A big dog’s booming bark came from somewhere inside.
Chapter 35
Teresa struggled with the screen. When the dog appeared, she gasped and hurried backward into the yard.
A massive fawn-colored pit bull stuck its head through the partially opened screen and forced its way out. It raced toward Teresa, all pink jowls, snorts and snarls, and sharp teeth. Teresa hustled backwards, stumbled, and fell on her rear.
She held her arms over her head, but instead of a horrific attack, the dog proceeded to slather her hands and the uncovered parts of her face with its tongue. She pushed at the dog, but it only caused the canine to double its efforts. Once she finally managed to sit upright, the enormous beast sat in her lap and gazed over its shoulder at her with a goofy jowly grin. Its tongue lolled from the side of its mouth.
“Aren’t you vicious.” She patted the dog’s solid head. A name tag on the collar read Pinky, and why not? The beast was all pink mouth and tongue and nose. Teresa surprised herself with a laugh and struggled out from under Pinky. A tennis ball sat nearby. She picked it up and threw it. The dog took off after it, and Teresa slipped inside the house and closed the glass.
While she was distracted, the zoe line had recalculated like a GPS route and now sat in front of her. Tiffany had crept inside, too. Teresa followed the zoe down the hallway. Outside the boy’s room, she pressed herself against the wall and took a quick glance inside.
Brent Winter, the young man who had captioned the photo about her living in the abandoned funeral home, sat in an overstuffed chair. She could just make him out through the fog.
“Smoking an Israeli joint man,” he said into the headset. “I’m so cheesed.”
She scowled. Tiffany pressed the hypo into her hand. Teresa looked down at her. Tiffany nodded. Teresa took a deep breath and launched into the room. She stabbed the hypo into Brent’s chest. He flailed his arms and pushed her into the side table where his beer tottered and fell to the ground in a fizzy mess. Teresa landed, once again, on her backside.
“Shit. What is this?” Brent held his hand up to the hypo that bobbed up and down with his sluggish heartbeat. He was too stoned to realize he’d been stabbed. Teresa quirked her mouth to the side and got to her feet.
“Just a bad trip.” She didn’t care if trip was the wrong word. Brent looked over his shoulder at the table that held his smoking joint, and Teresa grabbed the plunger.
As she pulled, Brent’s skin decomposed at an accelerated rate. His muscles and tissues disintegrated next, body crumbling to the ground and rotting with the sound of someone squeezing the insides from a pumpkin. His heart remained stuck to the end of the needle until the plunger fully retracted. It plopped onto the floor and burst like a water balloon full of blood.
All that remained of Brent Winter was a small pile of rotting meat and some bone fragments on the carpet. The odor turned Teresa’s stomach.
“Why did that happen?” she asked Tiffany.
The girl pulled a twisty straw from an empty soda bottle. “It has to do with your mind.” Tiffany tapped her temple. “Ruthie shriveled because you thought that’s what would happen when you pulled the plunger. The sheriff blew up because you thought he was fat. You thought Brent was wasting his life, so I guess he wasted away.”
“I didn’t think any of those things,” Teresa said. “I didn’t know what to expect.”
“Your subconscious, Mommy.” Tiffany squatted next to the remains and poked at them with the straw. She peered up at Teresa and shrugged. “At least he won’t chase us.”
“But what do I do with this mess?” She covered her mouth and nose with her sleeve. “The smell.” She gagged.
“Leave it.”
“Leave behind evidence?” Teresa couldn’t. Not with big shot Detective Logan on the case.
“UpNSmoke23? Hello?” A tinny voice came through the headset that had fallen when Brent disintegrated. Teresa looked at the TV where some kind of futuristic battle took place. “Where’d you go, man? We need your help breaching the base.”
Witnesses. Or were they? She didn’t know anything about video games kids played these days, but she knew they played online. Were the other players strangers? Teresa pulled her sleeves over her hands and picked up the headset. She listened in.
“UpNSmoke23, come on, man.”
“Dude, he probably passed out.”
