Authors: Tim Waggoner
Her grip tightened on the knife handle, and for an instant she thought the spirit in control of her body was going to shove the blade deep into her lover’s throat. But her body lowered the blade and stepped back.
“My mother was the only person who was ever good to me, and I’ve kept watch over her ever since I … went away. When I became aware that she was in danger, I tried telling someone about what you and your little girlfriend were up to. But I couldn’t get my message through, so I decided to deliver it in person. Now I realize Lenora never intended to harm Mother, just frighten her. So I came here to think, to figure out what to do next.” She felt her smile turn dark. “Got any ideas?”
• • •
Terry didn’t understand half of what Lenora was raving about, but one item caught his attention and caused him to feel a surge of panic. Lenora had wanted to tell someone about what they’d done. If anyone discovered the truth … if
Joanne
did …
He reached into his jacket pocket and wrapped his fingers around the handle of his scalpel. The blade had been put to a very different use than intended the last couple days, and it looked like he was going to have to use it that way again. But he didn’t take the scalpel out of his pocket, not just yet.
“There’s only one thing you can do, Lenora. Come with me to my place. Both your father and Joanne know you’re missing. They have people looking for you right now. It won’t be long before someone comes out here — a deputy, or one of your father’s people. After last night — ”
“What about last night?” she interrupted, voice harsh, eyes flashing dangerously.
Some instinct told him not to answer, but he felt a familiar pressure inside his skull, and he knew he didn’t have a choice. So he told her.
When he finished, she glared at him for a long moment, hand clutching the knife handle so tightly it looked as if her knuckles might burst through the skin.
“You tried to kill my … Debbie Coulter?” Her tone was cold, completely devoid of emotion.
“If you had left after spray-painting Debbie’s car and taping the poster on the front door of the café …” He shook his head. “But you didn’t. You had to break in and scare her, didn’t you? When you did that, Debbie Coulter became a potential witness. I was afraid she’d be able to identity you eventually. Tyrone Gantz was a witness, too. It turns out he was across the street watching that night.”
Lenora cocked her head to the side, and a distant look came into her eyes, as if she were listening to a voice only she could hear. “Why kill Ray Porter then? He didn’t witness anything. His only crime was hoping to get lucky with a beautiful Cross girl.”
Rage boiled up inside Terry, just as intense and overwhelming as the night he’d followed Lenora to the Burrito Bungalow and watched from across the street as she chatted up Ray Porter at a table outside. He’d been suspicious for a while that she was cheating on him, and while neither of them had ever said anything about their relationship being exclusive — hell, he was still screwing Joanne, wasn’t he? — jealousy got the better of him and he’d taken to following Lenora around until he finally caught her with another man. Man? Hell, with a goddamned boy!
After she left, he’d waited for Ray Porter — though he hadn’t known the son-of-a-bitch’s name then — to leave so he could follow. But the kid kept hanging around the restaurant, and Terry learned why when a couple hours later Lenora returned, got in Ray’s car, and the two drove off.
Terry followed.
He’d parked on a country road near the Deveraux Farm and snuck up on Lenora and Ray just in time to see her kick the asshole out of his car and take off, stranding him. Terry almost did him right there, but though he was angry with Lenora, he didn’t want there to be any evidence trying him to Ray’s murder. So when Ray started the long, lonely walk back to town, Terry followed at a distance, lights off, until he judged they were far enough away from the farm. Then he parked, cut across a field to intercept the boy, and cut his throat.
And then, because he
was
angry with Lenora, he’d called her cell to tell her what he’d done. But before he could say a word, she told him in a breathless rush about the “prank” she’d played on Debbie Coulter.
Terry thought fast. He wasn’t worried about getting caught. He knew enough about crime scene investigation to make sure he left no evidence behind — plus he was the goddamned coroner. If necessary, he could falsify autopsy results, no problem. But having two strange events occur on the same night … even in Cross County that was straining coincidence. People were bound to think the two events were connected. He was certain Joanne would. He knew how her mind worked — as well as various other parts of her anatomy.
