The Frenzy Way
ACCOLADES FOR
THE FRENZY WAY
“The Frenzy Way
is an awesome blend of police procedural and bloody werewolf action. It’s easily Lamberson’s best novel—and I loved his first two!”
—Jeff Strand, Bram Stoker Award nominated author of
Pressure
and
Dweller
(December 2009)
“A werewolf serial killer whodunit with real teeth,
The Frenzy Way
is a razor-sharp read from beginning to end. Lamberson’s tale is a police procedural, werewolf historical, good old-fashioned monster movie mash up, a winning mix to be sure, but what really makes the narrative shine are its deft characterizations. Even the tiniest bit players seem alive, vital, a crucial part of the puzzle, making this wild-in-the-streets werewolf hunt all the more tense. Highly recommended.”
—Michael Louis Calvillo, Bram Stoker Award nominated author of
I Will Rise
and
As Fate Would Have It
(December 2009)
“The Frenzy Way
is a grinning, snapping chainsaw of a novel, so grab some heavy gloves and eye protection and hang on for a fast, fun ride.”
—Jeff Jacobson, author of
Wormfood
(December 2009)
“From the opening paragraph, Greg Lamberson’s
The Frenzy Way
sinks its long, dark claws into you, refusing to release you until your shaking fingers have turned the very last page. There is a chilling seduction to the intelligent, gritty crime noir style in which this distinctive take on the werewolf myth is delivered that is exquisitely terrifying, breathtakingly harsh, and beautifully brutal.
The Frenzy Way
is horror at its absolute best!”
—Gabrielle S. Faust, author of
Eternal Vigilance
(December 2009)
DEDICATION
Dedicated, with love, to Tamar
Published 2010 by Medallion Press, Inc.
The MEDALLION PRESS LOGO is a registered trademark of Medallion Press, Inc.
If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the publisher, and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment from this “stripped book.”
Copyright © 2010 by Gregory Lamberson
Cover design by Tommy Castillo and James Tampa
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission of the publisher, except where permitted by law.
Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictionally. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Typeset in Adobe Garamond Pro
Printed in the United States of America
ISBN: 978-160542107-0
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
First Edition
Special thanks to Christopher Aiello, a.k.a. “Chris the cop,” for serving as my technical advisor on this book. A retired NYPD detective, he has spared me considerable embarrassment in my depiction of the NYPD and its hierarchy.
A mighty thanks to Jamie LeChance, proofreader extraordinaire; Jeff Strand, for serving as my first reader (again) and for suggesting this book’s title; and Chris Hedges for making invaluable editorial suggestions.
Thanks, as always, to the team at Medallion Press for their continued support: Helen A Rosburg, Ali DeGray, Adam Mock, Heather Lewis, James Tampa, and Paul Ohlson.
And thank
you
for following me into hell once more. I hope we can do it again soon.
Alone in the wilderness I roam
With much hardships in the wilderness I roam
A wolf said this to me.
—Sitting Bull
“Never before in all history were so many large wild animals slain in so short a time.”
—Theodore Roosevelt
John Stalk awoke with a sudden jerk, his fingers clawing empty air for the M-4 assault rifle he hadn’t held in six months. In that same instant, he expected to see clouds of mortar erupting from the grimy walls of sun-bleached buildings, machine gunfire strafing dusty streets, and figures in bulky uniforms scattering among panicked civilians. Instead he saw pale blue moonlight seeping through the windows and glinting off knotty pine walls. Kindling burned in the stone fireplace across the main room.
Not in Fallujah
, he thought, the thick comforter falling away as he sat up on the futon. His father’s cabin. As a boy, he had come here with Chief Dan to hunt and fish. Now, after being stateside for half a year, the dreams of Fallujah persisted with unyielding clarity, the dead men from his unit calling to him with silent mouths. Jameson. Pillman. Raeckel. The list went on.
The sweat on his forehead cooled. What had awakened him? He wondered if he would ever be able to sleep through common background noise again. The forest surrounding the cabin had always been serene. If he couldn’t relax here …
Then he heard it: a long, high-pitched wail descending from the mountaintop, piercing the night with its stark loneliness. The howling rose and fell in a melody, the pitiful singing filling him with inexplicable sadness. For reasons he did not comprehend, he felt instant kinship with the beast crying in the night.
A wolf
, he thought, his heartbeat quickening. Then he dismissed the notion. Wolves had not been reintroduced to New York as they had been in other states. Oh, a gray wolf could conceivably have wandered down from Canada, but that would have caused quite a stir at the border.
Must be a coyote
.
Climbing out of bed, he dragged the comforter after him. Clad in long johns and thick socks, he padded across the rugs on the wood floor to the nearest window. Falling snow flickered in the moonlight like fireflies, obscuring the tree line at the property’s edge. The massive silhouette of the mountain towered over him, blotting out the slush gray sky.
The howling resumed, rolling over the treetops. He rubbed his arms beneath the comforter. Standing transfixed for several minutes, he tried to pinpoint the creature’s location on the mountain. The lonely song echoed around the terrain, seeming to come from several directions at once. He shivered. Withdrawing from the window, he added fresh kindling to the smoldering fire, then laid down on the futon and closed his eyes. He fell asleep to the sound of the animal’s melancholy voice.
That’s no coyote
, he thought.
Gunfire awoke him: sharp reports that split the night asunder. Fixing his eyes on the crossbeams in the cathedral ceiling, Stalk thought he had been dreaming of combat again. But a shrill yelping followed the third and final shot, followed by silence. His body turned rigid.
The wolf
!
Flinging back the comforter, he ran to the window and staredthrough the falling snow. He waited there for several minutes, hearing nothing, then returned to bed. Someone had killed the wolf, but who? He supposed the animal had disturbed the occupant of one of the cabins that peppered this side of the mountain. That was easier to imagine than some hunter tracking a creature by moonlight.
But aren’t wolves a protected species?
Out here in the Adirondacks, in the middle of the night, who could enforce such laws? Lying down once more, he folded his arms behind his head and closed his eyes.
Stalk didn’t know how long he had been asleep when the scratching sounds woke him. Propping himself on his elbows, he scanned the cabin’s dark interior, trimmed with orange light from the fireplace. Outside, the snow had stopped falling, leaving a black void beyond the cabin windows. The clawing sounds continued, and Stalk’s gaze moved through the darkness to the door. Was that a husky moan he heard on the other side?
Something’s out there
, he thought, heart palpitating.
Trying to get inside.
Without hesitation, he leapt from the futon and lifted the Winchester rifle from the hand-carved wooden rack on the wall. He crossed the room in three generous strides. Twisting the locks, he threw open the heavy door, stepped back, and aimed the rifle at the rectangle of darkness as frigid air swept inside, chilling him like wine. Shifting the barrel downward, he gaped at what he saw.
Moonlight rippled across smooth flesh. Dark hair splayed over the snow. The woman lay facedown on the ground, her left arm, folded beneath her breasts, supporting her torso while her right hand reached out toward Stalk. Her right leg extended straight behind her, while her left leg was bent, its knee touching her elbow. Her nude body quivered in the cold.