Torn

A novella.

How do you go on when something like that happens to your child?

Bill Cranston is a family man, whose marriage is falling apart, eroding under his wife's constant bitterness and her retreat into alcohol and drugs. He is also the sheriff of Luther's Bend, a generally quiet town. When a little girl is abducted from a local park and carried into the woods, Bill leads a desperate search to find the child. but the little girl is only bait, and something vicious waits in the woods for her rescuers.

I am me. Can't you see? I am me and he is he. When he is he, I can't be me.

Douglas Sykes is insane. He sits in Bill Cranston's cell, speaking in rhymes and riddles. Though a stranger to Luther's Bend, Sykes seems to know a lot about Sheriff Cranston. Through his ramblings he reveals secrets about Bill, and secrets about himself. Sykes claims to be a mythological creature - a monster - and a handful of his victims have finally tracked him down, victims who now share Sykes affliction.

A pack is descending on Luther's Bend. They are hunting Sykes, and they will not stop until everyone near him is left broken, bleeding, and torn.