So since there was no avoiding a link, he decided to strengthen it and misdirect Joanne in the process. He carved Carl Coulter’s calling card into Ray Porter’s abdomen and then — wearing surgical gloves, of course — he removed the boy’s wallet, took it back to the Deveraux Farm, and planted it in the barn. When he was finished, he headed back to town and called Lenora one last time to tell her what he’d done, mostly so she could prepare whatever alibi she might need, but also because he wanted her to know that he’d killed for her and that, by tying Ray’s murder to her vandalism at the Caffeine Café, her prank would be all the more effective. Lenora hadn’t been upset. Indeed, she’d seemed quite pleased, and if it hadn’t been prudent for them to avoid seeing each other for a time, he’d have insisted she come over to his place.
Instead, he screwed Joanne the next day. She was nowhere near as good in bed as Lenora — who could use her mental powers to enhance sex in a way normal women never could — but she made an acceptable substitute, like a living blow-up doll.
Terry had thought he’d taken care of everything, but now events were beginning to spiral out of his control. After setting the Caffeine Café on fire as a diversion, he’d tried to eliminate the two witnesses last night: Tyrone and Debbie. But he’d only succeeded in taking care of Tyrone, and in the process he’d nearly been caught by Joanne. Luckily, he’d been able to ambush her and hit her in the head with a rock he’d picked up in the Duvalls’ yard, striking hard enough to render her unconscious but not so hard as to cause serious injury. When she’d slumped to the ground, he told himself that he should kill her too, but he couldn’t bring himself to do so. He didn’t love her, not really. But he hadn’t been able to take her life. So he’d fled and, just as he’d done with Ray Porter, he’d returned a short time later to play coroner.
But this morning he’d heard from Joanne that Lenora was missing and that Marshall Cross was insisting on taking Debbie Coulter — who, it seemed, had been in some sort of shock since last night — to Sanctity. How was Terry supposed to get to her there? And now
this
… Lenora had bought a ticket on the crazy train, and it looked like she was planning on riding it all the way to the end of the line.
“Forget about Ray,” Terry said. “All that matters right now is you — and stopping your father from taking Debbie Coulter to Sanctity.”
“My father’s doing
what?”
“He’s taking Debbie to Sanctity to prevent another attempt on her life.”
Lenora regarded him for a moment in silence, but he could see the calculation going on behind those feral eyes. Slowly, her mouth stretched into a sly smile.
“Thanks. I know what to do now.”
She walked past him and as he turned to ask her what the hell she was talking about, she swung the knife handle at his temple. The last thing he saw before the blow fell and darkness rushed in to claim him was Lenora’s wild eyes and her cold, cold smile.
• • •
Lenora gazed down at the still form of her lover lying on the dirt floor of the Deveraux barn. Enough light came through the open doorway for her to see that he was still breathing.
We can fix that
, said a voice inside her head. An accompanying image flashed through her mind: Terry’s throat sliced open, a triangle carved into his stomach, bisected by a jagged lightning bolt.
“No,” she whispered, her voice once again hers to command.
It’ll only take a couple minutes. It’ll be fun. Trust me. I know
.
“I won’t hurt him. You can’t make me.”
Want to bet?
Her body took a shuffling step forward, and her knees began to bend of their own accord. Her mind was beginning to clear, but her thoughts were still sluggish and confused. But she knew one thing with absolute certainty. She was Lenora Cross and no one — alive
or
dead — could make her do something she didn’t want to.
She straightened and took a step backward. The voice that had taken up residence inside her mind howled with frustration.
He tried to kill my mother!
“So what? She’s not
my
mother.”
Before she could stop it, her hand brought the knife to her own throat. She smirked with a complete absence of fear.
“You won’t do it. Not until you’ve gotten what you came for. So let’s quit jerking around and get to it.”
The knife remained at her throat for a moment longer, but then the hand was truly hers again, and she lowered the blade.
All right. But if he interferes again, I’ll gut him for sure. You too, if you try to stop me
.
“Whatever. Let’s go.”
She turned away from Terry’s unconscious form and started toward the doorway.
