best you could come up with? It’s the freakin’ summer. I don’t think you can even have hail in the summer.”
Something hit off of one of the living room windows, broken glass tinkling to the floor beneath.
“Are you shitting me?” Rich said, heading toward the window where one of the curtains now billowed.
Sidney didn’t really know why she reacted the way she did, but she called out, “Rich, no!”
He turned ever so slightly but continued toward the broken window. He grabbed the long, billowing material of the curtain to pull it away, but something was waiting for him behind it.
Rich let out a scream, jumping back as a raccoon, crouched among the broken pieces of glass, sprang at him.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Janice cried out in a mixture of rage and absolute disgust, thrashing wildly atop the body of her husband as he attempted to put his arms around her.
His movements were weak, spastic, flailing, giving her the opportunity that she needed to escape his clutches. She would rather not have remembered, but the memory was suddenly there in her mind, a time when she actually welcomed Ronald’s strong arms around her. But that was a long time ago, before the hate and revulsion.
Janice drove her boney elbows into her husband’s ribs with all her might to break his hold on her, and to drive the disgusting memory away. An awful moan escaped the man, and all she could think of was a ghost roaming the halls of some ancient English castle.
Rolling off the thrashing man, she scrambled to her knees and began to stand. The fact that her husband still lived was a problem, and she at once began to formulate how she would finish what she had started. The pain in her hand was incredible, each rapid-fire beat of her heart like somebody taking a hot poker and driving it into the meat of her palm. She held the bandaged hand to her chest as she rose, keeping her distance from the man who twitched and flopped upon the floor of their bedroom. Perhaps he would still die, she thought as she watched him there in the darkness. Maybe he just needed a little more time.
The smell was instantly revolting, but familiar. A smell that she’d grown used to since purchasing Alfred, the pungent and incredibly strong smell of French bulldog farts.
Janice turned in the black of the bedroom to find the dog standing behind her, staring at her intensely. She again noticed the strange glassy shine over his right eye.
“Who wants a cookie?” she asked in the calmest of voices, not wanting the dog to pick up on her tension. There wasn’t much that the dog wouldn’t do for a snack. She figured that was all she needed to distract him from what she had done.
Alfred continued to stare at her intensely.
“Do you?” she asked him, again with little reaction.
She noticed that Ronald had gone completely silent and turned her attention from the dog to see that her husband now lay perfectly still.
Dead, she hoped.
Janice could not stop the smile from coming, her spirits lifted by the possibility of her husband’s demise.
But her happiness was short lived. As she turned back to her dog, she found that he was right there in front of her, mere inches away, having silently come closer.
She actually gasped as she found the French bulldog looking up into her eyes.
“Let’s go get that cook—” she started, but never finished. The dog silently lunged, his sharp, crooked teeth sinking into the flesh of her thigh.
Janice cried out, pulling away from Alfred’s attack but tripping over the body of her husband and falling to the floor once more. The dog continued to come at her, powerful jaws widening for another bite. Janice kicked with her legs, attempting to drive the bulldog away, but it had little effect. Alfred snapped crazily, willing to bite at anything near his mouth. She tried to get up, to run away, but he kept at it, keeping her down at his level. Alfred dove at her side, going for the flesh of her stomach. She tried to grab hold, to wrestle and perhaps immobilize him, but the dog was too fast and strong, squirming from her grasp before lunging and snapping again.
Janice tried to get him to listen, screaming out commands, but her attempts at authority were falling on deaf ears.
Arms flailing, she managed to grab hold of some of the looser flesh and fur on the side of Alfred’s face, yanking him back and holding him at bay. The dog silently twisted in her grasp, seemingly unaware of the pain that he must be causing himself as he tried to bite her. He brought one of his paws up as he twisted, trying to scratch her with his claws. With her bandaged hand she batted the paw away, but it still managed to dig bleeding furrows into her wrist. Her arm was getting weaker, and the dog seemingly stronger. Janice knew that it wouldn’t be long before the dog grew so incensed and twisted so violently that he would cause the furry flesh on the side of his face to tear, and Alfred would again be free to bite at her.
Holding the dog at a distance as it thrashed in her grasp, she looked around the room for some sort of solution. In a flash of lightning followed by a nearly deafening crash of thunder, she saw the bathroom across from the bedroom and made her decision. Janice didn’t waste any time and began to drag the struggling dog across the room toward the door. His movements were getting more wild and frantic, and she could feel the sides of his chomping teeth now rubbing against her hand furiously as he continued to fight and shake in her grasp in an attempt to bite her.
