F Paul Wilson - Novel 10

by Midnight Mass (v2. 1)

  He was more sure now than ever that they'd been searching for him.

  With the arrival of another trio of Vichy, the first three left. The second three took up guard positions as all eight undead trudged up the Post Office steps. Joe noticed that six of the males clustered around the female while a lone male brought up the rear. Something familiar about that solitary figure, but Joe couldn't place it.

  No time to think about it either. He broke into a run. Dawn was coming and he had to race the sun to the beach.

  - 10 -

  CAROLE . . .

  Soon.

  Carole sat on the bungalow's tiny rear deck and watched the sun's lazy fall toward the horizon. A beautiful end to the day. She might have enjoyed it but for the adrenaline buzzing through her.

  A good day ... as good as could be expected. In these times, a good day was when nothing unusually ugly occurred.

  Joseph had made it home just after sunrise. Before dropping into a deathlike sleep in the rear bedroom, he'd spoken into the cassette recorder Carole and Lacey had looted from the Radio Shack.

  Was it really looting? she wondered. Did taking something from a store that was never going to reopen make you a looter? It seemed like a silly thing to worry about, but she did.

  When Carole had asked Lacey what she thought, she'd replied, "Who gives a shit?"

  Maybe Carole needed to adopt more of that attitude.

  Carole had returned to the church this morning and, when no one was watching, left the recorder on the front steps. It seemed to take forever, but eventually someone found it and played it for the congregation.

  Cheers and tears—that was the only way Carole could describe the reaction. At least initially. It took a while for the anger to set in, but when it came it was fierce. The undead and their collaborators had tried to turn their Father Joe. A craven, cowardly, backstabbing act. The anger bound the parishioners even more closely. They'd stay on and fight harder. To the death if need be.

  Carole tried to draw strength from the memory of their boisterous resolve. For soon she would have to do what she and Lacey had discussed. Part of her hummed with anticipation while an equal part recoiled.

  Joseph had awakened a short while ago. He and Lacey were inside, talking. The indistinguishable murmur of their voices drifted through the open glass door, mixing with the thrum of the waves and the calls of the gulls.

  Her heart kicked up its tempo as their voices faded. That meant that they were heading for the front bedroom.

  Soon ...too soon . . .

  "Okay."

  Carole jumped and turned at the sound of Lacey's voice.

  "Now?"

  How inane. Of course now. That was why Lacey was here.

  Carole rose unsteadily. Did she have the nerve for this?

  Lacey pressed the steak knife into her hand. "He's waiting."

  Carole nodded, took the knife, and headed for the bedroom. When she reached the alcove she hesitated. She wiped a sweaty palm on the pants of her sweatsuit, then forced herself forward.

  I can do this, she thought. I must do this.

  Joe was sitting on the bed, head down, hands clasped between his knees, looking like a man on death row. He didn't look up as she entered.

  "Okay," he said, his voice hoarse. "Let's get this over—" He must have sensed something. His head snapped up. "Carole? Sorry. I was expecting Lacey."

  Her tongue felt like flannel. "It won't be Lacey today."

  Before he could understand, before he could protest, Carole clenched her teeth and jabbed the point of the knife into the center of her palm. She suppressed a gasp of pain as the blade pierced her skin.

  "No!" Joseph was on his feet. "No, don't!"

  "It's already done," she said.

  "Carole, I can't." He backed away a step. "Not you."

  She held out her hand, cupping her palm to hold the pooling blood.

  "Yes. Me. It's only fair. I don't want to be left out."

  That wasn't quite the way Lacey had put it last night after Joseph had left so abruptly. She'd said that if the three of them were going to work together, be a team, then they'd have to act and feel like a team. "One for all and all for one, and all that shit," she'd said.

  Which meant they had to feel at ease with each other, and that would never happen unless someone broke through the wall of shame that had sprung up between Carole and her uncle. Joseph couldn't do it. Only Carole had the power.

