by Paul Johnson
‘Do they?’ Sebastian’s tone made it clear he didn’t see himself as one of them. ‘Those fatigues won’t exactly do for undercover work.’
Quincy shrugged. ‘I figured you’d be taking us to the mall.’
Sebastian ignored that. ‘Are you ready to go, Matt?’
‘Just about. Can you get Special Agent Simms to box up what’s left?’
He nodded. ‘All right, let’s hit the world outside.’
Before I went, I passed by the hi-fi and picked up the CD Karen and I had listened to. Our son would have heard Monteverdi’s Orfeo, too. I wasn’t going to leave that behind.
Mikey Lister was in seventh heaven. Not only had the hooker brought the grass he’d asked for, but she was a stunner-Cuban, a beautiful deep bronze color, and a rack to stop the traffic. She said she was called Lucky, but he didn’t believe that for a second. After this, he was going to take that nickname himself.
She was in the shower now, so Mikey went through her clutch bag. There wasn’t much in it-some keys, cigarettes, condoms, gum. There was a man’s billfold containing over five hundred dollars and a credit card in the name of L. Sanchez. Maybe she was called Lucky after all. He thought about lifting a couple of the fifties he’d given her, but decided against it. His brother Gordy had stepped up to the plate recently and, for the first time in his life, his bank account was healthy. Maybe losing his pins hadn’t been so bad after all. His smarmy shit-sucker of a lawyer had nailed the driver who had hit him for major damages. So a hooker a week was no big deal anymore.
Then again, he thought, looking at the uneven stumps that protruded from his boxers, he was stuck in the chair till he croaked. He did an hour on crutches every day, but they made his arms hurt. Artificial legs were out of the question. He had too little of the real ones left. At least Lucky didn’t mind. Some of the girls could hardly disguise their horror. That made him so mad that he made them blow him, so the bitches’ faces were up close and personal with the stumps.
‘I leave now,’ said Lucky, emerging from the bathroom in the least clothing that the cops would let her get away with on the street. Girls in the Tallahassee area weren’t what Mikey would call shy and retiring when it came to what they wore, but this one beat them all.
‘See ya, doll,’ he said, sticking his finger between her legs.
She slapped his arm. ‘We finished now, doll.’
Mikey Lister watched her go. Had she just given him attitude? He pushed the wheel toward the door and got there before it slammed behind her. He grabbed the golf club he kept for emergencies and rolled down the driveway.
‘Hey, Castro quim, get a load of this!’ he yelled, closing on her spectacular rear.
Lucia Sanchez sidestepped the chair and Mikey trundled past, bouncing onto the road. ‘Get back here, bitch!’ he yelled, swinging the club.
‘Screw you, gimp!’ she screamed back, as she got into her scarlet Bonneville.
Mikey watched her accelerate away, still in the middle of the street. He looked around, but there was no one outside. Just as well, he thought. He wasn’t in the mood for whining from his tight-assed neighbors. About thirty yards away he saw a dark blue Crown Vic that looked familiar. Was it the same one that had been across the road from his place yesterday? Was he being watched?
He pushed the chair to the side of the road and thought about that. He didn’t know what Gordy was up to these days, but it sure wasn’t legal. He didn’t have that paper job anymore and he’d begun calling from different places each week. He’d also told Mikey not to talk about him, not that he did. Mikey had always thought Gordy was a pathetic runt and he’d given him hell when they were kids. Maybe Gordy had someone watching him to make sure the cops weren’t doing surveillance, too. Screw that.
Mikey Lister set off down the street, the golf club across his thighs.
‘Hey, peeper,’ he shouted, ‘you want some of this?’ As he got nearer, he saw the driver’s head rise from the back of the seat and heard the engine start. ‘Yeah, that’s right, get the fuck outta here!’
The Crown Vic pulled away, leaving Mikey in the middle of the road. He stayed there until it turned the corner and disappeared.
‘Yeah, Mikey,’ he said. ‘Way to go!’ Maneuvering the chair, he pushed himself back toward the driveway of his building. The sun was beating down on the back of his neck and he could hear the cry of seagulls in the distance. Some place, he thought. Sunshine in the middle of winter. It sure beat the shit out of Oklahoma.
