Niklosi's Nightmare (First Wave Book 10) (9 page)

Kyle ran a hand over his face
before he slapped it down on his knee, causing BJ to pretend to jump.

“What the hell is a haint?” Kyle
asked in frustration.

BJ gave him a puzzled look.

“A haint’s a haint. Ya know, oooh,
oooh,” BJ said as she held her hands up and pretended to be a ghost.

“I think she means a ghost, sir,”
Greg said as Kyle shot him a glare.

“I got it,” Kyle said before
turning back to the cop. “So you were seriously out there looking for a ghost?”

“O’ course! That haint’s been after
poor Jepson fer weeks now. It’s my job to protect him,” BJ said defensively
while keeping her face a blank mask.

Kyle shook his head in disbelief.

There’s no way in hell even this
chick believes that shit,
he thought.

Kyle decided to try another tactic.

“How long have you been a cop?”

BJ scratched her head again.

“’Bout 12 years now,” she admitted.

“You’ve been the town cop for that
long?” Kyle asked incredulously.

BJ laughed and slapped her knee.

“No, sir! I was a cop in St. Louis
until recently. I had this case where we was a-chasing this guy, and he got me
tackled and beat pretty good afore my partner got there. Momma ‘vinced me to
come home not long after that,” BJ explained.

She couldn’t be happier that the
incident and her injuries had been pretty well documented. When she knew the
major was coming, she’d called her old partner, and without caring why, he’d
agreed to tell anyone who asked that she’d never been the same after that
beating she’d taken. This part of the plan looked like it still remained solid,
and she continued to play it.

Kyle looked over at Greg and nodded
his head. Greg pulled out his satellite phone to verify her story as he headed
out of the door. Kyle looked down at the cop, wondering just how badly she’d
been beaten.

“OK, so you were a street cop in
St. Louis for a while, and you’ve been back home a few months now?” Kyle asked,
trying to confirm what she’d told him.

“Naw, sir. I was a de-tective in
St. Louis. I’ve been back home for a few months,” BJ said as she nodded her
head rapidly.

“A detective?” Kyle asked,
completely floored that the woman sitting in front of him could have ever
passed a detective test in a major city.

He looked up when Greg opened the
door and nodded for him to come over.

“Give me a second,” Kyle said to BJ
as he strode to the door and stepped outside to find out what Greg knew.

“Sir,” Greg began with a sad shake
of his head. “She’s telling the truth. One day she was a brilliant detective on
the fast track to promotions, and then she was beaten by a perp so bad she was
in a coma for days with a blood clot on her brain. Her partner said she was
never the same after that. He convinced her to go back home because it was getting
harder for him to cover for her.”

Kyle cursed and kicked at the dirt
before he looked down the street and saw the same filthy faces staring back at
him. He’d been sure there was something wrong with the cop; he hadn’t expected
it to be a work related brain injury.

“Have we gotten anything worthwhile
from here?” he asked in frustration, wondering if the whole trip had been a
waste of time.

“The fingerprint cards are smeared
beyond recognition. The Mojo guy said the suspects were fighting them too hard,
and they spilled coffee on them,” Greg told him while he pulled out his notepad
and began scanning it.

Kyle snorted and shook his head.

“Yeah, I can’t imagine the aliens
were sitting patiently as these idiots tried to print them,” he agreed as he
stared back at the various people who watched their every move.

They are creepy as hell,
Kyle
thought.

“We won’t know anything on the door
knob until we get it to the lab. We haven’t found any usable fingerprints on or
around the building, other than the locals’,” Greg read from his list. “The
strange one is that the weapons are gone.”

Kyle turned to Greg when he heard
that.

“Did the cop take the weapons when
they processed them?” he asked.

Greg shook his head and shrugged.

“She said she took the weapons, but
they disappeared after the suspects did,” Greg said, not sure he believed it,
but he really didn’t care as long as they left Baker’s Creek.

Greg wasn’t convinced the aliens
had ever been there, and as long as they were gone, he was happy to just leave
and go back to hunting them somewhere else. That corner of the Ozarks gave him
the creeps, and he was really hoping the major would decide to leave before
nightfall.

Kyle shook his head for a moment
and looked back out at the street and the faces still openly staring at them.

“Why the fuck do they keep staring
at us?” he ground out in frustration, pissed off that they’d wasted the time to
come here.

“Probably haven’t seen this many
teeth in one place in a long time,” Greg said with a snicker.

“What information did you get on
the others?” Kyle asked, trying to keep the captain on task.

Greg cleared his throat and scanned
through his notes again.

