The Preacher: A Supernatural Thriller (Solom Book 3)

by Scott Nicholson

  Katy thumbed back: Where r u?

  Solom.

  Do u know what time it is?

  No man knows the hour or the day.

  Annoyed and a little scared, Katy hit the dial button. “Come on, answer me, damn it,” Katy whispered.

  Six rings and then voicemail.

  The house suddenly seemed emptier and darker, its old chestnut rafters settling like bones. A loose piece of tin flapped overhead. The lights flickered, and a wooden tapping sound walked the length of one outside wall.

  Katy peeked through the curtains of the front-door window. The porch light’s weak glare extended only a few feet into the yard, barely enough to illuminate the neglected flowers and shrubs that lined the steps. The moon flooded the valley but only offered the vaguest outlines of shapes, like the black angles of the barn, the gray pool of the garden, and the gently swaying weeds of the pasture. But nobody was out there that she could see.

  Of course, this was Solom, so that didn’t mean much.

  What she really wanted to see were headlights bouncing up the driveway, indicating Jett was alive and well.

  She fought an urge to jump behind the wheel of her Subaru and tear off down the road. But where would she look? Cross Valley High? Every pizza joint in Titusville? The Regal Cinemas complex in Windshake? The bowling lanes at McCallister Alley? Where did kids hang out these days? Most of their social lives were on their phones.

  Which was just perfect when you wanted to give your mom the silent treatment. At least Jett hadn’t blocked Katy’s number. But what was up with this messaging game? Jett should know better.

  Or maybe she knows exactly how to scare me.

  Katy stepped out on the porch, as if that would bring her closer to her daughter. The breeze carried an early hint of winter, and Katy wrapped her arms across her chest. She shivered from more than just the cold.

  She checked her phone once more, even though it hadn’t dinged. No new messages.

  Her heart accelerated as she spied twin dots of light turning off the highway beyond the Ward farm. Her relief smothered the anger and anxiety she’d been feeling. Jett was home, and all was well.

  But when the headlights turned into her driveway, she realized this wasn’t Hayley’s Honda. These headlights were much too far apart, and a bar atop the roof glinted with reflected moonlight.

  Police?

  Every possible fear rushed her at once—traffic accident, medical emergency, arrest for drug possession.

  She was still running down the list, not even aware she was walking barefoot down the steps and across the gravel, when the big sedan’s driver’s-side door opened. A tall woman in a brown uniform stepped out, put on a hat, and waved. Katy realized the bar lights weren’t flashing, which she took as a hopeful sign. Whatever it was, it probably wasn’t too serious.

  “Hello, Mrs. Logan,” the woman said. “I’m Deputy Vreeland with the Pickett County Sheriff’s office and—”

  “Where’s Jett?”

  “Jett?” The deputy glanced around the farm. “Is something wrong?”

  “No. Never mind.”

  “I’m not here about your daughter, ma’am. Sorry to drop in so late, but I saw the lights on and figured you were up. We’ve had some reported vandalism at a couple of the local churches. You know how seriously people take incidents like that these days, especially with all the hate crimes.”

  Katy wasn’t in the mood to care about property crimes. But Katy also didn’t want to explain to this officer how she couldn’t even keep tabs on her own daughter. And if she was going to be a resident here, she had to care about her neighbors and the community. That was part of the deal, wasn’t it? “I haven’t seen anything. I hardly leave the farm these days. Which churches?”

  “Rush Branch Primitive Baptist and True Light Tabernacle. Some graves were…uh…desecrated. I know it sounds like a prank by a bunch of hooligans, but that’s a Class One felony in North Carolina. And you can imagine the pressure we’re under to wrap this up before Sunday services.”

  “That’s awful. I wish I could help. Can you give me more information?”

  “We’re holding some back because we don’t want the newspaper to get hold of it, so I’d appreciate your discretion.” The woman tilted the brim of her hat down so she was glaring at Katy in a stern manner. After Katy nodded agreement, the deputy added, “It looks like the suspects piled a bunch of…animal organs and intestines…on a couple of the graves. Almost like a Satanic cult thing. Lord, I hope we don’t have any of that nonsense going on. That’s all Solom needs.”

