The Adjusters Read online

  Near the circular window was a metal-framed bed. The sheets were rumpled, as if someone had slept there recently. Henry started towards it, making out framed pictures standing on a bedside table. He picked one of them up and squinted at it, interested to see who actually lived there.

  The picture in his hand was old, perhaps taken twenty years before, judging by the clothes the people were wearing and the washed-out colours. He could just make out a couple in their fifties, grey-haired and standing on either side of a much taller, good-looking man, who Henry guessed was their son. He realized that the picture had been taken on the porch of the house, at a time when the place was well-painted and there were hanging baskets brimming over with flowers. He turned his attention to the younger man in the middle and realized with a shock that he recognized him…

  Although he was wearing a T-shirt and jeans rather than a cop’s uniform, it was unmistakably Trooper Dan.

  Henry’s mouth fell open. He hadn’t noticed who it was at first because the trooper’s expression in the photo was friendly and open. He was grinning broadly at whoever was taking the photo. Henry turned his attention to the other pictures on the table. He narrowed his eyes to pick out the details in the gloom. There were more of the older couple. A graduation photograph from a police academy.

  Dropping the photo on the bed, Henry was certain of one thing: they were standing in Trooper Dan’s house.

  And they had to get the hell out. Fast.

  Headlights and the sound of a vehicle moving outside made him cross to the window and look out.

  The familiar police cruiser had pulled up out front, sending a cloud of dust into the air. The car door swung open and Trooper Dan stepped out. He reached back into the vehicle, produced a pump-action shotgun, and then walked towards the porch.

  Henry felt his way across the attic room as swiftly as he could without making a racket on the floorboards. As he reached the top of the narrow stairs he heard the front door bang open. Trooper Dan’s boots clumped into the hallway, making no effort to disguise his presence. Henry listened for a moment. He couldn’t see, but he sensed the cop standing in the hall, listening to the silence of the darkened building. Clearly, the men in the helicopter had seen them run into his house and alerted the trooper. And now here he was.

  There was a loud, metallic rasp – the sound of a round being jacked into the chamber of the pump-action shotgun; Henry recognized it from a million cop shows.

  “Yoo-hoo!” Trooper Dan yelled into the house. “I just came to let you kids know, y’all picked a real bad place to hide.”

  Henry closed his eyes as he heard the man begin to walk across the hall, no doubt towards the lounge and then the kitchen… Where Fox would be hiding…

  Before he really knew what he was doing, he brought his foot down heavily on the nearest stair. A loud creak echoed through the house. Below, the sound of the cop moving stopped.

  “I can hear you, you dumb little punks!” Trooper Dan called up. “Don’t make me come up there. Or it’ll be worse for you!”

  Henry stood still for a moment, waiting for the cop’s next move. When he was greeted only with silence from below, he realized that the trooper was waiting for him to act. He licked his lips, which were incredibly dry. Suddenly, he remembered something he’d seen in one of the bedrooms on the second floor – an open fireplace…and beside it a metal poker. His best chance of a weapon against the man. And at least it would give Fox the opportunity to make a break for it…

  “Come and get me!” Henry yelled, bolting down the stairs to the second floor. Even as he reached the landing the sound of Trooper Dan thundering up the main staircase made the walls shake. Henry didn’t look round. He hit the half-closed door of the nearest bedroom and ran towards the fireplace, snatching up the poker and throwing himself down beside the bed…

  Trooper Dan jumped into the doorway and froze there, the shotgun trained on the room. There was no emotion in his eyes, but he was breathing heavily, excited.

  “I know you’re in here,” he hissed.

  Hidden by the bed, Henry held his breath and gripped the poker tightly in his hands. He knew he would get just one chance against his enemy. He had to wait for the man to step into the room.

  “You should have given up when you had the chance,” Trooper Dan said, walking into the room. “Now it’s gonna have to hurt…”

  Henry expected the cop to check the bed first, but was surprised when he headed for the other side of the room. He looked around and, seeing a cupboard standing ajar, realized the trooper thought that was where he was hiding. He’d been given a chance. All he had to do was wait…

  Trooper Dan passed the bed, shotgun aimed at the cupboard as he approached.