“The only thing we got on the
mother is a birthdate and wedding date. The brother was a graduate of an
institute of technology in New England before coming back here,” Greg read from
his notes.

“Wait,” Kyle said, stopping Greg.
“The Mojo guy graduated from an institute of technology, and the cop was a damn
prodigy before her attack?”  

Greg read the information again and
looked at the major curiously.

“Yeah, what the hell is up with
that? How did those two get to be the smartest people in this place but ended
up as dumb as the rest?” Greg asked, his own suspicions rising now.

“Weren’t there cameras in there?”
Kyle asked as he pointed towards the station.

“I think Mojo told one of the lieutenants
that the cameras hadn’t been hooked up yet,” Greg said as he flipped through
his notes.

“Then why are they there?” Kyle
replied as he studied the building. “Where is Mojo?”

“He’s at the diner with the
others,” Greg said, hoping like hell he wouldn’t have to go back in there to
get them.

“Good,” Kyle said cryptically
before he strode back into the station and sat back down on the desk near BJ.
“How come the cameras aren’t working in here or outside?”

BJ looked up at him and made sure
her brother was paying attention to the conversation as well since this was his
area and they needed to be consistent.

“BJ, just repeat what I tell you,”
Mojo warned in her mind.

“Well,” BJ said with a heavy sigh.
“See my brother was supposed ta hook ‘em up, but since he come back from that
fancy school in the city,” BJ said and leaned closer to him as she lowered her
voice, “all he do is smoke that wacky weed. I can’t get him to work.”

BJ struggled to keep the wide-eyed
look on her face as Mojo laughed in her mind, and even Nik snorted in humor.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Kyle
asked her in complete disbelief.

BJ just slowly shook her head.

“Momma been trying all the
remedies. Even put the nettle in his shorts on a full moon, but nothing is
working yet. It takes time to purge the evil once it takes root,” BJ explained
as she nodded her head, still struggling to keep a straight face.

*****

Traze slapped Nik on the shoulder
as they watched the video of what was happening in the station through the
fully operational cameras inside.

“I’m telling you, man. They aren’t
pretending. They really are that fucking crazy and sick. You need to run, man.
Run for your life,” Traze said in all seriousness, not the least bit convinced
they weren’t all insane and inbred in Baker’s Creek.

“Shut the fuck up,” Nik retorted
before he slapped Traze in the back of the head. “I’m trying to listen. Now see
if you can find out who the hell beat her in St. Louis. I want to know what the
hell happened to her.”

Chapter
Eight

Kyle wasn’t sure whether to laugh
or scream in rage at the obviously addled cop. On one hand, he really felt
sorry that her life was destroyed by a violent criminal. On the other hand, he
didn’t have the time or patience to deal with the brain-damaged woman and her
drug addict brother. Suddenly a thought occurred to him, and he dragged Greg
towards the door.

“Get their mother,” he whispered to
Greg before he shoved him out of the door, ignoring the horrified look on the
soldier’s face.

Kyle stood near the door for a
moment, trying to collect his thoughts as BJ resumed picking at her fingers.
Finally, he headed back to the desk.

"OK, Miss Markson, do you
remember what they looked like? Can you give me a description?” he asked as he grabbed
a pad of paper and a pen.

BJ chewed on her lower lip for a
moment as if deep in thought.

“The one was real tall. He had
black hair and eyes that looked like they come from the devil himself,” BJ
looked wide-eyed at Kyle and scooted closer to the edge of her seat. “He was
mean and ornery too. Fought like he had the strength of 20 men.”

Kyle looked at her doubtfully when
she said that, and BJ knew she needed to tone it down and make it more
believable instead of trying to needle a listening Niklosi.

“It took two Tasers to bring him to
heel,” BJ added with a nod of her head.

“You Tasered him?” Kyle asked as
his interest perked up.

“Yes, siree, we done Tasered him
with two Tasers. Done had to, he was fighting like the Devil, like I said,” BJ
explained, telling enough of the truth to be believed.

“That’s how you got the first? How
did you get the second one?” Kyle asked.

BJ chuckled and patted her stomach.

“Well that one was just stupid; we
caught him trying to break out the other one. Lucky we done knew the Taser
would work and got him too. It was the third one with the ray gun thingie that
caught us by surprise,” BJ explained just as her mother came into the station
followed by a frazzled looking Greg.

“There were three?” Kyle asked.
This was the first he’d heard of three.

“Of course there were three. How
else you think they got the drop on us?” BJ asked innocently as she ignored the
snickers of the soldiers still in the room.