  The deputy seemed to realize she’d broken out of professional character, because she straightened a little and added, “Since both churches are right over the ridge from you, I thought you might have seen some headlights or unusual activity. The vandalism apparently occurred within the last couple of hours because the…evidence is still fresh.”

  Katy was uneasy. She couldn’t help linking the crime with Jett’s absence. Was Jett capable of such an act?

  Normally, Katy would say “No way.” Especially since Jett had been off drugs for two years. But she also didn’t know her daughter was joining a church and getting baptized. And Mark and Jett’s church was one of those that had been vandalized.

  “What makes you suspect it was Satanic?” Katy asked. She couldn’t help glancing over where the hoof prints ended, although she couldn’t make them out in the dark.

  “Mostly because it was goat innards and blood. They left a decapitated head at one of the scenes. And the fact that the graves belonged to the Rev. Harmon Smith. Despite the rumors, he was a respected man of the cloth.”

  Katy almost mentioned how strange it was that Harmon, better known now as the Horseback Preacher instead of a memorialized founding father, was buried in three different graves at three different churches. The preacher’s legendary status as a vengeful ghost was more likely to make him a target than his duties as a circuit-riding Methodist minister.

  “Well, we did have a goat go missing today—” Katy’s phone dinged. “Excuse me, I’m expecting a call from my daughter,” she said to the deputy. Jett’s number showed on the screen. Katy swiped to the message: The hour is near.

  Katy glanced at the corner of the screen. It was a few minutes away from midnight.

  “Do you want to come identify the goat?” the deputy asked. “If your animal was taken, it will give us a lead to work with. Right now we don’t have anything.”

  Hell, no, I don’t want to traipse around a midnight graveyard looking at shredded animal parts.

  But Katy remained calm as she said, “Ours was pure white in the face, tan nose, no horns.”

  The deputy frowned. “Doesn’t match this one. Too bad. I mean, sorry for your loss, and I hope yours turns up. We’ve had a few reports of goat rustling going on this way lately, too. That’s another reason we want to connect these dots. Plus…” The deputy looked past Katy at the old farmhouse. “Well, with all that’s happened here, and what Gordon Smith did. I didn’t work that case, but you know how people talk.”

  “Yes. Discretion, I know.”

  A car engine whined in the distance and another set of lights turned up the driveway. To Katy’s delight, this time the headlights were small enough to be a Honda’s. The driver must have seen the patrol car, because the Honda stopped a good thirty yards from the house. Jett popped out of the rear and jogged toward the house as the car made a quick U-turn and hurried back toward the highway.

  Jett eyed the deputy as she joined a frowning Katy. “What’s going down, Mom?”

  “Graveyard vandalism at two churches,” the deputy said. To her credit, she spoke a little less formally to Jett, as if understanding the girl would likely be nervous.

  Or maybe she knows about Jett’s drug issues, even though she has a clean record here. Or possibly even Mark’s, since newcomers are rare enough in Solom to arouse curiosity. As the old saying goes, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.

  “That’s
awful,” Jett said.

  “You know anything about it?” Katy asked, heading off the deputy’s next question.

  Jett shook her head. “Gosh, no. That’s stupid.”

  “Go on in and get ready for bed,” Katy said.

  After Jett vanished in the house, the deputy said, “Do you always let your daughter run this late?”

  “On weekends,” Katy said, defensive. “That’s not against the law, is it?”

  “No, ma’am. It’s just after that mess with Gordon Smith…well, thank you for your time. If anything comes up, or you remember something that might help, please give us a call at the office.”

  The deputy folded herself back behind the wheel of her patrol car and drove away. Katy headed into the house, already scripting her scolding of Jett, when she stopped short. Her daughter’s high heels had left tracks.

