The house was made from stones the color of the earth, irregularly shaped, a roughly textured loamy brown, separated by veins of gray mortar.
The unkempt landscaping indicated the age and condition of the owner—grass that was overgrown, azalea beds filled with weeds, honeysuckle vines as thick as a man’s wrist on the columns in front of the home.
No cars were in the driveway except for the black Bentley and Hannah Byrne’s Prius.
Hannah and I exited her vehicle. The temperature was at least ten degrees cooler than when we’d started out only a few minutes before. Lightning flashed deep in the cloud bank behind the house. Thunder boomed a few seconds later.
Hannah pointed to the Bentley. “Wonder who that belongs to?”
I handed her Silas McPherson’s business card. “That name mean anything to you?”
She shook her head, returned the card.
I stared at the home, imagining the life that might have once been in such a place.
Women in elegant evening clothes, dresses purchased at Neiman’s in Dallas. Ranchers smoking cigars, drinking whiskey. A gathering place for the elite of the region.
Now the structure was old and worn, like the town itself.
“Who’s the Supreme Apostle?” I asked.
“The last one anybody knows about was named Carlisle. He died in the late nineties, and there was a power struggle, different branches of his family fighting for the leadership role.”
I continued to stare at the house as the wind blew harder.
“These days, nobody knows who’s in charge,” she said. “At least nobody on the outside.”
We headed toward the front entrance, an oak door crisscrossed with iron.
“So it could be the guy who owns this car?” I asked. “McPherson?”
“Maybe. But I doubt it. I can’t imagine the Supreme Apostle having business cards with his e-mail address on them.”
When we stepped onto the porch, the door swung open and a man in a dark suit peeked out, the older guy in the passenger seat from earlier in the day. He was tieless, the clothes he wore similar to what Silas McPherson had been wearing. But the resemblance stopped there.
Silas had been nearly six feet tall, medium build, with attractive facial features.
This man was maybe five five and stocky like a wrestler. He wore thick, oval glasses atop a nose that was short and flat. His face was round like a pie tin, the temple and a portion of one cheek disfigured by a birthmark that looked like a puddle of red wine.
“You must be Arlo Baines,” the short man said. “Silas told me about you.”
I didn’t reply.
“My name is Felix.”
“Where’s Boone?” I said.
“The heat was something today, wasn’t it?” He looked at Hannah. “And who’s the pretty lady?”
“I’m Mr. Baines’s assistant.” Hannah kept her tone even. “He doesn’t like it when I talk much.”
Felix cocked his head like he wasn’t quite sure of what she’d said. After a moment he moved aside. “Please do come in. It’s about to rain.”
Hannah and I glanced at each other and then stepped inside.
We found ourselves in a large foyer that smelled like mold and Listerine. The walls were bone-colored plaster, cracked in places, the floors dark hardwood that needed waxing.
A wide staircase was in front of us, next to a hallway leading toward the back of the house. To the left was a formal dining room. To the right was a living area filled with furniture from the turn of the last century—heavy sofas with densely patterned upholstery, ornately carved chairs, dark woolen rugs.
“Who decorated this place?” Hannah asked. “The Addams family?”
“I thought you weren’t supposed to talk much,” Felix said.
She shrugged. “I’m not much for doing what men tell me.”
He stared at Hannah with an expression that was a cross between quizzical and astounded, like she was a species from another planet or a talking gazelle.
A moment passed. Then: “Dr. Boone is upstairs,” Felix said. “He’s feeling indisposed.”
“I’d like to see him anyway,” I said.
“I’m afraid that’s not possible.” A hint of challenge in his tone.
I glanced up the stairway. A crystal chandelier with most of the bulbs burned out hung above the second-floor landing. The entire house was in shadows, dimly lit.
Felix pointed down the hall. “Silas is in the library.”
I decided not to press the issue with this strange little man. No telling what was lurking in the nether regions of the old home. Better to take things one step at a time.
“After you.” I tried to look friendly.
Felix smiled like he’d won a poker hand and waddled down the hallway. Hannah and I followed.
The library was on the right. The shelving overflowed with books. A worn leather sofa was in the middle of the room facing a desk made of dark wood that looked like teak.
Silas stood by a bay window, leafing through a ledger. He glanced at us and then turned his attention back to what was in his hand.
“Arlo Baines. Nice to see you again,” he said. “You are friends with Dr. Boone, yes?”
“More like acquaintances.”
Felix continued down the hall toward the back of the house.
Silas glanced at Hannah and then flipped a page. “You must be the reporter.”
Hannah Byrne’s eyes went wide. She didn’t reply.
He looked up from the ledger. “Perhaps you can do a story on Boone, the scion of West Texas in the winter of his years.”
