by SJD Peterson
Noah had had his bell rung, his head a little foggy from the blow, but he was aware enough to know that Drew was no longer speaking to him as he began moving around the room. Noah’s right eye was beginning to swell, and he turned his head to track Drew with his left.
Drew was pulling out things from a cabinet near a workbench; from the sound they made as he set them down, they were heavy. Noah heard clanking, what sounded like chains rattling, metal hitting metal, and thuds, but couldn’t see what the items were. Drew continued to mutter, too low for Noah to make out any words, while he finished laying out his supplies. He then stepped back as if examining his work as his hands moved along his torso.
Noah gasped in shock when Drew shrugged out of his shirt and tossed it aside. Drew’s entire back was covered in tattoos. In the center was a cross lying on the ground; sitting upon it, head down, hands in his lap was a depiction of Jesus Christ with a crown of thorns. A single ray of light shined down on Jesus. In the shadows were angels with mouths wide open in silent screams and demons with red eyes, laughing, some eating the angels, their fangs dripping blood, others stabbing them with wicked-looking knives, still others shredding them with long sharp claws.
Drew turned around, and the depiction of the fight between good and evil continued across his chest and covered both of his arms. Whatever Drew had been doing, it seemed to have calmed him, and the pep talk had obviously helped him get himself under control. Although his body was covered in horror, Drew’s expression was calm, almost serene as he gazed at Noah with those cold, dead eyes.
Noah shuddered. He’d never been more afraid in his life. He was in the presence of someone, something truly evil.
HUTCH GROANED at the pain, sharp, throbbing pain at the back of his head and neck. He tried to lift his head, but it felt as if it were made of concrete, too heavy to lift. He tried to think, make some sense of what was going on, but it felt as if he were in a dream, everything foggy and muddled except the pain that was bright and sharp.
He took a few deep breaths, and it seemed to help clear his mind somewhat, although some things still confused him. How was he standing up? At least, he thought he was upright, had to be as his chin was resting on his chest. Slowly, he swam up out of the fog, inching his way to the surface, and pried his eyes open. The harsh light sent another jolt of pain through his head and down his spine. Fuck, that had been a bad idea. He closed them again.
Disjointed images began to assault his befuddled brain, but they made no sense at all. A bloody shirt. A woman screaming. Stairs. Motorcycle, screaming, Noah.
Noah!
“Noah,” he groaned with difficulty, the words indiscernible. His mouth felt as if it were full of cotton, his tongue and throat dry. Wait. No, he was gagged…. He…. He had to save Noah. Adrenaline began to surge through him, burning off the last of the daze, and it all came back to him in a rush.
His eyes flew open, and he jerked his head back, the gag coming loose, ignoring the agony, and cried out, “Noah!”
Hutch’s gaze landed on him, bound to a chair with heavy ropes, tape across his mouth, but he was alive. Relieved, Hutch looked at the man standing next to Noah with a gleeful smile on his face.
“Welcome back, Agent Hutchinson,” Drew drawled with excitement. “We’ve been waiting for you.”
“You motherfucker, if you so much as harm a hair on his head, I’ll rip you to shreds,” Hutch bellowed as he struggled against the binds that held him to the wall.
“Tsk. Tsk. Such language,” Drew commented disapprovingly. He moved to a workbench, turning his back on Hutch. “Apparently I should have tied your gag tighter. No matter, I think I will enjoy your screams.”
Hutch ignored Drew’s taunts, his focus on Noah. “Are you hurt?” Hutch asked, meeting Noah’s gaze. Noah shook his head as he struggled against his restraints.
Hutch had to figure out how in the hell to get free. He couldn’t allow Noah to remove his bindings first. The thought of Noah having to fight this sick fuck made his stomach roil. He pulled at his restraints with every ounce of strength he could muster, but they didn’t so much as budge. His arms were stretched away from his body, nearly to the point of dislocation. His ankles and calves were secured together with heavy rope.
The position he was in, the religious ink all over Drew, hit Hutch squarely in his throbbing analytical brain. “Are you kidding me?” Hutch shouted incredulously. “Crucifixion? Seriously? Have you never read the goddamn Ten Commandments?”
