The Shadowkiller by Matthew Scott Hansen Read Free Book Online Page A

sensation, it caused him to stop and turn. Jack fully expected to see the sun peeking from behind the clouds, but instead the unbelievable figure facing him astride the trail a mere fifteen yards away caused his entire body chemistry to change in a split second. His hand went lax and his cigarette pack dropped.
    Jack Remsbecker’s mouth fell open and his perception became dreamlike, as if what was happening was not actually happening. It was the body’s extraordinary defense mechanism, preventing the mind from sending such shocking distress signals to the organs so as to actually induce heart failure or blackout from shock. Keeping going, despite all hope’s seeming gone, was part of a last-ditch effort by the body to save itself. The failure of that safety mechanism, when confronted by a certain, terrible death, can cause some to literally die of fright.
    Jack was not so lucky.
    He saw it all coming through eyes filtered by absolute, paralyzing fear. As this towering engine of destruction quickly advanced on him, he stood stock-still, his Timberlands glued to the muddy trail. Somewhere, some cognizant brain function ruled flight impossible. The figure moved so fast, too fast for something that big. And he saw the certainty of his death in its eyes.
    As it reached him, his muscles crumbled and he fell backward. But it caught him by the face before he went all the way over and held him, the pressure just enough to keep him up. Then it lifted him off the ground. Its massive palm covering his entire face, Jack saw his peripheral vision flash with red flecks as his blood pressure maxed out.
    He felt it bounding up the hill, off the trail. It carried him easily and, after a moment, stopped and shifted its grip to the back of his neck. It raised him, and their faces came within a foot of each other. As muscled fingers closed Jack’s voice box off, he smelled the awful stench of this thing and stared into its terrible orbs, yellow centers glistening with white rage.
    Then he heard—and felt—a popping sound like microwave popcorn. It was his spine.
    Jack wanted to cry like a baby but couldn’t get his lungs to respond because his neck had just suffered the catastrophic C2-C3 break, rendering his body from his shoulders to his toes into just so much flaccid meat. Then he felt hot breath as this unspeakable demon opened its vast mouth and bit into most of his face like an apple, from his chin to the bridge of his nose. With his vision still momentarily functioning, his severed spine didn’t ameliorate the unbearable pain from his neck up or the stark terror of man’s worst primal fear—that of being consumed alive by another creature. Jack’s last chaotic sensations were unimaginable agony layered upon exquisite horror.

7
    N ot long after the recently demised Jack Remsbecker had been spirited deep into the woods, then cleaned and consumed like a slaughterhouse chicken, Ty was easing the Mercedes back into its tiled slot. By the clock over the work bench it was 6:52. He knew Ronnie would be up and there would be tension until he explained himself.
    He crossed the plaza into the house, hung his James Dean death jacket in the closet, and staggered toward Ronnie’s office, hoping to expunge his cryptic good-bye message from her computer. In the kitchen sat his six-year-old daughter, Meredith, in her pajamas, spooning corn-flakes as if comatose. Ty knew that she would someday describe herself as “not a morning person.”
    â€œHi, sweetie. Mommy up?”
    â€œYeah,” she managed in a whisper.
    â€œShe been in her office yet?”
    â€œDunno.”
    In Ronnie’s office the screen saver streaked Escherlike images of ducks and reversed ducks, the same image that had played earlier. Ty tapped a key and the message he had typed was gone.
    â€œShit…”
    â€œHi.”
    Ty spun to find his wife standing in the doorway, wearing a white terry cloth robe, wet hair