Bug Man Suspense 3-in-1 Bundle (26 page)

The old man considered Nick's words, then nodded; it seemed to be enough for him.

“Thought you might be gang wardens,” Boo said.

“Gang wardens?”

“Wildlife agents.”

“Don't worry, we're not with Fish and Wildlife.”

“Figured. Not dressed for it. The woman, she dressed for a
fais dodo
.”

“A what?”

“A party. You two ain't from da bayou.”

“Does it show?”

Suddenly, the boat ran aground and lurched to a stop. Beth felt herself jerk backward; if Nick hadn't been holding her thigh, she would have fallen off the bench. The uncle shoved the tiller to the side and gunned the engine briefly, swinging the stern of the boat into shore. Without a word, he took the flashlight from his nephew's hand and stepped out of the boat with a splash. He waded into the marsh grass and headed inland, leaving the three of them sitting together in total darkness.

“It's a small world,” Nick said.

“Ain?”

“You went to LSU; I'm a college professor.”

“Where?”

“NC State, in Raleigh.”

“Wolfpack,” Boo said. “ACC football sucks.”

“Won't argue with you there.”

Thank you
, Beth thought.

“I've been to LSU several times. My friend here—she was there just this morning.”

Beth instinctively smiled, though she wasn't sure why; there was no way the man could see her face in the darkness.

Just then they heard a single shot from the automatic rifle; Nick and Beth turned and looked in the direction of the sound. A minute later they heard the marsh grass whisking apart again; the old man planted one foot in the shallow water and the next one in the boat, pushing off from the shore. He held the rifle in his left hand and the flashlight in his right; but there was something else in his right hand too—something large and heavy.

Boo took the flashlight and pointed it at his uncle's hand. The man was holding a large, brown, furry creature with a tail like a rat.

Très bon
,” Boo said. “Good fur.” “

To Beth's horror, the old man swung the creature by its foot-long tail and plopped it into the bottom of the boat near her feet; it landed in the darkness with a sickening
whump
. Her mouth dropped open; she drew in a sharp breath but didn't let it out.

“May I?” Nick said, pointing to the flashlight.

Boo shrugged and tossed it over to him.

Nick held the flashlight over his head to illuminate the entire floor. It was covered with dozens of the lifeless creatures. They had blunt, rounded snouts with coarse white whiskers that angled down and back, and two enormous front incisors that were a sickly yellow-orange. Their ears looked like little black seashells pasted to the sides of their heads, and their meaty haunches curved up over hairless black feet.

They stared up at Beth with glistening eyes.

Beth jerked her feet up onto the bench. “What is
that
?”

“Beats me,” Nick said. “I'm not into mammals.”

“Nutria,” Boo said. “Swamp rats, some say.”

“Rats?”

“Nutria,” Nick said. “I've never heard of them before. They're awfully big—how much do they weigh?”

“Eighteen, twenty pounds—seen 'em up to twenty-five.”

Beth was panting like a spent mare. The lack of oxygen was causing her head to spin; she imagined herself passing out and falling forward, landing face-first in a pit of yellow teeth and wriggling tails. In a panic, she threw both arms around Nick's neck and began to scramble up onto his lap.

“Ouch,” Nick said. “Watch the heels.”

The uncle turned to his nephew.
“Quel est le problème?”

The nephew just shrugged.

“Sorry,” Nick said. “My friend is muriphobic—she's afraid of mice. She has a hard time with the little ones; I'm afraid twenty-pounders are over her limit.”

“Dat's no mouse,” Boo said. “Dat's a nutria.” He hoisted one by the tail and stroked its fur, as if to reassure her.

Beth squeezed her eyes tight and climbed even higher, wrapping her arms around Nick's head like a python. Nick twisted his neck from side to side and straightened his glasses as if he were pushing his head through a turtleneck sweater.

“Better put it down,” Nick said. “She'll be up on my head in a minute, and I don't have the neck strength for that.”

Whump.

Beth could feel the dead rodents coming to life all around her, poking their blunt snouts into the air and sniffing; they could sense her presence, they could taste her flesh—their whiskers were almost tickling her feet. She jerked her head up and measured the distance to the shore.

“Don't even think about it,” Nick said.

Beth told herself again and again that her fears were irrational. Only minutes ago she had welcomed the soft warm fur around her ankles—she wanted to pull it up over her shoulders like an afghan on a chilly night. It was no different now, she told herself, nothing had changed. The fur was exactly the same; the only difference was that this time the fur was attached to a body—the bulbous body of a hideous, twenty-pound
rat
.

It was no use—no matter what mental hallway she started down, there was always the same demon in the closet at the end. She felt a wave of nausea rising over her; she tightened her grip on Nick's neck to force it back down. She began to tremble like a leaf. She tried every relaxation method and breathing technique she could remember, all the ones she so glibly recommended to her own patients. None of them worked; she wondered if they ever did.

“Nick,” she whispered. “I'm begging you.”

Nick looked across at Boo. “Mind if I ask where you're taking us?”

“Our place.”

“Is it much farther? I hate to complain, but she's squeezing all the blood out of my head.”

“Five minutes. Hungry?”

“Starving.”

“Stay for supper den.”

“Glad to. What are we having?”

He nodded to the floor.

“Thanks,” Nick said. “Maybe just a salad for her.”

