Twisted Tales Read online

  Rather than mull over the situation, I immersed myself in the movie. It was a gory show about a pack of werewolves tearing through a quiet Illinois town. The acting was terrible, the dialogue was stilted, and the plotting was choppy, but it nonetheless got a huge response from the audience, especially Stacy. Every time a werewolf ripped out someone’s throat, she whooped, and she sighed with something approaching ecstasy at every drop of spilled blood. I got the weird feeling that she rooted for the werewolves to prevail over the humans.

  But I didn’t complain. We explored each other’s bodies quite a bit during the show. At several points, we became so entangled that I wasn’t sure whose limbs were whose. We might never have done any of that if she hadn’t been so engaged by the film. Not only was I curious to see if this new level of intimacy would loosen her tongue on family matters, I also, I admit, looked forward to becoming better acquainted with her body.

  As the closing credits rolled down the screen, the theater lights brightened. Hands entwined, we stood. I led the way to the crowded aisle ... and then I glimpsed a familiar shape in the corner of my eye. I spun.

  It was Mr. Payne. He stood two rows behind us. He glared hatefully at me. I realized, with despair, that he had witnessed every kiss, every forbidden touch that I had shared with his precious daughter.

  Mr. Payne pointed a long finger at me. “You!”

  I shrank back. People around us looked, curious and alarmed.

  Stacy gripped my hand. “Daddy, you shouldn’t have followed us!”

  “I’m only looking out for your best interests, sweetheart,” he said. His eyes burned into me. “I should kill you.”

  “Will you relax?” I said. “We just watched a movie!”

  “Bullshit. I saw you. You were all over her!”

  The crowd snickered. Humiliation flushed my face. I hated that he had chosen this place to cause a scene.

  Mr. Payne charged toward us. The crowd fled out of his path like antelope fleeing a lion. Indecision, disbelief, and fear had rooted me in place. I stood there holding Stacy’s hand, while fury seethed in her father’s eyes. His hands clenched and unclenched, as if in eagerness to crack my neck.

  Spurred to move, I pulled Stacy backward. As though she weighed no more than a Barbie doll, Mr. Payne grabbed Stacy by the arm and yanked her toward him. She cried out, her hand slipping out of mine. Using one huge arm to cradle his daughter against him, he thrust his other arm toward me.

  “Stay away from my little girl!” He shoved me. I flew backward, tripped on something, and hit the floor.

  I lay sprawled in the aisle, gazing at the ceiling.

  Clearly, agreeing to this assignment had been a mistake. Mr. Payne was too volatile for me to get close enough to him to learn the truth. The safe, slow-moving course of action sanctioned by my superiors was not going to work. If I was to succeed in my mission, I’d have to break protocol.

  I was more certain than ever that Mr. Payne was a killer. With his tendency toward violence and his fiery temper, I could believe that he had slaughtered several men, as the rumors indicated. All in the service of protecting his lovely daughter.

  By the time I got out of the theater, Mr. Payne was screeching out of the parking lot in a black jeep. Stacy was mashed against the rear windshield, crying out my name.

  I raced to my car. I was about to jam the key in the ignition, when I noticed the front of my shirt, in the area of my chest where Mr. Payne had pushed.

  A couple of buttons had been torn off. Dark blood—my blood—stained the cotton. The blood had clotted and the small wound didn’t hurt. In fact, I hadn’t noticed the injury until now, maybe due to my dazed shock. But I thought of Mr. Payne’s long, sharp nails. Nails like claws.

  Mr. Payne had left me no choice. I opened the glove compartment.

  Inside, a revolver awaited me.

  It was already loaded. With silver bullets.

  When I arrived at Stacy’s house, she answered the door. She ushered me inside.

  “I’m so glad you came,” she said. “I’m sorry about what happened.”

  “Your father went nuts,” I said. “Is he here?”

  “He’s out running.”

  “Running? At this hour?”

  “He does it all the time,” she said. “I usually go with him, especially when there’s a beautiful full moon, like there is tonight. But I was mad at him for what he did to you, so I stayed in.”

  “When will he be back?”