  In blood.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  As Katy read aloud all the cryptic texts, Jett undressed and slipped into a knee-length Grumpy Cat T-shirt. “Sorry, Mom, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I told you I couldn’t get a signal in Titusville. Hillbilly wireless, remember?”

  “That’s not an excuse. There are still pay phones in the Twenty-First Century, even in Solom.”

  “You expect me to spoil the fun so Hayley can drive me around for half the night to check in with my probation officer?”

  “If that’s what it takes to keep your word.”

  Jett flopped down on her bed and stared at the ceiling. Katy couldn’t help secretly sniffing to detect any alcohol or marijuana. Many popular drugs left no odor, but her daughter’s eyes weren’t red and her pupils didn’t harbor the frantic energy of LSD or Ecstasy.

  Jett seemed sober, if a little jumpy. “Okay, I’ll never leave the house again. Why don’t you ground me until I’m as ancient and boring as you?”

  “Jett, there’s no need for that. You broke our deal, and you don’t have the right to be angry with me because of it.”

  Katy pretended to straighten Jett’s room, bending and picking up some papers that had fallen from the desk. Her real intention was to check the high heels, which Jett had kicked a few inches under the bed. The bloody prints hadn’t made it into the house, and Katy had wiped a finger in the stains on the porch to test them. She would have been happy if the substance was goat poop, but it bore the slick viscosity and tangy odor of blood.

  The heels, however, now appeared clean. There had been no tracks in the hall or the stairs, and the rug at the front door was free of stains.

  “Then explain to me how somebody could have texted from your number if your phone didn’t have a signal,” Katy said.

  “Do I look like a tech geek? I’m just a kid.”

  Amazing how that excuse came in handy whenever hard questions came up. “Jett, you earn freedom through responsibility and—”

  “What was up with the cop? Is that one of the ones who came out here when Gordon tried to chop us to bits and feed us to the goats?”

  Changing the subject was another tactic to defray a good discussion. Katy didn’t know whether to admire her daughter’s cleverness or ban her from video games for a week.

  But now Katy had an opportunity to ask about the shoes. “You tracked in some blood. Do you know where it came from?

  Jett’s eyes widened in innocence. A little too wide. “Gross. We stopped at the Gas-n-Go at the red light. I thought that place looked a little sketchy. Hayley’s going to kill me if I messed up her carpet.”

  “So it wouldn’t have anything to do with…goats?”

  “No way, Mom. I don’t go near those little monsters unless it’s broad daylight. You know that.”

  Katy sat on the bed at Jett’s feet. She would just have to risk giving Jett nightmares. As if life and Solom hadn’t already done a good enough job of that. “Somebody apparently performed some kind of animal sacrifice at a couple of graves.”

  Jett made a puke face. “Yuck.”

  Katy tried not to sound too accusative. “You wouldn’t know anybody who would do that, do you?”

  “Maybe Tommy Wilson if he was drunk and you dared him, but who in the world would even dream up something like that?”

  Katy was too eager to accept Jett at her word. Maybe all parents considered their children to be little angels. Even Jeffrey Dahmer’s and Ted Bundy’s mothers probably loved their children and overlooked their faults. Even when they extended to serial murder and cannibalism.

  “One of the crimes was at the Free Will church,” Katy said. “The one you’re joining.”

  Jett met her eyes for a moment and then looked away. “So you talked to Dad, huh?”

  “I wish you’d told me.” Katy took one of Jett’s hands in hers. The flesh was cold. “You know I support your informed choices. That’s a big step, and I want to be there for you. Don’t cut me out, okay?”

  “Sorry, Mom. I just know how weird you get about religion. Especially after Gordon—”

  “I’ve already apologized for that mistake. Why do you have to keep laying a guilt trip on me? I only married him so we could start a new life away from…away from…”

  Jett smirked with a Pyrrhic victory. “Now who’s laying a guilt trip?”

  “You’re becoming a woman,” Katy said, dismayed by how helpless she felt over the endless march of time. “Soon you’ll be on your own and I won’t be there to help you. That’s why I want to be here for you while I can.”