25

The boat veered around to the left and pulled up in front of a rickety old dock. The nephew threw a loop of rope around the closest pier and pulled the boat in; when he did, the dock leaned so far toward them that Nick thought it might collapse.

“Hurricane wrecked it,” Boo said. “Not much good before—even worse now. We go one at a time, or we go swimmin'.”

“The woman first,” Nick said. He lifted Beth in his arms and set her on the dock; it shifted even more under her weight. She still had her arms wrapped tightly around Nick's neck; he gently pried them away and said, “Walk to the shore. Take it slow. I'll be right behind you.”

She struggled to her feet and started forward, picking up speed as she went, as though the nutria might be right behind her. When she safely reached land, Nick crawled out onto the dock and followed.

Thirty yards from the dock was a rectangular cabin made of peeled cypress logs chinked with mortar in between. The roof was made of corrugated tin, just like the shack upriver, only this one was covered with cancerous splotches of brownish-orange. The design was basic, and the structure was undoubtedly handmade, with a simple slab door in the center surrounded by a window on either side. The entire cabin sat three feet above the ground on short, stubby stilts made of hand-hewn cypress posts. The cabin windows were dark; there were no signs of activity inside.

The uncle headed directly for the cabin, hauling two nutria by their ropelike tails. The door had a simple lift-latch and bore no lock. The nephew went around behind the cabin; a few seconds later came the low, rattling sound of a generator starting, and the two cabin windows slowly glowed with a warm yellow light.

Nick and Beth stood together in a bare dirt area in front of the cabin, watching this scene and wondering what they were supposed to do next. The nephew appeared again from behind the cabin and started for the door. He turned to them and said, “Supper in a few minutes.” He stepped inside and closed the door.

Beth looked at Nick. “They're just going to leave us here?”

“They might as well,” Nick said. “There's sure no place to go.”

“Nick—we've been kidnapped.”

“Don't be silly. They're fixing us supper—we're guests.”

“You don't invite dinner guests at gunpoint.”

“You haven't tasted my cooking.”

“Nick, I'm serious—they could kill us both, and no one would ever know. We're in the middle of nowhere—we could be a hundred miles from the nearest town.”

“Look,” he said, pointing to a pickup truck parked just a few yards beyond the cabin. “There's obviously road access out here. We're not that far away from things, we just don't know where we are. They're not killers, Beth, they're poachers—that's why they asked if we were ‘gang wardens.' Remember? It was just before your psychotic episode.”

She glared at him. “It was not a ‘psychotic episode.' I happen to have a common phobia, that's all.”

“You should see a psychiatrist—that's what I do with all my problems.”

She looked at the narrow dirt road behind the pickup. “They're not looking—maybe we should run.”

“Now you are being psychotic. Where would we go? Besides, we haven't had supper yet.”

“Supper? Are you actually hungry?”

“Man does not live by MREs alone. Some of these Cajuns can really cook.”

“I am not setting foot in that cabin. The old man was carrying two of those . . .
things
.” The word came out with a shudder.

“They were dead.”

“I don't care. I'm staying right here.”

“I hate to point out the obvious, but they shot one of those
things
just a few minutes from here. Are they carnivorous? Do they hunt in packs? They have to eat supper, too, you know.”

“Nick, shut up.”

“Sorry. I hate to take advantage of your irrational fears.”

“You
love
to take advantage of my irrational fears.”

“Actually, I do, but I'm not just jerking your chain here—I need you inside.”

“Why?”

“Because a woman can have a civilizing influence in a situation like this. These guys probably haven't seen a woman in weeks—maybe months.”

“I'd rather not remind them of that.”

“Would you rather we talked
with
you, or
about
you? You know what I say to your face; there's no telling what I might say behind your back.”

He took her by the arm and coaxed her toward the door.

“Sometimes I could strangle you with my bare hands,” she said through clenched teeth.

“I know. That's
my
irrational fear.”

The aroma that met them in the doorway was mouthwatering—at least Nick thought so. The old man stood with a black iron skillet in front of a simple propane cookstove, with a sizzling column of steam rising into the open rafters above. Boo cleared off a rough wooden table made from an old cable spool; it still had the words
EXXON MOBIL
stenciled in black across the top.

Neither man bothered to look up when Nick and Beth entered. Beth went directly to a chair in the corner of the cabin; she checked under it before sitting down, then crossed her arms and pressed her back against the wall.

Nick walked over to the nephew. “We appreciate the hospitality,” he said.

“No problem.”

“I didn't get to introduce myself. My name is Nick Polchak; my friend there is Beth Woodbridge.” He extended his hand, and the young man took it. He had a grip like a hydraulic press. “How did you guys fare in the hurricane?”

“Not bad. Lot o' rain.”

“Your cabin looks dry. Didn't it flood here?”

“Water came up, but not dis high.”

“Why not?”

“Da bayou—soaks up da storm surge like a sponge. Da city's what floods—it's da levees. Supposed to keep water out; now dey keep water in.”

“Your uncle—does he speak English?”

“Sure. He don' want to.”

“Why not?”

“He's Cajun. Old Cajuns, dey like da old ways. Dey still speak French mostly—Cajun French, anyways.”

“And you?”

“I speak it when I want to—mostly to him. But I'm a college boy, remember?” He made a fist and held up his ring again. “I'm capable of speaking perfect English whenever I wish,” he said, articulating each word crisply and clearly.