  “I’m gonna count to five,” he said. “One…two…”

  Henry tensed, ready to spring as the cop took another step past him.

  “Three…”

  He gripped the poker as tight as he could and focused on the back of Trooper Dan’s neck.

  “Four…”

  Henry leaped from his hiding place, raising his weapon above his head as he flew at the cop…

  Who spun round lightning fast, bringing the muzzle of the shotgun up. Henry skidded to a halt on the carpet, the poker going limp in his hands.

  “Five!” Trooper Dan said with a grin. “You think I’m stupid, son?”

  Henry allowed the poker to drop from his fingers. It landed heavily on the carpet and he started to back away towards the bedroom door. Trooper Dan followed him, keeping the shotgun aimed at his head.

  “Please,” Henry said, hoping desperately that Fox had used her chance to get away, “I haven’t done anything wrong.”

  “Haven’t done anything wrong?” Trooper Dan said. “You’ve broken into my house, boy. I’ve got every right to shoot you.”

  Henry backed through the door and out onto the landing.

  “I didn’t know…”

  “I didn’t know,” the man mimicked. “Well, I’ll tell you what I know. You’ve got about ten seconds to live. Say your prayers. If you do pray, that is, city boy.”

  Henry’s back touched the bannister. There was nowhere else to go.

  “I knew you were trouble from the first moment I laid eyes on you,” Trooper Dan said as his finger tightened around the trigger.

  Henry grabbed the bannister and pitched himself backwards. He fell a short distance…then hit the stairs on his side. The thick carpet cushioned his fall, but the pain was intense along his arm. With a cry, Henry began to tumble uncontrollably, coming to a rest on the floor of the entrance hall. He struggled to get up, but his leg buckled underneath him – he’d twisted it in the fall.

  Thud!

  Trooper Dan leaped over the bannister and landed perfectly on the stairs before him. Henry rolled over onto his back and began to push himself away in desperation.

  “Hoo-eee, boy!” Trooper Dan said with a whistle. “That was some acrobatic move! I didn’t think you had it in you!”

  Henry managed to get to his feet and started staggering back towards the front door, which was standing open, shafts of moonlight brightening the porch.

  “Come on, son,” Trooper Dan said, making his voice sound reasonable, friendly almost. “You didn’t think I was really gonna shoot now, did you?” He laid the shotgun down on the hall table as if to prove his point. “I ain’t gonna do that. It wouldn’t be fair. But I am gonna beat you to death…”

  He moved forward and aimed a kick at Henry’s stomach that connected with the force of a locomotive. Henry flew backwards, through the open door, across the porch and onto the dusty ground at the front of the house. He clutched at his gut and gasped, trying to suck air into his lungs as pain exploded through his diaphragm.

  Taking his time, Trooper Dan strolled across the porch, pulling on his leather gloves a little tighter and flexing his fingers. As the cop got close, Henry grabbed a handful of dirt and threw it at his face.

  “That ain’t nice,” Trooper Dan sa
id, dodging to one side and then reaching down to take Henry by the shirt front with his left hand. He hauled him to his feet and drew back his right fist.

  “No!”

  Trooper Dan’s fist stopped in mid-flight as Fox’s voice rang out from the porch.

  “Let him go right now or I’ll put a bullet in your head!”

  With a surprised look, Trooper Dan released his grip on Henry’s shirt, allowing him to fall back to the ground. They both turned to where Fox was standing… On the edge of the porch… The shotgun in her hands…

  “Hey!” the cop said. “That’s my gun!”

  “Back off!” Fox ordered, taking a step towards him across the porch.

  “You’re gonna put a bullet in my head?” Trooper Dan said. He tapped a gloved finger on the centre of his forehead. “Right here?”

  “Yes!” Fox said, clearly struggling to stop the shotgun from trembling in her grasp. “Put your hands up and stay back!”

