Bedbugs (16 page)

“Damn you, Billy! Where the hell are you?” she muttered, stamping her foot angrily on the ground.

 
“Huh? What’s the matter?”

Coming so suddenly out of the darkness, his voice sounded less than an inch from her ear. Stifling a scream, Sarah wheeled around just as Billy walked toward her from around the side of the house.

“You scared the crap out of me!” Sarah said, her voice ragged from her repressed shout.

“Keep it down,” Billy whispered, signaling her with a wave of his hand and then pointing upward. “My parents’ bedroom window is right there.”

Without another word, Billy turned and started walking across the backyard, keeping to the shadows of the trees cast by the thin moonlight. Within seconds he was lost from sight; but before following him, Sarah had to stand there a while longer, waiting for her heart to stop racing.

“You coming or not?” Billy whispered from the shadows. She could hear him but not see him.

For an instant, Sarah considered saying,
No, I’m not coming! This whole thing is ridiculous!

Any way she looked at it, she was foolish to be following Billy to the Laymon house—or
anywhere
—at night. If the killer really was there, then they would both be in serious trouble. If he wasn’t there . . . well, just to deny Billy the satisfaction of scaring her, she was determined to steel her nerves against the inevitable surprise he probably had planned for her. Knowing Billy and his practical jokes, he probably had one heck of a surprise planned for her. Finally deciding that she had come too far now to turn back, she took off in the direction Billy had taken across the yard and through the stand of trees that skirted the dirt road leading up to the Laymon house.

In the dark, she tripped and stumbled in Billy’s wake as they felt more than they saw their way through the woods.

Wind rustled the leaves overhead, the sound—as much as Sarah tried to resist the idea—reminding her of dry, hard bones clicking together.

“Did you see the light out there again tonight?” she asked at one point when he stooped to let her catch up with him.

In the dark, she saw him nod. “Yeah, just before I snuck out of the house I saw it blink on and off a couple of times.

Sorta like he was signaling someone or something.” He peered through the darkness to where he could see the looming black bulk of the house through the night-dark puffs of foliage. The abandoned house was no more than a dark smudge against the black stain of the night.

“You’re just trying to scare me, that’s all,” Sarah said, angry at herself for letting her teeth chatter as she said it.

“We’ll see. We’ll see,” Billy replied. “Come on. I figure we can swing around and come up on the back of the house. That’ll probably be the safest, and we can avoid the swampy ground.”

They fought their way through a thicket of briars that bordered the swamp. Both of them got their feet wet, and their sneakers made soft, sucking sounds as they left the cover of the trees and crept, shoulder to shoulder, up the grass-choked slope behind the Laymon house.

Sarah’s heartbeat sounded all the louder in her ears and she couldn’t repress a shiver as they crouched at the crest of the hill and stared at the deserted house. She had never been this close to it, looming up against the night sky. The peaked roof glinted like metal in the moonlight, and the blank, glassless windows gaped like yawning mouths. Everything about the house was silent, dark, and dead. Her conviction that Billy was setting her up grew all the stronger.

“I figure we can try the cellar window nearest us,” Billy whispered as he pointed toward the foundation steeped in shadow. “I think it was that one where I saw the light.”

“Don’t you know?”

Billy grunted. “It’s hard to tell. All we gotta do is check.”

“I don’t think I want to go any closer,” Sarah whispered. It surprised her that, although she usually didn’t even like Billy, she found a strong measure of reassurance just being close to him. “There’s noth—”

Before she could finish, as if on cue, a light came on, illuminating the cellar window from the inside. A distorted rectangle of sickly yellow light spilled out onto the ground, showing in sharp detail the tangle of grass and weeds that grew there. The window was skimmed too thickly with dirt for either Billy or Sarah to see inside clearly.

“We’ve
got
to get closer,” Billy whispered harshly, sounding almost desperate. He shifted forward, preparing to scramble the rest of the way to the house, but he was checked by Sarah’s hand tugging at his sleeve.