Bess stepped away from Greg and
sent him a scathing look that caused him to flinch before she turned to Kyle.

“You wished to see me,” Bess said.

Kyle’s gaze swept over her flawless
black skin, high cheekbones, and her thin, perfectly-postured frame, and he
again wondered how such a woman could be in Baker’s Creek. She looked like
she’d be more at home in a mansion drinking mimosas, not stuck in some dead end
corner of Missouri. It stirred his already simmering suspicions.

“Yes,” Kyle said as he continued to
study Bess. “Your daughter said that the prisoners escaped not long after you
brought them food. Why would you be doing that?”

“I do believe we’re still required
to feed prisoners in this country,” Bess said with an elegantly raised brow.

“Of course,” Kyle immediately said,
feeling guilty for asking. He shook it off. “But why would you do so at such a
strange hour of the morning?"

Bess gave him a look that made Kyle
feel like he’d just asked something stupid, and he felt the urge to apologize,
but he quickly quelled it.

“Young man, my daughter has been
staying out by Jepson’s place all night for the last few nights in a row. I was
making her something to eat for when she came back to the station when she
called her brother to ask him to come in,” Bess explained matter-of-factly. “I
merely went ahead and made a little more food for the prisoners thinking I
wouldn’t have to come back in a few hours to feed them as well.”

Kyle knew it sounded reasonable.
Everything about the woman was calm and reasonable. But he still couldn’t shake
the feeling that something was off about Bess Markson and her strange children.
He decided to switch tactics.

“Can you describe the prisoners to
me?” Kyle asked as Greg pulled out a recorder.

“There was one who was taller than
the other. I’d guess around six foot six. Really tall,” Bess began. “He had
very dark eyes and hair. The shorter one was maybe six foot three or four. He
had brown hair and brown eyes. Both were well muscled.”

Kyle wasn’t the least bit surprised
that the sharp woman had picked up so much on the prisoners. She was definitely
the entire working brain of this whole community.

“Did you hear them talk to one
another?” he couldn’t help but ask.

Bess nodded her head slowly.

“I did. But it really didn’t make
any sense to me. The smaller one spoke of being in the wrong place while the
taller one mentioned something about bad intel,” Bess lied easily.

Kyle tried not to react to Bess’s
words, but he didn’t believe her and he couldn’t explain why. When she’d been
describing the prisoners, he could feel the truth in her words, but the moment
she started talking about the alien’s conversation, it resonated badly with
him.

“So, you think they were referring
to how they ended up here?” Kyle asked bluntly, his tone filled with disbelief.

Bess narrowed her eyes at the major
as if chastising him for not trusting her.

“Let me tell you something, young
man. The last thing I care to do is waste my time repeating myself or putting
up with this distraction,” Bess said, her voice carrying a hint of anger. “You
may not believe this, but this town has better things to do than host you and
your men. There are people who need food, crops planted, and medical care, and
that’s not happening with everyone ogling the strangers. So finish your
questions so I can get back to work.”

Kyle blushed, feeling like he’d
just been spanked over her knee in front of his men. Stealing a glance at the
others, he was stunned to see that all of his men appeared embarrassed and were
looking anywhere but at Bess’s penetrating gaze. It didn’t make him feel much
better.

“Ma’am, I assure you that we’re
trying as best as we can to get the information we need so we can leave you in
peace,” Kyle replied, trying to appease the woman and still get what he needed.

Bess smiled gently and pulled up a
chair next to BJ. She gracefully gathered her skirt and sat primly in the chair
before looking up at Kyle with her strange eyes.

“I am still willing to share
anything I know with you. Maybe my presence will help my daughter to remember
as well,” Bess said as she smiled affectionately at BJ and patted her hand.

BJ got the clue and put a goofy
smile on her face as she put her head on her momma’s shoulder.

“Aw, I love you, Momma,” BJ
whispered in a childlike voice before she grinned up at Kyle. “I want to help
too.”

Kyle closed his eyes and counted to
10 before he opened them. The moment he saw that goofy look on BJ’s face, he
closed his eyes and tried counting again.

“Do you know what happened to the
weapons?”

Kyle’s eyes flew open, and he gave
a nod of thanks to Greg for posing the question and putting the brakes on the
crazy train.

“Not really,” Bess answered. “There
was a huge flash of light that came from the door. It was blinding. I could
hear the two in here shouting at someone else that I couldn’t see. Someone ran
in here, and I heard metal clanging and something hit the floor. By the time I
could see again, the place was empty, the box was on the floor, and the weapons
BJ had put in the box were gone.”

