Survivors Will Be Shot Again by Bill Crider Read Free Book Online Page B

That was why it was better not to think about the past. What was left of it never lived up to the memories.
    Rhodes drove past and around another curve, turned left onto another road, and drove a half mile to where the Hunts lived. He pulled off to the side of the road, stopping the Tahoe in front of the house. It had been new when Rhodes was a boy, but it hadn’t been fancy even then. It hadn’t been kept up, and now showed its age. The paint was flaked and peeling, and a few loose shingles lay on the roof. A pane in one of the windows had been replaced by cardboard. The yard was mostly weeds, and it hadn’t been mowed in a while. The house sat up on concrete blocks, and the space between the house and the ground was covered with tin that had been painted white like the house, though some of it had been bent away and not straightened. It was streaked with rust. The satellite dish on the roof looked like new, however.
    Rhodes couldn’t remember exactly when the Hunts had moved into the house, but it had been a good many years earlier. The original owners, an old couple named Phelps, had moved somewhere to be closer to their children. Houston, Rhodes thought, or Dallas. They were probably dead by now.
    Melvin’s wife, Joyce, had worked in town for a while at the Walmart, but she’d quit a few years ago and hadn’t had another job as far as Rhodes knew. Melvin made a little money doing odd jobs around Clearview, and he’d done welding for people who needed it until his rig had been stolen. Hunt might’ve been the one who cut out the B-Bar-B brand and welded it to Billy’s gate for him. Rhodes would have to remember to ask Billy about that.
    The welding rig had been kept in the barn in back of the house. The barn was in no better condition than the house, but at least it hadn’t fallen down. Yet. Rhodes didn’t think it was going to last much longer if something wasn’t done.
    Rhodes looked through the windshield of the Tahoe at the trees in back of the barn. They grew thickly all the way down to Crockett’s Creek, and Rhodes wondered if the Hunts had experienced any problems with feral hogs. It seemed likely, but something like that would be the last of Joyce Hunt’s concerns now.
    Rhodes got out of the Tahoe and shut the door. As soon as he did two black-and-brown short-haired dogs of indeterminate breed charged out from under the little porch in front of the house and headed straight for him, barking loudly, teeth bared. There was some leopard hound in their background somewhere.
    Carelessness. That was what came of thinking about the past. You forgot about the present and what might get you in trouble. Rhodes should have thought about the dogs. There were almost always dogs at houses this far out in the country, and the people who had them didn’t usually keep them around as companions. They wanted real watchdogs who could protect their property from other animals and unwanted guests, and this pair didn’t appear to be in a friendly mood. They appeared to be in the mood to rip somebody’s arms off, and the nearest somebody with arms was Rhodes.
    Moving with an alacrity he hadn’t experienced since the long-gone Will o’ the Wisp days, Rhodes opened the Tahoe door, jumped inside, and slammed the door. He was just in time. The dog that had been two steps ahead of the other, unable to stop his forward momentum, slammed into the door with enough force to shake the vehicle. Or maybe Rhodes was just imagining that. The Tahoe weighed nearly six thousand pounds, after all.
    The dog wasn’t hurt. He and his partner stood outside the Tahoe, jumping up and trying to bite Rhodes through the window, their claws scratching the paint as they slid back down. The Blacklin County Sheriff’s Department decal was going to be a mess. The county commissioners wouldn’t be happy about that.
    Rhodes could have unlocked the shotgun and given the dogs a bit of