Neither Hannah nor I spoke.
“An old man with no heirs.” Silas shook his head. “So much property to dispose of.”
“Why are you concerned with Boone’s estate?” I asked. “Are you in the property business?”
Outside, a flash of lightning turned the yard a bright white. A second later, thunder crashed.
“My business,” he said, “is none of your business.” He flipped a page. “We should be clear on that, Mr. Baines.”
Hannah pulled out her notepad, looked at Silas. “How do you spell your name?”
“You’re not doing a story on me, are you?” Silas closed the ledger. “That would be a mistake.”
She scribbled down something.
“Hannah Jane Byrne,” he said. “The oldest daughter of Frank and Samantha Byrne. Born in Greenwich, Connecticut, in 1982.”
His words were staccato, accent tinged with traces of the Midwest.
Hannah looked up.
“Currently taking a leave of absence from the New York Times,” he said. “An involuntary leave, I might add.”
Hannah pursed her lips, eyes forming into slits.
“There were rumors of a breakdown in the newsroom.” Silas stared out the window. “Idle gossip, I’m sure.”
“Who the hell are you?” Hannah’s tone was incredulous. “How did you know about any of that?”
Silas walked away from the window, chuckling softly. He tossed the ledger onto the desk. The rain started to fall, a few drops at first, then heavier. The light grew dim in the library, a lamp on the desk providing the only illumination.
“And here you are with my new friend Arlo Baines,” he said. “Himself unceremoniously dismissed from the Texas Rangers.”
“Look at you,” I said. “Getting your Google on. You must have had a better Internet connection than I did.”
“What do you want, Mr. Baines? I have a busy schedule.”
“I’m still looking for Molly’s children.” I paused. “Why is it that I think you might know something about them?”
A wonderfully ambiguous nonanswer. I decided to be more direct.
“Do you know where they are?” I asked.
He looked at me like I was a dog standing on two legs.
I followed the hunch forming in my mind and said, “You’re looking for them, too, aren’t you?”
“You annoy me, Mr. Baines.” He had a sad expression on his face. “And I thought we’d get along so well.”
Hannah glanced up like she’d heard something. She moved to the window, looked out.
“Sky of Zion,” I said. “What’s your connection?”
The question knocked him back for a moment. That was plain to see on his face. Silas McPherson wasn’t used to people asking things that required real answers. I sensed that in his world, people followed orders. Or else.
“You are one of the unclean, Mr. Baines.” His expression became cold. “I wouldn’t expect you to understand.”
From the other side of the room, Hannah banged on the window.
“Hey!” she shouted to someone outside.
Silas rushed to the window.
She turned to me. “I think it’s the boy you’re looking for.”
Silas pressed his hands against the pane, peered outside.
“The weirdo with the glasses,” Hannah said. “Felix. He’s chasing the kid.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The words had barely left her lips before another bolt of thunder rattled the house.
Silas turned away from the window and faced me.
I stood in the middle of the room, blocking his path to the door. “Tell me about Molly and her children.”
He opened his mouth as if he were going to respond. Then he lunged toward the door like he had a ballistic missile strapped to his back.
I could have tried to stop him, but he was moving like someone junked up on a bad combination of drugs—crack and angel dust, meth on top of bath salts.
I galloped after him, heading down the hall leading toward the rear of the house, Hannah right behind me.
We ran through what looked like a family dining room and into the kitchen.
The rear door was open.
I dashed outside.
The backyard was an overgrown mess—a lawn that was more weeds than grass, bordered by pyracanthas and oleanders growing as thick as bamboo.
At the rear of the property was an outbuilding, what looked like a garage and guest quarters. The door to the structure was open.
Silas McPherson stood in the middle of the yard, swiveling his head, looking in all directions.
Rain splattered on the shoulders of his suit, drops permeating the woolen fabric.
I headed toward him, and he charged toward the side yard, heading to the front of the house.
Hannah stood by the corner of the house, holding a piece of firewood.
Silas was paying attention to me, so he didn’t realize she was there until it was too late.
He saw her at the last instant, right as she swung the hunk of wood toward his head. He managed to get his right hand up in time to block to blow.
That was good for his head, bad for his hand.
I was only a few yards away. Despite the rain, I could see clearly what happened.
The wood snapped back his fingers, the digits moving so far in the wrong direction it looked like the nails touched the rear of his hand.
He howled like a rabid wolf, his mouth a perfect O shape.
Hannah reared back for another strike. She swung, but Silas ducked out of the way and tore around the side of the house.
Hannah lunged after him but slipped, falling facedown onto the wet grass.
I let Silas go, skidded to a stop by Hannah. Pulled her to her feet.