Drew spun around, his face contorted with rage. In three long strides, he was within an inch of Hutch with a dagger pressed against his throat. “You will not use the good lord’s name in vain.”
Hutch couldn’t help it; he began to laugh. “Oh, that is rich. You get all pissy when I break the third commandment, but you can break the sixth one repeatedly. Why, because it’s lower on the list?”
Hutch gasped as the blade was pulled across his throat. Seconds later a burning sensation bloomed along his flesh, and he instinctively tried to cover the wound but was halted by his restraints.
Drew held the blade up, examining it as he ran a fingertip through the small amount of blood along the tip. “No, because I give God only what he demands of me. That wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at thine hand.”
“Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself,” Hutch retorted, quoting Leviticus.
Drew seemed shocked with Hutch’s response, staring at him for long, tense moments, then his eyes cleared and he shrugged. “I have been doing a little research on you, Agent Hutchinson. I have to say I was quite disappointed with what I uncovered,” Drew stated as he returned to his workbench and set the knife down.
“You learned I was smarter than you, huh?” Hutch taunted.
“On the contrary, Agent Hutchinson.” Drew kept his back to Hutch as he picked up one implement after another as if he were considering each before discarding it.
Hutch glanced over at Noah, who was still struggling against his restraints as he watched Hutch with concerned, fearful eyes. Hutch’s chest tightened. He wanted to assure Noah everything would be all right, that he was going to get him out of this, but he didn’t dare speak for fear Drew would turn his sick game on Noah.
“No, what I discovered, much to my dismay,” Drew informed him with what sounded like regret as he moved once again to stand before Hutch, “was that instead of being the one I had hoped would be able to see my work for the good it was, you had given in to the wicked temptations of the flesh and turned your soul over to the devil.”
Hutch glanced at the scissors in Drew’s hand nervously but refused to show it on his face. Instead he met Drew’s gaze with determination and anger. “Sold my soul to the devil? I make sure evil is kept from polluting society by keeping them contained in a cold concrete cell. Or, for the really sick fucks like you, I send them straight to hell.”
“I thought so too, but alas, it wasn’t so,” Drew said with a heavy sigh and began cutting Hutch’s shirt away. “You’ve lain with other men and in so doing have become an abomination, filthy, unholy, but I will be your salvation.”
Images of tortured men with mutilated genitalia flashed in Hutch’s mind, causing fear to spread tendrils throughout his body, grabbing him so tightly he couldn’t breathe as Drew cut Hutch’s clothes away. It took every bit of his self-preservation and stores of inner strength to push it down with an iron-clad will. He would not give in to this son of a bitch.
I will not die at his hands.
“You fucked up,” Hutch informed him, shocked at how strong and even his voice was. “You left my partner upstairs. He knows I’m down here, and it’s only a matter of time before he’s interrupting your depravity party.”
Drew shrugged nonchalantly. “I’ve prepared for that,” he said cryptically.
“What do you mean?” Hutch demanded.
Drew didn’t clarify, instead he remove
d the last of Hutch’s clothes and returned the scissors to the workbench where he retrieved his dagger.
“What the hell do you mean you’ve prepared for that, goddammit?”
“I’m going to need you to focus, Agent Hutchinson. But I must warn you,” he said soberly. “It’s not going to be easy, but I need you to stay strong if I am to exorcise your demons.”
“My—” Hutch’s words turned into a howl of pain as the blade was drawn across his chest in three quick slashes.
“Forgive him, Father, for he knows not what he does,” Drew called out and sliced Hutch again. “Let us pray.”
HUTCH’S SCREAMS of misery were like a lightning bolt of agony to Noah’s soul. For long moments he was held in the clutches of terror crushing down on him, robbing him of movement and breath, his very heart dead in his chest.
The accusing eyes of his dead sister flashed in his mind’s eye, and Noah screamed.
Trying to dispel the image, to drown out the sounds of Hutch’s pain was impossible. With the tape covering his mouth, Noah was the only one who heard his scream, and it did nothing to stop the nightmare.