  Lacey had known one sure way for Carole to break through. It was radical, she'd warned, something her uncle would balk at—and Carole wouldn't be too crazy about it either—but it had to be done.

  Joseph was shaking his head, his mouth working but saying nothing. She could read no expression in his scarred face, but his eyes looked terrified.

  Still cupping her hand, Carole sat on the bed. She placed the knife beside her and tugged on his sleeve.

  "Sit, Joseph," she said. "You've given so much, had so much stolen from you, let me give something to you."

  "No!"

  "Why will you take it from Lacey but not from me? Do you think there's something wrong with my blood?"

  "No, of course not."

  "They why not me?"

  "Because ..." He shook his head.

  "Please don't reject me." She felt a thickness in her throat, heard a catch in her voice. "I couldn't bear it if you turned me away."

  Joseph must have heard it too. He slumped next to her. "Carole . .. you don't have to do this."

  "I do. I want to."

  That hadn't been quite true when she'd stepped into the room, but now, this close to him, feeling his anguish, she wanted to be part of this, she wanted this bond, terrible as it was.

  She held her cupped palm beneath his chin.

  "Please?"

  With a groan Joseph bent his head and pressed his lips against her palm. A shiver ran through her as his tongue swirled against her skin.

  So close . . . she'd never dreamed they'd be this close.

  Carole felt him swallow, then with a sob he pushed her hand away and sagged against her, resting his head on her thighs, facing away.

  "Oh, Carole, I'm so sorry. So sorry."

  She made a fist over her cut palm to stanch the bleeding. Her other hand rose of its own accord, hovered over his head for a few heartbeats, then dropped and began stroking his hair.

  "You have nothing to apologize for, Joseph," she said softly. "This was not your choosing. It's not your fault."

  He said nothing. For a moment she feared he might rise and leave the room, but he didn't move.

  She said, "You almost told me why you didn't want to take my blood. You got as far as 'Because.' Can you tell me the rest?"

  "Because ..." He took a breath. "Because I love you."

  She gasped, her hand recoiling from him as if it had been burned.

  Joseph began to lift his head. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have—"

  "No—no," she said, gently pushing his head back down. "Don't move." She couldn't let him see her face right now, for she knew her heart must be shining in her eyes. "It's all right. It's . . . it's ..."

  The intoxicating feelings bursting through her . . . she'd never felt anything like this before. It was indescribable. Her words dried up and blew away like dead leaves.

  I love you . . . had he really said that?

  "It's wonderful," she managed.

  "I'm not talking about love as for a fellow human being. I'm saying that I love you as a woman."

  "All the more wonderful," she said. "Because I've felt the same way about you."

  Now his head shot up and she couldn't stop it. He stared at her, mouth agape. "What?"

  She could only nod. She felt tears brimming her eyelids and didn't trust herself to speak.

  "That can't be," he said.

  She nodded again and forced the words past the swelling in her throat. "I was taken with you the day you arrived to replace Father McMann. And as I came to know you, I came to love you."

&nbs
p; "You mean 'loved,' don't you."

  "No. I still do. More than ever."

  He looked away. "You can't. That man is gone."

  She touched his scarred cheek. "No. He's been changed, but he's not gone. He's still there, inside. I feel him when you're near, I hear him when you speak."

  "Maybe he's there now, but I don't know much longer you can count on him being around."

  "I have faith in you."

  "I appreciate that, Carole but. . . I've been having a dream, the same dream yesterday and today. Hanging from a precipice over this swirling darkness that's calling to me, beckoning to me."

  "But—"

  He held up a hand. "I know what you're going to say, but this doesn't feel symbolic. This feels real. It bothers me that part of me wants to let go and fall into that abyss. But that's all right. I think I can handle that. What bothers me more is there's no sense of light above me trying to draw me the other way. Only the darkness below."

  "I don't understand."

  "Where's the balance? The darkness seems to be in control with nothing opposing it. Nothing but us."