“Yeah! That flash was that ray gun
thingie I was telling you about!” BJ added with a grin.

“What box were they in?” Kyle asked
as he looked around the now-wrecked office.

BJ stood and walked over to where
the box was flipped over and she picked it up, walked back to Kyle, and tried
to hand it to him.

Kyle backed away from it and nodded
to Greg.

“Get that to the lab,” he ordered.

BJ tried not to smile as Greg
grimaced and looked for a way to take the box from her without really touching
it.

“Just take it outside!” Kyle boomed
out in irritation.

Greg jumped, grabbed the box
between two fingers, and ran out of the door with it.

“Wassa matter with him?” BJ asked
with a straight face.

“Nothing! What weapons do you
remember taking from them?” Kyle asked.

*****

Niklosi ran a hand through his
short hair in irritation at the scene below them. The damn major had been
grilling Bess and BJ for more than seven hours now, and Nik was ready to jump
down there and just kill them all to get it over with.

“Patience, Nik,” Grai warned his
agitated friend. “They’re doing an amazing job. I have no idea why the idiot is
still hanging around.”

Yeah, that’s the problem
, Nik
thought.

They couldn’t figure out what it
was that was keeping the major in Baker’s Creek. Bess and BJ had answered every
question, most of them multiple times, and there was no evidence to keep the
major and the military in the town, yet they hadn’t left.

“I don’t think they’re pretending,”
Traze added, referring to the inbred hillbilly act.

“If you don’t shut the fuck up, I’m
going to do more than smack you in the head,” Nik growled at Traze.

“Dude . . .” Traze began before
Grai sent him a warning glare.

“Shut up, Traze!” Nik yelled out as
he tried to listen to what Bess had just said. “They’re finally letting them go
for the night.”

“What did they say?” Grai asked, having
not heard because of Traze either.

“The dickhead wants BJ, Mojo, Bess,
and the district attorney back at the station first thing in the morning,” Nik
said as he began pacing in frustration.

He watched as Bess led BJ out of
the station and down the street before they disappeared behind the small house
that called itself the mercantile.

“Where did they go? Follow them!”
Nik demanded as he headed into the cockpit and began scanning the area for
where BJ had gone.

“Hang on,” Disc muttered as he sent
the craft following where the women had disappeared.

“Don’t fret, child. You’ll be able
to find us just fine,” Nik heard Bess say in his mind.

It definitely made him a little
uneasy, but he wasn’t about to say anything in front of Traze and give the idiot
more fuel for his ignorance.

The craft was heading in the
direction where he’d last seen BJ when Nik caught a flash of color in the trees
beneath them.

“There!” he called out and was a
little surprised to find more flashes of light beneath them.

“What is that?” Disc asked as he
peered down to identify what was causing the lights.

“Looks like . . . blinking
Christmas lights or something,” Traze said as he looked beneath them as well.

“Could be one of those bike lights,
or maybe a couple of flashlights,” Grai suggested, although he doubted it was
anything that simple.

Nothing about these people strike
me as simple in any way,
Grai thought to himself.

“I see a house. I think it’s a
house,” Disc said as he pointed in the distance.

They waited until the sparkling
lights beneath them led them to the home partially hidden among the heavy
forest growth beneath them before they realized they must be at BJ’s home. It
was confirmed seconds later when the lights blinked out below.

“I could probably set down right
there in that field,” Disc suggested as he pointed to the small clearing not
far from the home.

“No, they can drop,” Grai said, not
thrilled with the idea of being on the ground.

“I’m not going,” Traze said, still
fuming that his own brother was trying to turn him over to the crazy witch.

Grai glared at Traze for a moment,
then chose to ignore his brother and watched as Nik flipped Traze off and
jumped out of the transport. He leaned over near the open door that Nik had
just disappeared out of and gasped in shock.

“Oh Gods! Nik!” Grai called out in
a panic.

Traze ran over to the door and
leaned out to see what might have happened to Nik. He felt the strong push and
his eyes connected with Grai’s as he fell out of the open door and spun through
the air before he hit the ground with a loud thud.

“Now, go play nice and keep your
mouth shut,” Grai whispered through his mind as Traze sat up in the tall grass and
looked around in fear.

Traze was still trying to
comprehend that his own brother had thrown him out of the ship when he heard a
chuckle. His head spun around, and he saw swirling hazel eyes.

“Come, child. No food will be
served that you haven’t ever had before. Now act like you were raised with some
manners and a backbone,” Bess said with a grin before she turned and headed to
the house.