You let me die.
Let Mom die.
You could have saved us.
Killer.
Killer.
Killer.
NOOOOOOOOO!
Noah was infused with rage and determination, and he began to struggle with every bit of his strength as if his life depended on it. No, as if Hutch’s life depended on it. The realization caused Noah to work harder. He would not let another person die. Hutch would not die.
Muscles screaming, blood dripping down his hands, Noah gritted his teeth and pushed harder, used the pain and agony and sorrow and shoved it at his binds.
“In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, I cast you out.” Drew’s voice echoed around the room.
Hutch screamed. Noah pulled the sound into his soul. Took every grunt and sob emitted from Hutch and propelled it through his body.
Something popped and fire shot up Noah’s arm, the pain causing his head to swim and his vision to narrow, his left arm hanging loosely at his side.
His side?
Noah threw himself forward, his left arm and hand refusing to obey his commands but his right one still working.
The ropes around his ankles were tight, the blood flowing from his injured wrist making the restraints slick and slippery, but he wouldn’t give up. Couldn’t. Finally, he threw off the ropes and raced to the workbench.
Weapon. Weapon. Weapon. There! He snatched up a two-foot long spear-like object.
“You must help me, you must force the devil out of your soul,” Drew screamed. “Let him go, or he will take you to hell!”
Noah pulled his arm back just as Hutch’s gaze met his. “I’ll meet you there,” Hutch rasped out.
Noah plunged the spear through Drew, pulled it out, and thrust it upward, aiming for the heart, ensuring the son of a bitch was on his way to hell before he even hit the floor.
Chapter 27
A TINGLING sensation along Noah’s scalp roused him from his fitful sleep. He lifted his head to find Hutch looking at him as the tips of his fingers teased along Noah’s hair.
“Hey,” Noah said softly. “How you feeling?”
“I feel….” Hutch licked his lips and swallowed hard. “Throat’s dry.”
Noah sat back and pushed the nurse’s call button. “Sorry, I’m not sure if you’re allowed to have anything. We’ll have to ask the nurse.”
“How—”
“The surgery went great. You’re going to be sore for a while from the exploring around they did in your belly, but from what I understand, there is no major damage to any of your internal organs.”
Hutch shook his head and winced. “How is Byte?”
They’d learned soon after arriving at the hospital that Byte was alive but in critical condition. The bullet had hit a lung. “He made it through surgery and is in stable condition,” Noah assured him. “He’s going to be okay.”
Hutch nodded, the look of relief turning to one of pain when he swallowed hard again. “And you?”
Hutch was covered in dozens of burns and cuts, a couple wounds deep enough they were concerned about internal bleeding, and yet he wasn’t worried about himself, but about Noah and Byte. It was another thing Noah found appealing about Hutch: he acted all gruff and burly, but beneath the hard exterior was a sweet, squishy core.
Noah held up his good arm to show his bandaged wrist. “I’ll live.” Hutch tilted his head and narrowed his eyes as he took in the sling Noah was sporting. “That’s not life-threatening either.” Broke, raw, hurt like fuck, but not going to kill him.
“Can I help you?” asked a pleasant voice through the intercom.
“Yes, Agent Hutchinson would like something to drink, please.”
“I’ll be right there.”
“Thank you,” Hutch said in a raspy voice.
“You’re welcome, but all I did was push a button. You better be thanking her,” Noah said.
Hutch shook his head. “For saving my life. I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you.”
“Hey! There will be none of that,” Noah told him sharply. “I played the role exactly as it was meant to be. I was the worm, remember?”
“But you asked me not to let the line break. I’m…. Fuck, Noah, I’m so sorry.”
Noah’s chest tightened painfully at the glimpse he got of the aggrieved look in Hutch’s eyes before he turned away. Ignoring the way his body protested, legs spasming as he stood, Noah leaned over Hutch and forced Hutch to look at him with his good hand.
“The line didn’t break, Hutch. It held firm as we both tugged and pulled on it, and dammit, we won. We took that son of a bitch down. We are here to talk about it, and more importantly, he can’t hurt anyone else ever again.”