  "God is out there, Joseph, working through us."

  "Not working too well, I'd say. Look what's happened to me."

  She wanted to tell him that what had happened to him might be all part of God's plan, but held back. Now was not the time.

  He shook his head. "All those years at St. Anthony's . . . you loving me, I loving you, longing for you, and neither of us knew. Imagine if things had been different... what a team we'd have made, Carole."

  "We're a team now, at least part of one."

  "Yes, but the possibilities ... all gone now." He laid his head back on her thighs. "Gone for good."

  She began stroking his hair again. "We're together now."

  "But look what it took for us to find out how we felt about each other. You've been through a living hell since Easter week, and I. . . I'm not even human anymore."

  "I don't care what you are. I know who you are."

  After a while he said, "Sex is out of the question, you know."

  "Yes. We both still have our vows."

  "I don't mean that. I mean . . . one of the changes in me . . . one of the things they stole from me ... I don't think I ever can."

  Carole said nothing. It didn't matter.

  They stayed this way a long time, Joseph lying still against her thighs, Carole stroking his hair, soothing him, murmuring to him. In the world outside the horror still raged all about them, but here, in this moment, in this place, she'd found a sliver of peace, the closest to heaven she'd ever been.

  CAROLE . . .

  Lacey burst out laughing. She couldn't help it.

  Joe glanced up from where he sat across from her at the little dining room table. "What's so funny?"

  "I was just thinking what a cozy little domestic scene this is. Here's Papa Joe, sharpening stakes to drive through undead hearts. There's Momma Carole at the sink mixing up a batch of napalm. And here's baby Lacey cleaning her 9mm pistols." She laughed again. "We're the new nuclear family!"

  Carole turned from the sink where she was stirring a strange mix with a large wooden spoon, and gave her a wry smile. "Nuclear... there's a thought."

  "No, Carole," Joe said. "Don't go there."

  What a change in Carole and Joe. Their meeting in the bedroom had transformed them. They'd come out leaning close to each other. Lacey wouldn't have been surprised if they started holding hands, but they didn't. Joe seemed so much more at ease in her presence, and Carole ... well, Carole positively glowed.

  All because of me, Lacey thought. Did I have the situation and solution nailed or what? Am I brilliant or am I brilliant?

  After Joe had fed, they went their separate ways. Joe took the car to Lake-wood to work out a plan of attack on the Post Office. Carole walked down to the abandoned business district on Arnold Avenue to do what she termed some "shopping." Lacey hoped that neither of them ran into Vichy along the way.

  Her own job was simpler. Armed with a makeshift siphon, she'd been assigned the task of finding gasoline.

  That had proved a cinch. Her first stop had been the garage behind the bungalow where she discovered an old Ford convertible with a full tank. She found a dusty five-gallon gas can, probably for a motorboat, and filled that.

  Carole returned later with a shopping cart loaded with boxes of different brands of soap flakes, some lighter fluid, plus a bag of sundries from a party supply shop. She immediately set up in the kitchen and went to work filling the house with fumes.

  Lacey held up one of the 9mm rounds and showed it to Joe.

  "Look at this. Hollow point. They're all hollow points."

  Joe shook his head. "Nasty things. I hear they make a little hole going in and a great big hole coming out."

  "Why would the undead be carrying automatics loaded with these?"

  "To protect against humans, I imagine," Joe said. "They're strong, they're fast, but that's not enough if they're attacked by a mob." He pointed to the round. "That's probably what the Vichy will be using against us this morning—if they get the chance."

  "Let's go over the plan again," Lacey said.

  She wasn't crazy about it. As much as she respected her uncle's intelligence, he'd had no military training, had never engaged in any sort of violent activity. Lacey had at least studied martial arts. That wasn't much, but it had trained her on how to size up an opponent, how to look for strategic openings. Joe's plan seemed to depend on too many variables.