“You don’t have to,” she said, keeping her voice low, forcing herself not to let it quaver. “I know
exactly
what you’re up to!” Turning toward the house, she rose to her feet and, cupping her hands to her mouth, shouted, “Okay, Johnny—and Curt, too, no doubt! You can come out now! Game’s over!”

Suddenly, from behind, something hit her in the back of her knees. Her legs gave out, and she twisted as she went down, crumpling to the ground. Billy’s weight came down hard on her stomach and chest. The air was forced out of her lungs in a single burning gasp. She wanted to scream and shout, but all she could manage was a breathless moan.

“What . . . are you crazy?” Billy hissed, his mouth close to her ear.

Sarah struggled to get out from under him, but he worked his arms and legs to keep her pinned flat to the ground.

“You—just—get—off—me—right—now!” she sputtered. Try as she might, she couldn’t dislodge him by wiggling.

“You’d just better hope to Christ he didn’t hear you,” Billy said. He had his head cocked up and was anxiously scanning the house. The dull glow from the window washed over his face, giving it a ghostly cast.

 
“You didn’t fool me for a minute,” Sarah managed to say now that Billy had shifted his weight a little, and she was able to draw a breath. “I know darn well that my brother’s in there, shining that light just so you can try to scare me. Well, Billy Lewis—it just won’t work this time!”

“Ahh, but I think it
will
work,” a man’s voice said, coming to her like a boom of thunder from the surrounding darkness. Sarah had no idea of the direction. “I think you will be scared . . . a whole lot!”

Still unable to see, Sarah listened as steady footsteps approached them from the side of the house. When she looked up, she saw the huge bulk of a man towering above her. He was almost featureless, no more than an inky silhouette against the starry sky as he stood there with his hands on his hips, looking down at her.

“I want to thank you for bringing her to me, Billy-boy,” the man said, followed by a hollow laugh. “Now, be a good boy ‘n help me get her into the cellar. That way, you’ll get to see what I like to do with people like her.”

-3-

S
arah couldn’t believe any of this was happening, but it was real; she knew that when she felt the man’s strong hands slide under her and heave her up onto his shoulder as if she were a sack of grain. Her throat closed off; nothing more than a feeble squeak would come out as he carried her around to the back of the house. With each step, his shoulder bumped into her like a soft fist in the stomach, taking her breath away. Pinpricks of light spun like comets in front of her eyes. The night song of crickets roared like the ocean in her ears.

Before heading down the cellar stairs, the man paused and turned to look back at Billy. “So, Billy-boy, this is your lucky night tonight, huh?” he said. Down inside the cellar, Sarah could see the faint light of a single candle washing the floor and walls like a coat of cheap paint.

Billy said nothing; he simply followed when the man started down into the dank cellar.

A choking, musty smell tinged with something else, possibly the smell of sewage, nearly gagged Sarah as her mind, like a transmission that had lost all of its teeth, kept whining, louder and louder. No matter how fast it revved, it just wouldn’t catch and hold onto anything.

Who is this man? And what is he doing? she wondered frantically. If the point was to scare me—all right, he and Billy have done it. The joke’s over and done! They’ll be letting me go home now, I’ll bet. But then why is he taking me down into the cellar.

These and other questions roared through her mind like a funnel of wind. There were no answers, but Sarah knew it was going beyond a joke; she knew she was in serious trouble when the man unslung her from his shoulder and dropped her roughly to the floor. She hit hard; a jolt of pain as bright as lightning ran up her spine. Her chest ached, and she still couldn’t get enough air into her lungs to scream as she watched the man stand back from her, fold his arms across his chest, and smile menacingly. The faint sounds of other footsteps on the cellar steps made her look around, but her heart sank when she saw Billy.

“Just what—are you trying—trying to do?” Sarah said between gasps. Her question was directed not at the man but to Billy, who was lurking in the dark corner by the cellar door. It was the man, however, who answered her.

