I took a breath. “Her name was Jill Kelly.”
“YOU SON OF A BITCH!” he bellowed, grabbing the back of my neck.
I whirled, the fillet knife flashing in the sundown light, and opened a blooming red gash in his stomach. But in the same instant something exploded between us, my right side set aflame, and I knew Danny had shot me. He fired again at point blank range, but I’d seized his wrist, shifted it just enough that the slug went wide. He staggered against me, and I slashed down with the knife, yet at the last moment he caught my forearm, held it in place with his terrible strength.
For an endless moment we struggled against each other, our feet inches from the edge of the tunnel. The water roared by us, disappeared into the dying light. I glanced down, saw our blood streaming into the rushing surf and washing away into the reservoir.
Danny grinned into my face. “I might get my wish after all, Father. If you die before I do.”
I returned Danny’s rabid grin.
“It’s not gonna happen,” I said.
He showed his teeth. “Why not?”
“Because we’re both gonna die.”
And gripping him, I launched us into the falls.
Chapter Eighteen
I wasn’t prepared for the hammerblow of the water. In the split second between deciding to drag Danny out into the gushing runoff and actually executing my plan, my only misgiving was a simple one: falling from a great height. My fear of heights had never been debilitating, but it had frequently troubled me. Climbing ladders. Traveling in planes. Even gazing out the windows of tall buildings. So other than ending the Sweet Sixteen Killer’s reign of terror once and for all, the only thing on my mind was how terribly high we were and how very long it would take us to reach the thundering surf below.
When the powerful falls walloped us, we were both sent cartwheeling through the air. Miraculously, we did not lose hold of one another. It was a testament not only to my desire to prevent more murders, but of Danny’s lunatic hatred of me, the one who had learned his secret and dared to confront him.
Because I was grasping the fabric of his police uniform so tightly, the fillet knife was pinned between my palm and his shoulder. We had toppled end over end perhaps three times before our vertiginous revolutions began to slow, and I was able to think clearly. The pressure of the waterspill was so colossal that we had been taken into the gush only momentarily before being belched inward, deflected toward the outcropping tunnel perhaps ninety feet beneath the one out of which we had fallen. I saw Danny throw a panicked glance downward at the huge concrete cylinder, his eyes vast with terror, and in that moment, I knew my chance had come. His guard was down, his superior strength nullified by his fear of dying. As we gained speed in our final descent, I gripped the knife handle, pulled it back, and jabbed it straight at Danny’s left eye. In the last moment he glanced up at me, and in his eyes I saw a flicker of fear, a last, feeble remnant of his humanity. It occurred to me in that moment, as the wicked point of the fillet knife zoomed toward his eye, that Christ wouldn’t do what I was doing, that Danny was still perhaps capable of being saved.
But I wasn’t Jesus. I was just a man, and a deeply flawed one at that.
This was the best I could do.
The fillet knife sank into his eyeball, popping it like an overcooked egg.
He released me, and though our fall was still accelerating, my brain swiftly registered the worry that he might yet survive. If the knife hadn’t sunk in far enough and if the impact with the water didn’t kill him and if he somehow managed to navigate the pounding water beneath us, all my efforts would be for naught.
Then his head collided with the outcropping tunnel, and I knew Danny Hartman had breathed his last.
The force of my knife blow had thrust his head backward just enough to align it with the unforgiving rim of the tunnel. The base of his skull slammed into the concrete rim at an ungodly speed, snapping his neck like a stick of chalk and transforming his body into a boneless, flailing rag doll.
That much, I thought as I plummeted into the maelstrom, was done. The Sweet Sixteen Killer—Killers, I amended—would terrorize the city no longer. Millions of Chicago-area parents could rest easier knowing their daughters would cease to be hunted.
But what of me?
I was mere moments from entering the seething cauldron of water, the throaty boom of the upracing reservoir nearly deafening now. And though it was selfish, though I knew the city would be better off if I died too, and the demon were trapped inside my lifeless shell, I wanted nothing more than to live. I deserved punishment, I thought in those last moments. Maybe I even deserved death.
