“Art!” Steve’s voice. Art turned and waved goodnight to him. His hand froze mid-air when he saw the man holding out his phone. “It’s your wife. She’s worried sick, says you didn’t answer your phone and figured she’d check with me.” In a low, conspiratorial voice, he whispered, “If she’s calling me she knows where you are, so no sense hiding.” He grinned.
Art wanted to say Just tell her I’m on my way home, but remembered that he wasn’t suppose to be here in the first place. The message would sound too much like a brush off. He’d tell her he would explain everything when he got home, then hang up before Quinn arrived. The sooner he was out of this place the better. In fact, once he got home, he’d remove the battery from his own phone. Maybe go so far as change his number.
He reached out to Steve’s proffered hand, too late wondering how Beverly had known this man’s cell phone number.
“Hi, Bev,” he said, “Listen, I—“
“Mister Dinneck,” said Peter Quinn’s smooth voice.
The world crinkled around him, faded to black.
No, no! God hel—
And he was no longer anywhere but in the world created for him by his master. He listened to the instructions, handed the phone back to Steve and returned inside.
It was still early. He could wait a little longer. He saw Steve heading directly for his car through the closing front door, heard the Star Spangled Banner begin to play from somewhere in the room. He was content to simply sit in the chair and wait for Quinn to show up. He had something important to tell him.
After Star Spangled Banner listened to the call without speaking, he passed the phone to the next, who listened then passed it on to the third. All three men at the cribbage table rose as one and went to get their jackets. They said, “Goodnight, Art.” Art Dinneck waved absently to them.
He was trying to remember something important. It was just at the tip of his memory, if he could only remember....
Chapter Sixty
“Is the girl inside?”
Manny Paulson nodded. He stood in the open doorway leading from the alley into the store’s back room. Peter Quinn closed his car door and said, “Is Dinneck the only one out front?”
Another nod. Nathan, who’d been pulling the Ark from the back seat and trying to make the action look more like a struggle than it truly was, looked up at the name. He couldn’t have meant him, so his father was here!
What did Dad have to do with this? More insurance?
Quinn moved around the front of the car, the fingers of his right hand grazing the hood absently. “Leave him there for now. He won’t disturb us.” He turned to Josh. “Mister Everson, please follow our Holy Man into the building.”
Nathan straightened and gave Josh a look. His friend stared back blankly. What was he was seeing? Nathan followed Quinn into a long rectangular room, dark save for a row of short red candles burning along the far wall. There was a lingering odor of sulfur, from the matches Paulson likely used to light them. Nathan remembered the sudden welling of fear this morning, a sense that something evil lurked inside this room. The fear returned, though not the overwhelming terror of earlier. Nathan thought, Lord, protect me. Give me strength to face what’s in here.
Bathed in the candles’ red glow and drifting among a thin line of sweet smelling incense, sat a small altar. It reminded Nathan of a Japanese Zen shrine, minimal adornments, set low so one had to kneel before it. The incense stick’s tip had only a small bit of ash.
Seeing what adorned the altar gave him a start. The small statue had a body of gold, though the gold was likely no more real than that which adorned the Ark in Nathan’s arms. It was difficult to tell in the dim light. The idol had the head of a bull, outstretched arms waiting for an offering.
Forgery or not, he did not want to put the Ark on the floor in front of such a desecration. He looked away. Elizabeth stood near the wall on his left, not far from the door leading to the front room where his father was apparently waiting. Her expression was less blank than Josh’s now, and when he looked her way she blinked and returned his gaze.
Quinn said, “Ah, welcome back, young lady. I trust you had a pleasant sleep.”
She was wild-eyed now, looking around the room in a panic. Only when she tried to move did she realize her hands were tied behind her back.
“Nathan, what—”
Quinn raised his hand. “Do not speak.” She stopped talking like an obedient servant, but Nathan was glad to see her expression remained alert. She looked at him, mouthed where are we? Then her eyes fell on what he was carrying. Her look of shock changed to confusion. Maybe she saw it now for what it truly was. She mouthed something else, but Nathan was too preoccupied to interpret it.