The pickup that had turned into the street ahead of him had large chrome bull bars. Mikey pulled into the side and gave it the benefit of his professional eye. ‘Nissan Frontier,’ he said to himself. ‘2003 or 4. Those bars are new, though. Hey, is that a woman driving? Come on, bitch, take off your cap.’ He imitated the action.
The blonde obliged. Her hair was short and she looked good. Then she jerked the wheel to the right and floored the gas pedal.
Mikey Lister flew out of his wheelchair and headfirst into the trunk of a nearby palm tree. The last thing he saw was the set of the woman’s lips. It looked like she was in pain.
Fifteen
Peter Sebastian drove us to the airport outside a town called Rockford. Quincy Jerome and I were in the back of the SUV. I looked out through tinted windows at the world I’d been excluded from for what seemed like years. It was icy cold and there were few people around. The exhaust fumes from vehicles hung in the air like ghosts unable to take corporeal form. Northern Illinois did not look in any way inviting.
‘If you don’t mind me asking,’ Quincy said, ‘what’s the plan?’
I flexed my fingers. ‘We find Heinz Rothmann and I get rid of him.’
Peter Sebastian glanced into the mirror. ‘Partially correct. We need to find Rothmann, but I want him brought in, like any other felon.’
‘So I’m an officer of the law now, am I?’ I asked ironically.
‘But if you have to use extreme force to defend yourself,’ the FBI man continued, ‘then so be it.’
‘Uh-huh,’ Quincy said. ‘That applies to me as well, does it?’
‘You’re a soldier,’ Sebastian said. ‘You’re trained to fire back if you’re attacked, no?’
‘You sure this is aboveboard?’ the sergeant asked. ‘I don’t want to find myself in a court accused of murder.’
‘Not going to happen,’ Sebastian said emphatically. ‘As for legitimacy, I can show you an authorization signed by the Director of the FBI.’
‘Maybe later,’ Quincy said, glancing at me.
I didn’t respond to his look. All I cared about was nailing Rothmann.
‘Where are we going?’ I asked, as we arrived at the airport.
‘D.C.,’ Sebastian replied, showing ID at a gate. ‘I want to review the murders. Then we’ll come up with a detailed plan.’
I didn’t buy that. The FBI’s head of violent crime was about the most structured person I’d ever met. We wouldn’t just come up with a plan, he’d have several carefully structured strategies already.
We were waved past the terminal building and through a gate in the security fence. Sebastian drove into a hangar and stopped next to an executive jet.
Quincy Jerome let out a low whistle. ‘Cool. Never been on one of these babies.’
Neither had I, but I didn’t feel any exhilaration. It was like my emotions had been streamlined-everything was directed toward finding Rothmann.
A few minutes later, we were in the air and arcing upward through a thick cloud cover. Quincy had his eyes glued to the porthole, until a tray of food arrived from the galley. When Sebastian sat down opposite me, I leaned forward and spoke to him in a low voice.
‘I presume you’ve publicized the fact that I’m in circulation.’
He shook his head. ‘We’re not telling the media anything as that would provoke a feeding frenzy. But we will pass the word to some of our informers in the criminal underworld.’
‘So I’m the bait.’ I gave him a cold smile. ‘Don’t worry, I can see
the attractions of that idea. But what if he doesn’t come after me?’
‘You killed his beloved twin sister, Matt. Trust me, he’s going to come after you.’
I sat back. ‘So why are we going to D.C.? Why don’t we go somewhere easier for him to target?’
Sebastian thought about that. ‘Got a suggestion?’
‘I have, actually. You remember Mary Upson?’
‘The woman who got you out of Maine.’ His memory was as sharp as I had expected. ‘Her mother was involved with the Antichurch of Lucifer Triumphant.’
‘Correct. Maybe we can kill two birds with one stone. You can interrogate the old woman about the cult and I can find out what Mary didn’t tell me.’
‘They were both interviewed at length after the cathedral massacre. The mother denied any involvement with either the Antichurch or Rothmann. Besides, your relationship with Mary Upson didn’t exactly end happily, Matt.’
