Thr3e

by Ted Dekker

  “Yes. But either way, we’ve pieced together his framework. At least the logic of it.” Dr. Francis sat and faced her with his fingers touching each other in a tepee. “My goodness. You came here to find out who Kevin really is. I think I’ve just stumbled on it, my dear.”

  “Tell me, who is Kevin?”

  “Kevin is every man. And woman. He is you; he is me; he is the woman who wears a yellow hat and sits on the third pew every Sunday. Kevin is the natures of humanity personified.”

  “Please, you can’t mean that everyone’s a Slater.”

  “No, only those who do as Slater does. Only those who hate. Do you hate, Jennifer? Do you gossip?”

  Who loves what he sees, but hates what he loves? The simplicity of it hit Sam midstride, as she paced Kevin’s living room, staring at the travel posters. The windows to the world. It wasn’t who; it was the seeing! Who had seen? Slater had seen her and wanted her. But where had he seen her?

  The window. Her window! The boy Slater had watched her from the window and seen what he desperately wanted but could not have. And he hated her.

  The answer to the riddle was her window!

  Sam stood still, stunned, then ran for her car. She fired the engine and roared down the street. 7:23.

  Sam punched in Jennifer’s cell number.

  “This is—”

  “I think I have it! I’m on my way now.”

  “What is it?” Jennifer demanded.

  Sam hesitated. “This is for me—”

  “Just tell me where, for heaven’s sake! I know it’s for you, but time’s running out here!”

  “The window.”

  “Kevin’s window?”

  “My window. That’s where Slater saw me. That’s where he hated me.” She glanced in her rearview mirror. Clear. “I need more time, Jennifer. If Slater even gets a whiff of anyone else snooping around this, he may pull the trigger. You know that.”

  No response.

  “Please, Jennifer, there’s no other way.”

  “We could have a dozen of the best minds on this.”

  “Then get them on it. But no one from the investigation and, without question, no locals. We can’t risk a leak. Besides, no one’s going to know these riddles like I do. This is about me now.”

  Silence.

  “Jennifer—”

  “Just hurry, Samantha.”

  “I’m doing sixty in a thirty-five as it is.” She hung up.

  Hold on, Kevin. Please don’t do anything stupid. Wait for me. I’m coming. I swear I’m coming.

  26

  Monday

  7:25 P.M.

  WHETHER THE BOY WAS IMAGINARY OR REAL, he knew Sam and he wants her to come,” Dr. Francis said as Jennifer closed her phone. “He’s luring her in. You see that, don’t you? The riddles are only to continue the game.”

  Jennifer sighed. “And if Sam finds them? He’ll kill them all and I’ll have done nothing.”

  “What can you do?”

  “Something. Anything! If I can’t save him, then I should report this.”

  “Then report it. But what can any of your colleagues do?”

  He was right, of course, but the idea of sitting here in his living room discussing the natures of man was . . . impossible! Roy had been killed in similar circumstances by the Riddle Killer. True, Slater probably wasn’t the same man who’d killed Roy, but he represented the same kind of man. Unless Kevin was Slater.

  Did Slater live in her? Do you hate, Jennifer? Milton?

  “Perhaps the most you can do is try to understand, so that if an opportunity does come, you’re better equipped,” the professor said. “I know how frustrating it must be, but now it’s up to Sam. She sounds like someone who can handle herself. If I’m right, Kevin will need her.”

  “How so?”

  “If Kevin is Slater, he’ll be powerless to overcome Slater on his own.”

  Jennifer looked at him and wondered what movies he watched.

  “Okay, Professor. We still don’t know if Kevin is Slater or not. Theories are fine, but let’s try the logistics on for size.” She pulled out her notebook and crossed her legs. “Question: From a purely logistical and evidentiary perspective, could one person have done what we know to have happened?”

  She opened the book to the list she’d made two hours earlier, after Sam’s call suggesting for the second time that Kevin was Slater. She ticked the first item with her pencil. “Kevin gets a call in his car.”