  “Later.” She smiled seductively. “Relax, Nathan. We have plenty of time to pick up where we left off.”

  She led me to the sofa. She sat on my lap, put her arms around my neck, and leaned toward me. I put my finger on her lips.

  “Not now,” I said. “We have to talk.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  I was going to put everything on the table. “Do you remember Daryl Williams?”

  She suddenly drew back. Anxiety lit up her eyes.

  “Who is he?” she asked, her quavering voice betraying the fact that she knew who I was talking about.

  “You dated him three months ago,” I said. “You went out with him a few times, until your father apparently decided that he didn’t like him. Someone discovered Daryl’s body in a forest. His corpse had been mauled, like a pack of wolves had attacked him.”

  I drew the crime-scene photograph out of my jacket pocket and held it in front of her face. She gasped. She climbed off my lap, her hand covering her mouth.

  “Nathan,” she said. “I’m sorry. I ... I don’t know what to say.”

  I whipped out another grisly photo.

  “How about David Taylor, a guy you dated last year? Remember him? Yeah, this rotted corpse with its neck chewed in half doesn’t resemble him at all, but I think you know who I’m talking about. Your father hated him, too.”

  Tears shimmered in her large eyes. She hugged herself.

  “Where did you get those pictures from?” she asked shakily.

  “Doesn’t matter.” I didn’t enjoy forcing her face into this dirt, but it was necessary to stop these games. “We know what’s been going on.”

  “I’m so sorry.” Tears rolled down her cheeks. “Daddy can’t control himself. He gets crazy when he doesn’t like the guys that I date—”

  “Don’t make excuses for him. Your dad is a blood-crazed killer. He’s only using his desire to protect you as an excuse to indulge in these wild killings. He has to be stopped.”

  “What do you mean, stopped? Are you a cop?”

  “I am a cop, but not the kind of cop that you might think.”

  “What do you—”

  A howl pierced the night, silencing her. I did not know exactly where the howl had come from, but I knew what it had come from—and I knew it was not far away.

  I gripped Stacy’s shoulder. “If you like me as much as I like you, you’ll tell me everything. No more secrets, Stacy.”

  Her eyes were wary. “But he’s coming, Nathan. Do you have any idea what he’ll do if he finds you here?”

  “I’ll take the risk. I have to know the whole story.”

  She slumped on the couch. Stared at her lap.

  I pulled over a chair, sat in front of her.

  “I’m waiting,” I said. I was trying like hell to convince her that I wasn’t afraid.

  She said, “Eight years ago, on a family vacation in Arizona, my mother was killed.”

  She paused and looked at me, as though checking to see whether I believed her. I said nothing, only nodded.

  She continued. “My dad and I found her body. It was torn to pieces. Before we could even think about what to do, my father and I were attacked, too. But we weren’t killed. We were bitten and turned into ... Well, you know what we became, don’t you, Nathan?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “What happened to my mom scarred both me and my father pretty deeply, but my father’s pain is more obvious. He became obsessed with protecting me, with making sure that I never ended up like
my mom. Pretty foolish for him to worry about that, considering the abilities I have, but in his mind I’m just Daddy’s little girl, like I’ve always been.”

  “Go on,” I said.

  “He’s as obsessed with protecting me as he is with making sure that I hook up with the right guy. I mean, the right guy, whoever he turns out to be, will have to become one of us. He’ll have to become part of the family, in every way. That’s why he’s been giving you so much hell, Nathan. He doesn’t think you’re right for me, and he’s trying to scare you off.”

  “Without resorting to killing me, I presume,” I said.

  She winced. “Daryl and David were sweet guys,” she said. “But they were much more aggressive than you are. Daddy didn’t like that at all. He tried to make them leave me alone, but the harder he tried, the pushier they became. Daddy had finally had enough. So he ...”

  “Slaughtered them,” I said. “There are others, Stacy. I don’t have photos, but I know that Mr. Payne has been busy ‘protecting’ you for at least the past five years. Over a dozen innocent guys have paid the price for being interested in you.”

  “He’s not a killer, Nathan. Please don’t make him sound like he’s evil.”

  I touched her face. I felt bad for her. She was immersed in denial.

