Page 50 of Bait and Switch
“Facts,” Calvin spat. “Nobody cares about facts. Nobody cares about anything. It’s all lies. Dwayne and me, we just do what we’re told and have a little fun on the side. But when something goes sideways, we’re nothing. Less than nothing. It’s all burning down, all of it!”
Calvin had moved again, and for a second, Casey could clearly see a partial silhouette of him. In the firelight, he looked like a beast, barely human, worse than someone who’d been living rough for weeks or even months. Backlit by the flames, he looked like the wild man Carlos had described. Then Calvin started moving, jumping around and flailing his arms, and Casey started to worry that he was under the influence of something. If he’d had something in his hands, Casey couldn’t see it now.
The wooden roof of the shed crackled and popped, then fell inward in slow motion, sending sparks shooting up into the night sky. A different kind of stars and not ones that Casey was overly fond of. The one good thing about this weird-ass situation was that it had started to snow. At first, he’d assumed the flakes landing on his clothing were ashes, but it seemed that nature had a different plan.
Unfortunately, the wind also started to pick up. Even with the precipitation, it wouldn’t take too much for the scraggly cedars growing just feet from what was left of the shed to catch and go up like poorly made candles.
“Calvin.” Casey tried to reach him with words again, even though he figured it was a lost cause. He scrambled to come up with another tactic. “You started the fire? Why?”
With what he hoped looked like casual ease, Casey started moving to his right, around the outside of the fire, away fromthe still burning pile of lumber. He figured he maybe could catch Perkins by surprise and disable him.
“Dwayne died there. It’s one of those things.” Calvin stood still while he thought about his answer. “A pyre. I’m releasing his spirit, it’s trapped in there.”
Briefly, Casey shut his eyes. Seriously? Calvin Perkins was going to make Casey feel sorry for him? After all these years of despising the man and his dead brother almost more than anyone else on Heartstone?
“Gotcha.” His laugh was maniacal, and the sound had Casey’s eyes snapping open and his stomach clenching. “Dwayne would’ve hated that fucking woo-woo bullshit. I’m burning this whole place down because it’s haunted. It needs to go. I’m done with this. Then I’ll take care of the rest. I’ll take care of it all, there’ll be nothing left.”
“Er, Calvin, seems to me you’re going a bit too far. This isn’t your property—” He wasn’t going to get into a who-the-land-belonged-to conversation since Casey had strong pro-Indigenous opinions about land rights. “This is Gordon’s place, and I think he’s going to be sad that you’ve burned it down.”
“Gordon? You mean that namby-pamby man-boy? Everybody is allpoor Gordon. What about me? What about Dwayne?!”
Ah, there it was, the world-revolves-around-me argument. Calvin had probably managed to convince himself that Dwayne’s death was Gordon’s fault—not Deter Nolan’s.
“For fuck’s sake,” he muttered.
Slowly, Casey continued to ease around the blaze, not wanting to alert Perkins, although the guy didn’t seem to be paying attention to him. Was he alone? Where was his massive truck? Casey peered into the dark, his flashlight in his hand once again.
The fire snapped violently, sending more sparks upward, and again Calvin was briefly visible—if anything, he looked worse than Casey’s initial impression, his clothing ripped and shredded, barely holding together. And whatever Calvin had been carrying now sat on the ground not far enough from the flames, just an odd lumpy shape.Shit. What was it?
“I wouldn’t come any closer if I was you,Ranger.” The last word was said with a familiar Perkins-style sneer.
The snowfall began to thicken, and visibility was diminishing. Fat flakes swirled in the dark and wind—except in the radius of the fire. From far away, Casey thought he heard the call of a siren, but he couldn’t be sure.
“They’re here,” Calvin whispered in a singsong voice, “and they’re going to get you next. You really shouldn’t be here, Lundin.”
Well,thatwasn’t creepy at all, Calvin sounded like he’d been taking lessons from Jack Nicholson. “Who are you talking about?” It was a good thing Mickie had made Casey watch quirky horror-adjacent shows as a kid.Salem’s Lotand theChuckieremake had left an indelible impression on young Casey. He pulled out his Glock.
Behind him was a crunching sound, and it wasn’t the fire consuming fuel. A twig? A footstep? Shit. Casey started to spin around, but it was too late. Something hard slammed against the side of his head. Dropping the flashlight, he stumbled forward, trying to pick his feet up so he didn’t lurch closer to the flames.
“What the fuck!?”
Blinking away tears of pain, Casey swung his gun hand around, weapon out, as he spun to fend off the attack. But his assailant lunged again, kicking this time, and the booted foot smacked hard against Casey’s wrist. His service weapon flew out of his grip into the dark, and Casey stumbled backward, trying to get a better look at the person in the flickering light.
Whoever it was appeared to be average size and was bundled up in cold winter gear, a baclava covering most of their face. All he could distinguish were unremarkable eyebrows that were just a dark slash above the fabric.
Casey was at a distinct disadvantage, reeling from the blow to the head, his weapon and flashlight out of reach. He was glad that at least he’d had the hood of his jacket pulled up over his toque. It had provided a small amount of protection, but he didn’t know if he was bleeding or not.
“Stand down,” he shouted, automatically raising his arms to protect himself. “I’m an officer of the law!”
His back was to Perkins now, and any second he expected Calvin to start raining blows on him. Casey had to assume these two were working together. The knock to his head was making him feel slightly nauseous, which was not good.
When is a head injury good, Casey?
The attacker remained silent and didn’t back away. Instead, they moved into Casey’s space, and with one shoulder dipped forward, they charged him. They were moving fast, and he’d already been caught off guard once and was now slightly dizzy.
He wobbled and lost his balance, landing on the frozen ground, a pained grunt escaping him. Casey’s already tender skull banged against an exposed rock, or maybe just frozen earth, and he saw stars.
He struggled to stand up, but his head was throbbing. Instead, he grappled for the attacker’s pant leg but couldn’t get a good hold on the fabric because his fingers were too cold.
