Bear Creek Cove

Created by Adobe Firefly

The metallic staccato from the typewriter almost drowned out the screaming from upstairs. He would laugh every time the black Royal rang its bell at the end of the line in seeming answer to the begging voice behind the door. “Let me go!….DING!”

It was hilarious.

He rolled the paper out of the machine and held it in his latex gloved hands. He read the note, nodding. It was good. So very good.

He put the letter in a manila envelope along with the instant photo he had taken an hour earlier. He used a moist sponge to seal the envelope. He stood up from the folding chair behind the card table the typewriter sat on. There was no other furniture in the room. A piece of paper with a single word in all caps lay beside the typewriter on the folding table. The table also held several rolls of fluorescent tape in different colors, a sheaf of white paper, and a stack of envelopes. He took the sheet with the single word, folded it up, and shoved it into his pants pocket.

He grabbed the shotgun that was on the floor near the chair, and took the envelope, leaving the house without paying attention to the plaintive cries for help from upstairs. He had no worries. No one would hear him.

***** 

“It can’t be that easy,” Detective Kim Sands said, re-reading the note for the eighth time.

“I wouldn’t think so,” her partner, Detective Bobby Anderton said, leaning back in his chair.

Sands rubbed her eyes and tossed the note, which was enclosed in an evidence bag, onto her desk next to another bag with the photo of the face of a middle-aged man. He was beaten up badly. His right eye was swollen shut, and his left was ablaze with fear.

Near the photo and note was the envelope in its own clear bag. A white typed label on the envelope was addressed to Sands. As far as she could tell, the same typewriter was used to write the note, but she didn’t know that for a fact. She was no typewriter expert. Not much call for it in the past few decades.

The postmark was local and from the day before.

Anderton sat and grabbed the note, reading it. It was only his fifth time.

“The rules are simple. This Friday night at 11 p.m. you will arrive at Bear Creek Cove. You can bring a partner, but no one else. You can have your guns, I do not care. But there can only be the two of you. I will know if there are helicopters. I will know if there are other cars. I will know if others show up early, or if they follow you in. Once you arrive, you will have one hour to find and rescue the captive. Simple as can be. But break even one rule one tiny bit and he will die. Just like the last four.”

Gary Hubber was the fifth kidnapping victim in the past year. Like two of the other victims, Hubber was involved in construction or real estate development. Two others were principles with local tech companies. The previous four kidnapping victims had been murdered, their bodies found on or near sites they were working on or company property.

Hubber owned TrueStar, a development company with a dozen projects at various stages. He had been missing for three days.

“Bear Creek is part of the Woodlands subdivision,” Anderton said. “And TrueStar bought that area a couple of months ago. They haven’t even broken ground out there.”

“Did we have patrols check the area?” Sands asked.

“If they haven’t, they were going to get around to it. They are stretched a little thin, and probably focused on the active sites.”

“Run it by the Captain, but let’s keep the patrols away from Bear Creek Cove until Friday night,” Sands said.

“And then?”

“And then you and me go catch this guy.”

***** 

Sands and Anderton pulled up to the police barricade blocking Bear Creek Cove. There were at least ten cruisers parked nearby, their lights off. Assistant Chief Nichols walked up to the car, and Sands rolled down the driver’s side window.

“Sands, this is your play,” Nichols said. “You give the word, and we roll in. But I’m telling you right now, if we hear a gunshot we come in with or without an invitation.”

“Yes sir,” Sands said.

Nichols nodded and told another officer to let Sands and Anderton in. They drove slowly into the dead-end cove. There were eight houses along the cove. They had been nice, middle-class homes forty years ago. Now they were all empty and in various states of disrepair. The electricity to the area had been shut off for months.

Anderton shone his Maglite at each house as they passed. “What are we going to do, search each of these places?”

“Assuming our perp isn’t lying, we have an hour. There’s no time for that,” Sands said, her eyes scanning the cove.