“Yeah, Israeli joints? Jesus fucking Christ—he’s probably blitzed.”
“Should we call an ambulance? Anyone know where he’s from?”
The last was followed by a series of negative responses.
She dropped the headset, stepped over the pile of rot, and took her daughter’s hand. They left through the front door.
The stink of Brent’s putrefaction stayed in her nostrils until she reached the dirt road at the edge of town. She avoided the slushy mud—left after the snow had melted—as best she could. Tiffany hopped from mostly dry spot to mostly dry spot. Everything was a game to her. Teresa wished she could be so carefree.
At the abandoned house, Teresa went inside, and the walls melted as they usually did. But instead of the brown stone, Tiffany’s nursery, the real one—not the basement—appeared. The crib, the rocker, the changing table. All of it. Every piece Derrick had given away.
“Mommy! My things!” Tiffany reached over the crib’s rail and pulled out Big Bear. She held him up and twirled around.
“I don’t understand. How is this here?”
Tiffany twirled. “Yaldabaoth, Mommy. He is glorious.”
Teresa closed her eyes and swallowed. The door opened, and Derrick walked in. Teresa gasped and backed away from him. His eyes weren’t right, though. They were yellow, not dark brown.
“What do you think?” Yaldabaoth’s silky, sensual voice came from Derrick’s lips. He held his arms wide and turned a circle.
Teresa grabbed onto the edge of the changing table and pulled in a deep breath.
“Too much?” The grin was not her husband’s.
Teresa nodded. “I’m not exactly on good terms with my husband right now.”
He moved closer to her and touched her stomach. A pleasant chill ran through her, as if his touch had electrified all of her nerves.
She looked past Yaldabaoth for Tiffany, but her daughter wasn’t anywhere to be seen.
“This is what you want, isn’t it?” He moved closer still, pressing her against the changing table. “Happiness with your husband? The return of your child?” Yaldabaoth’s lips lingered millimeters from hers. His hands roamed to her backside, cupped her buttocks. Her eyes flew open and met his. The spell broke.
“You don’t want me,” she said. “All you want is this.” She slapped the hypo full of Brent’s zoe into his hand and moved away from him. “Stop trying to fool me with your mind games.”
The nursery melted into the cave with the pool. Yaldabaoth tilted the syringe back and forth like a seesaw.
“Four more.” He laughed.
Chapter 36
Ann stayed at the station in case anyone called in. While the coffee machine gurgled and hissed, she considered what George didn’t know. If she had stayed in Harmony and followed the path her dad wanted for her, none of this would have happened. She wouldn’t have even been a detective on the Stabber case. She would have had a relationship with her dad. She would have known about the Protectorate and the Messengers and Sophia.
Maggie.
She wandered back to the lockers for the umpteenth time and opened her dad’s, smelled his shirt again even though his scent was long gone.
“I’m sorry, Dad,” she whispered. She was sorry for everything. For not calling him more. For never coming back. For not following in the family’s footsteps and running for Sheriff of this godforsaken town. She slammed the locker and leaned her forehead against the cold metal.
It’s not your fault. You wanted a life.
You should have been here.
She lifted her head. McMichael had said something he
r first day back. Something Ann thought strange at the time.
“I should have been there,” he’d said. McMichael probably felt it was his duty to be by Bram’s side, having been Bram’s right-hand man almost their entire lives. But her dad wasn’t on duty when he went to Egypt.
Not sheriff’s duty anyway.
McMichael’s locker stood next to her dad’s. What would his combination be? Ann went to the storage cell, searched for, and found, a crow bar. A set of lock pick tools sat on a nearby shelf. She grabbed those, too.
Less than five minutes later, Ann bent the metal door well out of shape. A bead of sweat tracked down her face. She wiped it away and opened the locker.
A standard gray lock box, like her dad’s, sat inside. Ann pulled it out and took a ragged breath to calm her heart, which beat behind her eyeballs. The picks made easy work of the simple lock.
