Paradox Lake Page 20

  “Dear Jesus,” I say aloud, the rainwater and the tears dripping into my mouth, “protect me on this night of nights. Protect Anna. Protect my only little girl.”

  I get back up on my feet and climb over the big tree, then resume my jog through the thick forest. The round beam of flashlight aimed directly ahead, I make out the secluded beach on my right-hand side. It’s barely visible in the darkness. Moving on, I’m determined to get to the house in the woods as fast as possible. If I remember correctly, it should only take me maybe fifteen or twenty minutes to get there. That is, if I can keep up my pace. I have no choice but to keep up the pace. Every second counts.

  But what if Anna is already dead? What if she’s already dead and now they’re waiting to spring a trap on me when I arrive at the house?

  “Oh God, don’t let that happen. Promise me you won’t let that happen.”

  Don’t think like that, Rose. Just use all your strength to get to Anna. She’s alive. I can feel it.

  I agree with Dad, Rosie. Anna is still alive. But she’s hurting and she needs you. She’s calling out for you right now, Rosie. Do not give up. You and Anna are survivors. Don’t forget that.

  “I am,” I say through my short, labored breaths. “I swear to God I am. Give me strength, Charlie and Allison. I know you are with me. Send me the strength I need to save our Anna.”

  I see my family in my head and I feel their presence like I feel the rain on my face. They are that real. They are that alive. That’s when something shoots out of the dark forest and tackles me so hard in the belly, the breath is knocked right out of me. My face buried in the mud, I turn quick onto my back, and try like hell to fill my stinging lungs with precious air. What the hell locomotive just ran me over? My knife and flashlight have dropped out of my hands. But I’m able to reach out for the flashlight. When I aim the beam up at whatever hit me, I see a raging bloody man who’s missing his left eye.

  CHAPTER 46

  “SAAAARRRRRRAAAHHHHH!” screams the Wolf as he digs his claws into Anna’s red-robed back. “Saaaarrrrraaahhhhh!!!”

  He wonders where Tim is. What is taking him so long? Anna’s mother should be dead by now. He should be here, down in this basement, watching him feeding.

  I can’t wait much longer …

  Anna screams, “Mama! Mama! Please save me!”

  Tears stream down her pale face. She’s never before felt this kind of pain. The Wolf props himself up onto his hind legs and removes his claws from her back.

  “Now,” he says, “I want you to say, ‘What big teeth you have.’”

  “No,” Anna begs. “Don’t make me. Don’t make me say that.”

  “But that’s how we play this game, Little Red Riding Hood. You have to say what I tell you to say.”

  “Mama! Please, Mama!”

  She’s weeping, crying the tears of a young girl who is now entirely convinced she’s about to die.

  “Say it, Little Red Riding Hood,” the Wolf demands. “Say the words.”

  In her mind, she gives up. Duct-taped to that chair, half naked and covered in sweat and filth, with only an open red robe for clothing, she has no choice but to say the words and pray her death will be quick.

  “What … big teeth … you have.”

  “The better to chomp away at your sweet flesh,” says the Big Bad Wolf.

  Aiming for her neck, the rabid animal opens its jaws wide.

  CHAPTER 47

  SLAPPING THE FLASHLIGHT from my hand, Tim grabs hold of me by my right arm, while I search desperately for the knife with my left hand. He drags my exhausted body over the newly felled tree and over the rain-soaked trail, in the opposite direction of the house in the forest.

  “You thought I was dead, didn’t you, Rose?” he says. “And after the nice date we had together. After everything I’ve done for you and sweet, luscious little Anna, this is the thanks I get.”

  He’s yanking on my arm so hard, I fear it will dislocate. The pain is electric, and it shoots from my arm socket to my brain and back again. I still can’t breathe. If only I could get enough air, I might get myself back up on my feet and run away from this madman. But I’m powerless.

  We come to another, smaller path. He turns onto it, pulling me along, dragging me over roots and rocks. The sky lights up in brilliant white electric light, the thunder booms, and the rain soaks me to the bone. He drags me onto the patch of beach and releases me.