  “Although you said there’s no evidence of that first call, correct? The cell phone was burned. The entire call could have been in Kevin’s mind, two voices talking. Same with any unrecorded conversation he had with Slater.”

  She nodded. “Number two. The car blows up three minutes after the call, after Kevin has escaped.”

  “The personality that is Slater carries a sophisticated cell phone in his pocket—Kevin’s pocket. This device is a secure telephone and a transmitting device. After the imaginary conversation giving him three minutes, the Slater personality triggers a bomb he’s planted in the trunk. It explodes, as planned. He detonates all of the bombs in similar fashion.”

  “The second phone Sam found.”

  “Follows,” Dr. Francis said.

  “Where does the Slater personality make all these explosives? We found nothing.” Jennifer had her own thoughts but she wanted to hear the professor.

  He smiled. “Maybe when I’m done playing scholar, I’ll apply for a job with the FBI.”

  “I’m sure we would welcome you. Understanding of religion is a hot recruitment criterion these days.”

  “Slater obviously has his hiding place. Likely the place he’s hidden Balinda. Kevin takes frequent trips to this location as Slater, totally unaware. The middle of the night, on the way home from class. He remembers nothing of them because it is the Slater personality, not Kevin, who is actually going.”

  “And his knowledge of electronics. Slater learns, but not Kevin.”

  “So it would seem.”

  She looked at her list. “But the warehouse is different because he calls the room phone and talks to Samantha. It’s the first time we have him on tape.”

  “You said the phone rang while he was in the room, but Slater didn’t speak until Kevin was out. He reaches into his pocket and presses send on a number he’s already entered. As soon as he’s in the hall, he begins to speak.”

  “Sounds far-fetched, don’t you think? Somehow I don’t see Slater as a James Bond.”

  “No, he’s probably made his mistakes. You just haven’t had the time to find them. For all you know, the recording will bear that out. We’re just reconstructing a possible scenario based on what we do know.”

  “Then we can assume he planted the bomb in the library the night before last somehow, while he was supposedly in Palos Verdes with Samantha. Maybe he slipped out at night or something. The library’s not exactly a high-security facility. He, meaning Slater, did everything either while our eyes were off him or remotely using the cell phone.”

  “If Kevin is Slater,” the professor said.

  She frowned. The scenario was plausible. Too plausible for her own comfort. If it bore out, the scientific journals would be writing about Kevin for years.

  “And the Riddle Killer?” she asked.

  “As you said earlier. Someone Slater imitated to throw the authorities off. What do you call it—copy cat? It’s only been four days. Even the wheels of the FBI can turn only so fast. Perpetuating the double life beyond a week might be impossible. Four days is all he evidently needed.”

  Jennifer closed the notebook. There were a dozen more, but she saw with a glance that they weren’t so unique. What they really needed was the analysis of the two recordings from Kevin’s cell phone. It was the second call that interested her. If this theory held water, the same person had made and received the call that had sent them running for the library. It couldn’t have been imagined by Kevin because it was recorded.

  She sighed. �
��This is way too complicated. There’s something missing here that would make all of this much clearer.”

  The professor ran his fingers over his bearded chin. “Maybe so. Do you rely on your intuition very often, Jennifer?”

  “All day. Intuition leads to evidence, which leads to answers. It’s what makes us ask the right questions.”

  “Hmm. And what does your intuition tell you about Kevin?”

  She thought about it for a moment. “That he’s innocent, either way. That he’s an exceptional man. That he’s nothing like Slater.”

  His right eyebrow went up. “This after four days? It took me a month to conclude the same.”

  “Four days of hell will tell you a lot about a man, Professor.”

  “‘Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.’”

  “If he is Slater, do you think Kevin’s afraid?” she asked.

  “I think he is petrified.”

