The Heaven Trilogy

by Ted Dekker

  In living we die; In dying we live, the sign above the door read. You are killing me, Father. How could anyone betray him as Helen had? He had loved her in every way he knew how, and still she’d betrayed him! Ivena’s suggestion that her rejection of him was no different from his own rejection of Christ was well and fine, but it did not ease the whirlwind of emotions whipping through his mind.

  Jan felt a tremor take to his bones. He stood on the sidewalk and balled his hands into tight fists. “Why?” he muttered through clenched teeth. There could be no pain worse than this ache of rejection, he thought. It was a living death.

  A sudden image of Helen standing, smiling innocently, came to him. In his mind’s eye he snatched the image by the throat and strangled her. The image struggled briefly in terror and then fell limp in his hands. He grunted and dropped her.

  Jan shut his eyes and shook his head. “Father, please! Please help me.” Ivena’s words strung through his mind. She is no different than you, Jan. The rage and the sorrow and the horror all rolled into a searing ball of emotion. He dropped to one knee and stared up at the sky. “Forgive me, Father. Forgive me, I have sinned.”

  Another thought filled his mind. The police will come for you, Jan.

  The tears came freely now, streaming down his cheeks. He lifted both fists above his head and opened his hands. “Oh, God, forgive me. If you have grafted this love of yours into my heart, then let it possess me.”

  He didn’t know how long he remained on his knees facing the house before standing and making sense of himself. He had just leaped off a cliff back at the Towers, he thought, and he had no business loitering around for the impact. But there was Helen —it was all about Helen. He could not continue without resolving this madness.

  In living we die; In dying we live. He was living and he was dying and he was not entirely sure which was which.

  JAN’S GOING, even for these two hours, had dumped Helen back into a deep pool of depression. It was a strange brew of shame and sorrow and a desperate longing to be held in someone’s strong arms. In Jan’s strong arms. She’d distilled the emotions to one: loneliness. The kind that felt like a living death.

  She imagined throwing herself at him when he returned, but her shame dismissed the image. Instead she paced away the minutes, making the trip to the front window to peek for his return a hundred times, while a terrible agony gripped her heart. It was a pain that overshadowed all the pleasure of a thousand nights in the Palace. Dear God, she was a pig!

  The sound of the latch froze her to the carpet on the far side of the room. She was gripped by the sudden impulse to hide. God, help me!

  “Helen.”

  Oh, the sound of his voice! Forgive me, please forgive me! A lump rose to her throat and she swallowed it quickly.

  “Yes?”

  He closed the door and walked across through the shadows toward her. She shivered once. He emerged from the darkness, his eyes soft and lost. But there was no anger in them.

  Helen sat on the couch. You see, Helen? He loves you deeply! Look at his eyes, swimming in love.

  How could anyone dare to love her with such intensity, knowing what he now surely knew? Surely Ivena had told him everything. Helen felt the tears rising but was powerless to stop them. She dropped her head into her arms and began to weep.

  He stepped forward, dropped to his knees and gently placed both arms around her shoulders. His hands were trembling. “It’s okay, Helen. Please, don’t cry.” His voice was strained. She dissolved now, gushing with sorrow that had welled up in her chest.

  “I’m so sorry!” She wept, shaking her head. “I’m so sorry.”

  “I know you are.” So he did know. “Please, Helen. Please stop crying. I can’t bear it!” And then he was crying with her. Not just sniffling, but crying hard and shaking.

  She draped one arm over his shoulder and they buried their faces in each other’s necks and wept. Neither spoke for a long time. For Helen the relief of his love came like water to a bone-dry soul, parched by his absence. By her own folly. Forgive me! You’ve given me this man, this love, and I’ve rejected it! Oh, God, forgive me! She squeezed Jan tighter. I’ll never let him go! Forgive me, I beg you!

  Jan lifted her face with gentle hands and wiped at her tears with his thumbs. “I love you, Helen. You know that, don’t you? I would never reject you. Never. I could not; you are my life. I would die without you.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Yes. But no more. No more tears. We are together, that’s all that matters.”

