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By the time Deirdre pulled the trigger, the beast already reached across his body and grabbed her arm. The bullet missed Jake’s head by inches. As Billy spun her around, the gun flew out of her hand and clattered across the floor. Shandi scrambled over to it, scooped it up, and pointed it at the beast. She knew it wouldn’t help her, but she felt safer having it in her hands and not Deirdre’s.
The beast enshrouded Deirdre’s face in his massive hand, muffling her screams. Her body kept twisting, as he continued pulling on her arm with an ungodly force. A horrible, sickening crack echoed through the room, and the screams stopped suddenly. The beast tossed Deirdre aside like a rag-doll, her body crumpling to the floor in an unnatural tangle of limbs.
Shandi forcefully stifled the urge to scream. The beast turned towards her, not immediately descending on her. She suddenly realized that the gun presented a threat to Billy without offering any real protection to her. Pointing it at him would only serve to make her a target. She sat it on the ground next to her and slowly stood with her hands up. She didn’t know if he would respond to that body language, but it seemed as reasonable as anything else.
She glanced at Jake, saw his eyes closed and felt her heart thump in fear that he had passed out. His hand twitched, indicating that he still lived, and she suppressed the need to drop down beside him. Maybe he just didn’t want to see what had happened to Deirdre and what might happen next.
As Billy took a step toward her, Shandi froze in place, afraid that if she ran, it would trigger a predator instinct in him that he wouldn’t be able to ignore. She needed to show him that she did not fear him.
“Billy. It’s okay. It’s not your fault,” she said, her voice far weaker than she had hoped.
He looked deep into her eyes. She could see more there now, recognition at his name, perhaps, though she might’ve been imagining it. He kept advancing on her. She forced herself to stand her ground, unable to control the forceful shaking of her limbs.
He stood directly over her now. She slowly tilted her head back to look at him, reminding herself that this creature had once been a man. He had done horribly gruesome things, but those atrocities could hardly be blamed solely on him. Arrowhead had done this to him, sentencing him to a life of pain and agony. She could only hope that he could still recognize and appreciate sympathy.
In an instant, he spun and ran out the door, stopping to let out one of his inhuman howls as he crossed the porch. Shandi breathed a sigh of relief and moved back to Jake. His eyes fluttered open now, but he looked drained.
Before she could talk to him, a gunshot rang out. Then more. She heard the beast growl. She jumped back to her feet and ran out onto her porch to see Cam shooting at the beast from the other side of his Suburban.
“Cam. Stop!” she yelled.
It didn’t matter to her in that moment that she stood on her front porch in jeans and a bra. Cam looked up at her with surprise, giving the beast time to run. Only once Billy had moved far enough away did Cam scuttle to the front porch and grab Shandi’s shoulders.
“Are you okay?”
She pointed towards the door and responded with a single, shaky word. “Deirdre.”
Cam rushed inside. Shandi followed. Cam quickly glanced over at Jake, but then went to Deirdre and knelt beside her. As Shandi took in the way that Deirdre’s head sat, she knew the beast had killed Deirdre. No one could be twisted up in that way and survive. Cam put two fingers to her throat. The look on his face confirmed it. Deirdre would no longer present a threat.
He looked back at her. “Did the beast do this?”
Again, Shandi nodded. Cam moved to Jake and studied Shandi’s blood-soaked shirt wrapped around Jake’s arm. He looked into Jake’s eyes and patted his cheek. “Stay with me, Jake. You’ll be fine.”
Cam shouted something into the radio on his shoulder, helped Jake to lay down on his back, then found a footstool in the kitchen that he used to prop up Jake’s legs. Shandi felt immediately grateful that Cam had shown up when he had. She found herself unable to act. She wanted to go to Jake, to comfort him and hold his good hand, but instead she just sank to the floor and stared off into the distance. Cam would have to handle it for now.
Soon, EMTs flooded into her house. Most of them went to Jake, some to Deirdre, but one came to Shandi. She felt guilty taking the attention of someone who might be able to help Jake. She felt fine. She just needed to collect herself. She waved the EMT away and got back on her feet. He forced a blanket over her shoulders and she accepted it.
She watched as they gingerly removed her shirt from Jake’s arm. She winced at the blood, unsure whether losing that much blood meant a death sentence. She wouldn’t be able to get to Jake now. She could barely see him in the sea of medics. She didn’t remember what Cam had ordered into his radio, but it seemed to have gotten every EMT in Rose Valley to her house.
One of the medics looked at Cam. “He’s going to be fine. It looks bad, but it’s mostly superficial.”
Cam clapped him on the shoulder. “Thanks, Brian.”
That didn’t compute to Shandi. Jake looked far too weak for it to just be a superficial wound. Something drained his energy, and if not the gunshot wound, then...
The beast. Jake brought Billy to them, and most likely Jake saved her by sending Billy away. Could that have taken a toll? It seemed reasonable. Shandi felt an overwhelming sense of relief as she started to accept the EMT’s promise. Jake would be fine. Only Deirdre would die tonight.
Cam stood up and disappeared into Shandi’s house. One of the medics brought in a gurney and started strapping Jake to it. Healthy or not, Jake seemed destined for another visit to the Rose Valley emergency room. She would go with him, of course, and for that she would need a shirt.
She dropped the blanket on the floor and navigated around the hubbub. As she turned the corner to her bedroom, she almost ran directly into Cam’s chest.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. Here,” Cam said as he thrust one of her t-shirts towards her. She looked down at the faded green leprechaun on the front, trying to remember the last time she’d wore it. Maybe not since they had been married.
Shandi smiled despite the situation, and replied, “Thanks.”
She turned around and slipped the shirt over her head as she walked. Cam followed and patted her on the back in an uncharacteristic show of comfort.
Cam called out, “Brian!”
One of the EMTs walked over. Cam put his hand on the young man’s shoulder, stood to full height, then looked him straight in the eyes. “This is Jake’s girlfriend. Make sure you keep her in the loop. I don’t care what your stupid rules are. You treat her like his family, y’hear me?”
Brian nodded. “Yessir, Sheriff. You got it.”
Cam nodded back and smiled. “Good. Thanks, Brian.”
She expected Cam’s reaction to be much less gracious, especially when he had arrived to her so scantily clad. But that had always been the way with Cam. When you needed him to come through—when it really mattered—he would never let you down. She too often forgot that about him.
Brian motioned for her to follow out to the ambulance, where she climbed into the back next to Jake. The back of the ambulance left little room for her to squeeze in, but she didn’t mind. It was the least she could do.
As they rushed through the streets of Rose Valley, Shandi felt her wits returning to her. She thought about Deirdre and expected to feel remorse or horror, but she didn’t. She felt anger, then a brief flash of embarrassment, and then the resolute surety that Deirdre deserved what she got. Shandi smiled, content in the fact that Deirdre couldn’t hurt Jake anymore, and that she wouldn’t be able to convince anyone else that the beast couldn’t be saved.
Billy recognized his name. Shandi would have bet her life on it. Their plan would work. They could find the humanity in him. They had to.