  Trooper Dan slowly raised his arms. “It’s okay, missy. I ain’t gonna do nothin’ stupid.”

  “Take out your gun and toss it over here,” Fox ordered.

  Trooper Dan began to reach towards the revolver sitting on his hip.

  “Slowly!”

  “Take it easy,” Trooper Dan said as he picked the Magnum from his belt with his thumb and forefinger.

  “Toss it over here.”

  The cop threw the weapon so it landed on the porch steps between them. “There you go,” he said. “I ain’t armed no more. Now what?”

  Fox licked her lips and shifted the gun in her grasp. “Henry, are you okay?”

  Henry moved to the side and caught Fox’s eye. He could see she was terrified. “Just run,” he said.

  Trooper Dan grinned and started moving forward again. “Are you gonna run, girl? Ever fired a weapon before? You know you’ve got to squeeze the trigger, right? Squeeze it real slow…”

  “I know how to fire a gun!” Fox said, her voice high and strained. Beads of sweat stood out on her forehead. “Stop moving!”

  Trooper Dan sniggered. “Just give that shotgun here and we’ll forget all about it, what do you say?” He lowered his left hand and reached out for the weapon.

  “No deal,” Fox said with determination. She waved the end of the shotgun at him.

  The cop stopped moving and lowered his hands slowly. His voice hardened. “Now, let’s not do anything stupid.”

  “Fox, get the hell out of here!” Henry said, struggling into a crouch. He could barely stand on his left leg.

  “Shut your mouth, boy!” Trooper Dan snapped, not taking his eyes from the shotgun barrel. “Nobody’s goin’ nowhere until I get my gun back. Now, you hand it over and there’s no hard feelings…” His right hand began to creep round towards the back of his belt… “I’ll just take you both back to Newton and we can have a good talk about everything that’s happened…”

  The shotgun wavered in Fox’s hands, as if the effort of holding it up had become almost too much to bear.

  The trooper reached out towards Fox with his left hand. Henry looked to the cop’s back and saw the fingers of his right hand closing around the handle of a knife concealed in his belt…

  “Fox, watch out!” he yelled.

  Trooper Dan whipped the knife round in a smooth, well-practised motion. Fox squeezed the trigger…

  The sound of the shotgun was deafening.

  Trooper Dan’s left hand exploded as the shell ripped through his open palm.

  The recoil from the blast threw Fox back against the side of the house as if she was the one who had been hit.

  Henry staggered back in shock as a fine red liquid like the lightest of rain fell through the air across his face. Before him, Trooper Dan sank to his knees, clutching his left wrist with his right hand. A terrible, siren-like howl broke the silence of the night air. It took Henry a second to realize that it was the sound of the cop screaming in agony. He looked to where the man stood, holding his left arm. Nothing remained of the fingers of his left hand. Only the lower part of his palm and the thumb remained. Still stunned, Henry looked around on the blood-splattered dirt, expecting to see the cop’s severed digits lying around, but they were nowhere to be seen. Perhaps they’d been completely destroyed by the force of the shotgun shell.

  “Oh, Jesus,” Trooper Dan whispered. His hat had fallen off his head and was lying to one side in the dirt. Henry noticed that the pupils of his eyes were huge and black and locked on his damaged hand. “Sweet, holy Jesus.”

  Henry stumbled to the porch, giving the kneeling cop a wide berth and noticing that the knife had embedded itself in one of the wooden posts circling the house. Fox was sitting on the floor with her back against the wall, staring at Trooper Dan with a shocked expression. The shotgun lay to one side.

  “Are you okay?” Henry asked, crouching down beside her.

  Fox gave no response. She was either too shocked or stunned to respond.

  “Hey!” Henry said, shaking her shoulder roughly.

  She snapped out of it, looking round at him. Reaching into her pocket, she produced two sets of car keys. “I found these.”

  “Great,” Henry said, looping his arm under hers and lifting her up. “We’re getting out of here.”

  “Did I get him?”

  “Yeah. You got him.”

