Left Hand of Evil excerpt (2800 words) (Patreon)

MinionS: Adrienne has been thinking about this story for years. He has written some of it. It is such a cool story! Can't wait for him to be able to give it full attention. This is a rough draft.

There will be a cool-ass dog character in this story...like a major character :)

Kaitlin McCormick stood with her hat in her hands.

Enough time had passed since Elliot saw her last that her deputy badge had been replaced by a sheriff's shield and her county car was unmarked.

A standard sedan, with tinted windows, and an antenna at the back window, sat parked in the driveway. Even without the county police markings, it was unmistakable for anything but a cop car.

And other than a few extra gray hairs she hadn’t aged.

“Evening Elliot, it’s been a while.”

Three…five years. It shamed Elliot to think it had been that long since he’d fled from Madson.

From his past, his present, and the terrible darkness that had haunted him.

If anyone understood his reasons for not returning it would be Kaitlin.

The fact that she had driven almost a hundred miles to stand on Elliot’s doorstep meant her reason for visiting wasn’t to catch up.

Either someone had died or…

She gestured with her hat. “May I come in?”

Elliot wanted to tell her no, instead he gripped the wheels of his chair and rolled back enough to clear the foyer.

Kaitlin scraped the soles of her boots on the welcome mat before following him inside. Elliot backed up the short ramp to the living room and she shut the door.

The thump of heavy feet hit the floor and Lucy trotted from around the corner. With her blinding white coat, long neck, and powerful body, the Great Pyrenees shared more traits with a polar bear than the wolves responsible for domestic canines.

She stopped in front of Kaitlin and jumped up on her hind legs placing her hand-sized paws on the woman’s shoulders.

“Woah there, girl…” Kaitlin laughed.

Elliot reached for the handle on Lucy’s harness. “You know better than that.”

Kaitlin batted his hand away. “It’s okay, I promise.” She ruffled the dog’s floppy ears. “You’ve gotten bigger.”

“More like fatter.” Elliot snapped his fingers. “Lucy, off.” The dog dropped to all fours, offering her backside to Kaitlin for a scratch.

Kaitlin combed her fingers through the dog’s coat. “How old is she now? Sixteen?”

In human years.

But Elliot didn’t think that human years applied to the pyr anymore. Like reality didn’t apply to him.

Or at least a part of him.

He rubbed his left palm even though there was no reason to. It had been years since the scar in the center had seared with tingling electric heat.

Elliot had hoped to keep it that way.

“She looks great.” Kaitlin stopped petting Lucy and watched Elliot. “Her coat is thick, her eyes are clear. If I didn’t know any better I’d say she looked like a two-year-old.”

She did.

Lucy looked the same age she had on that night when Elliot lost everyone that made Madson home.

Elliot turned his wheelchair around and rolled into the kitchen. “You want some coffee.”

Kaitlin followed him. “Are you having any problems getting her licensed?”

“She’s fine.”

“I mean if you are, doc Roberts could take a look at her.”

Elliot pulled two cups from the drain rack on the counter.

Kaitlin stopped by the kitchen table. “He’s never said anything about her before, he wouldn’t now.”

And even if he did, who would believe him? Elliot doubted anyone would care about a dog who’d somehow gained immortality when the person who’d given the townsfolk of Madson a glimpse of hell stood in the same room.

“You didn’t drive almost two hours to ask me about Lucy, you could have done that on the phone.”

“It’s been a few years since you left.”

“And she didn’t look a day over two when she was twelve.” Elliot had no idea how long it meant the dog would live and he didn’t like thinking about it.

“It’s not like we talk all that often, so when we do, I want to hear about you.” She glanced in Lucy’s direction. “No offense of course.”

“Then maybe you should take a day off more often so you can answer my calls.” While Elliot made it a point to avoid Madson he didn’t avoid calling Kaitlin or her father.

She smiled but it was sad. “I should. I’m sorry. It’s just always so late when I get home and I don’t want to wake you up.”

“How foolish of you to assume I can sleep.” He finished prepping the coffee machine and turned it on. Steam hissed and water gurgled in the reservoir. He rolled over to the table with the cups in his lap and set them down.

Kaitlin still hadn’t pulled out a chair.

“Please sit.”

She set down her hat. “I’d rather help with the coffee.”

“I don’t need help.”

“That’s not—”

“And you’re a guest.  Sit.” Elliot waited.

The chair legs scrapped against the tile floor. Kaitlin eased herself down.

Elliot went to the fridge and got the milk. “So what happened?” He collected the sugar bowl and brought them both over. The lid of the sugar bowl clinked as he sat it beside her cup with the milk.

“Can’t I just come visit?”

“If this were a personal visit you wouldn’t have driven a county vehicle.”

She dropped her gaze and fondled the edge of her hat. “I really keep meaning to get out here and see you.” She skipped a look around the kitchen. “You’ve done well.”