Alfred planted his paws, but the hardwood floors of the bedroom were not a bulldog’s friend, and he was easily dragged. The dog fought even more wildly now, as if realizing where it was that she was taking him. Alfred thrashed his muscular body and continued to try and gouge her with his claws, but Janice held tightly, for the alternative was something that she would rather not think about.
She made it through the doorway out into the hall, but the dog managed to get his claws dug into the wood of the door’s threshold, and she found her grip on the dog’s face sliding off just enough so that . . .
Alfred went wild, his savage jaws snapping crazily, like some kind of mechanized animal trap. Janice screamed as she pushed herself back with her legs toward the open bathroom doorway as Alfred came at her. Her hands shot out in front of her to hold him back, and the dog’s mouth chomped down upon her fingers. She felt the fragile bones snap beneath the closure of his unrelenting jaws. The pain was blinding, and she saw brilliant explosions of red before
her eyes as she struggled to retain her consciousness. Rolling over onto her knees, Janice furiously began to crawl her way into the bathroom. An incredible weight landed upon her back, driving her flat to the floor, and she felt Alfred’s hot breath upon her neck. Scrunching up her shoulders, she reached behind her to try and knock the animal away. Her fingers touched on something cold and metal, and she at once knew that she was touching the dog’s choke collar. Grabbing the chain, she yanked with all her might, flipping the dog over her right shoulder as she pushed off from the entryway floor to the bathroom.
Alfred rolled from her back into the side of the bathroom’s trash can, barely pausing a second before he was charging her again. She’d managed to stand and reached over to pull a wicker hamper into the dog’s path, blocking him. Janice used that moment to turn herself around and grab hold of the bathroom door to start to close it. Alfred sprang off the body of the hamper, wedging his head in the doorway just as she tried to pull it shut. The bulldog was wild, attempting to shake his blocky head free and force more of his muscular body through to get at her. Janice pulled the door with both hands, even though the pain from her injuries was excruciating. But she was willing to endure it to prevent what would surely be worse if the dog managed to get out of the bathroom.
Still pulling on the doorknob, she raised her foot, kicking the dog in the face once and then again. Blood dribbled down his dark nose onto his yellowed teeth, giving them a new, horrific look as they continued to snap and grind. Summoning all her strength for one final push, Janice lifted her leg and drove the heel of her sensible shoe square into Alfred’s snout and managed to drive his head back into the bathroom and allow her to pull the door closed.
She stood there shaking, head pressed to the door. Alfred was going wild in the bathroom, repeatedly hurling his muscular body against the door. She actually started to laugh, a kind of release from the intense emotions that had been gradually building since smashing her husband’s skull in. The door felt cool against her brow, and she closed her eyes, giggling insanely as the tension began to slowly leave her.
Alfred angrily continued to throw himself at the door, and she seriously began to worry that the French bulldog might be strong enough to punch his way through. She turned herself around, her back pressed to the vibrating surface of the door, and opened her eyes to the darkness of the room . . . and her husband standing mere inches from her.
Janice tried to scream, but the sight of him, the way his head was grotesquely misshapen where his skull had been smashed in, and how he looked at her, head cocked strangely to one side, with dark, dead eyes that seemed to bore into hers . . . it stole away her ability to cry out.
Then she noticed it, just as she had on Alfred. A shiny reflective coating over her husband’s right eye. She wondered what it might mean as he lunged at her, his mouth agape.
Janice tried to escape, darting to go around him, but he was too fast. Ronald collided with her, slamming her back against the hallway wall, and lowered his face to her neck to sink his teeth into the tender skin and rip a huge chunk away. Her hands went to the spurting wound as she cried out; there was so much blood. Janice tried to push her husband away with one hand, but the blood from the neck wound had made the hardwood floor slippery, and she found her feet sliding out from beneath her.
Ronald stiffly lurched in her direction, his spastic movement reminding her of the mechanical historical figures at the Hall of Presidents in Disney World. Her head was becoming light, and she tried to use the wall to prop herself up, to make her escape toward the stairs and hopefully to freedom out into the storm, but Ronald caught her, driving her down to the floor again. Janice tried to fight him, but he was too strong. Again he lowered his bloodstained mouth toward her exposed neck.
He sank his teeth into her throat with a sickening pop, tearing the tender flesh away with a savage yank.
* * *
The man who had been Ronald Berthold watched the woman die.
No longer did he remember that he had once loved her, cared for her. Nor did he remember that she had tried to kill him.
Ronald Berthold was gone, and only the body remained.
The blood that had been gushing from the woman’s gaping throat wound had slowed to a mere trickle as her heart ceased to pump. The man stared, watching for further signs of life, but there were none.