  Another howl shattered the night. It was getting closer.

  I glanced at the windows, at the shadows surrounding us. He would be there soon.

  Stacy straightened. “How did you learn so much about us?”

  “Word gets around,” I said. “When someone has been as reckless as your dad has been, others notice. I pursued a relationship with you because I was asked to learn the full story.”

  “You mean you dated me only to learn about my father?” she asked. “You used me?”

  “Hold on, don’t get mad. Yes, I first wanted to date you to find out about Mr. Payne. But when it became obvious that we clicked so well, I started to fall for you.”

  She smiled a little. I could not return her smile. I was conscious of the howls. They were getting much closer.

  “So who sent you to me?” she asked. “What kind of police do you work for?”

  Just as I opened my mouth to tell her an angry roar filled the air. A huge, dark shape hurtled like a torpedo through the living room window, shattered glass flying everywhere.

  The intruder landed in the far corner of the room, an area thick with shadows. I glimpsed a hairy, hunched form, like a big man on all fours, and I heard husky breathing issuing from the beast.

  Stacy grabbed my hand. “Come on. If you want to live, we’ve gotta get to my room!”

  We ran to the staircase. Behind us, the creature growled. I looked over my shoulder.

  The animal had moved out of the shadows. In spite of the glossy coat of gray fur, the long snout, and the sharp, canine teeth, I recognized who it was. The eyes gave it away.

  Mr. Payne—the werewolf.

  “Hurry!” Stacy pulled me upstairs. We scrambled into her bedroom, and then she slammed and locked the door.

  “Do you want to be with me?” she asked. Her eyes blazed.

  “Be with you?”

  She grasped my shoulders. “Do you want to be with me? Forever?”

  I stammered. “Stacy, I have to do something.”

  “What?”

  I opened my jacket, revealing the gun holstered on my hip. I pulled the revolver out of its sheath.

  Stacy retreated a few steps. “Please, put away that gun, Nathan.”

  “Sorry, but I’m only following orders.” I grabbed the doorknob and flung open the door.

  “No!” she cried.

  Ignoring her, I moved to the staircase. Mr. Payne, the werewolf, bounded up the steps. The beast leaped over three and four risers at a time. It snarled, saliva flying in thick ropes, eyes aflame with inhuman rage and hunger.

  My hands trembled. He was so enormous. If I missed, I was finished.

  The werewolf sprang toward me.

  I squeezed off one, two, three shots, the revolver booming like a cannon. One misfired round plowed through the railing; one smacked into the creature’s chest; and the third drilled it between the eyes.

  The beast shrieked. Leaking blood like a busted water hose, the werewolf rolled down the stairs. It crashed to the floor with an impact that reverberated through the house.

  Then, silence. The creature lay on the floor unmoving. Dead.

  I closed my eyes.

  I hadn’t handled my assignment in the neat, thoroughly documented manner that my superiors would have preferred, but they would accept my work. They would have to accept it. I was one of the few detectives in the world qualified to handle this kind of case. The scarcity of individuals in my position provided job security.

  “You killed him,” a guttural voice said from behind me.

  It was Stacy. She was crouched in the doorway. She had begun to metamorphose, too: pretty nose lengthening into a canine snout, claws pushing through the tips of her slender fingers, coarse hair covering her creamy skin ...

  “I had to kill him,” I said. “Unchecked beasts like him make it more difficult for all of us. He was violating the code.”

  I thought I saw confusion on her rapidly transforming face.

  I wanted to explain, so I said, “Our power lies in our secrecy. Your father was killing at will, and that isn’t allowed. Kills have to be carefully planned and concealed, or else the safety of our entire species is threatened.”

  She dropped to the floor on all fours. She raised her long neck, stretched her jaws wide. Her thick tongue swept across her rows of sharp teeth.

  She howled.

  “I’m responsible for enforcing the laws for us,” I said. I looked at the revolver in my hand. “According to the law, I’m supposed to slay you, too. I’m not allowed to leave witnesses.”

  I studied Stacy’s werewolf form. She regarded me with her dark eyes, panting softly, expectantly.

  She was gorgeous.