‘True. I’ll try to make it up to her.’ The fact was, I was in pure manipulation mode. Rothmann would have been proud.
Sebastian looked up from the notes he was making. ‘How do we let Rothmann know where you are?’
‘We won’t have to. If you give Mary’s mother a chance, she’ll find a way to get in touch with him.’
‘Smart, Matt. Okay, I’ll talk to the Maine State Police and find out if the women are still living there.’
‘Sparta, that was the name of the town.’ It was the first place I’d reached after I escaped from the Rothmanns’ camp.
‘I know,’ he said testily. ‘I went there to catch you.’
I watched him as he went to the front of the cabin and picked up the phone.
‘I haven’t been to Washington since I was a kid,’ Quincy Jerome said, taking Sebastian’s seat.
‘Don’t hold your breath, big man. We’re rerouting.’
‘Where to?’
‘Probably Maine.’
‘At this time of year? Shee-it.’
‘Even worse than Illinois, eh?’
‘You know where I’m from?’ he said, shaking his head. ‘Mobile, Alabama. That’s about as different from Maine as you get.’
‘I’ll take your word for it.’ I feigned exhaustion and closed my eyes. I didn’t feel like talking. I liked Quincy, but often he made me laugh and I didn’t want to do that anymore. I tried to think of Karen and our son, but they wouldn’t come to me. My memory seemed to be working fine when it came to other things, but their faces-even Karen’s-had gone. If this was what grief did to you, I could do without it. I wanted to see them and weep.
‘Matt?’
My shoulder was shaken and I snapped awake.
‘You’ve been out for over an hour,’ Peter Sebastian said. ‘Mary Upson and her mother-’
‘Nora Jacobsen.’
He nodded. ‘They’ve moved to Portland-Maine. Not Oregon, fortunately. We should be there in an hour and a quarter.’
‘You realize there’s a serious drawback to this plan,’ I said, after I’d gulped down a bottle of water.
‘What’s that?’
‘Sara Robbins.’
Sebastian studied me impassively. ‘She’ll see that you’ve been released, sure. But how could she know you’re in Portland?’
‘Trust me, she’ll find out. It wouldn’t even surprise me if she was working for Rothmann.’
‘Then we really will kill two birds with one stone.’
Quincy Jerome leaned across the aisle. ‘Who’s Sara Robbins?’
‘You do not want to know,’ I replied. ‘On second thoughts, you have to know.’
By the time I’d finished telling him about the Soul Collector, we had almost reached Portland.
Abaddon had been given that name by her brother. As far as she was concerned, that was who she was. The family was from Atlanta, but she had lived in St. Louis for the last five years, mainly because it was centrally located and had good flight connections. She often worked on both east and west coasts, as well as plenty of places in between, so a hub was essential.
She looked out of the window in the roof of the converted warehouse in Laclede’s Landing. The apartment had been an expensive buy because the area was a historic district, but that hadn’t been a problem. She liked the view of the Mississippi, the pair of bridges on one side and the open space around the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial on the other. She wasn’t so keen on the 630-foot-high Gateway Arch. Modern architecture and art didn’t cut it for her, and the stainless steel parabola always struck her as a monument to American vanity.
Abaddon broke a couple of eggs into a glass, added salt, pepper and Tabasco, and drank them down. That would keep her going till dinner, which she would eat at Connolly’s, an Irish pub that did great burgers and stews. Tonight she was celebrating. Connolly’s was a young people’s hangout and if she was lucky she would find a willing guy. She corrected herself. Luck had nothing to do with it. Although she was forty, she kept herself in good shape and her hair was still black as ravens’ feathers. A man she lived with for three weeks-the most she’d ever managed-had told her that she had witchy looks. She reckoned he was right. She’d inherited her father’s dark hair and complexion, as well as other attributes. The genes behind her mother’s meekness and mousy hair had been outmuscled in a big way.
