Despite her training, she got closer. Reached out, pinched a fold of the bag between her thumb and forefinger. She gave it a quick yank, then stood back and brought the Glock out, aimed it at the table.
A lump in the bag rose up, then fell back. Something that sounded like fingernails scraped the inside of the bag.
Sandy stepped back, still holding the Glock up and ready. She supposed it was possible that Jerm had been brought here still alive, and he was simply asking for help, inside a cadaver bag. Possible, but not likely. It was also possible that it wasn’t Jerm at all in that bag. Could be that it was someone else entirely.
Sandy didn’t think so.
She had no choice. She reached out with her free hand and started to unzip the bag. Something scurried over inside the bag and grabbed at her hand. It felt almost like someone’s hand on the other side of the fabric trying to clutch at her. She shifted to the side and unzipped the bag about eighteen inches in one, long, smooth motion.
Fingers unfurled from inside the bag and pulled at the plastic.
Sandy’s immediate thought was that she was watching two hands come crawling out, all on their own, like that pet hand from The Addams Family. Then she realized they weren’t hands exactly. They had fingers and even toes, but no palms; the digits rose up into a mass of gray webbing, like a short, stubby tipi. They scuttled awkwardly out of the bag like spiders that had waded through grain alcohol.
Other parts of the bag were moving now. Bigger parts. Sandy had seen enough to know that whatever Dr. Castle had seen last night, he had been right.
She reholstered the Glock, found a large pair of tongs, and picked up one of the finger spiders. It struggled weakly, and as she turned it over, she could see a mass of what looked like white cotton candy underneath, growing out of the upper pads of the fingers and toes. She dropped it in the bag and quickly grabbed the other one. She used the tongs to grab the zipper and zip the bag shut.
The parts inside continued to move.
Her radio crackled. It was Liz. “Chief, you there? Come back. Chief?”
Sandy wanted to start shooting at the bag, to burn it, something. She hit the button on the radio. “Chisel here. Over.”
“Chief, we’re getting a ton of calls about people not coming home last night. I’m forwarding them on to the county boys for now, but I just got one hell of a weird nine-one-one call, thought you should hear about this one first.” Liz either hadn’t heard about Sandy’s suspension, or more likely was simply choosing to ignore the command. “Male, says he’s under attack from some kind of monsters. I think he’s just some tweaker, wandered off the interstate and got lost. He’s freaking out, says he needs help.”
“Monsters, huh?” Sandy said, watching the body bag.
“His words, not mine. And you’ll never guess where he was calling from. The Einhorns’.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Nope. When it rains it pours, huh?”
The Einhorns. Mrs. Kobritz. And now Dr. Castle. All those missing people.
“You want, I can let Sheriff Hoyt know, and he can send one of his boys out.”
Sandy knew that she would have to bring Sheriff Hoyt into this mess, sooner than later, but if she could figure out at least a few pieces of the puzzle, it might go easier for her and Kevin later. Never mind that she was unable to act in any official capacity as the town’s chief. “No, that’s okay. I’ve got it. Let Sheriff Hoyt handle the parade for now. I’ll head out there, see what’s what.”
“You gonna join us at the parade? I’m outta here in less than… twenty minutes. You want me to save you a spot?”
“No, that’s okay, thanks. I’ll be there soon. I’ll find my boy and we’ll watch it together.”
“See you then. Over and out.”
Bob was proud of himself.
It had been years since he’d personally driven the harvester up and down the rows, but the old skills had never left. Even as bad as he felt. Of course the technology had changed, made it easier for one man to do everything. Used to be, he had someone else to drive alongside the combine with a trailer to collect the grain. Now, the combine itself had a trailer, and so Bob could easily harvest acres and acres on his own.
He remembered endless summer days of sitting on his father’s lap in the combine, bouncing through one field after another, back and forth, back and forth, as his father taught him what was important in life. God. Farming. Family. Back in those days, there wasn’t much to do in the cab of the combine. Now, he still couldn’t believe how it had more technology than his office at home. Air-conditioning, for one thing. They’d never had central air put in the house, and so Bob always felt a little guilty using it in the combine. A radio. He’d seen some models that even had little televisions, but he drew the line at that. No sir. You couldn’t work and watch TV at the same time.
He didn’t bother closing the gate behind him. The field was done. Time to let it sit until next spring. It had been too early to harvest the corn, and it wouldn’t be as sweet as it should be, but that wasn’t the point. No, he’d harvested his son’s corn to show everyone that his son had been a farmer when he died. No one could take that away. No one. Not even Allagro.
And now Bob had the evidence. Two acres of corn that half-filled the trailer behind the combine. That amount was nothing, of course, not when he was used to dealing with hundreds of acres, day after day. It was enough, though, to make sure everybody knew that the Mortons had farming in their blood.
If Bob had turned around, he might have seen the lazy black cloud that jolted and swirled with every bump in the road as it hung like a fog over the trailer of corn.
He passed Cochran’s rental car. It was empty. Bob hoped the son of a bitch had gotten lost out here looking for Bob Jr.’s two acres. He was in no hurry as he eased the massive combine and trailer up to the intersection of Road G and Highway 17. It only had a top speed of fifteen miles an hour anyway. He turned left, toward town.
It didn’t matter anymore. Cochran was too late to do anything. Let him call his bosses. Let him make all the threats he wanted. Let him go give those condescending looks to somebody else. Bob had taken care of his farm.
If nothing else, that’s what was truly important to Bob. No matter how he looked, or how he felt, he could still take care of his business, his home, his life. And by God, he was going to prove it to everybody. He couldn’t think of a better way to show everyone just what a genuine American farmer was made of.
It was time to take the corn to the parade.
CHAPTER 20
Sandy didn’t see a car in the Einhorn driveway. It didn’t look much different from the last time she had been out here, except for the police tape on the front porch. They’d hauled Kurt’s truck back to the county lab to test for any bloodstains. As far as Sandy knew, they hadn’t found anything. She didn’t think they would.
She pulled around the horseshoe driveway and parked in front of the steps. She got out and stood in the full morning sunlight, taking in the house for a moment. A breeze ruffled the plastic ribbons of yellow crime-scene tape stretched across the front steps. All of the shells that had littered the driveway had been collected. She went up the front walk and saw that the bloodstains were almost gone. One good rain and you’d never know a man had been shot to death on his front lawn.
She ripped the tape away, not worrying too much about disturbing a crime scene. Being suspended, she had no business being out here in the first place. She peered in the window. Nothing moved inside. Knocked on the front door. No answer.
It didn’t surprise her. Whoever had been here had taken their car and left.