The Scream Catcher Read online

  Coming from upstairs, the happy sounds of Jack filling his bath.

  “I’m still going to contact, Mack,” Jude says. “Just for peace of mind.”

  “He’s on the other side of the lake,” Rosie reminds him. “Forget the land line. I doubt internet works either.”

  “Cell phone,” he smiles, pulling the small Verizon unit from his jeans pocket.

  As his wife heads for the upstairs, Jude pulls his mobile from his pocket, dials the number for the Lake George Village Precinct.

  Assembly Point Peninsula

  Thursday, 8:29 P.M.

  Jude stands alone in the kitchen with the rain coming down outside the big window. He waits for a connection . . . and waits. But he gets nothing. The wireless telecommunications signal simply produces a repeating beep.

  But that doesn’t stop him from trying.

  He pulls the phone from his ear, speed-dials his father’s private office number, again holds the device up against his head . . . and again waits.

  This time he gets even more nothing. Not so much as an electronic beep, beep, beep. All he manages is a huge helping heap of dead air and following that, termination of the call.

  “Damn!”

  Jude pockets the mobile phone. Taking the flashlight in hand, he walks back through the vestibule to the front door, opens it. He takes another look outside, shines the beam of light in the exact spot at the end of the drive where the Jeep-Cruiser should be parked.

  Still nothing there.

  Once more he descends the porch steps, walks out to the drive. Out beyond the exterior log wall of the two car garage, he sets his eyes upon the lake. Still no sign of the police boat.

  Back up on the front porch, the overhead shields him from the now light rain. It only makes sense that his personal witness protectors must have been called back in to assist with the blackout emergency. Even from where he stands he can make out the distant sound of cop sirens blaring from the Jeep-cruisers that shoot down the village Main Street all the way on the other side of the lake.

  Funny how sound travels over water . . .

  Jude knows that along with the massive blackout comes the possibility for numerous automobile accidents, acts of vandalism, looting sprees, injuries, accidental deaths, random acts of violence, not so random acts of violence.

  Should I pack up the fam damily, move them to the village until the blackout is over?

  In his heart, he knows that it’s a bad idea. The village will be as crazy and dangerous as a jungle—a drunkard’s paradise. Jude is a former cop. It doesn’t take a whole lot of thought to come to the conclusion that the safest place in any blackout is right here, inside the walls of one’s home-sweet-home.

  Stepping back inside the home, he closes the wood door behind him.

  Inside the living room to his immediate left, the white wedding candle suddenly goes out, reducing the space to blackness. It’s like a giant wind had suddenly whipped through the big log home.

  Aside from the smoldering, glowing ember of a candle wick, he can’t see a thing. Nights on the lake are always dark, but with an overcast sky and the lights from the village extinguished, the blackness seems all consuming.

  Jude steps into the living room, walks the walk of the blind man, right arm extended out before him like a pointer, like a replacement for the eyes. He moves slowly, snail’s pace, sliding the soles of his boots along the hardwood in the direction of the wick instead of lifting them one at a time.

  But when the wick burns out completely, he can no longer be guided by its orange glow. He has to instead rely on the candle’s smoky fragrance. The smell guides him across the living room floor. That is, until he jams his knee into the coffee table.

  The collision startles him more than the sharp, yet delayed pain in his kneecap.

  “It’s okay,” he calls out almost by instinct, even though neither Rosie nor Jack have voiced their concern. “Just tripped is all.”

  Moving sightless around the table, he makes it to the candle, pulls the pack of matches from his jeans pocket, fires it up. As he relights the candle, another emergency siren can be heard coming from outside the log home.

  His chest grows tight.

  The demon is awake and wants to play.

  Turning, Jude limps his way around the couch, makes for the stairs, heads straight for the master bedroom. Bending down, he takes a painful knee beside the bed, reaches under for the long black plastic case that houses his shotgun.

  The Molloy Gravel Pit

  Thursday, 8:40 P.M.

  Deep night inside the abandoned pit.