Quinn stood in front of him, closely inspecting the Ark without actually touching it. His expression moved slowly from one of awe, to curiosity, to something else. Something darker. He looked up with his eyes only.
“Getting a bit heavy to hold, Reverend Dinneck?” Nathan didn’t like the tone of voice. Sarcasm?
“A little.”
“A little,” Quinn repeated. He reached out, as if to touch the lid, hesitated, then waved his arm instead toward the altar and the Molech icon. “Please place it on the floor, there, just before the altar. Do not try anything stupid or one of your friends will die. I haven’t decided which yet. Just know that I am very serious.”
Nathan put the Ark down, deciding to curb the pretension of it being a struggle. He assumed the charade was about to end. Had Vincent Tarretti known the Ark was not real? Maybe. The man had sounded so convinced, beyond any doubt. A sudden thought, a realization that... he quickly put it out of his mind. Deal with the present. On the altar the statue’s eyes stared up, its bull-head drifting in and out of clarity with the thickening smoke from the incense stick.
Nathan felt renewing tugs of irrational terror return, as if seeping from this idol. Drifting like mist along the floor to his knees. He found he couldn’t pull his face away from the dark animal-face with its wide, open mouth. His fear grew.
God help me, he began to think, before his thoughts became muddy. It was hard to focus. He was aided unwittingly by Quinn, who grabbed the back of his jacket and pulled him away.
“Please step back, Dinneck.”
Nathan stumbled, wanting to swing out, to keep the man from touching him. He was pulled back ten steps. Quinn’s white hair and moustache, when he moved to stand beside him again, were red in the candle light, flickering in shadows.
“It’s show time,” he whispered. “Need I remind you not to move from this spot?”
Nathan didn’t reply. His captor slowly approached the Ark and knelt before it. He began to chant, the words nonsensical. Nathan wondered if this was an actual language, or sounds to help him concentrate. He’d heard of such things, even in the Christian community, with people speaking “in tongues”, people so lost in the rapture of prayer they involuntarily uttered sounds with meaning only to them.
Only this man was not praying to God, but to a demon from the Old Testament that most assumed had long ago faded into historical obscurity.
The dark stench of the terror in the room built to a physical level. Elizabeth tried moving beside him, but Paulson raised his hand, shook his head. A small fact occurred to Nathan, but one which he thought might be important, perhaps for later use. Neither of these men carried guns. At least, none that he could see. Quinn’s voice had been weapon enough so far, controlling the only person who was armed: Josh.
If the police ever became involved in the murder investigation, all evidence would point to his friend.
After a few minutes, Quinn stopped his chanting and rose, slowly, to stand over his prize. He stared at it for a long time, long enough that Nathan was starting to get worried. Nathan looked at his watch. Only eleven-thirty. It seemed they’d been captives for hours. He looked around the room. The mini-mart at the end of the strip mall closed at ten. Wasn’t Josh supposed to be the closer? Either way, anyone working
there had already left. Maybe there was an alarm. He needed to get outside, break the window, do something to get the police here.
With Quinn occupied, Nathan could grab Josh’s gun before Paulson had a chance to stop him.
He tensed, preparing to lunge at his friend before Quinn could realize what he was doing. From the way the man was scowling at the box, that would happen any time now.
“Mister Everson, shoot anyone who makes a move toward you. Be sure the bullet goes into their head. More efficient that way.”
The internal momentum Nathan had been building almost pushed him toward Josh anyway. His friend had the gun raised and pointing directly at Nathan’s face. Still, if he could cut to the side....
“Actually, Mister Everson,” Quinn continued, still with his back to everyone else in the room, “shoot the woman if anyone makes a move toward you.” Josh quickly moved the gun away from Nathan and toward Elizabeth’s head.
Damn you, Nathan thought furiously. How did you know? How could you know?
Quinn turned around to face his small congregation. His smile was slight and mocking.
