by Kyle Mills
“Excuse me?”
“Don’t talk to me like I’m an idiot, Sara. It pisses me off. Kneiss is dead. We both know it. Obviously, it’s not in the best interests of the church—that is, your best interests—to let that little tidbit leak until Good Friday. Got to keep that collection plate full.”
“I understand now,” Sara said, starting a smile but stopping its progress across her face with a slight wince. “You believe that Albert died and I needed a new messenger. I’ve heard that you believe that Jennifer Davis is Albert’s granddaughter. If that’s true, she’d be the perfect replacement, wouldn’t she?”
Sara shook her head. “I’m disappointed, Mr. Beamon. I would have thought you’d understand us better by now. There’s no need for a new messenger. And for that matter, no expectation that there would be one for another two thousand years.”
“I know that. I was thinking more along the lines that Kneiss wanted someone to replace him as head of the church instead of putting you in the job. I think Albert understood what you were doing and didn’t like it.”
“What I was doing?” she said, suddenly angry. “What do you think it is that Albert doesn’t like? The fact that I’ve devoted my entire life to spreading his message and building his church?”
“I don’t think it was your results, Sara. I think it was your methods.” Beamon jerked his head toward the bar. “Men like Gregory Sines don’t exactly fit into most people’s idea of a church elder.”
“What I’ve done, I’ve done for God.”
Beamon smiled. “I believe that most of the war, torture, and cruelty in our history were started by men with those same words on their lips.”
“I don’t think you have any idea what it is to have faith, Mr. Beamon. God directs me in all things. He tells me what is right and wrong. He has given me the strength to accomplish what I have.”
“And the strength to protect the church when it’s threatened.”
“That too,” she said, looking directly at him.
“And Jennifer’s a threat now, isn’t she? You built the church, not Albert. He had the message, but you had the means.” Beamon took a sip of his drink. “And then, right before he dies—the old sonofabitch gives it away. Gives away your church. To a fifteen-year-old girl with dyed blonde hair and a ring in her nose, no less. That had to be a kick in the ass.”
“I have no idea—”
Beamon cut her off. “But then Albert goes and dies—not ascends, just dies like the rest of us. Or maybe you helped him along? Either way, it would leave you in quite a pickle, wouldn’t it? The only way you’d be able to explain it is that his time as the Messenger was over. That someone is being chosen to take his place.”
Sara sat perfectly still. The heavy makeup and dim lighting would have made her look like a mannequin if it hadn’t been for the reflection of her eyes.
“Seems to me that Jennifer would be a good choice,” Beamon continued. “Fixes your little theological glitch and has the added benefit of getting her out of your way.”
Beamon put his cigarette out in the ashtray on the table. “Because somebody has to take Kneiss’s place next week. Don’t they?”
Sara’s eyes darted left. Toward Sines, Beamon guessed.
“That’s quite a theory, Mr. Beamon. I’m not sure how to respond.”
“Then let me make a suggestion. Give me Jennifer. You religious leaders are masters at dredging up obscure Bible passages to justify whatever it is you want to do. Hell, tell your people that God appeared to you in a box of Cracker Jacks and told you that it was Jennifer’s destiny to be a Protestant. I don’t really give a shit.”
“Do you think your position is strong enough to be making threats, Mr. Beamon? What do you have? A few illegally obtained recordings of conversations between—who? Can you prove these people’s identities? I doubt it. And I doubt even more that you can prove how the recordings were originally obtained.”
“Oh, I think you’re probably right. From a letter-of-the-law standpoint, I’d have a real uphill battle. But if those recordings were sent to the FBI anonymously—or maybe better, to some of my contacts in the press—with a detailed explanation of what they were and how they were obtained, I imagine that I could generate some real interest in the way you operate your church. Hell, I probably wouldn’t even have to go through all that trouble. I could just give them to your biggest fan—the German government—and trust them to use them to do the absolute maximum damage.”
Gregory Sines slid silently into the booth next to Sara, prompting Beamon to move his hand a little closer to his gun. “Look, Sara. I don’t care about the people on the tapes. And I care even less about the people who vote those idiots in. It’s not my job to save the public from themselves. But the girl, well, as I see it, she’s gotten a raw deal.”
“I don’t understand you, Mr. Beamon. You’ve lost nearly everything of value to you in the span of a few weeks. And for what? If I had the girl, I certainly wouldn’t let you find her.” She shook her head in sadly. “Take what I’m offering you. Marry that psychiatrist. Move away from Flagstaff.”
Beamon grimaced and finished his drink. “Can you imagine what it would be like being married to a psychiatrist? Her always knowing what you’re thinking? Besides, I’m considering learning to ski.”
“Is this just stupid male pride? No matter what happens, you lose.” Her voice lowered. “If you think what you’ve suffered so far has been difficult, I can assure you that you won’t like what your future holds. God will not let you stand in the way of His work.”
Beamon smiled. “God’s work.” He reached out and squeezed her hand, coming suggestively close to her injured thumb. “My guess is that you’re about as religious as I am. But if I’m wrong and there is a God, I’m starting to think He’s on my side.”