  “I don’t know why I go back, Jan. I . . .”

  He pulled her into his shoulder and shook with another sob. “No, no! It’s okay.” He held her tight, like a vise. It was the first time she fully understood his pain—that he was screaming inside, fighting to hold his sorrow from crushing her.

  The realization was numbing, shocking her into a dumb stare as he fought for control. Oh, God, what have I done? What have I done?

  And she knew then that her own tears—her loneliness and her heartache—it was all for herself. Not for Jan. She missed him. She felt lonely. She wanted to be forgiven.

  But this man in her arms, his emotions were directed toward her. He wanted to comfort her. He wanted to forgive her. It was the difference between them, she thought. A gulf as wide as the Grand Canyon. Her selfish love and his selflessness. That was the message of his book, The Dance of the Dead. He had died to a piece of himself for her. Even now in her arms he was dying to a piece of himself for her sake.

  And what death was she willing to give for him? Not even the death of her own self-gratifying pleasures. She clenched her jaw and swore to herself then that she would never, never go back to Glenn. Never!

  Helen kissed Jan’s mouth, and she wiped his tears away. He returned the kiss and they held each other for a long minute.

  “Helen, listen to me,” Jan finally said.

  “I’m so sorry—”

  “No, no. Not that. We have another problem. I’ve made a mistake. I think we might have to leave.” He suddenly stood and strode quickly for the kitchen.

  Helen sat up. “Jan? What mistake?”

  “I went to the Towers,” he said with his back to her. “I shot Glenn Lutz.”

  She sprang to her feet. “You shot him? You killed Glenn?”

  “No. I shot his hands.” He lifted the receiver from the wall and faced her. “I’ll explain in the car, but right now I think we should get Ivena and find a safe place while we work this out.”

  Helen stared at him, stunned. “A safe place?”

  “Yes.” He quickly dialed Ivena’s number. “You could grab a few items, but we need to leave.”

  “How long?”

  “I don’t know. A day. Two.” He leaned into the phone. “Ivena? Thank God you’re safe.”

  Jan had shot Glenn’s hands? The truth of it struck her as she stood in the living room, staring dumbly at Jan’s back while he talked to Ivena. Heat suddenly rushed over her skull. She spun to the front door, half expecting to see Buck or Stark in the frame. But the door rested shut. Either way, Glenn would’ve undoubtedly dispatched them by now.

  Helen ran for the bedroom, panicked. She stuffed a toothbrush and a tube of toothpaste along with a few other toiletries and some underwear into Jan’s overnight bag. Where could they possibly go?

  Jan had shot Glenn. Did he know what that meant?

  She ran out to the living room. Jan was locking the sliding door to the backyard. “We’ve gotta move, Jan. Do you have any idea where we’re going?”

  “To safety,” he said.

  “And where will you be safe from Glenn? He has ears—”

  “I know, Helen. And I’m not a stranger to danger. I’ve seen my share.”

  Jan quickly pulled the drapes. He shot her a fleeting smile, grabbed her hand, and hurried for the door. “If there is danger it will likely be at Ivena’s house, not here.”

  “He said three days,” Helen said. The street was clear and t
hey walked briskly for the car.

  “That was while he still had two good hands. I may have changed his mind.”

  Helen uttered a small nervous laugh and climbed into the Cadillac. But there was no humor in her voice. They sped from the house and Helen demanded Jan tell her exactly what had happened at the Towers.

  He did.

  Helen knew then that someone would die. That much was now a certainty. The only question was who.

  CHARLIE WILKS stood in Glenn’s office, stunned by the bloodied floor before him. Glenn sat limply in his chair, weakened by the ordeal. It was an unusual sight to be sure; not because Charlie was unaccustomed to bullet wounds or puddles of blood, but because it was Glenn’s blood. The strong man had been visited by his match.

  A doctor Glenn called Klowawski had already fixed his shoulder in a temporary sling and bound his hands in white strips of gauze like a boxer. The repair work would be done in the clinic, but not until Glenn had had his say with Charlie.