  “This is where it happened,” he says, not without a smile on his bloody face. “This is where I watched the Big Bad Wolf devour our precious Sarah. It was quite a thing to behold, let me tell you, Rose. Now Sarah has come back. Now you, her mother, have come back to us. And now, we will send you both back to heaven so that you can return to us once more.”

  He bends down, picks something up. It’s a rock. He’s gripping the rock in his hand and he’s approaching me with it. He’s going to beat my brains in. It’s the only logical explanation. I’m inhaling, my diaphragm finally allowing me to take a deep breath. I see his smiling, one-eyed face approaching me with the rock. When he reaches me, he drops to his knees and raises the rock high.

  “Don’t you see, Rose?” he says. “I’m going to kill you so that you will live forever. That’s how the game is played. It’s the perfect paradox.”

  “You are one sick fuck, you know that, Tim?”

  His smile turns upside down.

  “Sarah and her mother never used language like that,” he says. “Now hold still and play right.”

  He’s just about to smash my brains in with the rock, when I shove the knife into his crotch.

  They say that sound travels fast over water. If that’s indeed the case, then Tim Ferguson’s agonized screams can be heard for miles and miles. I pull the knife out and dark, nearly black arterial blood spurts out. I’ve obviously hit an artery. He drops the rock and tries to stand, but he can’t. He’s in so much pain he’s kneeling there stone-stiff. I raise myself onto my knees, and I feel the rage erupt in my stomach like the flames in a blast furnace. Using all my strength, I stab him in the face over and over again, until he is almost unrecognizable, his face turning into so much raw hamburger.

  “Please … stop,” he says, his words slurred and nearly incomprehensible. He’s openly weeping now, like a child. “Please, for the love of God, stop hurting me.”

  I see the knife in my hand, the blade covered in blood, along with my entire hand. There’s no way he’s living through this. Standing, I clean the blade with the back of his rain-soaked shirt and then I wipe my hand. As I start making my way toward the path, he remains on his knees where he will no doubt die in a matter of minutes or even seconds. And I can honestly care less about it.

  “Thanks for dinner,” I say, before scooting back into the woods.

  I no longer jog the trail.

  I sprint.

  There’s so much adrenaline and rage flowing through my veins, I feel like I can sprint an entire marathon and still have energy enough to run a second one. The knife gripped in my hand, I soon come upon a white light along the trail bed. It’s the flashlight I lost when Tim abducted me. I stop briefly to pick it up, and then I’m off again, the round circular beam of light illuminating my way.

  Lightning strikes all around me and more trees are hit. One by one, they split and collapse to the forest floor. It’s a like a war zone, but I’m no longer afraid. All fear has left my body while I focus on one single thing: saving my daughter from a second madman. When I start to smell smoke coming from a nearby wood fire, I know for certain I’ve come to the area where Ed’s house is located. That’s when I head off trail and into the thick woods. I plow through the brush like I’m a bull. Thorns stab at my face and arms, but I don’t slow down for anything. When I come to the opening where the house is located, I stop at the tree line and take a minute to get my bearings.

  The dog is still chained to the post, despite the heavy rain. It’s a sad sight to see. The skins are still hung up on the rack. There’s a lig
ht on inside the house, and for sure, a fire is going in the fireplace. I see no sign of Ed, but his beat-up pickup truck is parked in the two-track alongside the house. I know he’s in there … in there with Anna.

  My stomach cramps. It’s like I’ve just been punched in the stomach. My body turns cold, like the rain that’s falling on me is ice water. My God, what had been a rage-inspired determination is now turning into cold, crippling fear. It’s a fear I need to overcome if I’m going to save my daughter.

  Saaaaaarrrrrrrrrrr, cries the lonely loon.

  But then, why does the noise sound like it’s coming from the house and not the lake?

  Sarrrrrraaaaaaahhhhh …

  Saaaaarrraaahhhh, I recite in my head.

  “Sarah,” I whisper.

  That’s not a loon’s cry at all. It’s Ed and he’s crying for Sarah. Tim lied to me about the loon. He knew exactly who was making that sound the whole time. He must have known that Ed was making the noise. Ed was taunting us during the night. He was watching us, stalking us. He’s convinced that Sarah has returned, so he would come to the house every night and wail her name, like a wild animal. That wasn’t a deer emerging from out of the Paradox Lake trailhead. It was Ed.