  Baker Street was black and still, shrouded in the long line of elms standing like sentinels. The drive had sliced twenty-one minutes off the clock, thanks to an accident on Willow. 7:46. She passed Kevin’s old house—light glowed behind the drapes where Eugene and Bob might very well still be crying. Jennifer had kept the media at bay for the day, but it wouldn’t last. By tomorrow there would probably be at least a couple vans parked out front, waiting for a snapshot of the crazies inside.

  What loves what it sees? She slowed the car to a crawl and approached her old house. A porch light glared angrily. The hedges were ragged, not trimmed like her father had kept them years earlier. She’d already decided that she wouldn’t bother the residents for the simple reason that she couldn’t think of a decent explanation for why she would want to snoop around the bedroom window without causing alarm. She hoped they didn’t have a dog.

  Sam parked the car across the street and walked past the house, then cut into the neighbor’s yard. She rounded the house and headed for the same old fence she and Kevin had wriggled through on a hundred occasions. Unlikely the boards were still loose.

  She crouched by the fence and ran along it toward the east side of the yard, where her old bedroom faced. A dog barked several houses down. Settle down, Spot, I’m just going to take a peek. Just like Slater used to take peeps. Life had come full circle.

  She poked her head over the fence. The window was opaque, slightly obscured by the same bushes she’d crawled over as a child. Vacant? No dog that she could see. The boards she’d once been able to slip through wouldn’t budge. Up and over—the only way.

  Sam grabbed the fence with both hands and vaulted it easily. She had a body built for gymnastics, a coach had told her in law school. But you don’t start taking gymnastics at age twenty and expect to make the Olympics. She had opted for dance classes.

  The lawn was wet from a recent watering. She ran for the window and knelt by the hedge. What was she looking for? Another clue. A riddle maybe, scratched in the ground. A note taped to the brick.

  She slid in behind the bushes and felt the wall. The musty smell of dirt filled her nose. How long had it been since anyone had climbed through this window? She eased her head up and saw that the window not only was dark, but had been painted black on the inside.

  Her pulse spiked. Did Slater live here? Had he taken residence in her old house? I can’t have you, so I’ll take your house. For a moment she just stared at the window, caught off guard. Someone laughed inside. A man. Then a woman, laughing.

  No, they’d probably just turned the room into a darkroom or something. Photography buffs. She exhaled and resumed her search. Time was ticking.

  She felt along the ledge, but there was nothing she could feel or see. The ground was dark at her feet, so she knelt and groped around in the dirt. Her fingers ran over a few rocks—he could have written a message on a rock. She held them up to what little light reached her from the warehouses across the street. Nothing. She dropped the rocks and stood again.

  Had she been wrong about the window? There was a message here; there had to be! The dial on her watch glowed green, 7:58. She felt the first tendrils of panic tickle her spine. If she was wrong about the window, she’d have to start over—the game would be lost.

  Maybe she shouldn’t be looking for a written message.

  She groaned and stepped back into the lawn. The panic was growing. Take a breath, Sam. You’re smarter than he is. You have to be. For Kevin’s sake. Play his game; beat him at his own game.

  She paced the lawn, uncaring of her exposure now. She wore black slacks and a red blouse, dark colors that wouldn’t easily be seen from the street. Time was running out.

  Sam walked to the fence and faced the window. Okay, is there something in the bushes? An arrow? That was stupid movie stuff. She followed the roofline. Did it point anywhere? There were two second-story windows above the one down here, forming a triangle of sorts. An arrow.

  Enough with the arrows, Sam! This is something that you couldn’t mistake. Not something cute out of a Nancy Drew mystery. What’s changed here? What is altered to make a statement? What’s altered that could make a statement?

  The window. The window is painted black, because it’s now a darkroom or something. So really it’s not a window any longer. It’s a dark sheet of glass. No light.

  It’s dark down here, Kevin.

  Sam let out a small cry and immediately swallowed it. That was it! No window. What used to have light but does no more? What has no window?

  Sam ran for the fence and slung herself over it, spilling to the ground on her landing. Was it possible? How could Slater have pulled it off?