“We’re not
trying
to do anything, missy,” he said. His voice was low, booming like a cannon in the distance. “We’ve already done it, haven’t we, Billy-boy? You see, Billy-boy, here, has been helping me out the last few days . . . ever since I blew into town after breaking out.”

“You mean. . . .”

Knowing what the rest of her question was, the man chuckled and nodded. “You must’ve read about me in the paper, or maybe seen me on the TV.”

Sarah’s eyes felt as though they were bulging six inches out of her face as she stared up at Billy. He was still cringing in the shadowed corner. The feeble light of the candle made his shadow dance and weave. She couldn’t begin to accept that Billy had set her up for something like this, and her blood ran cold when she began to imagine what might happen next.

“You didn’t happen to bring that food you promised, did you, Billy-boy?” the man asked. He never once took his eyes off Sarah as he spoke.

“No, I . . . uh, I couldn’t bring it when I was coming out with her,” he replied, his voice sounding thin and weak. “I mean, she would’ve suspected something was up.”

“I been gettin’ kinda hungry, Billy-boy,” the man replied. He shot Billy a quick, angry glance, then turned back to Sarah, who was pressing herself back against the stone wall.

“Then again,” the man went on, “I always was a business before pleasure kind of guy.” With that, he reached behind his back and quickly snapped his hand out in front of him. Held tightly in his right hand was a thick-bladed knife, at least six inches long. The blade glinted wickedly in the candlelight as the man turned it back and forth admiringly.

“You. . . ? What are . . . you?” Sarah sputtered. Her mind was nothing more than a black blur as she stared, horrified, at the gleaming knife.

This is going too far!
her mind screamed. This man isn’t kidding!
This isn’t just some practical joke. He means it!

“Billy . . . ?” she said, no more than a whimper.

“Billy-boy ain’t gonna help you, little girl,” the man said. He took one slow step toward her, the knife weaving in front of him in a lazy figure-eight. “Oh, no! Billy-boy’s the one who brought you up to me. He’s the one who said he wouldn’t mind if I carved you up. Ain’t that right, Billy-boy?”

Wide-eyed and trembling, Billy nodded in agreement. “You see, little girl?” the man said. “Billy-boy found me living out here, ‘n—well, my first recourse was to waste him. I couldn’t very well have him blabbing about the escaped convict living up here in this deserted house, now, could I? But before I gutted him, we started talking; ‘n before long, he and I had worked out a little deal. Ain’t that so, Billy-boy? He’d bring me food so I could hole up here until I figured where to go next, but what was in it for ole’ Billy-boy, here? Then, just yesterday, we struck on our little deal.”

“I can’t believe you’re doing this to me!” Sarah yelled at Billy. Hot tears stung her eyes, but she forced herself not to cry. Her chest still felt like it was bound with steel bands, but the horror of her situation now fueled her anger.

“Oh, Billy-boy ain’t gonna do a thing . . .’cept watch,” the man said, taking another step closer. “When we got to talking about what I was put in jail for, he told me he’d just like to see what it looks like when someone dies. You see—that was our deal. He’d bring someone out here, and I’d put on a little show for him. Right, Billy-boy?”

Before Billy could respond, the man laughed a deep, watery laugh and came closer to Sarah, leaning down so the knife blade was level with her face, no more than three inches away.

Sarah’s hands and feet scrambled wildly on the floor, but the solid granite blocks prevented any further retreat. It took several seconds for her brain to register that her right hand was wrist deep in some gritty-feeling stuff, either sand or crumbled mortar; but once she realized it, she acted quickly. Grabbing as big a handful as she could, she screamed and flung it straight into the man’s face.

In the split second the man staggered back in surprise, bellowing his rage as he tried to clean his eyes, Sarah coiled her legs and jumped to her feet. She was running full speed for the cellar stairs when she heard the man shout behind her. It sounded like he was right behind her, inches away.