Ann opened the lid, and her breath caught in her throat. She lifted a crystal vial necklace almost exactly like her dad’s by its chain. Spots of dried blood stained the glass, but it was otherwise empty. She knew the necklace didn’t belong to McMichael for two reasons: the necklace would be full of blood, and he would be wearing it, abducted or not.
Ann returned her attention to the sheriff’s box and found a small black address book and a newspaper clipping.
The article dated back eight years: American woman dies in tragic bus accident.
The location of the article: Nag Hammadi, Egypt. The woman: Lisa McMichael, the sheriff’s wife.
Ann sank to the floor. His wife was a Protector. She was killed. In Nag Hammadi. Which was in Upper Egypt. Where her father died. Her lungs struggled to fill.
Keep it together, Logan.
The little address book sat on the floor where it had slipped from her hand when she read the article. She picked it up and flipped through the pages.
Red pen struck through most of the names. The addresses were from all over the world but mostly Egypt or its surrounding countries. Libya, Sudan, even Jordan and Syria.
One name remained unmarred by red ink: Asim Raghib. Next to his entry a circle enclosed the initials PA. She flipped back through the book and found several other names with PA next to them. PA. Protector Allegiant.
Ann put the newspaper article and the necklace back in McMichael’s lock box. She needed to go home to cross reference the names with the list in Maggie’s book and the list from her dad’s locker. She rushed back to the kitchenette and grabbed a cup to go before unplugging the pot.
She arrived home a few minutes later and immediately flipped to the back of the book. Starting on the first page, she scanned the list and paged through the address book. All of the names that weren’t identified as Protector Allegiant were listed in the book, including Lisa McMichael. Another dead end.
The Sa tingled. Ann peeked at it. The edges glowed a little. She should check on Maggie, make sure the girl was okay.
* * *
In the bright glow of Derrick’s porch light, Ann rapped on the decorative glass panes set in the door. Derrick answered. Ann didn’t like the way he smiled or the way his eyes lit up when they landed on her.
“Hey,” Ann said. “So, I have a strange request.”
“Yeah? What’s up?”
“Can I see Maggie?”
His face fell. “What’s this about? Did Teresa say something?” Derrick stepped out onto the porch. Ann stepped back so he wouldn’t encroach on her personal space.
“What did she say? Did she tell you . . .” he covered his mouth with his hand.
“Tell me what?” Ann squinted at him. He was hiding something.
Derrick paced down the front walk to the fence and back.
“I lost my temper. No, not my temper. I’m just so . . . so frustrated with her.” He stood before Ann, and his eyes told her everything. He was sorry for, and regretted, whatever he had done. “I’m tired, Ann. All we do is fight.”
“What did you do?” Ann crossed her arms.
“I think I hurt her—” He held up his hands when she dropped her arms and opened her mouth. “Not too badly. I had her by the wrists and might’ve squeezed too hard. She was raving and out of control. I needed to get her attention. It wasn’t bad. I swear.”
“Are you sure that’s all?”
His eyes searched the space between them and came back to hers.
“Yes. We fought, I hurt her, she left. I haven’t seen her since.” He glanced at his watch. “Where is she?” His question came with worry.
“I’m sure she’s just with a friend or something.”
“Teresa doesn’t have any friends here.” His voice was so matter of fact. “Not close friends, anyway. She blames me for not fitting in.” He shook his head. “Ridiculous.”
An uncomfortable silence fell between them. Ann shifted her eyes to the door.
“So, can I talk to Maggie?”
“I told you everything. Why do you need to talk to her?” He crossed his arms and distributed his weight evenly—smack in front of the doorway.
Derrick was Maggie’s legal guardian. He had a right to know the reason.
“That old book she carries around. She loaned it to me. I need to ask her some questions about something I read.”
Derrick relaxed. “You can read it?”
Ann shrugged.
He let out a breath and motioned for her to go inside. “Down the hall to the right.”
Maggie was at the coffee table with a stack of paper and a box of one million crayons, or however many colors Crayola had now.
“Hey, Maggie,” Ann said. She sat on the floor next to the girl.
