The Hollow - Excerpt

Excerpt from The Hollow

Prologue

They are home. 

The men stand on the bluff, careful to stay out of sight. They watch the three SUVs travel down the winding road that leads to the Hollow Campgrounds. 

It has been twenty years since they last visited the Hollow. The biggest of the three men, who weights two-hundred-eighty pounds, motions for the others to follow.  

He opens the rear of their step truck and shows them the tools he has purchased. There are drills, saws, icepicks, and blowtorches. Knives, hatches, and machetes, as well. 

The other two men smile, satisfied with the contents of the truck. It is early in the day. Around 11 a.m. The beginning of November and most of the trees are bare. There is a fourth man who is part of their group, but he is wild and unpredictable. If they are successful at the Hollow, they will meet up with their friend later. 

The people in the SUVs have no idea what is in store for them. The men have been staying in the Hollow's empty cabins for weeks. The youngest of the three, twenty years old, likes butchering small animals. He usually starts by cutting off the limbs. 

The young man has said he wants to try killing something bigger. 

He will be given the chance.

Liz Mallory couldn't deny the prickly feeling that danced on the back of her neck. She didn't like the woods, and attributed the strange feeling to her dislike of their location, but she couldn't shake it. It felt like they were being watched.  

Liz was driving the second vehicle in the three car caravan, a blue Ford Excursion. Jamie, her seventeen-year-old daughter, sat in the passenger seat. They were off for a weekend camping trip with some of Liz's old college friends, who were in the vehicles in front and behind.  

"You're quiet, mom," Jamie said. 

"Woods. Don't like them." 

"Afraid of a bear?"  

"Rabid squirrels. They terrify me."  

"Your sense of humor terrifies me sometimes," Jamie said. 

Liz cracked a smile. 

"We'll be fine. We're staying in cabins. I wonder if they'll have a fireplace?" Jamie said. 

"Said online they did. They just reopened this place." 

Jamie said, "Oh yeah?" 

Liz nodded, but didn't tell her daughter why the cabins had been closed for the past nineteen years. "Doing renovations." 

She was being jittery, which wasn't like her. The trip would be good for them. The divorce from Ken had been painful. She'd spent the better part of last year fighting with him and his lawyers, with Jamie caught in the middle. Her daughter had the strength of a grizzly, and had held up well through the ordeal. Even when Ken had called Liz a filthy bitch in Jamie's presence. Liz had thought Jamie was going to go for her father's throat when he'd said that. Maybe they could start putting thing behind them, unwind. There was a twelve pack of Sam Adams in her cooler to help with that. 

"Look's like Uncle Matt's stopping," Jamie said. 

"There's the cabins, that's why." 

They came around a bend and saw three cabins perched up on a hill. The cabins had new vinyl windows, and each had a porch out front made from knotted logs. They looked cozy to Liz, and she envisioned herself in front of a fireplace, feet up, beer in hand. Maybe this wouldn't be so bad after all.