“Then what the hell do we …..Wait!” Anderton said. The beam of his light hit some fluorescent green tape on one a mailbox. The tape made the sign of a cross.

Sands pulled up in front of the house, and the two got out of the car. They both pulled their Glocks out, and carried their flashlights in their left hands.

Anderton pushed open the chain link gate to the crumbling front path, and began to walk towards the house, scanning his surroundings. Sands followed two steps behind. Two shrubs stood near the front porch. They were tall enough that someone could be hiding there. Anderton moved forward, his gun moving from shrub to shrub.

He reached the porch. No one was behind the shrubs. The porch creaked as Anderton and Sands approached the front door. Anderton tested the knob; the door was unlocked.

Sands looked at Anderton and indicated she’d take the lead as she nudged the door open and waited. She didn’t hear anything. She pushed it open, pointing her Glock into the darkness. She turned on her Maglite and scanned the room. There was a folding table with an old black typewriter. A red arrow made of tape pointed towards a staircase.

Anderton and Sands exchanged a look. Anderton took a position behind her, swiveling his weapon to cover the stairs and all the entrances to the room.

Sands approached the table. The typewriter was open, and the ribbon spools were missing.

Sands followed the arrow. “Are you crazy,” Anderton hissed at her. “This has to be trap.”

“I assume it is. Just keep your eyes open.”

She climbed the stairs, with Anderton two steps back. The stairs groaned in protest as they climbed. At the top of the stairs was a room directly in front of with a hallway branching left. The room was empty except for a stool in the center. Old, black drapes covered the windows. Sands shined her light down the hall, revealing three closed doors.

Sands walked towards the stool and saw a spooled typewriter ribbon. The spools were on a piece of paper on which “MACHINE MEMORIES” was typed. There was a creaking sound. Sands whirled around to see Anderton reaching the top.

Sands unrolled the spools. As her light played across the black and red ribbon, she could make out “MACHINE MEMORIES” on it. She unwound it more and could read the text of the letter she had received followed by two words in all caps.

“COMING UPSTAIRS”

Sands spun towards the staircase, dropping her Maglite. “Behind you, Anderton!” Anderton pivoted to face the stairs.

From the other side of the room, a man carrying a shotgun stepped out from the black curtains.

Anderton was caught in the back by the shotgun’s slug. He crashed against the wall and crumpled into a heap on the floor, his Glock skittering across the floor. Sands lunged forward, causing her to stumble and roll halfway down the stairs. Her left arm snapped under her weight as she flipped down the stairs.

The man pumped another shell into the shotgun as he advanced. Sands scrambled down the stairs, pain spearing her arm. Spinning blue lights and siren wails approached from outside.

He was at the top of the stairs. Sands wildly fired as she scooted backwards. She shot again, missing. He fired the shotgun, blowing a hole in the hardwood floor inches from Sands’ head.

The man ran towards her wielding the shotgun like a club. Sands emptied her clip, and the man collapsed to the ground dead.

Two officers burst through the front door.

***** 

Sands spent a couple of nights in the hospital. Hubber wasn’t as lucky. He was found unconscious in a room upstairs with a skull that had been cracked by a blow from the shotgun’s butt. He lingered for three days before dying.

Anderton had been hit in his kevlar vest. He had a couple of broken ribs, and a long recovery. He was okay.

The killer was easily identified. He had no record, and there was no connection between him and the victims, and no known motive.

After Sands returned to the office, she sifted through the evidence out of morbid curiosity. One of the techs had transcribed all the messages that could be found on the typewriter ribbon.

It was the final one that caught Sands’ attention.

“Change is killing me.”

If you want to support my writing, one of the best ways to do it now is to subscribe to my Substack. For now, I will keep putting stuff here for free, but will pull the pieces down after a month or so. I’ll keep the full archive of ongoing work available on Substack for paid subscribers.. So, if you think this is worth a few bucks and you like receiving the content as a newsletter, give it a shot. Through the end of June, new subscribers to an annual plan (which is already pretty low) can get 20% off, which will last as long as you keep the subscription.