Dark Hollows (A Finn McCoy Paranormal Thriller Book 4) Read online

  Dark Hollows

  A Finn McCoy Paranormal Thriller

  Scott Langrel

  Copyright © 2014 by Scott Langrel

  All Rights Reserved

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, or by photocopying or recording, without the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law, or for the purposes of brief quotations for articles or reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. Resemblance of characters to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Geographical locations are used in a fictitious manner.

  Other books in the Finn McCoy series:

  The Grass Monkey and Other Dark Tales (A Finn McCoy Paranormal Prequel)

  Homecoming (A Finn McCoy Paranormal Thriller #1)

  Shadows in the Sand (A Finn McCoy Paranormal Thriller #2)

  Cold Chills (A Finn McCoy Paranormal Thriller #3)

  To be notified of new releases, please contact the author at

  [email protected]

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Epilogue

  Excerpt From The Blight: A Wolf Donovan Supernatural Thriller

  Prologue

  Randy Peterson had discovered that he was a gofer, and he was none too happy about it.

  Sure, he had the fancy title of technical assistant, and that had been a major selling point when he’d been offered the job. Randy figured it would look good on his resume, so he’d decided to sign up. It sure as hell hadn’t been for the pay, which was virtually non-existent.

  He tripped over an exposed tree root and nearly went down. Cursing, he steadied himself and switched his flashlight on. He was losing daylight fast; he’d be lucky to make it up to the malfunctioning motion sensor before dark, and it was a certainty that he would be making the return trip to base camp in the pitch black. On top of that, the gathering clouds signaled an approaching storm, and Randy had left his raingear back at camp.

  Increasing his pace, Randy continued up the wooded slope toward the ancient train trestle. Even in broad daylight, the thing looked rickety as hell; in the gloomy shadows of the coming darkness, it appeared downright dilapidated. Randy found it hard to believe that trains actually crossed the ramshackle bridge on a daily basis. He wouldn’t have crossed the thing on a handcart for any amount of money.

  On the plus side, his time in this God-forsaken rural craphole was nearly over. With any luck, filming would wrap up tomorrow or the next day, then it would be back to civilization for editing and post-production. Randy couldn’t wait to be rid of rural Kentucky. He had to drive for nearly twenty minutes just to get to a McDonald’s, for Pete’s sake. And he hadn’t seen a Starbucks in over a week. The quicker he got to return to Cincinnati, the better he would like it.

  Randy paused to catch his breath and check his bearings. He was pretty sure he was close to the spot where they’d placed the motion sensor several days before. It had been functioning properly up until thirty minutes ago, when it had suddenly gone offline. Caleb, the team leader, was nothing if not a stickler for perfection. As far as Randy could tell, it was the man’s only redeeming quality. Caleb had no imagination. How he’d ended up making documentaries about the supernatural was a mystery to Randy.

  Clearly, it was all about the money. Paranormal crap was the hot ticket of the day, and every fool with a video recorder was trying to cash in on the craze. It wasn’t as if anyone on the crew actually believed in this type of spooky bullshit, least of all Randy.

  As he resumed walking, however, he had to admit that he was a bit uncomfortable in the darkening woods. He was out of his element; he’d been born and raised in the city and had seldom ventured into rural areas, much less the outright wilderness. The great outdoors held little interest for Randy. Technology, not nature, fascinated him. The woods were better left to rednecks and tree huggers.

  He topped a rocky outcrop and fanned his flashlight’s beam. He was sure he was in the right spot; they’d attached the sensor to a tree trunk which lined the crude path leading up to the railroad tracks. Now, it was nowhere to be seen.

  Annoyed, Randy unclipped his two-way radio from his belt and pressed the talk button.

  “Peterson to base.”

  “Base here,” Caleb’s voice crackled from the radio’s speaker.

  “I’m up here at the spot where we placed the motion sensor.”

  “Did you find the problem?”

  “Yeah. The problem is that it’s not here.”

  There was a brief pause. “What do you mean, it’s not there?” Caleb asked irritably.

  “I mean it’s gone. I’m standing beside the tree we attached it to, and there’s no sign of it.”

  “Maybe it fell off the tree. Did you look on the ground around it?”

  “Caleb, I’m telling you, it’s gone. I helped strap it to the tree myself. No way did it just happen to fall off.”

  “Damnit, Randy! All of this equipment is rented. We can’t just lose a two-hundred dollar piece of equipment. We’re running over budget as it is.”

  Randy gave the radio a look of contempt. If Caleb was so concerned about it, he could haul his condescending ass up the mountain and help look for it.

  “I understand that, Caleb. But I’m telling you it’s not here. Even the straps are gone. It didn’t just fall off the tree.”

  “So you’re saying someone took it?”

  “Obviously,” Randy answered, then paused as he realized the ramifications of that statement. If someone had taken the sensor, it was likely that the someone in question was still lurking nearby, possibly watching him from the concealment of the dark woods.

  Randy fought the sudden urge to bolt back down the mountainside. He’d neither heard nor seen anything out of the ordinary since leaving the base camp. If someone were out to ambush him, they probably would have done so by now.

