Warren took one more step.
Florence made good on her threat.
The two shots hit him in his oversized forehead.
Warren lunged at her, moving so fast Florence barely had time to dive to the side.
The giant turned around and faced her.
“Warren’s head hurts,” he said. Then his eyes got narrow. “Now Warren gonna make you hurt, too.”
# # #
Mal placed the pointed end of his exposed ulna against his throat, ready to kill himself before he let any more freaks operate on him.
But when the door opened, it wasn’t Eleanor or her monstrous brood.
A German Shepherd, tail wagging. It put its front paws on the embalming table and licked Mal’s face.
“JD! Oh, Jesus...”
Mal watched a blonde woman enter the room, followed by several others. The blonde wore a tee shirt, but no pants or shoes. A younger version of her—obviously her daughter—followed, holding hands with a boy wearing black leather gloves. A pregnant woman followed, clutching her belly with a thousand yard stare. The last person in was a woman in a tattered jogging outfit. She had limp hair and hollow eyes and looked like she’d lived through a war.
They immediately went about unstrapping him, bombarding him with multiple questions.
“Who are you?” “What happened?” “Are you okay?” “Where’s Eleanor?” “Where’s the exit?” “What’s your name?”
“I’m Mal,” he said. The pain in his wrist was bad, but bearable. He sat up, and the movement made him woozy. The older blonde put a hand on his shoulder to steady him.
“Do you know how to get out of here, Mal?”
“I think so. But I need a favor first.”
“What?”
“Your dog has something that belongs to me.”
The woman snapped her head around and pointed. “JD! Drop it!”
The German Shepherd opened his jaws, and Mal’s hand flopped onto the ground. The blonde picked it up without hesitation.
“I’m so sorry.”
“Pleased to meet you,” Mal said, “since we already seem to be shaking hands.”
The woman set the hand down next to Mal. Then she took a roll of gauze from the instrument tray and began to wrap it around Mal’s stump. “I’m Letti.”
“I know. I was supposed to interview you and your family.” Mal blinked twice, trying to keep it together. “Where’s Florence?”
“I don’t know.”
“Have you seen a woman with no legs? Her name is Deb?”
Letti shook her head. Mal eyed the other people in the room. He recognized the girl, Letti’s daughter, and the thin woman. She was also an
Though close to being in shock, Mal was still enough of a reporter to recognize what a terrific story this would make.
“I think my clothes are in a pile over there.”
Kelly turned away while Letti and Maria helped him get off the table and dress. Mal’s cell phone was still in his pants pocket. He tried it.
Letti found a plastic bag for his hand. She placed his severed appendage inside, and tied the bag to his belt.
“Thanks. There’s another door,” Mal said. “Far end of the room. That’s where Eleanor went. I think it’s the way out.”
Everyone loaded up on surgical tools—scalpels, knives, saws, cannulas—filling hands and pockets. Then they walked to the door, giving the corpse of Jimmy a wide berth. Letti let JD go through first.
“Clear,” she said.
They shuffled through the doorway, one by one. Rather than the exit, this was another room. It was large, a few hundred square feet. Concrete walls. Dirt floor, but muddy in parts. In the corner was a hole in the ground, several pipes leading into it. A pump and two water heaters stood next to the hole.
The rest of the room was packed, floor to ceiling, with cardboard boxes. Dozens and dozens of them, many of them crumbling and moldy.
Mal squinted at the nearest box.
He touched the cardboard and his finger went right through it, like tissue paper. Powder spilled out. Mal stared at the floor, and saw a great deal of the powder mixing with the dirt. Near the water pump, there was so much powder it had turned the mud a lighter color.
“What’s Distoval?” Kelly said, staring at a box.
“Distoval is another name for Contergan,” Mal said. He’d just read about this very subject when researching the history of Monk Creek. “It was a sedative, developed in the 1950s in Germany. They thought it was a wonder drug. DruTech was the company set to manufacture it in the US. But the FDA didn’t approve it. DruTech lost a fortune, and closed up their factory in town. They were supposed to dispose of their supply. I guess they paid off Eleanor, and it ended up here.”
“Why wasn’t it approved?” Letti asked.
“You probably know it by its other name. Billy Joel even mentioned it in a song.”
“Thalidomide,” Sue whispered.
Mal nodded, which made him slightly dizzy. He knew he was rambling, but it helped him feel grounded. “It caused massive birth defects. Real freaky stuff. Pregnant women taking it gave birth to children with some pretty terrible deformities.” Mal pointed to the well. “And it’s apparently gotten into the Inn’s water supply. The drugs have seeped into the ground. Anyone pregnant drinking from that well will... oh, shit.”
Mal’s addled brain remembered the woman who very obviously was with child.
“Are you saying,” the woman was gently rubbing her belly, “that my baby...”
“We don’t know that,” Letti went over to her. “We don’t know for sure, Sue. We’ll get you to a doctor when we get out of here.”
“But… this is Larry’s baby. It’s supposed to be normal.”
Letti patted Sue’s hair. “There’s nothing we can do about it now, Sue. Let’s focus on getting out of here.”
“I can’t have one of those freaks growing inside me. I can’t.”
Mal had been feeling pretty terrible before, but now he felt like curling up into a ball and dying.
“There’s the door,” Cam said. “Maybe that’s the way out.”
Cam led Kelly, by the hand, to the exit. Letti and JD followed.
“I’m so sorry,” Mal said to Sue.
“They did things to me,” Sue said. “Horrible things. I can’t have my baby be like that.”
“I’m sure it will be okay,” Mal lied.
Sue nodded. She and Mal walked toward the door, and then Sue broke off, heading for the well.
“Wait! Don’t!”
The pregnant woman gave him a sad, backward glance, then jumped into the hole. Two seconds later, there