  “You’re sure it was Jan Jovic who did this?” Charlie asked. “Not someone who looks—”

  “It was the preacher, you idiot! He stood here for ten minutes waving my own gun at me. You think I imagined the whole thing?”

  Charlie glanced at the bloodied shirt glistening in a heap on the floor. “Of course not.” Someone had tried to mop some of the blood from the floor with the white cotton shirt and succeeded only in smearing circles on the tile. Glenn had this coming to him, and for that Charlie felt no sympathy. But the law did prohibit citizens from storming into other people’s offices and blowing holes in their hands. Jan Jovic had just found himself a heap of trouble and Glenn would play it to his advantage.

  “This gives me what I need,” Glenn said. “You do realize that.”

  “Yes it does. It gives you the right to have Mr. Jovic apprehended. But nothing more.”

  “That’s not what I’m talking about.”

  “And what are you talking about, Glenn?” Charlie knew, of course.

  “This muddies the waters. It gives you a good cover.”

  “Gives me cover? And why would I need cover? I’ll get your man, throw him in the slammer for a few days, prosecute him like the law requires—”

  “That’s not what I want. It’s not enough.”

  “What then? You want him dead?”

  “No.” Glenn wore a small smirk. “Not him—he’s too valuable alive. I just paid ten million for his backside. I need him alive but I also need him willing. The old hag, on the other hand . . .”

  “The woman?”

  “I’m going to kill the old woman and I want you to stay out of my way. Help me if I need it.”

  Charlie took a breath and let it out slowly. It wasn’t the first time, of course. But Glenn was messing with decent people, not the regular scum he mixed with.

  “I’ll make it worth your while, of course.”

  Charlie sat in a guest chair. “So let me get this straight. You want to kill an old defenseless woman who’s known by half the country as an icon for motherly love and you want me to cover up the murder? That about it?”

  Glenn’s lips flattened. “Yes. That’s exactly what I want. You haul the preacher in and let me deal with him up close, and you use the distraction of this whole mess as a smoke screen when they find the old woman’s body.”

  “They are two different people—”

  “I don’t care if they’re ten different people!” Glenn yelled, red in the face. “I’m going to kill the old hag, and you’re going to see that no one looks my way! Is that too much to ask? He’s a criminal, for crying out loud. He shot an unarmed man.”

  Charlie drummed his fingers on the chair’s armrests and pursed his lips. It could be done, this cover-up of Glenn’s. But it could also blow up.

  “There’s fifty thousand in it for you,” Glenn said. “One hundred if we need your help.”

  Charlie felt his pulse quicken. “Fifty? Five-O?”

  “Fifty.”

  “Help in what way?”

  “Setting her up.” He waved a bandaged hand in a dismissal. “It won’t come to that.”

  “You’ll make it look like an accident?” Charlie said.

  “Of course.”

  “Okay. But if this goes sour, this discussion never happened. You remember that.” Charlie stood. “I’ll put out an APB on the preacher; you go ahead and create your little accident. But for God’s sake, keep it clean.”

  Glenn smiled past crooked teeth. “It’s already done, my friend. It’s already done.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  JAN SAW the black Lincoln parked across the street from Ivena’s house the moment he entered her block. He jerked the Cadillac’s steering wheel and plowed into the curb sixty yards from the house.

  “What are you doing?” Helen demanded. “You just drove off—”

  She saw the car and froze.

  Jan clawed at the handle and shoved the door open. “Stay here.”

  “Jan, wait . . .”

  But he didn’t hear the rest because he was already sprinting for the house. The black Lincoln had been in the Towers’ parking garage. It had no business here. He muttered under his breath and veered for Ivena’s backyard.

  A tall wooden fence bordered Ivena’s heavily vegetated yard. Purple hydrangea and white gardenia flowers spilled over the white pickets. Jan slid to a stop at the fence, peered through two slats, and seeing nothing but an empty lawn past the vines, clambered over. He dropped to a crouch, his heart now pounding in his ears. Behind him, a car door thumped shut—Helen was following. Too late to stop her now.

  The greenhouse’s glass walls were too crowded with vines to see past at this distance. A steady breeze whispered through the leaves overhead, but otherwise the air lay quiet. Jan rushed for the back door.