Maggie’s face lit up, and she hugged Ann. The embrace made heat swarm Ann’s body. When Maggie let go, Ann took off her jacket. Derrick was standing behind the couch, watching. She didn’t know how to ask him to leave, that they had something secret to discuss. But she didn’t need to.
Maggie turned to Derrick. “Daddy, can I please talk to Ann by myself?”
Shock replaced Derrick’s parental curiosity. Ann shifted her eyes to Maggie who smiled bright and sweet at him, then to Derrick who, little by little, melted. He cleared his throat.
“Sure. I’ll be in the kitchen.” He shuffled around the breakfast bar and leaned nonchalantly against the counter. Ann knew he was still listening.
“Are you okay?” Ann asked in a low voice. “It . . . tingled.” She pointed at her chest. Maggie nodded, but her eyes were sad. She pointed to pages of drawings on the table. The drawing on top depicted a cross between a lion, a snake, and a man.
“Is that . . .” Ann swallowed. When she spoke again, her voice came out a whisper. “Is that Yaldabaoth?”
Maggie nodded. “My head is full of pictures of him. I had to get them out.” She put her crayon down and looked at Ann with intensity. “He scares me.”
Of course he does. He wants to kill you and trigger the End of Days.
Ann swallowed hard. Maggie shuffled through the pages of drawings. All of them were Yaldabaoth.
“I don’t think drawing him is helping me get him out of my head,” Maggie said in a sad whisper. She kept shuffling through the papers and pulled two out.
“This one came to me two nights ago, and this one last night.” Maggie pushed the drawings toward Ann.
The first one showed Yaldabaoth with his arms spread wide. Lightning bolts were drawn all around him. A jagged stick figure, sketched in a reddish-brown color, stood in the background as if watching.
Maggie touched Ann’s hand. Then she pointed at the red-brown figure. Ann looked at her face. Maggie’s eyes filled with tears.
When she spoke, her voice came out small and choked. “That’s Ruthie.”
Chapter 37
Teresa spent the rest of the waning afternoon at the cemetery on a stone bench near Tiffany’s grave. The sun slipped closer to the mountains flanking Harmony. The air cooled. She didn’t want to go home and face Derrick. Faint bruising had begun to bloom where his fingers had crushed the skin aga
inst the bones of her wrists.
He marked her in anger. What could either one of them possibly say to right this wrong? A simple apology wouldn’t cut it this time. She wouldn’t accept that. Not for physical harm.
She rose to her feet and left the cemetery. At the town center she paused.
I have nowhere else to go.
For the briefest moment, regret hovered over her. If she’d tried harder, perhaps then she would have a trusted friend to go to in times like this.
Ruthie was the only person she could think of who showed her any kindness lately. At the thought of the now stick-figure-zombie, for lack of a better word, her heart hurt.
Teresa gazed in the direction of Louise’s house. Louise shared the secret of Bram Logan with her, sure, for her own ulterior motive, not out of friendship.
It was worth a shot. Teresa walked with purpose to Louise’s house, and arrived as the mountains swallowed the sun. At the door, she raised her knuckles and rapped against the wood.
“Who is it?” Louise’s voice, sing-song and muffled, came from inside.
“It’s Teresa.”
Louise opened the door, her face a beaming ray of horribly wrinkled sunshine.
“What can I do for you, Doctor?”
Teresa touched her throat, unsure of what to say, how she would ask.
“I . . .” Teresa shook her head. “Never mind. I’m sorry I bothered you.”
Louise stepped aside and waved Teresa into the house.
“Come in—have some tea, dear. Let’s talk.” Louise motioned to the table. Teresa sat.
Louise filled the kettle and put it on the burner.
Click. Click. Fwump.
She smiled at Teresa. “You have nowhere to go, do you?”
Teresa twisted her wedding ring and shook her head.
“No worry. I’m glad you stopped by. I wanted to discuss something with you.”
Teresa perked. “Oh?”
“We have a common interest.” The kettle screamed, Louise lifted it. “Tea?”
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