A limp figure was sprawled on the carpet in front of the couch, a female, lying facedown. She was naked except for her panties and her arms were bound behind her back, though the handcuffs were hardly necessary. The pale cast of her skin told them she was beyond struggling. Bean slipped into the room and scanned it once more before moving to the girl, and Billie stayed right behind him. “I don’t want to do this,” he whispered, but he reached out and touched the girl nonetheless. Her skin was stiff and turning cold. He pulled her onto her back, where they could see the young face with its glassy eyes open and its mouth frozen in a grimace, and they found the features only too familiar. Billie started to gag and all Bean could mutter was a low “No . . . oh, God, no . . .” as he felt for a pulse in Doreen Moody’s puckered, much-bitten throat. But there was none. He sighed with frustration and sat back on his butt. And then he realized his fingertips were still wet from touching her, almost oily. Not blood. Saliva. The bites were fresh.

“Ah, company,” came from behind them. Both flinched and whirled about to find Dutch Larson standing in the rumpus room doorway, blocking their retreat. He wore only his jockeys and a clean T-shirt, or at least it had been clean when he put it on. Since then his ventilated chest had leaked a steady dribble of Doreen Moody’s blood across his bloated stomach. He had washed his face since they’d last met and combed the hair on his loose scalp, and he’d even pushed his jagged ribs back into place. But he looked no less nightmarish.

Bean tried to rise and bring up his shotgun but there wasn’t time: Larson charged across the room hissing and bowled him over, knocking the Mossberg in one direction and the cake cutter in another. The creature’s momentum carried them onto the couch and over it and onto the floor, and Dutch came out on top. He hammered at Bean and clawed at him, knocked his hands aside so he could get at that thick, luscious, bull-like neck. Bean tried frantically to throw his attacker but he was pinned by Larson’s weight and couldn’t gain any leverage. He swung again at Larson’s leering, flat-nosed face, but the marshal caught his wrist, forced it to the ground, and held it there, and all the while squealing in anticipation and raining oily spittle onto the deputy’s face.

“Dutch!”