Instinct Jason Hough (best mobile ebook reader .txt) 📖

sometime later today, and they won’t be too pleased if they come up here to find the scene in such a state, the implication being their son’s death is a low priority, or worse, being handled sloppily.

Back in the lot I’m halfway into the driver’s seat of my car when a distant sound stops me. For a moment I think I’ve imagined it, but then it comes again. A sort of hollow thud, like someone striking a drum with one of those padded drumsticks you see in marching bands. I wait, ears strained, but the sound doesn’t return. Still, I’m pretty sure I didn’t imagine it, and it wasn’t natural, so I get back out again.

The parking area is utterly silent, save for a light wind rustling nearby branches. I make a slow circle in place, looking for anything that might hint at the source of the noise, but there’s nothing. Trees surround me, save for the trailhead leading to the site of the bear attack, and the entrance to the Masonic Campground opposite.

I walk around my car and over to the rusty metal gate that blocks the gravel road leading to the place. The barricade is identical to the one keeping traffic away from the cell tower. Unlike the cell tower’s gate, though, there’s no key on my key chain for this one. We probably have an extra key for it back at the station somewhere, but I decide to simply walk around the barricade instead. The gravel road isn’t long, and besides, the sun is out, and I’m a California girl at heart.

The path—calling it a road would be generous—is deeply rutted and ill-maintained. It’s also devoid of any tire tracks or footprints. During my whirlwind first week on the job Greg had mentioned something about this place and its owners, the Free Masons. That storied, secretive organization that factors into countless conspiracy theories right alongside the Illuminati. From Greg’s perspective it’s just a club for making professional connections. “All the perks of religion without the deity business,” he’d said. For whatever reason they’d all but stopped coming up here in recent years. The various fees and taxes remain paid up, though, keeping the property on their books and off-limits to everyone else.

It’s only a quarter mile to the campground. I stop at the end of the path and survey the place briefly. Weeds and grasses poke up everywhere, but I can still see the various plots where RVs can be parked or tents set up. There’s a few Porta Pottis off to one side, padlocked shut. Opposite them is a row of picnic tables and a few concrete grilling areas, charred black from years of use.

Farther on, just visible through the trees, there’s a pond. Its placid surface is a murky green, and even from here I can see the little circular eruptions of ripples as insects land and take off again.

Wild blackberry bushes surround the stagnant pool of water, their branches so heavy with the fruit that they droop to the ground. The dirt is littered with the little berries, rotting away.

Through the tangle of blackberry I spot a hint of blue. Not sky, though. This is a bright, unnatural blue, like a piece of fabric or plastic, maybe, about thirty feet past the pond. Curious, I walk around to the right, but can see no way to get to whatever it is.

Then I try the left, and about fifty feet along I find a narrow trail that leads through the thorny bushes.

Unlike the dirt road, there are footprints here, and they seem pretty fresh to me.

Cupping one hand beside my mouth, I call out, “Hello? Hello?!”

There’s no reply. No sound at all, really. Insects and a few birds. Whatever that drumbeat I’d heard before was, it hasn’t happened again.

I make my way through the branches. They’re thorny as hell, snagging on my shirtsleeves and grabbing at the legs of my pants. I pause, consider going back to the car for some gloves. This idea I discard as paranoia and carefully push a branch aside so I can duck past it. As I do so, the words on my hand make their mantra-like statement to me once again. You need help.

“I’ll be the judge of that,” I tell my past self, and continue on.

One second I’m squirming through the undergrowth, the next I’m in a small circular clearing, maybe twenty feet across. It’s so perfectly circular, in fact, that it must have been carved from the blackberry thicket with a chain saw.

Off to one side of this is a domed camping tent. A nice one. Dark red with yellow zippers and cords.

But I ignore it for the moment. It’s the center of the clearing that has my attention.

Here someone has built a pyramid out of plastic blue barrels. Big ones. Ten- or twenty-gallon, I think.

On the sides of the containers are white stickers covered with printed words and icons. Three stand out to me immediately.

A triangle with a skull and crossbones inside, the word “poison” below.

Beside it is another triangle. Inside this one is a wavy line with a dotted line above it. Nonsensical save for the word printed below: CORROSIVE.

At the very top, in bold print, is the last detail that matters: POTASSIUM FLUORIDE.

There’s a rustling sound from across the clearing.

Someone is in the tent.

“Hey Kenny. Can I get you something? You look like you could use a good meal, man.”

“Nothing, bro. I’m good. Just came by to ask you something. Do you know about this?”

“I can’t read that from here, hand the phone to me. Hand the fucking phone to me, Kenny. I’m not going to drop it. Thanks. Moron. You call Mom, by the way?”

“ ’Course I did. The big five-oh. Damn. She gave me shit about not making her a grandma yet. Like who wants to be a grandparent at fifty? Anyway, read that, Kyle. Seriously read it.