“We have to hurry,” she said. “He’s getting away.”
“Go inside and wait for me,” I said.
In the same instant, there was a crack of lightning and a boom of thunder. The rain fell harder. Water dripped from Hannah’s face. I was wet to the skin.
“I’m not waiting for anybody.” She plunged into the thicket that was Boone’s side yard.
I followed.
Thorns plucked at my shirt and skin. My feet slid on the mud. Despite all that, a few seconds later I burst free of the vegetation and emerged in the front yard of the old house.
The sky was black, the rain still heavy.
Hannah stood looking at the spot where the Bentley had been.
“Let’s go.” She headed toward the Prius.
“Where?”
The storm was loud; we had to shout to be heard. At least no tornado sirens were going off.
“We have to find them,” she said. “They’re part of the cult. They know about my niece.”
“But which way did they go?”
She looked down the street in both directions but didn’t say anything. She glanced at the house, a bewildered expression on her face.
On the one hand, we were searching for a black Bentley, which would stick out like a Kardashian at an Amish church social, especially in a town as small as Piedra Springs. On the other hand, it was raining heavily, and we didn’t know where to begin the search.
“We have to try,” she said.
“OK.” I nodded. “We’ll do a grid search, block by block. Let’s get to it.”
We both saw the Prius’s damaged tires at the same time, the two on the right side, sliced along the sidewall. Not bad work for a man with only one functioning hand. Though maybe Felix chipped in.
Hannah yelled an obscenity and pounded her fists against the hood of the car.
I grabbed her arm, pushed her toward the house. “Go inside. Check on the old man.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Find that kid.”
“Why can’t I come with you?”
“Because I work better alone.” I headed off into the rain, wondering why I had turned down her offer of help.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-SEVEN
I ran down the street, heading east, my pace an easy lope.
Boone’s house was in the northwest quadrant of the town.
From what I remembered of the map, there wasn’t much to the west—another couple of blocks, then the city limits.
After that there was nothing but West Texas flatlands, a never-ending sheet of earth stretching as far as the mind could imagine, a desolate landscape unbroken until the next tiny town sprang up nearly a hundred miles away, closer to New Mexico than Piedra Springs.
The area to the north was much the same except the nearest town was closer, probably only ninety miles off.
The rain had slackened to a hard, steady drizzle, but the sky was still dark.
The houses got smaller the farther east I went but not by much. This was still the ritzy part of town. The late-model vehicles in the driveways were almost exclusively American made. Pickups and sedans, Fords and Chevys. The occasional Cadillac.
I stopped at each cross street and peered in both directions, much like I had done the day before. Nothing. No cars or people were moving. Even the dogs of the town had taken shelter.
Three blocks later, I jogged past a park lined with live oaks, their trunks as thick as boulders, leaves greasy and slick from the rain.
I stopped at the corner, leaned against one of the trees, tried to catch my breath.
My wife and I had always talked about moving to a smaller city, a better place to raise children than Dallas.
I wondered what our life would have been like in a town like this. Would it have made a difference?
Across the s
treet was a one-story house with fresh flowers in the beds and a Texas flag hanging from a pole mounted by the front door. The home reminded me of where I had lived with my family, a ranch-style house in North Dallas, not far from a high school where my son and I used to toss a football on Saturday mornings in the fall.
A sedan with a roof rack sat in the driveway.
In the front of the home was a large picture window overlooking the street and the park.
A figure appeared in the window. Sheriff Quang Marsh, holding a coffee mug.
So the sedan was a sheriff’s department squad car, not a roof-racked civilian vehicle.
Marsh stared outside and took a sip from the cup.
I reflexively shrank back even though I had to be invisible to him because of the dim light and my position against the tree trunk.
A girl appeared by his side. The eight-year-old I’d seen in the softball team photo in his office. They talked for a few moments.
I wanted to break away and continue looking for Molly’s son, but I couldn’t force myself to move.
Marsh placed a hand on the girl’s shoulder and continued to stare outside.
I wondered what he saw that I didn’t. There was nothing out here but stormy weather.
The girl disappeared from view. In that instant, I missed my family more than ever, an ache that throbbed deep inside. Rain mixed with tears dripped from my face.
Marsh continued to stare outside, sipping from his mug. After a moment, he raised his arm and pointed east, the direction I’d been headed, as though urging me on.
I blinked several times, wondered if I were imagining the whole thing.
The house was still there. Marsh was not. The light had dimmed, so his cruiser was now nothing more than a mass of shadow.
I ran to the east, hoping I wasn’t losing my mind.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-EIGHT
Two blocks later, I found the Bentley parked in front of a large two-story building made from red brick and limestone.
The Devil's Country [Kindle in Motion] Page 12