The only upside to the settlement with the publishing company who’d almost cost him his sanity.

“Does Jean still work for you? I didn’t see her car out front.”

“She has her own place now. Comes in at eight, leaves by three.”

“What if you need help at night?”

“She’s my housekeeper, not a nurse, and I haven’t needed a nurse since I got out of the hospital.”

“Do you at least have someone you can call…”

“Kaitlin.” Elliot didn’t mean to sound angry, but he wanted to get this over with.

Kaitlin folded her hands. “It’s Georgie.”

As a kid, Elliot had been friends with Georgie. Everyone had been friends with Georgie. And like everyone else, Elliot grew up and Georgie didn’t.

But he’d always been a fixture in Elliot’s life. Happy-go-lucky Georgie. Always willing to play video games, pass up parties for comic books, and keep company with the crippled kid who couldn’t get out of bed.

The last of the coffee gurgled into the pot.

“What about him?” Elliot used a thick dishtowel to protect his lap from the carafe and wheeled it to the table.

“State police pulled him over last night and arrested him.”

“I didn’t know he had a license.”

“He doesn’t.”

“Then why was he on the road?”

“He got a job at Bernie’s processing plant two years ago.” Kaitlin fixed herself a cup of coffee. “It’s ten miles one way. County looks the other way as long as he keeps his mother’s old Buick on the pig trails.”

“But he wasn’t on the back roads.”

“No.”

It was the way she said it that made Elliot ask, “Why he was arrested?”

“The officer found Madaline Stills in the back seat. She’d been…” Kaitlin stopped mid-sip and put her cup down hard enough to slosh coffee over the edge. Elliot took a handful of napkins from the stack in the middle of the table and held them out.

Kaitlin mopped up the mess taking far longer than she needed to. When she finished she couldn’t seem to lift her head. “She was in pieces, El.” Her voice was barely a whisper.

“What?”

“She was cut up. Dismembered. Wrapped in plastic bags.”

“Georgie could never do that.” No, the Georgie Elliot knew had cried over baby birds that fell out of their nests and toads crushed in the street when they fled the spring rains. A grown man with the innocence of a child’s heart. Always kind and gentle despite being bigger than most men at the age of twelve.

“He didn’t kill her,” Kaitlin said it like a plea.

“Did he say anything? Like what happened?” Not why he did it because she was right Georgie wasn’t capable.

“He said he found her in one of the cold rooms at the plant and was taking her to the hospital to get her fixed.”

One summer when was ten Georgie had scraped the neighbor’s dog out of the road and carried it in a basket on his bike to the family doctor to get it fixed too. Some of the town’s folk had been disgusted, others laughed at him.

But there was a big difference between a dead dog and a dead woman.

“Everyone in town knows him, they can’t possibly think he’s capable of hurting anyone.”

“He was already over the county line when the statey pulled him over. Cowa County took him in.”

“Does he have a lawyer or do I need to call Lawrence?”

“Court appointed.”

Elliot rubbed his forehead. “What did the attorney say?”

“They’ve scheduled a hearing to assess his competency to stand trial.”

“Anyone who talks to him for five minutes can tell he’s incapable of understanding the charges.”

“A person can be mentally challenged and still understand right from wrong.” And Georgie had a very strong sense of morality even for a man with his level of cognitive impairment.

“Well when they’re done, whatever the bail is, I’ll pay it.”

“Judge isn’t going to grant him bail.”

“Why?”

Kaitlin dropped her chin.

“What?” Elliot said.

She signed. “Last month Mr. Stills brought caught Georgie…”

Elliot waited.

Kaitlin’s face turned pink.

“Caught him what?”

She exhaled a frustrated breath. “He caught Georgie in the men’s bathroom masturbating with a scarf.”

Elliot huffed. “He’s not the first guy to do something stupid at work.”

“Except the scarf belonged to Madeline Stills. Darrel said he stole it out of Madeline’s car when she brought him lunch. He wanted Georgie arrested so I sent two deputies out to talk to Georgie and get him to apologize hoping it would smooth things over.” Kaitlin took a sip of coffee. “When they got there they saw photos of Mrs. Stills and a lot more of her things.”

“What kind of things?”

“Her clothing. Most of it was underwear.  A few shirts, skirts, pants. A hairbrush.” Kaitlin clenched her eyes shut like it hurt to talk.

“Did Georgia say why he had her belongings?”

“Yeah,” Kaitlin shook her head. “He claimed he was in love with Madeline and that they were getting married and were going to have kids.”

“Jesus.”

“Darrel caught wind and after that, there was no talking him out of filing charges. He told me if I didn’t arrest Georgie he would sue the department.” Her expression went from stern to worried and back.

“You didn’t did you.” Elliot made it a statement.

Kaitlin tucked back a lock of her red hair behind her ear. “Madeline came to me after Darrel had his blow-up. She said she wanted to talk. We were supposed to meet at Fran’s café last week but she never showed. I tried to call her but it kept going to voice mail.” She furrowed her brow. “She was scared El.”