“Manny, if you would be so kind as to tie up Mister Dinneck, we have much to do, still.” He looked at Nathan. “One doesn’t need to be a psychic, Reverend, to sense when someone is planning a move against you. You wouldn’t be a very good poker player.” He glanced back at the Ark, the semblance of a smile dropping again. Paulson roughly tied Nathan’s wrists behind his back with what looked like a blue paisley necktie. His shoulders stretched painfully in their sockets. Quinn looked from the Ark back toward him, and his smile did not return. In fact, his mouth continued down, past what could simply be called a frown or a grimace. With a hiss, he added, “Still, everyone has one good bluff in them sometimes, don’t they?”
Nathan actually gasped when Quinn quickly reached out and grabbed the edge of the Ark’s lid.
And nothing happened.
Chapter Sixty-One
“Come over here, Paulson, and help me lift this cover.”
Manny moved slowly across the room. “But I thought, I mean, shouldn’t we wait for that guy from Maine to get here?” He looked at his watch. “He’s due any—hey, wait a second, that’s not—”
The air was changing in the room. As Paulson pointed at the plain wooden box, Quinn’s expression alternated between contempt, fear, and anger.
“Then stay where you are and learn something, you idiot!” He grabbed the cover with both hands and pulled. The box, in its entirety, raised up from the ground. Quinn glared over at Nathan, then slammed the Ark down onto the concrete floor.
It cracked; a wide crevice running down the middle of its face. Small splinters of wood and flecks of gold paint fluttered to the floor. He picked it back up, higher this time, and screamed like a mad man. Down came the box again. This time it shattered. Most of the pieces were large, oddly contorted. Other smaller splinters sailed back into the air to land on the altar or behind the macabre demon’s statue.
Quinn roared with rage again, kicked at the remnants. Elizabeth backed against the wall. Nathan was glad to see her mouth pressed closed, not daring to call attention to herself while the man’s rage exploded throughout the room.
Not knowing what else to say, Paulson muttered, “It’s empty, and... it looks different.”
Quinn screamed, “It’s not REAL, you idiot!”
Nathan tried, with everything he had, to contain the hysteria suddenly filling him. Everything since coming to town was too far removed from normal. The nightmares, Hayden’s disappearance and murder, a crypt with the Ark of the Covenant that was nothing but wood and paint, his father. All of it, insane. Nonsense.
Too much. It was all too much to expect one man to contain.
Nathan began to laugh.
A giggle at first, which he was able to stifle, but another came roaring out of him. He felt himself sliding into some uncontrolled idiocy, but he couldn’t curb it. Elizabeth had done the right thing, shrinking into the background while Quinn expended his anger on the wooden chest, but he could not stop himself. With one final guffaw and eyes tearing, Nathan knew it was useless to fight this sudden burst of emotion. He simply didn’t care any more.
“Nathan,” Elizabeth whispered, breaking her imposed silence, “be quiet.”
Peter Quinn straightened and turned. He moved slowly but consistently to close the gap between Nathan and himself. His movements were those of a jungle animal toward its prey. Nathan knew he was about to die, but he was exhausted, pushed beyond his limits. He didn’t care any more. He was tired of letting this lost, insane man terrorize him. He stopped laughing and straightened.
What would come, would come, whether he laughed at this man or did nothing at all.
“Something funny, you Jesus-loving freak?”
Nathan took a deep breath and forced himself to smile, though it was a weak gesture. “You,” he said.
The first punch slammed into his left cheek and sent him to the floor. Since he was still bound, Nathan fell to his side and something popped in his right shoulder. In a haze, he was lifted up, punched again in the same place. He did not fall this time, tried to open his eyes to see from where the next blow would come. Before he could clear his vision, something hit him on the other side of his face. He went down again. A hard kick centered in the stomach. Air raced from his lungs. He curled his legs for protection, too intent on finding a way to take a breath to feel more pain. Something moved over him, then the pain came, sharply tearing up his back. He’d either been kicked again or shot. He screamed and spat blood from his mouth. He’d bitten down onto his tongue.