  He began to manoeuvre her across the porch, stopping to pick up the shotgun awkwardly with his free hand. Tucking it under his arm, he stooped to get the Magnum as well. He didn’t intend to leave either of them lying around for Trooper Dan. The cop had stopped staring at his hand now and was gazing at them both with a completely blank expression.

  “Stay the hell down!” Henry snapped, waving the second gun at the cop as he moved to get up. “You know we’ll use this now!”

  Trooper Dan stayed on his knees, but his eyes followed Henry as he passed. The cop’s skin had gone deathly pale, making the splatters of blood on his face stand out in high contrast, almost black in the moonlight. He grinned, exposing two rows of perfectly white teeth. “You’re dead,” he hissed. “I’m gonna kill you.”

  “Yeah? Well you’ll have to catch us first.”

  Henry carried on past the cop, half carrying Fox, who was too shaken up to put one foot in front of the other unaided. Up ahead the ancient pickup trucks stood waiting and Henry made a beeline for the slightly less wrecked of the two. It was a monster of a vehicle with rusting green paint and cobwebs in the windows, but the tyres appeared intact. As they reached the door he looked back at the house and was shocked to see that Trooper Dan had got to his feet and was staggering in the direction of a barn over to the side.

  “You have to help me out here,” Henry told Fox urgently. “That cop isn’t finished.”

  His words seemed to bring Fox to her senses a little, because she unhooked her arm from his and stood up straighter. She caught sight of the guns he was carrying and her face went pale once more. “I don’t want those anywhere near me.”

  “It’s okay,” Henry said. “I’m getting rid of them.”

  With a cry, Henry heaved the shotgun through the air. It disappeared far into the undergrowth at the edge of the property. He did the same with the Magnum and then pulled on the pickup door handle. It opened with a screech of rusted metal. Henry pushed Fox into the passenger seat and then limped round to get behind the wheel.

  The first set of keys fitted in the ignition and when Henry turned them the engine gave a protesting howl. The entire frame of the vehicle shuddered as if it were about to fall apart.

  “Try again,” Fox encouraged as she reached over to wipe away the grime from inside the windshield with a rag she’d found on the floor. Already she was beginning to sound more like herself again, much to Henry’s relief. Nothing kept her down for long.

  Henry turned the key again, but shook his head when the engine failed to spark a second time.

  “Maybe we should just make a run for it,” Fox said.

  “We need a vehicle,” He
nry insisted, remembering the helicopter. They weren’t going to make it very far on foot. As Fox wiped another section of the windshield they saw Trooper Dan emerge from the barn through the smeared glass. He was headed directly for them, left hand now wrapped in a bandage and covered in a thick, black substance that looked like tar – as if he’d smothered it to stop the bleeding. In his right hand he held an axe.

  “Oh no,” Fox said, reaching over to lock her door.

  Suddenly Henry regretted getting rid of the guns and almost considered making a run to get them, but Trooper Dan was already too close. For a man who had just lost most of his left hand, he showed little sign of pain now. In fact his face, with those black, inhuman eyes, had a look of insane determination that gave him the aspect of an unstoppable machine.

  “Come on!” Henry said, almost pleading as he turned the key and hit the gas again. The truck began a rhythmic juddering, as if it were on the verge of ticking over…

  Outside, Trooper Dan came within a metre of the vehicle and raised the axe high with a cry. He brought the shining, highly sharpened head toward the windshield.

  The engine of the pickup roared into life. Henry threw it into reverse and it sped backwards as the axe came down, scraping across the already dented surface of the hood. He spun the wheel and the pickup skidded 180 degrees, so it was facing the driveway out of the property. The truck handled like a beast, but instincts honed by years of playing racing games kicked in… Henry threw the stick into drive like he’d been behind the wheel for years…

  “Floor it!” Fox yelled.

  In the side mirror Henry saw Trooper Dan running at them, axe swinging in his hand. He hit the gas hard as the blade of the axe ripped through the flimsy metal of the passenger door, centimetres from Fox’s leg. Then the pickup shot forward, down the gravel drive that wound through the trees, and out onto the main road.