The only problem about St. Louis was that she wasn’t close to the Antichurch down south. Sometimes she managed to attend rituals on the way to and from jobs; other times she flew down specially. She didn’t make it every week, but she’d been given a dispensation. As long as she was there at least once a fortnight her soul remained bound to Lucifer. She couldn’t imagine life without that. Then again, she hadn’t been able to conceive of life without the old man until the catastrophe happened. The family had been devastated, but had managed to keep the Antichurch going, despite the efforts of the heretic. Abaddon had done what she could to avenge the lost faithful, but the enemy had always been untouchable.
Now, at last, the time had come. True, Abaddon had to do things the way her employer wanted, but that wasn’t a problem. She would do anything to get a shot at the heretic, kill anyone and never count the cost. It was what she lived for, what she wanted more than anything in the world. And she knew that the great god beneath the earth was on her side. There was nothing worse than a traitor. Now the enemy would pay for his sins against the Antigospel of Lucifer.
Abaddon opened her laptop and checked her employer’s secure site. Apparently Matt Wells had been released by the Feds. He could lead them to the enemy, but first she was to deal with someone else. The woman who stared out at her from the blurred photograph had short blond hair and prominent cheekbones, and she looked to be in good physical condition. As she read through the file, she felt the tingle throughout her body that always came when she was put up against a worthy opponent. This target was nothing less than a demon. She had killed at least fifty-six people, and those were only the confirmed victims-it was estimated that she was responsible for dozens of other deaths, in the U.S. and abroad. Her original name had been Sara Robbins, but later she was known as the Soul Collector. Her brother had been a vicious serial killer. Even more interesting, she had been Matt Wells’s lover. Nobody seemed to know her current name. Finding her was the first part of the job. The second was to take her out.
She looked toward the Gateway Arch, glinting red in the late afternoon sun, and smiled. This was going to be some contest. Abaddon versus the Soul Collector. The angel of the pit versus the killer who culled spirits. Assassin versus assassin. Pro versus pro. There could be only one winner. The heretic might even get caught in the cross fire.
We were in an office borrowed from the Maine state cops on the outskirts of Portland. Peter Sebastian had just finished with the major in charge, making it clear that the FBI was boss now. While he was doing that, I caught the news on a TV high up in the corner. There was more about climate change than I remembered before we’d been cut off from all news media in the camp. There was a high-prof
ile gathering of international leaders at the UN in ten days and special correspondents were stressing how important it was that progress be made on the issue.
Quincy Jerome sat at the conference table, looking like a fish who wished he was back in the water. In the past I’d have kept him company, but I didn’t have the urge anymore. There was a job to be done and being friendly was irrelevant. Besides, he’d been taken aback by what I told him about Sara. Soldiers didn’t expect to be attacked by attractive women. I made sure he had no illusions-she would pick up my trail, it was only a question of time. But I found that I didn’t care anymore. Nailing Rothmann was all that mattered.
Sebastian came over. ‘I’ve got surveillance on the Jacobsen house. Both she and Mary Upson are there.’
I stood up. ‘Let’s go then.’
‘Not yet. I’m waiting for some essential material from D.C. We’ll interview them tomorrow morning. They aren’t going anywhere.’
I looked at him doubtfully. ‘You’d better hope they aren’t. They’re our only leads.’
‘Apart from Gordy Lister. Look at this.’ He handed me a printout.
‘Jesus, this came in hours ago. How come you only got it now?’
Sebastian pursed his mouth. ‘I didn’t. I was informed this morning. I thought you had enough going on.’
I glared at him. ‘Don’t do that again. I’m the tethered goat here. I need to know what’s happening.’ Sebastian nodded, so I went back to the paper. ‘This Mikey Lister was what? Gordy’s brother?’
‘Yes. I’m embarrassed to say that our Jacksonville field office had him under surveillance, near Tallahassee. I thought Gordy might show up there after we spotted him in Philadelphia. The hit-and-run driver was gone before our people could react. There will be disciplinary proceedings.’
‘“No witnesses,”’ I read. ‘In broad daylight?’
‘Apparently.’
Quincy Jerome stirred. ‘Are you sure it was an accident?’
‘Of course not.’
‘Who would have wanted him dead?’ I asked.
‘I don’t know.’