But I didn’t want it.
I plunged into the tumult, my body immediately sucked under and forward by the unimaginable weight of the gushing water. Thousands of gallons pummeled me lower, punishing me, battering my body deeper into the sable depths. I had swallowed a good breath before I’d hit, but now, several seconds underwater, I could feel my lung capacity beginning to struggle against the immense weight bearing down on me. It was as though pitiless giants were kneading me and tossing me about like a lump of clay, their merciless fingers wringing, releasing, flicking, pushing, and at some point I opened my eyes and saw, far above me, a lighter shade of water. It was faint, diffuse, but I knew it was the sky. If I could only reach it, only summon the reserve strength that must surely reside deep within my body, I might stand a chance of deliverance. I spread my arms, pushed backwards, gathered my hands together and then stroked as hard as I could. Bolstered by the titanic force of the churning water, I moved away from the tumult, and what was more, I still had sufficient air to rise through the water, to make steady diagonal progress upward, upward, until the indigo sky above me appeared within reach. I stroked, stroked, and then I breached the surface, spluttering and gasping, unwilling yet to believe I had survived, that I had escaped the terrible drowning that only moments before had seemed inevitable.
As I bobbed in the water, my good spirits disappeared.
If I had survived, that meant Malephar had survived too. My noble aim—taking my own life to rid the world of the demon, had been usurped by my frantic desire to live.
Elated yet troubled, I began to tread water, moving slowly away from the thundering surf and into the comparatively placid waters of the semicircular reservoir. I was perhaps sixty yards from the retention wall, and though it might prove difficult climbing out of the water on my own, I knew help would come eventually. The reservoir was rimmed by a fitness trail that would almost certainly be populated by joggers and other Chicagoans at this time of night. I pictured them helping me out of the water, marveling at my good luck at surviving the ordeal, or perhaps bristling at my stupidity for risking death. I imagined them taking my hand, smiling down at me…
…Malephar leering up at them. Malephar attacking them.
My throat tightened. I couldn’t allow the demon to strike again.
My voice low, hoarse, I resumed the recitation: “By the power of the saints, I cast you out.”
No! the demon growled. You’re alive, damn you! Have you forgotten about your gunshot wound? Why do you think it is healing?
I had completely forgotten about the wound, and though being reminded of it revived my pain, I strongly suspected that Malephar’s incredible powers had already repaired much of the damage in my side.
But I continued with the rites anyway, my voice strengthening. “Depart, seducer. Depart, transgressor.”
And what of your remarkable survival back there? Do you think you possessed the power to escape the rapids alone?
That made sense, I thought as I treaded water, but it changed nothing. Malephar’s actions had nothing to do with helping me and everything to do with perpetuating his own malign existence. “Be gone, you foul pestilence! Depart from this flesh!”
I saved you, you sniveling weakling! You would have died without me!
I knew this was true. But I was grimly intent on bringing this to an end.
Either the demon would be driven from my body, or I would be killed in the process. Either way, the world would be safer without Malephar, even if the respite were only for a year or two.
Something told me it would be a good deal longer.
I began the Lord’s prayer.
It acted on Malephar like a livewire. My whole body began to judder, to thrash, the demon wild to prevent me from continuing the prayer. But I pressed on.
You will never defeat me! Malephar screamed. But there was pain in the sound.
“Thy kingdom come,” I said between gritted teeth. “Thy will be done…”
I will visit untold tortures upon you, craven! the demon bayed.
“On earth as it is in heaven.”
I felt the same kindling of pain I had experienced in the bathroom earlier. Malephar was attempting to snap my ribs, to splinter my bones and pierce my entrails.
Yet gone was the feeling of helplessness. Gone was my impotent fear.
I continued the prayer.
Sensing my resolve, Malephar redoubled his efforts to assault me from within. New pain ignited in my chest, sharp hooks of agony ripping through my shoulders.
But I said, “For thine is the kingdom…”
Malephar roared.
“…and the power…”
The demon’s voice became a squeal of pain—
“…and the glory, forever and ever…”
—and then of horror and disbelief.