  “Must be locals,” Caleb’s voice came from the radio. “They must have gotten wind of the project. Damn. This could compromise the rest of the shoot.”

  “Yeah, well I’m feeling pretty compromised right now. I’m heading back down to camp.”

  “Hold on. Just stay put. I’ll send Mark and Trevor up there. It’s probably just kids.”

  “So what if it is?” Randy argued. “You think they’re just going to hand the sensor back to us?”

  “We need to show that we won’t put up with this bullshit.”

  “So you want us to beat up some kids?”

  “No,” Caleb said, speaking slowly, as if to a child. “I do not want you to assault anyone. Just see if you can flush them out and get our equipment back.”

  “There’s a storm blowing in,” Randy protested.

  “I’ll send your raingear up with Trevor. Base out.”

  Randy spat on the radio, then wiped the saliva off on his pants leg. That sanc
timonious prick was a gnat’s hair away from being one technical assistant short. If Randy had had his own ride, he would have marched off that mountain, told Caleb where to shove it, and driven back to the city. But since he had hopped a ride with Trevor to save on gas, Randy supposed he was stuck.

  If it had been kids who had taken the sensor, then the little delinquents had better hope that Randy didn’t find them.

  A flash of lightning illuminated the mountainside, followed by the rumble of thunder. The storm would be upon him before Mark and Trevor could arrive with his rain suit. Swell. At least it was August, and the temperature had been blistering hot during the day, so he was in no danger of freezing. In fact, he supposed that a little rain would feel refreshing, as long as he could keep from getting struck by lightning.

  Well, there was no use in just standing around. He might as well look about and see if he could find anything. With any luck, he might find the missing sensor and get back to camp before the brunt of the storm hit. If he did, Randy would be tempted to shove the sensor in Caleb’s face and tell him to go find the Goat Man himself.

  Goat Man, Randy thought with a chuckle. What a joke. As far as cryptids went, the Goat Man was definitely a B-list character, certainly not in the same league as Bigfoot or the Mothman. When you found yourself making a documentary about the Goat Man, you had to realize that you were scraping the bottom of the barrel. But there were already plenty of films about Bigfoot and Mothman, and even the Jersey Devil. Randy supposed that the producers had wanted some fresh subject matter, and the list of North American mythical creatures was a fairly short one.

  Enter the Kentucky Goat Man, a creature which supposedly roamed the area around the dilapidated railroad trestle and lured unsuspecting victims to their deaths. Some versions of the legend said that the Goat Man would lure its victims onto the trestle, where they would either be hit by an oncoming train or be forced to leap to their deaths. Other accounts had the creature ambushing and killing unlucky travelers with a bloody axe.

  Randy walked between the trees, tracking his flashlight on the ground. The forest floor had certainly been disturbed, but that could have been from his own team when they’d placed the sensor. Or it could have been a deer or other wild animal, for all Randy knew. He was definitely no expert on tracks.

  The first timid drops of rain began to fall. Randy knew that he would be soaking wet within minutes. His gaze drifted toward the eastern sky, in the direction of the ancient trestle. Lightning once again illuminated the dusky landscape. Randy’s breath caught in his throat.

  There was someone standing on the trestle.

  He could make out only a silhouette, and only for the briefest of moments, but he was sure he had seen someone. A very tall someone. He was a good distance from the trestle, so it was hard to judge proportions, but he was sure it hadn’t been a kid.

  Being alone on the side of a mountain—in the dark, and with a storm fast approaching—suddenly didn’t seem to be the best of ideas, Caleb be damned. Randy turned and started back down the slope. He would probably meet Mark and Trevor on their way up, but that was all right. They could either turn around and follow him back to camp or they could continue on their merry way.

  As for Randy, he was finished. If that meant his job, then so be it. It wasn’t that sweet of a gig, anyway. And it didn’t pay near enough for him to consider confronting some banjo-playing inbred alone and in the dark.

  The rain began to fall in earnest, and the next flash of lightning nearly blinded Randy. He swung his head back toward the trestle, but the light had already faded and he could see nothing. Surely, though, the figure on the bridge wasn’t pursuing him. And even if it was, Randy had enough of a head start to easily make the safety of the base camp. Not to mention, he should be running into the other guys any minute now.

  The storm was turning into a real gully washer. It was raining so hard that his flashlight was virtually useless, and despite the hot and muggy conditions, he was beginning to get chilled. He began to walk faster, anxious to get into his dry tent and a dry set of clothes. The storm would shut down any surveillance for at least an hour, so maybe he would have time for a couple of beers, as well. If, that was, his ice chest hadn’t been raided.

  With thoughts of warm clothes and cold beer running through his mind, Randy didn’t notice the moss-covered rock until it was too late. He planted his right foot squarely upon it, and the next thing he knew, he was tumbling ass over teakettle down the side of the mountain. Briars and saplings tore at his clothes and exposed skin as he plunged down the slope, and his flashlight went flying from his grip as he sought to grab onto something—anything—to slow or halt his progress.