Dale hit a drive-thru for an extra-large, extra-strong coffee before leaving Rhine. The damned stuff was volcanically hot, but he gulped it down anyway. He’d drank so much hot coffee throughout the course of the night that he’d long ago scalded his tongue and seared his alimentary canal to the point where he could swallow molten steel and not feel it.
But the latest dose of liquid adrenaline hadn’t helped much. He supposed he’d drank so much that he’d developed a temporary resistance to its effects. That, or else he was so goddamned tired that nothing short of replacing his blood supply with methamphetamines would help.
He drove down the country roads with his windows down, hoping the cool blast of early morning air would do for him what coffee no longer could. He knew he was leaving himself vulnerable to the Black Beast. He had no doubt the cursed thing was following him, though he could no longer see it. Not long after leaving Sanctity last night, he’d pushed his rearview and sideview mirrors out of alignment so he wouldn’t have to keep seeing the creature reflected there, tirelessly loping along behind despite the pouring rain, keeping up easily, almost mockingly, as if it could put on a burst of speed whenever it wished and catch up to him.
After a few hours of playing follow the leader up and down the roads of Cross County — with only an occasional stop for coffee at one late-night drive-thru or another — Dale had started peeing in empty coffee cups to relieve himself of all the fluid he’d taken in and hurling them out the window like urine-bombs at the Black Beast. He had no idea if any of the cups hit the creature, but that was beside the point. Childish as it might have been, it had felt damned good to do it. If nothing else, it had helped him stay awake. But now his eyes remained open only through sheer stubbornness. They felt gummy, as if his tear ducts were oozing sap, and his hands and feet were numb. The only way he could tell without looking that he still gripped the steering wheel was that he hadn’t swerved off the road and slammed into a telephone pole.
He wondered if that was the Black Beast’s hunting method — to pursue prey until it grew tired and stopped running. Maybe Sadie — by living on her houseboat on Lake Hush all these years — had managed to outlast the creature. Weary of waiting, the Black Beast had chosen new prey to chase.
Dale had plenty of time to think while he drove, and he thought he knew what the Beast was and where it had come from. This knowledge, however, didn’t give him any better idea of how to deal with it. Dale considered who he might go to for help. Not Joanne. The last thing he wanted was for the Beast to decide she would make more interesting prey than an old, broken-down reporter. Joanne had enough to deal with right now. He supposed he could always go to Althea, but he didn’t want to be indebted to her if he could avoid it. He’d had enough dealings with the Crosses over the years, and he wanted to try to maintain as much independence from them as he could — even if it might cost him his life.
But now he was so weary of the chase that he was tempted to say to hell with his principles and give Althea a call. He started to reach for his cell phone when he saw a green road sign with white letters that said SOMERSET 5 MILES. As he flew past the sign, he saw an unmarked dirt road coming up on his left. He slowed only because if he took the turn too fast, he’d flip his Jeep. Plus the dirt road was undoubtedly muddy after last night’s rain, and the last thing he wanted was to get his Jeep mired down in the muck. The chase would surely be over then, and Dale had no doubt who the loser would be.He took the narrow road as slowly as he dared, and even then the Jeep’s tires churned up showers of mud, the vehicle sliding back and forth more than Dale liked. He thought for certain that he wasn’t going to make it, but then he saw it not far ahead — a large white two-story house resembling an antebellum mansion that looked as if it belonged in the actual South instead of Southwestern Ohio. But there it was, and Dale had never been more grateful to see anything in his life. There were trees all over the property — apple trees, of course. What other kind would a person named Eve grow? A half dozen vehicles were parked in front of the house, for as rumor had it, there were always visitors here, no matter the hour. The vehicles ranged from a rusted-out pickup missing its passenger door to a tour bus for a musician Dale had never heard of to what he thought was a Stutz Bearcat, the latter looking as if it had just rolled off the assembly line yesterday.
Dale parked next to the Bearcat and turned off the Jeep’s engine. He sat for a moment, trying to work up the courage to get out, but he was simply too exhausted to feel much of anything.