  Even as she said it, Katy realized she needed to be needed. What would she have once Jett left? Thirty acres and a herd of goats and a property-tax bill and a few more streaks of gray in her hair.

  Damn, I might even start hoping Rebecca’s ghost comes back just so I’ll have some company.

  But she couldn’t worry about the future right now. That would take care of itself. Surviving the night was about all she could handle at the moment.

  As if reading her expression, Jett said, “So why don’t we talk about the things neither of us want to talk about?”

  Katy released Jett’s hand and glanced at the dark window. “Because…some things are better off not talked about.”

  Jett dragged the blanket over her shoulders. “Hayley saw the Horseback Preacher.”

  Katy looked away. Why couldn’t she be a normal mom in a normal house in Normaltown, USA? Why hadn’t she got the hell out of here two years ago? Why had she come to Solom at all?

  Because maybe you don’t really have a choice. Maybe your stay is involuntary.

  But she couldn’t go down that road. She had to try. “Does she do drugs? Maybe she was hallucinating.”

  “Mom.”

  “Lots of people ride horses in Solom.”

  “I already tried that, Mom. But he had the black hat and everything. Hayley said he looked at her, but she couldn’t see any face.”

  That’s him, all right.

  Katy told Jett about the hoof prints in the barnyard, which drew a shocked stare that might have been a little exaggerated. “You knew he was back and you let me go out at night?” Jett said. “There goes your Mom of the Year award.”

  “Honestly, I don’t think we should be afraid,” Katy said, trying to swallow her own logic. “If the Horseback Preacher was going to hurt us, he’s had plenty of chances. In a way, you can almost say he’s our guardian angel. He helped save us from Gordon, and then when Gordon came back from the dead as a scarecrow, the preacher showed up again. And yet we’re still here.”

  Jett rolled her eyes. “Mom. Do you even hear yourself?”

  “We’re not from Solom. Why should he even care?”

  “Maybe because we’re on his land? Have you ever stopped and thought that maybe this place is the common denominator in all the crazy crap that goes on in Solom? Harmon Smith, Gordon, Rebecca, the Scarecrow Man, and all these damned goats. It all started right here.”

  “Something in the water,” Katy said. “Or some mineral or chemical in the soil. The Salem witch trials might have been caused by contaminated
rye that led to mass hallucinations and hysteria.”

  “Mom,” Jett said, keeping her voice level. “The difference is this is real. This happened.”

  Katy clenched her fists in frustration. “Don’t remind me.”

  “So what do we do? Tell Dad?”

  Katy rose from the bed with a creak of springs that seemed terribly loud in the ancient house. She went to the window and scanned what she could see of the yard. A cluster of shadows just beyond the barn might have been a mounted figure. And that swaying thing in the garden—could that be the Scarecrow Man dancing on his wooden pole? Those clicks and creaks of wood below might be the decapitated Rebecca climbing the stairs, her head clasped in her hands.

  “No,” Katy said. “We almost got him killed before. Better to let him think I married a lunatic.”

  “Why are you so stubborn, Mom? It’s okay to need help once in a while. At least that’s the line you sold me when I was getting off drugs.”

  “Who or what can possibly help?”

  “Odus. The people who were on Lost Ridge with us last year. Any of the other preachers around here. My preacher, Elder David.”

  “Oh, great,” Katy said. “Pray the ghost away.”

  Jett pounded the mattress with her fists and sat up in anger. “It’s better than anything you got.”

  Katy pressed her lips together. She didn’t want to scream at her daughter, not when their nerves were stretched so taut they almost vibrated. To be a good parent, sometimes you had to act the exact opposite of how you felt. And despite her fear for their safety, she still wanted to be a good parent above all.

  Then take her and get the hell out of the valley. Now.

  But her feet didn’t listen. She discovered she was more afraid of the world beyond the edge of the driveway than of the farm. At least here in Solom she sort of belonged.

  “Solom has you now.”