  She felt for her gun. Okay, think. One hour. If she was right, she didn’t need five minutes, much less sixty, to find Kevin.

  “And how is a man or a woman set free from this hideous nature?”

  Jennifer asked.

  “You kill it. But to kill it you must see it. Thus the light.”

  “So just like”—Jennifer snapped her fingers—“that, huh?”

  “As it turns out, no. It needs a daily dose of death. Really, the single greatest ally of evil is darkness. That is my point. I don’t care what faith you have or what you say you believe, whether you go to church every Sunday or pray to God five times a day. If you keep the evil nature hidden, like most do, it thrives.”

  “And Kevin?”

  “Kevin? I don’t know about Kevin. If he is Slater, I suppose you would need to kill Slater the way you kill the old self. But he can’t do it alone. He wouldn’t even know to kill him. Man cannot deal with evil alone.”

  Kevin had never shown her the inside of the old shed because he said it was dark inside. Only he hadn’t just said inside, he said down there. She remembered that now. Nobody used the useless old shack in the corner of the lawn. The old bomb shelter turned toolshed on the edge of the ash heap.

  The window that wasn’t really a window had to be Kevin’s window. In Slater’s mind he might have used another riddle: What thinks it’s a window but really isn’t? Opposites. As a boy, Kevin thought he’d escaped his tortuous world through his window, but he hadn’t.

  The old toolshed in the corner of Kevin’s lawn was the only place Sam knew of that had a basement of sorts. It was dark down there and it had no windows, and she knew that she knew that she knew that Slater was down in that bomb shelter with Balinda.

  Sam held the nine millimeter at her side and ran for the shack, bent over, eyes fixed on its wood siding. The door had always been latched and locked with a big rusted padlock. What if it still was?

  She should call Jennifer, but therein lay a dilemma. What could Jennifer do? Swoop in and surround the house? Slater would do the worst. On the other hand, what could Sam do? Waltz in and confiscate all illegally obtained firearms, slap on the handcuffs, and deliver the nasty man to the county jail?

  She had to at least verify.

  Sam dropped to her knee by the door, breathing heavily, both hands wrapped around her gun. The lock was disengage
d.

  Just remember, you were born for this, Sam.

  She stuck the barrel of her gun under the door and pulled, using the gun sight as a hook. The door creaked open. A dim bulb glowed inside. She pushed the door all the way open and shoved her weapon in, careful to stay behind the cover of the doorjamb. Slowly, the opening door revealed the shapes of shelves and a wheelbarrow. A square on the floor. The trapdoor.

  How deep did the shelter go? There had to be stairs.

  She stepped in, one foot and then the second. The trapdoor was open, she could see now. She edged over to the dark hole and peered down. Faint light, very faint, from the right. She pulled back. Maybe calling Jennifer would be the wisest course of action. Just Jennifer.

  8:15. They still had forty-five minutes. But what if she waited for Jennifer and this wasn’t the place? That would leave them with less than half an hour to find Slater. No, she had to verify. Verify, verify.

  Come on, Sam, you were born for this.

  Sam shoved the gun into her waistband, knelt down, gripped the edge of the opening, and then swung one leg into the shaft. She stretched her foot, found a step. She mounted the stairs and then swung back up. The shoes might make too much noise. She took them off and then settled back on the stairs.

  Come on, Sam, you were born for this.

  There were nine steps; she counted them. Never knew when she might have to run back up full tilt. Knowing when to duck to avoid a head-on with the ceiling and when to turn right to exit the shack could come in handy. She was telling herself this stuff to calm her nerves, because anything in the dread silence was better than facing the certainty that she was walking to her death.

  Light came from a crack below a door at the end of a concrete tunnel. The tunnel led to a basement below Kevin’s house! She’d known that some of these old bomb shelters were connected to houses, but she’d never imagined such an elaborate setup beneath Kevin’s house. She’d never even known there was a basement in his house. Wasn’t there a way to the top floor from the basement? Jennifer had been in the house, but she hadn’t said anything about a basement.