  Creepy Ed … Theodore.

  Now it’s time to end this thing with Creepy Ed before he does something horrible to Anna. Something that resembles precisely what he did to Sarah Anne Moore way back in 1986.

  CHAPTER 48

  THE WOLF DOESN’T bury his fangs into Little Red Riding Hood’s neck entirely. Not yet. He just wanted to get a taste of her. He’s simply seeking an appetizer before he digs into his main course. He’s hurt her, that much is for sure, and her tears are the proof. So are the little spots of red blood oozing out of the bite marks. She’s also shivering, like she’s cold. But he knows it’s just a reaction to all the fear coursing through her veins. The shock.

  He recalls that day when his first Little Red Riding Hood began to tremble with fear and shock. She had to know he was about to eat her up. Once more, he’s acting just like a real wolf. The wolf doesn’t kill right away. The wolf waits patiently. It baits its prey, teases it, stalks it. Until the prey is so exhausted and full of fear, it lies down and accepts its own death as inevitable.

  The Big Bad Wolf enjoys the tasting and the teasing. Only now, he’s about to do something else to his young prey. The same thing he did to Sarah before he feasted on her raw flesh. Before he ate her pretty face off her skull.

  Coming around her, he kneels down and tears off her panties.

  She screams. That’s a good thing because the scream makes him all the more excited, all the more hard. He unbuckles his overalls, pulls them down, exposing his thick, crooked member. He knows he should be waiting for Tim to show up with Rose. But Tim is far too late, and he can’t possibly wait any longer. Besides, maybe Tim is dead. Maybe Rose got lucky and killed him before he was able to kill her. The Wolf can’t help but giggle at the idea of Tim dying at the hands of Little Red Riding Hood’s mother.

  “Now I want you to say, ‘What a big cock you have.’”

  “Please, mister,” Sarah cries. “Please just let me go. Please.”

  “Play right, Little Red Riding Hood,” he insists. “Say it, or I will eat your mother alive. I will cut her head off, skin her, and hang her hide up to dry.”

  Her tears flowing into her mouth, she whispers, “What … a big … cock you have.”

  “Louder!!!” he shouts.

  “What a big cock you have!” she screams through her tears.

  “The better to love you with,” he says. Then, with a smile on his hairy face, “I love you, Little Red Riding Hood.”

  He’s about to devour the face of his prey when, directly overhead, something heavy slams onto the kitchen floor.

  CHAPTER 49

  I ENTER THE house the easy way. Through the already open front door. The rain-soaked dog never once barked at me or paid attention to my presence, as though its prolonged exposure to the elements has sucked the life right out of it. I step inside the old house to a wall of stink that nearly makes me vomit a second time. I shine my flashlight at the bare walls. To my right is the fireplace with the fire dying inside it. Boxes of garbage and junk fill the floor spaces. The couch is so old, springs stick out of it. Beer bottles, pizza boxes, and plastic Ferguson General Store bags cover the coffee table. The wall behind the couch looks like it’s covered in blood spatter.

  To my left is the kitchen. To say the place smells like something died is putting it mildly. It smells entirely of death and rot. The counter is covered in chunks of raw meat, with flies buzzing all around it. What looks to be the torso of a deer is sitting in a slop sink in a bath of its own dark blood. My gag reflex kicks in. I’m trying my best to hold back the vomit. I can’t get out of there fast enough. Turning quick, my arm knocks into a pot that’s been set on the stove. It crashes to the wood floor, a bundle of pale human skin spilling onto the floor. The skin still has a face attached to it.

  Just like I thought … Father O’Connor …

  That’s when I lose it entirely. Whatever is left inside me comes up and I puke all over the floor. Wiping my mouth with the back of my hand, I decide to breathe through my nose. It’s the only answer. On my right is a wood door. In my gut, I know the door leads down into a basement. If my gut also serves me right, it’s where I’ll find my daughter and the psychotic murderer who’s holding her captive.

