Free The Brotherhood of the Wheel by R. S. Belcher Page B

There was a computer hutch, an old, battered gray file cabinet covered in small magnetic tags each possessing a word, and a swivel computer chair that was patched with more duct tape than the chair in the living room. The hutch and the small cork bulletin board on the wall of the small alcove opposite the computer were covered with news and magazine articles. Many of the articles had Rears’s name as the byline. They were all paranormal magazines like Fortean Times and UFO Magazine. On the ledge of the nook’s single window was a small fish bowl with a beautiful blue betta fish swimming about, its regal tail whipping, as it circled a small yellow plastic pineapple house at the bottom of the bowl. She picked up the yellow plastic container of food and sprinkled a few flakes into the bowl.
    The computer tower was gone from the hutch desk, and there was another forensic number placard beside where it had sat. There was no external drive, no USB drives; only the keyboard and the mouse remained. Lovina sighed and then began to look at the piles of paper on the desk.
    Suddenly, she stopped and walked over to the fridge. She opened it. There was no beer inside, no PBR cans like the one found spilled on the living-room floor by the overturned folding chair—not the big leather recliner but the folding metal chair. She searched the overflowing trash can as well. No beer-can empties. The fire caught in her mind: Dewey had company when his visitors came calling. So the local PD was looking for two missing people, or a material witness had managed to flee the crime scene, or maybe his guest was part of the abduction.
    She went back to the office nook. The papers on the desktop were old receipts and illegible scribbled notes. One note was a series of numbers: “ 39.8282° N, 98.5795° W.” Scribbled after it was “door to the Four Houses. Wyandotte County location ‘reflection’? but not accurate. Don’t think GPS works there. U.S. 36 and 281—Conspiracy of the highway commission? Numerology? Any connection to Metropolis-Utopia??? Ask Ballard?” Lovina shook her head and put the paper back on the desk. Who the hell was Ballard ?
    Another crumpled piece of paper was a printout of a photo from the computer. It was blurry, grainy. It looked as if it was taken inside a forest in bright daylight. There were dark smudges, silhouettes of people with no features, just dark outlines, and behind them loomed a towering blur of shadow—arms, maybe—with massive antlers fracturing out from what looked like the head. In the corner of the picture, in Dewey’s spidery scrawl, was “Patient zero? Did this one start the whole thing? Meme? Viral?” She dropped the wrinkled picture back on the desk. You can take only so much crazy.
    Lovina opened the top drawer of Dewey’s file cabinet and froze. Shawn Ruth Thibodeaux was staring back at her—the subject of a photo lying on top of the stack of files in the drawer. Lovina’s heart jumped in her chest. The picture was grainy, and there was a date and time stamp in the corner of it, most likely a capture from a handheld video camera. The girl in the picture had black hair and pale skin. She was looking down, and she seemed to be right on top of the person taking the picture, almost charging them. There was another person in the picture beside her, but all that was visible was part of a clawing hand and the corner of a hooded sweatshirt. She lifted the photo out of the cabinet. It was Shawn Ruth.
    The front door of the apartment crashed open, and two uniformed cops from the Tallulah PD entered, sweeping the room. When the fatter one saw Lovina standing in the kitchen, he leveled his 9-mm pistol at her, as he panted and sweated.
    â€œHands on your head! Now!” he shouted. Lovina complied with a sigh. She held on to the photo as she put her hands on her head. “Police!” the other cop, who Lovina didn’t think looked