  The heavy rain has slowed to a gentle mist while flashes of lightning are visible half a mile to the southeast in the direction of Lake George. Black Dragon stands outside Fuentes’ Jeep cruiser which was delivered to him by his student, T-Bred, only moments ago. Gripped in his right hand is a white plastic bottle of lighter fluid. He’s squeezing the bottle, soaking the interior of the white Jeep Cherokee with the flammable liquid until there’s nothing left to spray.

  Black Dragon appears as an opaque silhouette against an already impenetrable night. Black bodysuit, black face-paint, black gloves, black shin-high boots. Tossing the empty can into the open driver’s side window of the Jeep-cruiser, he pulls a pack of matches from a pouch attached to a Velcro waist belt. Just an average looking pack of cardboard matches, the words Linda’s Blue Bayou printed on the cover in large blue letters above the silhouette of a voluptuous, naked lady.

  Black Dragon wipes the mist from his eyes. He glances over his right shoulder at the brilliant jagged lightning. He listens for the rumble of thunder but hears nothing. Surrounding him on all sides is the barren rock face of the carved out pit. Nothing alive for miles around. Only dead, hard shale; only his own throbbing heart.

  Nothing alive inside the Jeep either.

  Or, nothing alive anymore that is. Only the remnants of what once upon a time was a super cop. Black Dragon pictures his student and the one job, or test, assigned to him. A simple, but oh so gruesome, task that resulted in murder and yet another scream in his collection of screams. And what a job T-Bred has done eliminating the 23 Assembly Point Road protector. What an astounding accomplishment, the evidence of which is now recorded on his iPhone app, which he brings to right ear. Even at a low volume, he can hear the distressed scream of Super Cop Fuentes as his throat was cut. Not a scream really. More like a gurgle. But it’s enough to raise the hairs on the back of the Black Dragon’s neck. What a kill game sound byte it will make. What a super piece of realistic audio.

  Scream. For. Me.

  Now that the future kill gamer has completed his assignment, T-bred to blend back into the blacked-out night where he is to report to the Glens Falls, Wild Bills All Day/All Night II arcade. He will know what to do once he gets there.

  Cupping his right hand over the lit match, Black Dragon strikes it against the sandpaper edge of the pack. Inside the shelter of his hand, he watches the sulfur burn and spark. At the appropriate time, Black Dragon approaches the Jeep, tosses the lit match into the fuel-soaked interior and the large, lifeless torso that’s laid out flat in its open back space.

  Taking a quick step backwards, he feels the immediate eruption of the red-white flame.

  Lake George Village

  Thursday, 8:42 P.M.

  Mack drives out of the parking garage, pulls a sharp left onto the main, Lake George Road. The stretch of narrow, curving Adirondack highway will take him from the village L.G.P.D. precinct, around the northern point of the lake to the Brook Trout Bridge, which is where he arrives in a matter of minutes.

  Driving the Jeep-cruiser onto the metal bridge he pulls over, gets out. Leaning over the railing he stares down into the fast moving white water.

  Nothing but white foam and mist.

  Not far on the east side of the lake, lightning strikes. The thunder concussion shoots across the water. Its reverberation is violent enough to rattle the seventy year old steel-framed bridge. Pulling a minia
ture Maglite from his raincoat, Mack heads to the opposite side of the bridge onto the road. He hooks a right-hand turn, makes his way onto the soft shoulder and then down the semi-steep embankment until he comes to the head of the Brook Trout stream. It’s there he shines the bright white beam of Maglite into the water. At first he sees nothing that might garner his attention. Nothing but the swiftly moving heavy water and the rocks that impede its path. Soon enough, it becomes apparent that water and rock are all he’s going to see.

  But then he’s about to kill the light, head back up to his Jeep when he spots something else in the water. Coming closer to the bank, he shines the round beam of Maglite onto a small object that’s caught up on a tree branch. The closer he comes to the water the more he can make out the object. In his mind, he’s able to see that it’s doughnut shaped, not at all like a dead bird or a stick or a tree branch. The closer he comes to the bank, the more he makes out the object for exactly what it is: the Electronic G.P.S. Surveillance Bracelet.