  "Okay," Joe said. "The Vichy guards spend most of their time hanging around on the front steps. When they're not smoking they're sleeping. They're bored and don't take their job seriously. No one's ever attacked them on duty like that and they probably think no one ever will. We're going to change that."

  "Hitting them at dawn I understand, but why napalm? Why don't we just shoot them?"

  "Because we're not marksmen—or, excuse me, markswomen—and we can't afford a protracted gun battle because my clock will be running. If they hold out past my sun tolerance, we'll have lost more than the battle. We won't be able to take them by surprise again. But more than that, the more bullets flying, the greater chance of you or Carole getting hit."

  "But how do we know the napalm will work?"

  Joe's idea was for the three of them to climb to the roof of the building across the street and each toss a napalm-filled balloon onto the Vichy as they lounged on the Post Office steps below. The street wasn't wide and it was an easy throw from the roof. Or so he said.

  "Oh, it will work," Carole said from the sink. "Have no fear of that."

  "But it has to ignite."

  "We'll make sure one of them's smoking before we toss."

  "That doesn't guarantee it will light."

  Joe leaned back, staring at her. For a moment she thought he was angry but couldn't be sure. So hard to gauge emotions when a face has no expression.

  "You're right," he said finally. "It doesn't." He turned toward the kitchen. "Do we have any gasoline left, Carole?"

  "A little. Why?"

  "Save half a dozen ounces or so. We're going to bring along a Molotov cocktail." He turned back to Lacey. "Better?" "You mean throw that first, then the napalm?" He nodded. "Yeah," Lacey said. "That'll work."

  JOE . . .

  "Oh, no!" Joe said as he heard a thwacking noise and the car began to vibrate. He slammed a fist against the steering wheel. "Damn!"

  They'd left an hour before dawn. The plan had been to loop north of Lakewood through Howell and approach downtown from the west. They were on Aldrich Road when the noise began.

  "What's wrong?" Carole said. She sat next to him in the front, Lacey sat in the rear with the arsenal.

  "Can you believe it? We've got a flat!"

  He popped the trunk and jumped out. Of all times for something like this to happen.

  "Can't we drive on the rim?" Carole said.

  "Any other time I'd say fine, but we can't risk the racket it will ma
ke."

  He lifted the trunk lid and was relieved to find the spare present and inflated.

  Nearly half an hour later they were rolling again.

  "That took too long," Carole said. "Maybe we should put this off till tomorrow."

  She's probably right, Joe thought. What's another day?

  But something inside wouldn't allow him to agree. He was primed and ready for a little payback. More than ready—aching.

  "Let's see how things look," he said. "If we can't do it the way we planned, we'll call it off."

  He looked at Carole and wanted to take her hand. He couldn't believe it. All these years she'd been as attracted to him as he'd been to her, and neither of them had had a clue. How sad, he thought. And how wonderful to be past that now.

  They reached Lakewood just as the sun was rising. They parked two blocks from the business district and lugged their milk crate full of bottles, balloons, and guns between the buildings until they wound up in an alley across the street and half a block up from the Post Office. The three-man Vichy day shift was on the job, so to speak, smoking and lounging on the steps. One of them sat near a shotgun that leaned against a wall; the other two had holstered pistols.

  Carole was looking at her watch. "We'll have to call it off. By the time we carry all this stuff up to the roof and start the attack"—she looked up at Joe— "it will be too late for you."

  Joe looked at the brightening sky. Damn. She was right.

  "All right. Let's head back to the car and—"

  "Wait," Lacey said. "Give me a minute here."

  "For what?" Joe said.

  Her jaw was set and her eyes had gone flat and cold. She worked the slide on one of her pistols and stuck it into the waistband of her jeans at the small of her back.

  "Lacey?"

  Before Joe could stop her she stepped out onto the sidewalk and began walking toward the Vichy. He wanted to call her back but didn't dare reveal himself. With the sun lighting her back, she moved briskly, hips swaying, arms swinging at her sides. Joe could only peek around the corner and pray.