  I tossed aside the gun.

  “But you know what? To hell with protocol. There’s a full moon tonight. And I don’t know about you, but that tiny steak I ate earlier left me hungrier than ever ...”

  The Sting

  There were only two things in the world that really frightened Anthony Morris: snakes, and winged insects with stingers, like wasps.

  When Anthony reached the outside entrance to their hotel room, he spotted a wasp as long as his index finger batting against the top of the door. With each soft bump against the wood, the insect emitted a loud buzz, as if grunting from its efforts to get inside.

  Anthony’s first impulse was to spin around, race across the walkway, plunge down the stairs, and wait in the car until the wasp flew away. His wife, as slow as ever, was still in their Mercedes, fiddling around with her camera, purse, and who knows what else. They had spent all day under the merciless Mississippi sun at a family reunion picnic; he could use the excuse that he wanted to find an ice-cream shop, to get a cool respite from the heat, and she would never know the true reason why he’d returned to the car. Although they had been married for three years and had known each other for five, Anthony had managed to conceal his embarrassing phobia. Letting Karen discover how deeply he feared wasps would be as bad as getting stung.

  Well, not quite as bad. As a child, he had been stung several times by wasps, yellow jackets, hornets, bumblebees—all of them had gotten him at least once. Nothing else matched the agony. He believed that his admittedly paranoid fear of the insects intensified the pain of being stung. The last time a hornet had attacked him, he had nearly passed out.

  In the parking lot below, a door thunked shut. Karen was on her way.

  Wings fluttering, the insect had attached itself to the door. Anthony could not believe the sheer size of the wasp. Maybe insects were bigger in Mississippi, because the thing was huge. Its stinger—he thought he could actually see it—seemed to glimmer in the twilight, like the tip of a deadly needle.

  Fro
m his readings about wasps, he knew that once they plunged their stinger into you, they would still survive. Unlike bumblebees, which left their stingers in your skin and soon died, a wasp retained its weapon, and could return to punish you again. And again, and again.

  He shivered.

  Okay, be a man about this, he told himself. I’m thirty years old, a successful lawyer, admired, respected, envied. It’s only a stupid bug. Kill it.

  Keeping his eye on the quivering wasp, he slipped off one of his Nikes. In a furious burst of energy, he hammered the shoe against the door.

  Got it! The wasp crunched underneath the shoe sole and drifted harmlessly to the pavement.

  And the verdict is: life in bug hell.

  “See ya, sucker,” he said, and chuckled. He kicked aside the insect’s carcass.

  As he put on his other shoe, his wife climbed the last step of the landing. With what he hoped was a nonchalant motion, he slid his room key into the narrow slot, unlocking the door.

  “It’s hot as hell in here,” he blurted. “And I turned on the air conditioner before we left for the picnic. What a shitty room. I told you we should’ve stayed at the Hyatt.”

  Karen trudged toward him, her normally cheerful face lined with fatigue, and browned from a full day in the sun. Her oversized purple T-shirt, which read MORRIS FAMILY REUNION 2006 in white letters, was rumpled and probably damp with perspiration. She had pulled back her hair into a bun; several strands stood up like unruly weeds.

  Anthony hated to see his wife looking worn-out like this. All she’d want to do is take a shower and flop across the bed. No loving for him tonight.

  “One more night in here won’t kill us,” Karen said as she walked inside. “I only need a shower. When I hit the mattress, I’m going to pass out. Put an ice bag on your head if you need to.”

  “Very funny,” he said. “I’m going to suffer heat exhaustion in here.”

  “Serves you right. After what you pulled at the picnic today, you aren’t getting any sympathy from me.”

  At the picnic, Anthony had been appointed gatekeeper, responsible for checking in relatives and family friends and giving them name tags. It was a humiliating, tiresome task. He was an attorney, for God’s sake, not some shiftless high school dropout—like some of his cousins. He hadn’t driven seven hours from Atlanta so he could sweat in the heat and be a receptionist. He had agreed to do it only because Ma Dear had asked him herself, and with her being ninety-two years old and this possibly being her last reunion, well, he felt obligated to comply with her wishes.