“Did she tell you that?”

“She didn’t have to. I could see it in her eyes, hear it in her voice.”

Elliot folded his hands in his lap. “Have you told Robert?”

“Yeah, Dad called her twin brother.”

“Did he know anything?”

“He thinks Darrel killed her.”

“Why?”

“She was pregnant and it wasn’t his.”

Elliot sat back and he and Kaitlin stared at each other.

The clock on the wall ticked. Steam rose from the tops of their cups.

When Elliot had gathered his courage he said, “Is it Georgie’s?” Elliot didn’t know whether to be happy Georgie had found someone who would love him despite his disabilities or angry at Madaline and feel as if she’d taken advantage of him.

And did he have a right to judge?

Because despite Georgie’s IQ he was still a human being, a man, and he deserved to have a life, and a wife and children if that was what he wanted.

“The ME should have the autopsy ready to post by morning. But Darrel Still’s temper isn’t exactly a secret. As a teenager, he beat more than one person into a coma. And his previous wives had made accusations of abuse as grounds for divorce.”

“Do you think Darrel killed Madeline?” Elliot asked only because he wanted to be sure that’s what she was alluding to.

Shadows darkened Kaitlin’s eyes. She gave a small nod. “Yeah, I do.”

“Are you going to arrest him?”

“Even if I had evidence Darrel has five friends from church, including the pastor, that swear he left on a camping trip with them three days ago. Darrel said he talked to her last night before they headed out on the boat. If he’s telling the truth then she couldn’t have been dead for more than eighteen hours.”

“Yeah, I guess it’s hard to chop up your wife when you’re out camping with friends.”

“Thing is, her body was in the freezer. Chopped up it wouldn’t take that long to freeze solid. She was a tiny woman. That’s going to make time of death impossible to pinpoint and all the evidence…” She clenched her eyes shut for a moment. “Georgie won’t stand a chance.”

“He’s not supposed to. That’s what an attorney is for.”

“And the attorney is already talking about pleading out.”

“Then I’ll get him a better attorney.”

“Even if a better attorney could beat the charges, it could take a year for this to go to trial. I don’t think Georgie will survive a month in prison let alone a year.”

She was right. Georgie wouldn’t survive prison. If the other prisoners didn’t kill him being locked in a cage would.

“He needs help,” Kaitlin said. “The only kind of help you can give.”

Elliot shook his head. “You don’t know what you’re asking me.”

“Yes, I do.”

“No, Kaitlin. You don’t. No one understands. No one can understand. You can’t understand.” It was impossible for them to comprehend what it was like. How touching that part of Elliot drew him closer to where it came from.

They never heard the promises it made.

They never felt how it spread, infecting, burning him alive with a fever, getting him drunk on the darkness.

They had no idea how close he’d been to losing himself.

Like that night years ago Lucy saved him. Dragging him back from the edge, holding him in place.

Protecting him.

As if she’d heard the thought, Lucy walked into the kitchen and stopped beside Elliot’s chair. The whiskered bumps over her eyes went up and she tilted her head.

“I’m okay.” He fondled her ear.

She rumbled deep in her chest.

“I promise.”

Did she believe him?

Elliot wouldn’t have been surprised if she didn’t. He hardly believed himself. He definitely didn’t trust himself.

“Please El,” Kaitlin leaned closer. “Just this once. For Georgie. I swear I’ll never ask you again.”

“It’s never just once.”

It would domino. The very nature of opening himself up to the connection drew in evil, like wasps to honey.

And Elliot wasn’t sure he could outrun it a second time.

“What I do isn’t admissible in court.” He wasn’t sure why he said it. She was a cop, she knew the law. Court was about hard evidence, not supernatural incidences.

“Has it ever mattered before?”

It didn’t have to.

Because the guilty would confess and they would suffer. Not because they were trapped in an eight-by-six cell, but because there was no amount of concrete or razor wire capable of keeping out the agonizing visions that would haunt them until their dying day.

Would there come a time when Elliot faced judgment for what he did? He might have been forcing the guilty to see inside themselves, but it was still evil.

He should have felt guilty knowing that, except he didn’t. He never did. At most, there was anticipation.

And at what point did that make him one of the monsters?

It was that fear that made him stop and drove him into the small country house in the middle of nowhere. Fleeing from the prospect of saving lives to save himself because there was no way to know where the line was so he could keep from crossing it.

A mile away or inches.

Either way, it didn’t matter because one toe over and there was no going back.

But if he didn’t do this Georgie could pay the price and Darrel would never face punishment for his crime.

Lucy whine and leaned against Elliot’s chair. He didn’t have to hear her to know what she said. She would protect him, just like then.

“When do you need me to be there?”

Kaitlin’s smile was sad. “I’ll pick you up tomorrow at ten.”