Satisfied, he struggled to stand, slipping in the coagulating puddle of blood and almost falling to the floor.
Almost.
The man caught himself against the closed bathroom door, a bloody handprint smeared across the white surface. The door suddenly vibrated menacingly as something on the other side threw itself against the obstruction.
The man stiffly stepped back from the door, staring at it with a questioning eye. It shook violently again.
Tilting his head from one side to the other, the man determined that something was on the other side and wished to come out. The man studied the door as it continued to vibrate and be pounded upon, his eyes fixing on the doorknob.
It took a moment, but the body remembered what it was for, reaching out with a blood-covered hand to grip the cool metal of the knob and squeeze it tightly, before slowly turning it to the right and—
Click!
The bathroom door swung inward with a prolonged creak, exposing the muscular figure of the dog standing there.
Waiting.
The man locked eyes with the beast, a kind of invisible communication seeming to pass between them.
The dog left the bathroom, briefly staring at the cooling corpse of the woman in the hallway before coming to stand beside the man.
They stood for a while, as if waiting for something—a message perhaps—and then began to walk toward the stairs.
Side by side, the man and the dog descended the steps to the first floor. At the front door, they paused momentarily before the man reached for the doorknob and, recalling what he had done just moments before, turned it.
He pulled the door open. There was a heavy gust of wind and rain, but the man and dog were unfazed by the fury of the elements as they walked together through the doorway.
Out into the storm.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Doc Martin should have left the clinic and gone home hours ago, but there she was, still puttering, having little need or interest to head home.
This was where she truly lived. This was where she was alive, and it had pretty much been that way since she’d first opened the practice nearly thirty years before.
The animal hospital was her life.
She was craving a smoke but dreaded the idea of going outside. The storm was raging and sounded like it could have gotten worse. The weather guys had said that this one was going to be a beaut, and for once it wasn’t all hype. She seriously considered spending the night at the clinic. It wouldn’t have been the first time that she’d sprawled out in her office chair, covered in blankets meant as donations from one of the mainland’s many animal shelters.
She was about to start flipping through the first of at least twenty veterinary medical journals that she’d let pile up when she heard them.
It sounded as though a full-scale riot was going on in the kennels.
“What the hell is that all about?” she muttered, leaving her seat and heading to the door that led to the dog kennels.
Doc Martin opened the door to the sounds of the wild. It seemed as though every animal inside the caged compartments was in the process of losing its mind.
“Whoa! Whoa!” she called out as she stepped inside the room. “What’s going on?”
The dogs inside their recovery cages were extremely agitated, barking and scratching at their compartment doors. The strong smell of urine and feces filled the air.
She stopped at the first cage to check out Lilly, the basset hound who’d had stomach surgery that afternoon. The dog was up on all fours, frantically pawing at the bottom of the cage door, and when she saw Doc Martin, she immediately threw herself at the door,
biting ferociously at the metal.
“What’s gotten into you?” she muttered to herself, concerned that the dog’s frantic activity might cause her stitches to pop. Doc Martin was considering getting some medication to calm her down when she noticed similar activity in the cage beside the basset hound.
Rufus, a cute corgi/Labrador mix who had come in to have some teeth pulled, was spinning around inside his cage so fast that Doc was afraid he was going to hurt himself.
“Hey,” she said, approaching the cage. She laid her hand against the front of the cage door and tapped it to get his attention. “Knock it off before you break your friggin—”
The dog stopped on a dime and shoved his face against the metal grate of the door so hard in an attempt to bite her hand that blood actually squirted from his nose.
Doc Martin quickly pulled her hand away, and Rufus immediately went back to spinning. Feeling eyes upon her, she glanced across the way to see Beau, the standard poodle who had come in for neutering, staring intensely at her, teeth bared in a sign of absolute aggression.
She didn’t know what was going on, but clearly something was up. It would have been easy to blame it all on the storm, to come up with some bullshit connected to atmospheric conditions, or even something as simple as intense fear caused by the sound of thunder, but she knew that it wasn’t right.
Something was seriously wrong.
A glint of light from one of Beau’s eyes caught Doc Martin’s attention, and she moved closer to the poodle’s cage. The dog reacted as aggressively as the others had, ramming his face against the metal cage door.
“What’s wrong with your eye?” she asked the dog.
Beau’s right eye seemed to be covered in a shiny, metallic film. She stared at it, moving one of her hands in front of the cage in order to get the dog to move his head around so that she could check it out better. She hadn’t a clue as to what it was. The fact that it was only covering one eye was interesting as well.