55
“ARE YOU OKAY?” ERNIE SAID, A LOOK OF concern spreading across her face.
Beamon hung up his cell phone in disgust, promising himself that that was the last time he was going to succumb to curiosity and retrieve his phone messages. “What? Oh, yeah, fine.”
“Anything interesting?”
He shook his head. “A kind of nasty call from the IRS and some woman from an AIDS counseling outfit who wants to discuss my recent diagnosis.”
Ernie’s hands went to her cheeks. “I’m so sorry, Mark, I had no idea … But I’ve read that there are some new medical—”
Beamon laughed easily. “Relax, Ernie. I don’t have AIDS. Sadly, I can’t even remember the last time I had sex.”
“The church?”
He nodded. “I guess I won’t be applying for a new life insurance policy anytime soon. So what’s so important that I had to haul my butt down here like it was on fire?”
Ernie grabbed a few sheets of paper from her desk and held them up proudly. “E-mail.”
“You actually got it working?”
She handed him the papers. “The Lord provides. We’ve received six e-mails in total, but most of them relate to financial matters, things I don’t think you’d be interested in.”
“And the others?”
She nodded toward the papers in his lap. “Read the top two.”
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Members currently studying are
absolved. Clear all students and
personnel from the Retreat by
midnight tonight.
God Bless
“The Retreat?” Beamon said
“It’s a ranch in eastern Oregon. Kneissians who’ve done something to anger the church go there.”
“Oh, yeah, right. There was something about that in your book. It’s the place they go and pay an arm and a leg to eat bread and water and get marched around in the mountains till they drop.”
“Till they’re forgiven,” Ernie corrected.
Beamon flipped to the second page.
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Sara will arrive at the retreat by
seven a.m. tomorrow morning. You
and two of your men will be waiting
for her there. She will instruct when
she arrives.
God Bless
Beamon rubbed at the bottom of his jaw and read the two e-mails again.
“What do you think, Mark?”
“I forgot to tell you that I figured out how Jennifer made it to the phone.”
“Really? How?”
“Sara’s mouth was swelled up pretty good. In an area about the size of a fist.” He pointed to his right hand. “And she had a fresh bandage on her thumb.”
Beamon watched Ernie’s eyes turn distant for a moment as she imagined what it would feel like to beat the crap out of Sara Renslier.
“This is it, Ernie,” Beamon said, bringing her back from her ecstatic vision before he lost her entirely. “Sara is injured right around the same time as Jennifer makes it to a phone and damn near gets a call out. Suddenly they’re clearing out the closest thing the church has to a prison and sending three of the wristband brigade there to meet Sara.”
“I think they’re going to move her, Mark.”
Beamon nodded. “The question is, how? If they’ve left already, they could maybe drive straight through, but that would be tough. Timing- wise and risk-wise. They’d have to drug her and put her in the back of a van or something …”
“They’re not going to drive.”
“They’re not?”
“No. There’s no road leading to the Retreat. They have a landing strip that’s kept open year- round.”
56
BEAMON EASED HIS CAR THROUGH THE OPEN chain-link fence and rolled to a stop in the middle of a random grouping of vehicles near the tower building. The lights from the runway were just an undefined halo, not really penetrating the dark, just changing its color. Even the light seeping from the windows of the building next to him barely managed to filter through to his car. According to the disembodied voice coming over the radio, a warm front had crashed into a mass of cold air above Flagstaff, resulting in the torrential rain that was flowing across his windshield and over the backs of the overwhelmed wipers.
Beamon stepped out of the car and began across the tarmac, hunched uselessly against the rain. His jeans and sweatshirt were completely soaked through in less than a minute, and the clammy material against his skin reminded him that in Flagstaff, “warm front” meant low forties.
He straightened up and slowed to a normal pace as the glow from the buildings behind him faded to nothing and a light source, roughly in front of him, strengthened. He adjusted his course slightly and headed straight for it.
Two red dots seemed to float in space for a while, but as he moved closer, the unbroken white of a plane’s wings began to appear, illuminated by light pouring through its open door and the small windows in its side.
Beamon circled to his right and stopped near the tail. He pulled a damp piece of paper from his back pocket and read the numbers off it before the rain smeared them into an illegible blob.
They matched. This was the plane. Thank God for Chet Michaels.
He could barely see through the haze created by the heavy raindrops exploding against the stairs leading into the plane, but as he edged closer, he could see that there was no movement inside.
Sliding his gun from the holster beneath his sweatshirt, he put his foot on the first step and gently weighted it. He’d never been on an aircraft this small and wasn’t sure if his weight would rock it and telegraph his approach.
Whether it was the mass of the plane or his recent diet, the steps didn’t budge under his feet, and he crept slowly up them and into the dry cabin.
The pilot in the cockpit to his left seemed to be engrossed in whatever was contained on the clipboard in his hand. He seemed completely oblivious to the sound of water dripping from Beamon onto the thick carpet, and continued running his finger down a column of switches in front of him.
There were nine seats in all, each half again as wide as the ones in an airliner’s first-class cabin and each lovingly covered in soft tan leather. At the back, there was a small storage area that Beamon could see was empty.