  I’ll be a dumb son of a bitch . . .

  Turning, he heads back up the embankment, goes straight for his Jeep. Slipping back behind the wheel, he thumbs the radio transmitter.

  “Emily,” he spits, “this is Mack. Over.”

  “Yes, Captain Mack, I’ve got you. Over.”

  “I’ve located our surveillance bracelet underneath the Brook Trout Bridge just like the GPS said it would be. And at present, it is without its owner. Over.”

  I read you, Captain. Do I alert all vehicles? Over.”

  “All vehicles are occupied with the blackout. Contact the Staties immediately with the sit rep. Over.”

  “Copy that. Contact the Staties. You go check on your son, Captain. Over.”

  “I’m on my way. Over.”

  Heart in throat, he drives, speeding past the miles of State-protected pine forest that lead to his son’s Assembly Point home. He knows that at this point, nothing should prevent him from seeing to his family. With Lennox free it’s quite probable that a new kill game is about to begin with Jude, Rosie, and Jack acting the part of the victims. It’s exactly what profiling Agent MacSweeny predicted. It’s been his worst fear all along: that Lennox would somehow slip out of the ankle bracelet, that once free he would use the opportunity to begin another kill game, this one motivated by revenge and aimed at the man who is to testify against him in court. Even the blackout feels too much like a coincidence.

  It has to be a part of the game. As will be the recorded screams of his son’s family.

  Mack drives pedal-to-the-metal.

  But it’s at the intersection of the Lake George Road and the Fort Anne Road, that the old Captain spots the pillar of flame. The red-orange fire is coming from approximately two-hundred yards up on his left, not far from the rear entry to Sweeney’s Boxing Gym.

  Maybe it’s out of pure call-of-duty, or maybe it’s out of pure instinct and cop intuition, but Mack immediately finds himself driving onto the Fort Anne Road in the direction of the large fire and what he knows in his bones will be Lennox’s location. Motoring all the way down into the man-made cavern, he sees what looks to be a white and blue, Jeep Cherokee 4x4 consumed in flame. The exact model and make of all L.G.P.D. cruisers.

  Coming to a stop, Mack opens the door, gets out, draws his old NYPD .38 service revolver. He walks guardedly towards the burning wreck. His heart skips a beat when he spots the license plate lying on the wet shale floor. In the light of the fire, he reads L.G.P.D.-9.

  “Fuentes.”

  Turning quick, he spots a big smiling man dressed all in black standing by the open door of the Jeep-cruiser.

  Assembly Point Peninsula

  Thursday, 8:50 P.M.

  Locked inside the screened-in patio, Jude sits and waits and feels the demon tapping at his insides with a clawed finger. He fears what might be out there in the black woods. When Rosie walks in, big brown eyes laser-beamed upon the shotgun laid across his lap, he turns quick to face her.

  “Expecting company?” she says, tan face tight and apprehensive.

  It did not dawn on Jude that Rosie might be upset about seeing a real live shotgun gripped in his hands. He stands, careful to be sure the double barrels are pointed away from his wife.

  “Is Jack alone?”

  “Sitting up in bed with his Game Boy and a flashlight.”

  Something hits the ex-cop then. Sideswipes him is more like it. It’s not that his brain has yet reached panic mode. There’s simply nothing to panic over other than the unknown. But Jude immediately feels that the frivolous use of a flashlight might not be the best way to solve their fragile battery situation.

  “Stay here,” he insists.

  Shifting the shotgun into his left hand, Jude moves across the slate floor, brushes past Rosie abruptly. He scoots through the living room and up the stairs to Jack’s bedroom. Leaning the shotgun against the hall wall, he goes inside, pulls the flashlight from the boy’s hand.

  Jack looks up at his father from his bed, round face painted not with surprise but with a pout.

  “What’s wrong, dad?”

  Jude sets himself down on the edge of the boy’s bed.

  “Listen little man, there’s no telling how long this blackout is going to last.” Holding up the flashlight as if to make a point. “That means we have to conserve all the battery power we can. Get it?”