  Ed, or should I call him Theodore, or should I call him Satan?

  Opening the door, I take a step down inside the dimly lit space. My body is shaking, my brain buzzing, the blood rapidly flowing through my veins and arteries.

  “Anna,” I say, like a question.

  My mouth is so dry, I can barely speak her name. I still have the knife in one hand and the flashlight in the other, not that I need it any longer. But it feels good to have it since I might have to use it as a weapon. Take another step down, and another, then another. Coming to the dirt floor landing, I turn completely around.

  That’s when I see her.

  Anna.

  She’s strapped to a chair and she’s naked, other than a red robe that’s been wrapped around her shoulders.

  “Oh my God,” I whisper.

  Then I hear, “Are you Little Red Riding Hood’s mama?”

  I never feel the blow to the head.

  When I come to, I’m on my back. He’s on me, straddling me. He’s torn my shirt off, and now he’s trying to get at my bra. Only he can’t because he’s having trouble reaching around my back. Why he just doesn’t rip it off of me I’ll never know.

  “Don’t let him touch you, Mama!” Anna screams.

  I’m not sure how long I was out, but it can’t have been for very long. Creepy Ed is naked from the waist down, his grotesque sex staring me in the face. He has no idea that I still have a knife in my hand. Tim was right, after all. He is simple. A stupid, simple monster of a man. The knife gripped in my right hand, I thrust it into the wolf tattoo on his neck.

  I pull out the blade, and he sits back onto the dirt floor. He gazes at me with wide, shocked eyes, like he can’t believe I’m actually fighting back. He doesn’t seem to be in the least bit of pain, while a thick stream of blood spurts out of his upper neck, like water from a suddenly punctured garden hose. Gathering up all my strength from whatever energy reserves I have leftover, I go to Anna and begin to cut her free.

  Ed picks himself up off the floor, pulls up his overalls and buckles them. I manage to free one of Anna’s wrists, then start on the other.

  “Hurry, Mama,” she pleads, “before he comes after us again.”

  Ed drops onto all fours.

  “Sarrrrrraaaaahhhhhh!!!!” he wails in a voice that is most definitely not human.

  He exposes teeth that look like long, sharp fangs. He’s drooling a combination spit and blood. His eyes have gone wide and dark, and he’s chomping down on his jaw. His fingernails are long and curved like claws. If I didn’t know any
better, I’d say he was transforming into the Big Bad Wolf right before our eyes. But I know better. He is just a man. A sick, mad man.

  I manage to free Anna’s second wrist. She stands. Pulling off my belt, I tell her to wrap it around her red-robed waist. She does exactly what I say. Then I tell her to step back.

  “Step back against the wall,” I insist, the knife poised out before me, at the ready.

  “You can’t fight him, Mama,” Anna screams. “He’s too strong.”

  “He might kill me, honey,” I say. “But he’s not getting near you ever again.”

  Ed growls. I see the thick muscles in his neck, arms, and shoulders flexing, like he’s preparing himself for attacking me, just like a real wolf.

  “What big teeth I have,” he says, the blood flowing down his face. “I’m going to dig them into your neck.”

  His eyes wide, his mouth frothing, the wild animal lunges at me.

  CHAPTER 50

  IT’S LIKE I’VE been hit head-on by a Mack truck. I’m thrown onto my back, but not without burying the knife into his left shoulder. He’s just about to pounce on me when something extraordinary happens. Something entirely miraculous. A man bounds down the basement steps, turns the corner, and jumps onto Ed’s back. He pounds Ed in the face with his clenched fist, repeatedly. At first, I’m so dazed from the tackle Ed laid on me that I don’t recognize the man. But when I’m finally able to focus, I make out the worn bush jacket, the blue jeans, and the cowboy boots. I see the round scruffy face and the receding hair.

  “Jesus, Tony!” I yell.

  “Tony!” Anna screams. “You go! Kill the monster!”

  Ed shakes Tony off. But the knife is still buried in his shoulder and his neck is still leaking thick, dark blood.

  “Nobody touches my girls!” Tony barks.

  Ed reaches for the knife, and slowly pulls it out. It is a sickening sight to behold.