Instinct by Jason Hough (ebook reader web TXT) 📗

smell of burning rubber makes me want to gag, and I force myself to get to my feet and move away, back to the main road.

Now I really have to choose. It’s a four-mile walk from here up to Silvertown, and roughly the same distance downhill to the edge of Granston. East or west. East or west.

I turn east, and start the long hike to Silvertown.

It seems like days later when I finally reach the thin narrow lane that leads up to the little bluff where the graveyard offers its striking view of the valley. The lane is curvy, walled in by trees on each side, which means from the state route I cannot see the parking area or the cleared hill and all its gravestones. The helicopter is still there, of that I feel certain. The sound of its rotor ebbed and vanished earlier when it landed, and I’ve heard nothing of it since.

The temptation to go that way is strong, but in the end I decide to keep on toward town. If the chopper is still there, it’s likely guarded, and I’m unarmed. Those fuckers have already tried to kill me, more than willing to hose down a garage full of expensive cars with automatic gunfire just for the off chance they might get a bullet into me. They also set my own car on fire. Something tells me if they spot me approaching their aircraft there won’t be any warning. They’ll just shoot me dead and then chuckle at the realization that I’ve delivered myself quite handily to the graveyard. Nothing left to do but the digging.

So I keep on.

But not all the way to town. Not yet. Because half a mile out I recognize another street, and this time I feel there is something worth stopping for.

It’s another winding narrow lane, but instead of trees walling in each side, there’s a mixture of lawns, hedges, and houses. Of Silvertown’s few neighborhoods, this is considered the nicest one. Back in the day, Conaty Corporation executives would have lived here. Not mansions, per say, but large homes with big yards that buffered them from any chance of having to suffer through the sound of a passing car.

With the company long gone, regular folk moved in, snatching up the chance at a nicer place as property values here nosedived in the wake of the scandal that sent all the executives scurrying off to Houston.

And one of them in particular is known to me, because almost every time I drive by it I see Doc’s Volvo parked at the end of the long driveway, just outside a detached garage. The home is just three driveways down on the left.

Locals call it the Smiley Mansion, and I haven’t yet thought to ask why. It’s an older place, perhaps as much as a hundred years old. From the look of it, though, it’s been renovated several times, and while not nearly as well preserved as Barbara Rogers’s home, the structure and the grounds are well kept.

“Damn it,” I whisper, upon seeing that Doc’s car is not in the driveway.

The windows of his house are all dark. In fact, the whole street is dark. It takes my exhausted brain a second to understand. The power’s been cut.

I hesitate, unsure now what to do. I’d hoped to find Doc’s car where it always is. There is a garage, though. Might as well try there. I still have the keys to the car. And, I realize, his house.

Despite the cover of darkness I still move up the lawn slowly, hunched over, every sense on high alert. There’s a good fifty feet separating his place from the neighbors on either side, and no fences, so I scan their windows, too, just to be sure no one is watching.

It’s only when I’m halfway up the drive that I realize I’m doing it again. Going it alone. Doing the opposite of what used to be my strongest instinct. The thought takes mental effort to complete, like pulling an old friend’s phone number from memory. Once I manage to grasp the concept, though, there comes a second conscious effort to ignore it. I do need help. I know that, even if I can’t keep the idea in my head when it matters. But right now, I think maybe the new go-it-alone Mary Whittaker is the better one, because after everything I saw in Ang’s mansion, I don’t know who I can trust. Certainly anyone with a broken nose is to be avoided, but Doc’s neighbors? Who knows if he’s drawn them into this mess, or used them as early guinea pigs.

No, right now I want to get into Doc’s place. Confront him if he’s there, or at least search his bathroom for a first aid kit so I can bandage up my goddamn skinned knee.

I try the garage first, though.

The actual door has no external manual release. There’s a keypad on the frame, but without power it’s useless to me. I go around back, happy to be concealed from view to anyone driving by. Not that anyone is.

There’s a back door to the garage. I twist the handle and open it a crack. Already adjusted to darkness, my eyes pick up nothing but stacks of moving boxes and the usual assortment of tools and lawn care equipment. No car, though, which is a bummer. Yet no car also means he’s not here, and that’s a decent consolation prize.

Resting atop a shelf by the door is a flashlight. A rechargeable one, but it’s plugged in. I grasp it and flick the power switch while pressing the business end against my hand. A glow of red instantly appears.

“Nice,” I breathe, and turn the device off again. Time to check the house.

A covered patio runs the length of the rear of the building, looking out on a slightly overgrown lawn and meager garden. Double French doors look in on a dark interior. The door itself is locked, but a quick jab