“Amen,” I breathed. A weight pressed in on me, as if my core were imploding, and in the next moment the pressure reversed itself, rushing away from me in all directions. Soothing air filled my lungs. Water droplets peppered my face. I had a momentary worry that the demon had manipulated me all along, that it had somehow jumped to Danny’s body and fulfilled the terrible coupling I had strived so desperately to prevent.
Then I remembered the way Danny’s neck had been broken, the limp tumble of his body after it connected with the tunnel’s rim.
Yes. Danny was dead. The terror was over. I needed only to swim the remaining expanse of water and call for help, and in short order I would be safe, my body and my life free of the demon’s infestation, the city liberated from both Malephar and the killers.
Almost sobbing with relief, I set off in a series of leisurely strokes toward the nearest portion of the reservoir wall. In the past minute or so, the surge of the churning water had nudged me closer to the perimeter of the large pool, so that now I was maybe thirty yards away, an easy enough distance even for an average swimmer like myself.
I thought of Liz, of Carolyn. I would have to explain myself to them, perhaps going so far as to tell them the horrible truth. How else could the child ever trust me again? Then, if they—and Casey—found it in their hearts to forgive my concealment of the demon, we might begin our hesitant attempts to build a new family. I wondered if Casey would hold his uncle’s death against me. I was now Danny’s killer, after all. Objectively, I had murdered a serial killer, one that would go down in the annals of true crime with John Wayne Gacy, Jack the Ripper, and the Zodiac as one of the worst in history. Surely Casey would see that. Surely he would understand—
Something seized my ankle and yanked me underwater.
I didn’t have time to suck in breath before I was dragged under, and immediately my throat was flooded with icy water. I kicked my leg to free it from my attacker, and in my frenzy to escape I imagined Danny Hartman grinning at me, my assumed victory over him simply an illusion. But as the fizzy water around me cleared, and I gazed into the face of the one who’d seized me, I realized Danny had nothing to do with this. His capacity to harm others had ended.
But Malephar’s had not.
Red-eyed, his face a sanity-shattering abomination, the demon leered up at me in triumph.
¨¨¨
In all my readings, in all my late-night discussions with Father Sutherland, even in my nightmares, I had never entertained the notion that a demon could take the form of physical matter. Not without a host.
But Malephar had. The accursed vision with which I was now presented, my mind scrambled to explain, was not really the demon; it was merely a projection of my worst imaginings. For what now loomed closer—its dark, pulsing face; infernal red eyes; and gaping, fanged maw—was the villain of a child’s darkest nightmare, the sort of phantasmagorical djinn conjured by a deadly fever or a severe illness. Though the shadowy water made it impossible to discern completely, the figure hauling me nearer was humanoid in shape, though unquestionably larger. The limbs were slender, yet sinuous… and alive with vicious energy. The face was venomous, exultant. And something else.
As Malephar’s red eyes bathed me in their lurid glow, as his tapered, serrated teeth roared laughter I could feel in my bones, I realized what I read in the demon’s expression was relief. Had he not grabbed me before I could exit the reservoir, he would have been consigned to a watery grave. I had the feeling that the strain of becoming physical matter was too great to be sustained for long.
Water trickled down my throat. A horrible acquiescence began to drowse over me.
The demon’s face was only a foot from mine, the eyes slitted in obscene longing. I flinched away, choking on the cold water. I flailed against the monstrous face, my strength ebbing. In my head, Malephar’s laughter intensified and caromed about, the demon’s celebration drowning me as surely as the water. I lashed out, struck the demon a strengthless blow to the face, and was appalled at the manner in which the creature’s skin abraded my hand. Bloody whorls curled upward like smoke. Something about the vision reminded me of Casey’s mangled body the night of the exorcism, the smoke that had plumed from Casey’s flesh when—
—with a convulsive movement I thrust my hand into my pocket, seized the crucifix, and stabbed at the demon’s left eye. The orgasmic, half-lidded look departed Malephar’s face, and the lids disappeared, revealing red, lambent irises. The crucifix, though small, cleaved through the eye, and for the briefest moment I saw a burst of fire where the crucifix had struck the demon. Malephar instantly released me, the demon sinking, his Klaxon roar loud enough to tremble the water, the demon’s bellow of pain emitting a power so awesome it compelled me backward, upward. But I knew it was too late for me to regain the surface of the pool. I had taken in too much water.