“Excuse me,” Beamon said, taking a step toward the cockpit.
The pilot tensed, bouncing a few inches out of his chair, and then twisted around to look behind him. He gasped quietly when he saw Beamon. Or, more precisely, when he saw down the barrel of Beamon’s gun.
Unbidden, the pilot raised his hands above his head. “What do you want? This is a small plane- Mexico’s as far as I could get you.”
Beamon wrung out the bottom of his sweatshirt and smiled. He’d never considered hijacking as a career choice, but in the current context it was looking pretty attractive. Fly down south of the border, sell the plane for a few mill to a drug runner, and spend the rest of his life on the beach with a drink in one hand and a taco in the other.
“Take it easy,” Beamon said. “I was told to meet some people from the church here—that there might be some trouble …
The pilot relaxed a bit. “Look, man. I just fly this thing, you know? Nobody ever tells me what’s going on—I just get people where they’re going.”
He was a rather puffy-looking man, Beamon noted. Not really fat, just kind of formless, with a round face that was strangely pale and hairless in a way that made it difficult to guess his age.
“Okay, then. Why don’t you step out of there—without touching any more of those buttons and switches, please—and have a seat back here.”
The pilot looked more than happy to oblige and moved slowly but efficiently from the cramped space of the cockpit and past Beamon, all the while keeping his hands as high as the low ceiling would allow. He took a seat in one of the plush leather seats facing Beamon and looked up to see if there were any more instructions for him to follow.
Beamon couldn’t think of any, unless there was a coffee pot somewhere, and there didn’t seem to be. He leaned his back against the uncomfortably curved wall next to the door leading outside and looked down at his hands. They’d turned bright white from the cold and felt completely lifeless. He pressed his index finger gently against the trigger of his revolver. The finger still worked, but the frozen skin covering it didn’t register the increased pressure. He’d have to be careful of that.
“Isn’t there a heater in here?”
The pilot shook his head. “Not until I start the plane.”
Beamon frowned and tucked his left hand into his armpit, accomplishing nothing but to wring a little more water from the sweatshirt and start it running down his side.
The rain had died down a bit, but the wind was still gusting through the door and sending a cold mist washing over him every few seconds. He struggled to keep his teeth from chattering and hoped things would move quickly. Of course, they didn’t.
He ended up spending the next hour trying to fight off the effects of the cold and wondering what the hell he was going to do if he was wrong and a bunch of church executives showed up with their wives and kids for a quick beach trip.
Beamon pressed himself a little closer to the wall when the dim red glow coming through the door wavered and then began to fade into a set of approaching headlights. He gave the pilot a quick glance that said “stay quiet” and poked his head around the corner of the door. Another Taurus. The church must get a bulk discount on those things.
The car stopped maybe twenty feet from the plane and both driver and passenger immediately jumped out. They had their backs to him, so he stepped fully into the doorway and watched as they opened the back door of the Ford and began to pull something out.
Even from behind, they were both easily recognizable. The small woman by her severe haircut and the bandage wound around her right thumb, and the man by the thick mustache, the tips of which were visible when his head moved. Beamon had hoped Gregory Sines wouldn’t make an appearance tonight. He looked like the kind of man who would be hard to
control in a situation like this.
Beamon smiled and let out a long, quiet breath as the headlights reflecting off the plane illuminated a white-blonde head of hair.
He realized that he really hadn’t expected this moment to ever come. The slow burn he’d been feeling in his stomach had been the unfamiliar sensation of defeat, and he recognized now that his recent actions had been governed more by the desire to go down swinging than anything else. He had to admit, though, that it made this moment that much sweeter.
Sara and Sines draped the arms of their cargo across their necks and turned toward the plane heads down, searching for any remaining patches of ice on the asphalt.
From where he was standing, Jennifer looked to be completely unconscious; her body was limp and the toes of her bare feet dragged across the tarmac as she was carried across it. He couldn’t see her face, but the skin on her arms looked as white as his—no trace remained of the athletic glow so evident in her photographs.
“Shit!” Beamon said in surprise as he threw a hand out to keep himself from rolling down the stairs. He twisted hard to the right, keeping his eyes on Sines, who had looked up just as Beamon was hit from behind by the pilot.
The man managed to get an arm around Beamon’s neck but wasn’t able to lock it off. Beamon twisted again and threw an elbow as Sines reached behind him for what no doubt was going to be a really big gun.
The pilot’s arm slid off the wet skin of his neck and he stuck a foot out just in time to trip the man and send him pitching out the door head first.
“Stop!” Beamon yelled over the sound of the rain and the pilot’s head connecting with the ground.
Despite his warning and the fact that his gun was already at waist-level, Sines’s hand disappeared beneath his jacket and was now starting to come back out. Fast.
Beamon waited as long as he dared, but when the butt of Sines’s gun became visible, he squeezed the trigger.
The round hit Sines dead center, as Beamon knew it would—hell, there was probably only fifteen feet between them. Sines jerked back and fell, but somehow managed to land in a sitting position and retain control of his gun hand. Sara dove to the ground, leaving Jennifer to fall face first to the asphalt.