  After what seemed like an eternity, he finally came to rest in a patch of laurel. For several moments he lay motionless, afraid to move and breathing heavily. There was no pain initially, only shock and the rush of adrenaline. Slowly, however, his right leg began to throb, and then the throbbing morphed into a wracking pain which shot from his knee down to his toes. Panicked, Randy tried moving the affected extremity and was rewarded with a wave of pain so extreme that his stomach roiled. He turned his head to the side and threw up violently.

  Broken, he thought with terrible clarity. My friggin’ leg is broken! Blindly, he groped for his radio, and was dismayed to find that it was gone, lost during the fall.

  He was hurt, and he was alone. Fear pulled his stomach into knots. How far off the path had he fallen? Fifty feet? More? He could hear nothing over the din of the pouring rain. Mark and Trevor could be passing him by even now, and Randy would never hear them. Worse still, he had no light with which he might signal his location.

  And then he did hear something—the sound of wood breaking, as if someone had stepped on a large, fallen tree branch with enough force to snap it. Randy craned his head to look back up the slope, but could see nothing through the darkness and driving rain. It was probably Mark and Trevor, on their way up the mountain. He almost called out, but another thought caused him to hesitate.

  He remembered the shadowy form he’d seen on the trestle.

  That was ridiculous. There was no way the figure on the bridge could have made it across the ravine and around the side of the mountain in such a short span of time. Besides, Randy had no reason to believe that it was anyone out to do him harm. He’d been spooked, that was all. And if he wimped out and remained silent, it could be hours before anyone found him. The thought of spending the night lying in the bushes with a broken leg in a thunderstorm did not exactly appeal to him.

  “Hello?” he yelled. “Guys? I’m down here! I need help! I think my leg’s broken!”

  Randy paused, hoping for a reply. He had no idea how far his voice had carried through the storm, but he was certain that anyone traversing the path above would have heard him. He strained his ears, hoping to hear the sound of help coming down the mountainside.

  He heard nothing but the pounding rain.

  “Help!” he screamed, desperate now. “Mark! Trevor! I’m down here!”

  Behind him, something moved.

  Unable to shift his body, Randy craned his neck back. He saw two things before his life came to an abrupt end.

  The first thing he saw was the creature. Framed against the flashing lightning, it towered above him. Red eyes glowed in the sockets of its large, goat-like head, and its matted hair, soaked by the rain, clung to its skull and face. The thing’s mouth hung open in a vicious snarl, revealing a set of wickedly-sharp teeth that no ordinary goat had ever owned.

  The second—and last—thing that Randy Peterson saw was the axe, stained with the dull red blood of the monster’s previous victims, as it descended on its deadly arc toward the center of his face.

  Chapter One

  Prucilla Pridemore couldn’t sleep. Something about the storm raging outside unsettled her and, try as she might, she couldn’t shake the feeling. It wasn’t like her; very few things actually scared Pru, and a simple thunderstorm wasn’t one of them. None
theless, sleep evaded her.

  At thirteen, Pru was well beyond the stage at which normal children were frightened by storms. But Pru was hardly a normal child. For as long as she could remember, she had been able to sense and see things that others around her could not. At first, she had not been able to differentiate between the spirits she saw and normal, living people. But when Pru was five, her beloved grandmother had died. For weeks, Pru had seen her Gramma’s spirit lingering about the house. Eventually, Pru came to understand that it was not actually her grandmother she’d seen, but a ghost.

  Her parents, of course, had not believed her, thinking their daughter to have an overactive imagination. Over the course of time, Pru had seen the wisdom in keeping her secret to herself and had told no one about her abilities. But that had all changed a little over a year earlier, when Pru and her mother had taken a trip to the South Carolina coast to visit Pru’s aunt and uncle.

  Pru yawned and stretched herself under her covers. Lightning flashed through her window, illuminating her bedroom and twisting shadows into elongated and unnatural shapes. The rumble of thunder followed closely behind and was loud enough to rattle the window in its frame. Pru had been counting the seconds between the lightning and the thunder, and was thus able to determine that the lightning had struck less than a mile away. Her father had taught her the trick shortly before he died.

  In South Carolina, the retirement community of White Pine Island had become the hunting ground for a pair of evil sea demons known as Nixes. Pru had lost her uncle, Paul Stallings, to the demonic entities, and had seen the rest of her family spared only through the intervention of Finn McCoy, a “paranormal handler” who happened to be on the island at the request of an old friend, Nan Roberts. Pru had teamed with McCoy and his girlfriend Amanda to defeat the Nixes, but in the process she had been forced to reveal her secret to her mother and aunt.

  In the year since, Becky Pridemore had come to accept her daughter’s unique gifts, though she had yet to become comfortable with them. For Pru’s part, she generally downplayed her talent for her mother’s sake, though she continued to see spirits and, to a lesser extent, demons in and around her Kentucky home. She had also kept in frequent touch with Amanda and McCoy, whom she had come to regard as a father figure. McCoy had taught her much about the supernatural world and Pru, ever the quick learner, now understood the dangers of her environment more clearly than ever before.