Stray Fears - Gregory Ashe Page 0,34

roots, concentrating on slow, even breaths. The soft shick-shick continued. I could see something now, a faint white spot between the oaks and pines. A pinecone crunched under foot, and I froze, but the shick-shick continued. I was more careful after that, watching the ground with every step, picking clear patches where the fallen needles were green and thick.

Then I realized the noise had stopped.

Someone screamed, and the white spot shot out of the darkness toward me.

I brought up the flashlight and the Sig, recognized Elien, and stumbled to one side. The shovel whistled through the air, barely missing my head.

“On the ground, on the ground,” I shouted.

“Get on the ground your fucking self,” he shouted back. “I’ll take your fucking head off!”

I shone the light in his face; he was holding the shovel like a baseball bat.

“Drop it,” I shouted. “Police! Drop the weapon!”

The shovel came down a few inches; he shielded his eyes with one hand.

“Officer LeBlanc?” he asked. “What the fuck are you doing?”

“Jesus,” I said, lowering the Sig. “What were you—are you ok?”

“Am I ok? I almost smashed your face in. Are you ok?”

“Will you put the shovel down, please?”

“Will you stop shining the light in my face?”

I lowered the beam, and I heard the shovel’s blade bite into the soil. “What are you doing out here?” I asked.

“I live here. Why are you sneaking around on my property?”

“I . . .”

Elien stared at me. Shadows hid his expression, but my face heated anyway.

“I wanted to make sure you were ok.”

“Oh, yeah, I’m great. Or, I was, until this asshole sneaked up behind me and tried to shoot me in the back.”

Holstering the Sig, I said, “I’m sorry. I was going to knock, but I heard a strange sound. I wanted to see what it was.”

“You didn’t hear me from the front door,” Elien said, “which means you’d already come around the side of the house, which means you were sneaking. Why were you sneaking around?”

“I was worried,” I said; I could hear how lame it was as soon as it was out of my mouth.

After a moment, Elien sighed. “Since you’re here, I guess I owe you something for saving my life. Let me finish up and we can go inside.”

I followed him farther into the trees; Elien was carrying a flashlight too, and he turned it on now, shining it across the ground until he found what he was looking for. I saw a hole about three feet deep. Next to it was a pile of something that looked like rope.

“Are those intestines?”

“Yes,” Elien said.

“Do you want to explain that?”

“Not really.” He used the shovel to slide the pile of viscera into the hole, and then he began filling in the dirt. With every shovelful, he grunted and swore, and after a minute, he paused and turned the flashlight on, inspecting his hand. Blisters had already split across Elien’s palm and fingers.

“Give me that,” I said, and I swapped the flashlight for the shovel before Elien could object.

“I can do it.”

“I know.”

“I do not need you to do that.”

“I know.”

“I didn’t ask you to do it.”

“Consider this a mission of mercy. You’ve got nice hands; no point ruining them.”

For a while, I just worked. After days of moping around the house, it felt good to do something. The burn in my muscles. The prickle of sweat across my chest and back. And, of course, the knowledge that Elien was looking at me.

When I finished, I looked at Elien: the perfectly windswept hair; a long, loose white tee that the night breeze pulled tight, translucent where sweat dampened it; the lean musculature underneath.

“Let’s take care of your hands,” I said.

“I have enough people taking care of me,” Elien said. “If I have any more men in my life taking care of me, I’m going to put a bullet through the roof of my mouth.”

“That sounds nice,” I said.

Elien looked like he was about to say something nasty, but then his face froze. His gaze was fixed on something over my shoulder.

“What?” I said.

Elien’s mouth moved, but no sound came out.

I thought back to the snapping branches like a string of firecrackers. A black bear. But bears didn’t move like that, not that I’d ever heard. Shifting my grip on the shovel, I turned around slowly.

For a moment, I thought it was some strange fruit: pale and white and long, hanging in the trees. Then the parts came together into a face that was too long