  Jack nods in understanding. He says, “Rosie said it was okay if I use a candle. But she wasn’t sure what you would say about it. So she thought the flashlight would be better.”

  Jude inhales and exhales, waits for the calmness to enter into his bloodstream. He takes a quick glance around the log-walled room—at the dinosaur and Sponge Bob Squarepants posters, at the television and the attached PlayStation PS3 video game system. Eyes back on his boy, he shrugs his shoulders, purses his lips. Although he says not a word about it, he can’t get it out of his mind that the dark monster is out there . . .

  No choice now but to allow Jack a “night light” candle.

  Flicking off the flashlight, he starts back down both sets of stairs, heads into the garage, grabs a white candle from the box. Back upstairs, he lights it, sets it far enough away from the boy on the nightstand beside the bed.

  “Now, listen up,” he warns. “That’s an open flame. And if you happen to knock it over, it can start a bad fire.” The boy turns his head towards the burning candle, eyes it respectfully. “So the word for tonight is ‘Careful’ with a capital ‘C.’ Okay?”

  Jack’s face beams with a confident Daddy trusts me expression.

  “I’ll be back up to check on you,” Jude says before closing the door behind him.

  Outside in the hall he listens for the tell-tale electronic beeps and squirts that come from the Game Boy. Upon hearing them, he’s thankful for the electronic distraction. He knows that video games require batteries too (or chargers anyway), but the last thing he wants to do is take away the boy’s fun…his distraction. For his first time as a father, Jude is grateful for the invention of the video game.

  Assembly Point Peninsula

  Thursday, 9:00 P.M.

  The double-barrel Savage once more clutched in his hands, Jude rejoins his wife on the screened-in patio.

  “And how have we defused the flashlight crisis,” she asks.

  “Candle,” Jude answers.

  Thunder emerges from out of the east.

  Rosie crosses her arms, holds them tightly against her chest, inches above her pregnant belly. She breathes in the night air, stares out the screen into the dark night. Jude is reminded of the morning they first met. He was sitting inside a café web on Prince Street, downtown Manhattan, a rough copy of Cop Job set out on his lap. Rosie walked in like a heaven-sent apparition, dressed only in farmer’s overalls, sandals, long dark brown hair pulled back and braided, skin tan and rich. She bought a coffee, sat down at the only seat available which was right beside him on the couch. When she offered up a near silent, ‘Hello,” he was able to get his first rea
l good look into her dark eyes. It was his first look, but then he’s never looked back . . .

  Now, four years later, her manner seems on the surface anyway, just as calm and collected as when he first met her. But as in the beginning, in the present, he has no trouble reading her candle-lit eyes. Only now instead of curiosity the eyes are filled with concern. Not over some imagined danger brought on by the blackout. But real concern over himself. It makes him wonder if he is in fact conducting himself in a level-headed manner. Or has the demon reduced him to a few cards short of a full deck?

  What he has to ask himself is this: Am I making the right decisions for my family?

  Jude stares out the screen toward the deep, dark woods.

  He wonders what’s out there.

  He can only pray that nothing is out there.

  After a time he says, “I’ll be honest. Before this blackout hit, I had planned for you both to leave the house tonight. Maybe put up at a hotel.”

  Clearing her throat, Rosie peers down at the tops of her sandaled feet.

  Raising her head back up, she says, “When were you going to let me in on this plan?”

  “After dinner. I was going to get Mack or Ray to look after you.”

  “What were planning on doing with yourself?”

  “Maybe head out to the village precinct. Sleep in Mack’s office on the couch.”

  “And you were going to do this in case Lennox slipped his surveillance bracelet?”

  “Maybe,” Jude says. “Or maybe I was planning on staying at the precinct just to make sure that come morning, I didn’t get icy feet and decide to back out.”

  She nods.

  “Not easy going back on your word in the presence of all those cops.”

  “That was kind of the idea.”

  Rosie stares through the screen at the woods.

  “We could still go to a hotel,” she whispers. “If it’ll make you feel better. We could take the boat across the lake. Jack and I could get a hotel and you could stay at the precinct with Mack.”