Murphy's Law (Roads Less Traveled Book 2) by C. Dulaney Page A

slightly curious, a bit frightened, and increasingly pumped-up. The man’s voice hadn’t sounded demanding as much as afraid. Yes, his voice had been laced with fear or terror, the difference in degree at this point didn’t matter much.
    “What’s going on down there?” Zack mouthed. I shook my head and started belly-crawling through the grass.
    The others followed, trying to be quiet but the swish-swish of the weeds sounded incredibly loud. We moved like this all the way across the wide open flat, the same male voice shouting or screaming at regular intervals as the minutes ticked by. When we finally reached the other side, just above the descending slope, the others slid up next to me and we wiggled down into the grass as far as we could. It may have covered us, may have not.
    Turns out it didn’t really matter; the camp, or what was once a camp, had been destroyed and now stood empty.
     
    * * *
     
    Kyra tried not to watch. She even tried not to listen, but as tightly as she’d squeezed her eyes shut, she simply couldn’t shut out the sounds. His shouts were on the verge of becoming screams, and she knew Shannon had already begun peeling his flesh away like the skin of a banana. Of course it wasn’t as easy as that, hence the revolting sounds it made. She had to give Devon credit; he was restraining himself incredibly well. By this time, the others had already screamed themselves into unconsciousness.
    For one terrible moment Kyra caught herself wondering what the hell had happened to make this girl snap. Whatever it was, it must have happened before Day One, and the dead people appearing out of nowhere had pushed the kid right over the edge. She remembered Kasey saying one time that the girl never used to be like this. Well, not like this ; at the house she was only withdrawn and listless, barely recognizing when others spoke to her. But this? Whatever—or whoever—it was that had gotten to her so severely sure did a bang-up job driving her batshit crazy in world record time.
    Devon was breathing heavily and Kyra heard Shannon walk away from them; probably to peruse over her tabletop of assorted torture instruments, mostly consisting of pliers, knives, a fork, a razor, and a straw. You don’t want to know what she used that for. Kyra opened one eye and glanced quickly at him. He actually didn’t look too bad. Shannon had started out slow this time.
    “Are you okay?” she mouthed to him once her eye had caught his.
    He nodded once and set his face in resolve, hoping to boost her confidence a bit. Kyra thought she heard footsteps off to her left so she quickly shut her eye and tried not to whimper.
    “What the fuck is this! ” someone yelled. The same someone who had come up behind Kyra’s left. She opened her eyes and looked around frantically.
    “Oh my God,” Kyra uttered.
    Zack was standing at her side with his pistol aimed at Shannon. She tried to look around for the others, but her position made that difficult.
    “Jesus, Shannon. Shannon! Put it down. Put it down now and back up,” a female voice said, this one coming from the other side of Devon. Kyra closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
    About time the fucking cavalry got here .
     
    * * *
     
    Since Day One, I’d seen a lot of crazy shit, I admit. No sense denying it. But this definitely took the cake. After walking around what was left of the campsite, we quickly came to an agreement that this was the same place we had been looking for; the bodies of the women went a long way in confirming that. The yells we heard had been coming from the ramshackle farmhouse, most of which had collapsed due to time and the elements. It wasn’t very difficult to ascertain what had happened judging from the blood and general violence of the scene. Or so we had thought. Remember what I’ve said about assuming?
    We followed a blood trail to this wreck of a house, around the back, to the only part still standing. After watching for a few seconds through