  Images of Ivena’s body, crumpled and bleeding, filled his mind. If he was right she would be in the greenhouse with the flowers. It was a preoccupation for her.

  Jan grabbed the knob and threw the door open.

  Ivena stood there in the middle of the room, her face raised to the ceiling, her eyes closed. The breeze swept her hair back from her neck. If she’d heard him, she did not show any sign of it.

  Jan scanned the room. The doorway to the house gaped to a dim interior. The assailant, if there was one, would be in there, waiting.

  “Ivena,” he whispered, keeping his eyes on the kitchen doorway.

  “Hello, Janjic. You are back, I see,” she said loudly.

  He started and snatched his finger to his mouth, but she hadn’t moved her head to him.

  “Come in, Janjic.”

  “Ivena!” he whispered harshly. “Shhh. Quickly! You must come!”

  She faced him. “What’s wrong?”

  “Come now! Shhhh!”

  He looked through the door to the house and Ivena followed his gaze. She hurried over to him, wide-eyed. “What is it?”

  Jan didn’t respond. He grabbed her hand and yanked her through the door. Such a relief swept through his bones at her stumbling safely into the backyard, that he hardly noticed the tall man materialize in the inner door’s shadows.

  But then he did notice, and his heart lodged firmly in his throat. His muscles locked up. The man stepped from the shadows, a gun leveled. Behind Jan, Ivena crowded his back. “Janjic Jovic, you tell me the meaning of this immediately or I will—”

  Jan threw himself backward, into Ivena.

  She cried out, but managed to stay upright.

  Boom!

  The gun’s detonation sounded obscenely loud in the small room. Ivena needed no further encouragement. Jan snatched her hand and they ran together nearly step for step toward the back fence.

  Helen had one leg draped on each side of the pickets. “Back, Helen!” Jan shouted. “Get back!” He spun around, grabbed Ivena around the waist, and hoisted her the full height of the fence with a grunt. “Pull her over!”

  Helen complied and Ivena disappeared. Jan threw himself over with
out waiting. He glanced back in time to see the black-clad gunman slide to a stop at the corner of the greenhouse. The man was no idiot; he was powerless outside with a noisy gun.

  Jan dropped to the ground. Helen had Ivena’s hand and they were running for the car already.

  Winded and panting like billows in chorus they piled into the Cadillac. Jan fired the engine and threw the car into drive. Jan squealed through a U-turn and sped down the street.

  JAN SWERVED through suburban Atlanta a good five minutes before easing his foot from the accelerator and slowing the Cadillac to the posted speed limit. It took a full ten minutes for the flood of questions and explanations to subside into silence. Ivena seemed more horrified with Jan’s attack at the Towers than with the fact that a gunman had nearly put a bullet through her skull in her own home.

  “It was foolish, Janjic. Now you’ve endangered yourself.”

  “And I wasn’t endangered before? He’s a beast. I couldn’t just stand by while an animal rampages through our lives.”

  “And now he will rampage less? I don’t think so.”

  Jan ground his teeth but didn’t respond directly.

  “Where are we going?” Helen asked beside him.

  “To Joey’s cottage,” Jan said.

  “The gardener?” Helen asked.

  “Yes. He lives in a small house on the property, bordering the gardens.”

  “You think it’s safe there? What makes you think Glenn’s men aren’t already there waiting?”

  “Glenn may be a monster, but he’s not omniscient. No one knows of the place. It’s pretty secluded.”

  Ivena spoke from the backseat. “My, my, I see we are in a pickle, Janjic. What are you up to now?” This from a woman who’d been kidnapped and beaten not forty-eight hours earlier.

  They sped toward Joey’s Garden of Eden rehashing their predicament. Ivena was right, Jan thought: They were in a pickle. Jan took a deep breath and breathed a prayer. I beg you to see us out of this madness, Father. It was your meddling that started it.

  But it was not God who’d blown holes through Lutz’s hands, was it? No. On the contrary, not so long ago someone had driven holes through God’s hands. So what did that make Jan? The devil? Now there was a thought.