Hutch started to respond, opening his mouth, then snapping it shut when the nurse walked in with a cup of ice in her hand. “How are you feeling, Agent Hutchinson?”
Hutch gave Noah one last look that Noah easily read as “this isn’t over,” then turned to the nurse. “I’m thirsty.”
“I can only offer you a few ice chips and some swabs,” she responded sympathetically.
“I want a drink,” Hutch grumbled.
“You take these,” she said, handing the cup to Hutch. “If you can tolerate them, I’ll see about getting you some water.”
“Whoopee,” Hutch muttered and then popped a spoonful of ice into his mouth.
“Mr. Walker, Officer Campbell has asked me to remind you he’s still waiting to speak with you.”
“What for?” Hutch snapped and then choked on his ice.
“Calm down,” Noah said and gently patted Hutch’s shoulder like that would do anything to dislodge the ice. He rolled his eyes at himself. “They just need to finish taking my statement. I’ll be back shortly, okay?”
“Can’t he take it in here?” Hutch grumbled.
“You’ll be fine,” Noah assured him and patted him gently on the top of the head. “Now be a good boy and do what the nice nurse tells you.”
“Brat,” Hutch growled, but his lip curled into a smile.
He grinned cheekily in response to Hutch’s tease. They were going to be okay. It was over; they’d all survived, and dammit, they could still smile, which was a major bonus.
HUTCH OPENED his eyes to find Granite sitting in the chair next to his bed with a silly grin on his face. “Please tell me you have one of those greasy cheeseburgers hidden in your pocket,” Hutch pleaded. “The food here sucks!”
“Sorry, Boss, gave the last one to Byte.”
Hutch sat up on the edge of the bed and dangled his feet. “How’s he doing?”
“Same as you—hungry, tired, and ready to get the hell out of this place.”
“They promised to spring me today,” Hutch informed him. “Any word on when he’ll be released?”
“Another day or two,” Granite responded with a shrug. �
�He’s pretty bitter about it too, but I promised him you’d give him a sponge bath if he was a good boy.”
“Geez, thanks,” Hutch grumbled. “So what’s the final word on the asshole who put us here?” Hutch had been given the “official” report by their deputy director, but he knew he hadn’t gotten the whole gory story.
Granite pulled his notepad from his pocket and dramatically flipped it open. “Let’s see how close your profile was, shall we?”
“Just the facts will suffice.”
“Oh hell no! I spent a lot of time on this, sitting in a straight-back chair that hurt my ass while you two slept and healed.” Granite shook his notebook threateningly at Hutch. “So just sit your ass back and indulge me, dammit.”
“Fine,” Hutch conceded, but rather than sit back, he stood and began gingerly pacing. His wounds protested, but he needed to move. Granite’s ass wasn’t the only sore one.
“Or stand,” Granite grumbled under his breath and then cleared his throat. “One Michael Edwards, thirty-eight years old and single. You got that right. Raised by one Geraldine Edwards, a crazy-ass religious fanatic who took young Michael in when his parents were killed in a car accident when he was four.” Granite looked up from his notebook with an impressed look on his face. “Got that one right too. You’re two and oh. Good job.”
“Thanks,” Hutch said dismissively. “Keep going.”
“Well, Crazy Geraldine, and I’m talking batshit crazy, was all fire and brimstone, playing with serpents, and beating the devil out of young Michael.”
“And we know this how?”
“’Cause I’m just that damn good,” Granite replied cockily. Hutch paused in his pacing and shot Granite a disapproving look. “Okay, okay. Damn, you’re no fun at all, Mr. Cranky Pants.”
“I’m cut, burned, hungry, and I need a fucking smoke. I deserve to be a tad bit cranky. Now keep reading.”
Granite rolled his eyes at Hutch, but he got back to his report without any further teasing. “Michael had numerous hospital admissions. He was admitted for broken bones, head trauma, stitches… and then at thirteen, Auntie Geraldine tried to exorcise the kid’s demons once and for all. By the time the cops were alerted by a church member with a conscience, Michael was on death’s door. He’d been beaten and caged for months.