But I had finally completed my sacrifice, my act of love. Though I knew myself to be a sinner, a wretched soul who didn’t deserve grace, I wondered if perhaps God might appreciate my attempt to become something greater than I was.
The demon’s corporeal form descended into blackness, the remaining red eye fixing me with a look of fiercest loathing. The momentum of Malephar’s hateful paroxysm having spent itself, my upward movement ceased. I floated at a level that I now saw was only five or six feet beneath the water’s surface. If I had only used the crucifix sooner. If I had only fought evil with God’s power a moment or two earlier, I might have lived.
A bone-deep frigidity iced my veins. Cold fingers caressed my limbs. My body grew heavy. I opened my mouth, the last breath of air escaping my lips...
And in that moment of dying I fancied I saw something that made no sense at all, a large, thrashing figure plowing through the water toward me. A pang of fear shot through me, a vestige of the horror from my encounter with Malephar.
The figure clarified and I recognized the face. A large, dark hand grasped mine. Pulled me higher. Not yet convinced this wasn’t some dream, I allowed myself to be towed along, the water around me changing to a light brown, then a greenish yellow. And then I was jerked upward, my head breaking the surface, my lungs assailed by sheets of flame.
Father Patterson gripped me in a bear hug. Before I could so much as cough, his great, muscled arms squeezed me in a movement far too violent to be one of kindness. My stomach and chest were frozen in an agonizing approximation of a broken machine, one so old and gummed with dirt and corrosion that coaxing it into working order is a fool’s errand. But Father Patterson repeated the moveme
nt, slamming my body against his once more. We bobbed on the surface of the water, Patterson manhandling me in a way that would have been comical had my terror not been so consuming.
My desire to live returned, my dogged, irrational need to keep on breathing. When Patterson’s interlaced fists slammed into my back, pinning my body against his, I vomited up what felt like fifty gallons of brackish water. He turned his face sideways but was still painted with the contents of my stomach and lungs. I spluttered, gasped, not quite able to breathe, but my lungs at least making the effort to suck in air now.
As I coughed and gasped for breath, I realized that Patterson had saved my life.
Chapter Nineteen
Father Patterson rode with me in the ambulance, and for the second time in a week I found myself in the hospital. The doctors were perplexed by the wound in my side. It looked, in the words of a Korean doctor whose last name was Kim, “like I was shot a month ago, and the wound has mostly healed.”
That was about right, I thought. For once, I felt grateful to Malephar, monster that he was.
I had no illusions about the demon being dead. I hadn’t seen Malephar dissolve or explode into a million pieces. He had simply sunk to the bottom of the reservoir, his uninjured red eye gleaming measureless hate.
I asked Patterson, as he sat by my bedside nursing a steaming mug of tea, what he believed had happened to the demon.
He regarded his mug, shivered, and said in a subdued voice, “I don’t like to think about it, tell you the truth.”
I waited, noticing how deeply seamed his forehead looked. It was early morning, maybe a little after six, and he hadn’t yet left my bedside. I had slept off and on for much of the night, but as far as I knew, Patterson hadn’t. He remained in the same green vinyl armchair, a few feet to my right.
“This thing shook me, Jason,” he said, his voice lower still. “Like every man, I’ve questioned my faith at times… especially after Ariana died. There are things I’m still not sure about. Like how can you hold it against somebody that he was born in a third-world country? If someone’s never heard of Jesus, how can we expect a person to believe in him? And then we…” He made a pained face, ran a palm over his stubbly cheeks. “…we put distance between ourselves and others. We pick out differences between people and we amplify them and act like they’re lost and we know the answers, and the truth is, we’re all lost. We’ve all sinned.”
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