He had to move, get to his feet. He could hear Elizabeth screaming for Quinn to stop. He forced his eyes open and in his limited vision saw Paulson holding her back. Josh still held the gun toward her head, arm wavering uncertainly.
He also saw Quinn returning from his altar with a jagged piece of wood.
“Are you done laughing yet?” The man’s eyes were wide with hysteria. Nathan tried to stand, to defend himself, but his muscles were too constricted. His shoulder throbbed dully where it had popped from its socket. He was helpless to stop anything that would come next.
Quinn raised the improvised wooden stake above him.
Forgive me for failing you, Lord. Accept me into Your arms, protect my friends and family.
“Peter, wait.” Paulson’s voice, a thin warbling in Nathan’s ears. “We still need him. What if the real one’s back at the cemetery?”
Nathan kept his eyes riveted to the wooden point dropping down to his chest. It stopped just shy of penetrating his skin, poking hard between his open jacket, pressing into his shirt. It was taking so long to get through. Quinn was growling and his hands shook. A line of spit dropped from the corner of his mouth onto Nathan’s cheek. He pressed the point harder against his chest, but not hard enough to kill. It was painfully obvious that he wanted to, but his maddened expression was changing. His eyes turned back toward the altar. Paulson’s suggestion had taken root, fighting with the blood lust.
Paulson continued, “Just long enough to go back there and see for ourselves. Just long enough for that. If there’s not something else in the grave, we kill them all and leave them underground with their dead buddy. No mess, no evidence. But... not... here!”
Quinn’s eyes were darting back and forth. Considering. He leaned forward until his forehead touched Nathan’s, the stake pressing so hard into his chest that Nathan moaned in pain. “OK.” He sighed. His breath smelled like mint gum and onions. “OK. One more trip, Dinneck, back to the graveyard. I guarantee you that you will suffer greatly before you die. But it’ll happen somewhere more fitting. And you’ll be the last to go, so you can watch your girlfriend die.”
Then he was gone, standing up and straightening his clothes as much as possible. He tossed the stake to the floor. Nathan remained where he was, unable and unwilling to move.
“Take Dinneck’s father and the girl to this boy’s church. Any sign o
f people, just continue on and meet us at the cemetery. I’ll go out front and have a word with Arthur first, make sure he cooperates. While I’m doing that, put the girl in the trunk then swing around front and pick Dinneck up. Don’t linger there.” He then leaned forward and whispered more instructions into Paulson’s ear. Nathan vaguely wondered if he was using the Voice on him. He doubted it. Paulson didn’t need much prodding. Whatever Quinn was saying must have been good, because Paulson looked excited. He nodded enthusiastically. Quinn stepped back and said loudly, “But put it in the back seat. We don’t want the girl choking to death on fumes before all the fun starts.”
Paulson nodded. “Why can’t we just leave Art here? We’ve got enough to handle as it is, and—”
Quinn shoved him toward Elizabeth. “Just do what I say and stop questioning me. You were right about needing the preacher, for now,” he added with a contemptuous gaze at Nathan, “but whether or not we find what we’re looking for, there will be a sacrifice to Molech tonight. And for that, we need his father. Now move.”
He turned back to Nathan. His composure had returned, though he was moving with more urgency, checking his watch often. “Get up, Dinneck. After I chat with your daddy we’re going to pay one last visit to the cemetery. See what trick your little caretaker friend tried to put over on us, eh?”
Nathan looked across the room, to the wreckage of the Ark. Part of him wondered the very same thing.
Chapter Sixty-Two
Nathan wished he could have seen his father, though he was certain Art Dinneck was so much under Quinn’s influence that it probably would have made no difference. It was possible the reason Quinn didn’t simply put Elizabeth back under was that he could only control so many people at one time. Especially in his current, near-panic state of mind. Quinn’s confidence had been shattered in the back room. Even now, as he led him and Josh across the dark grass of Greenwood Street Cemetery, he walked quickly, impatiently.
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