Black Creek Crossing (50 page)

Jared shook his head. “It was dark, and . . . Jeez, Chad
—you
had the bottle.” Chad moved toward him, but again Jared backed away.

“You
saw
it,” Chad said, the fury in his voice dissolving into a whine. “You—”

“It was dark,” Jared said. “I couldn’t really see—” He licked his lips nervously, then: “I think I better go home.” He turned and hurried down the stairs. A moment later Chad heard the front door slam.

What had happened? Why didn’t Jared believe him? He turned back to the mirror and gazed once again at his face.

How had it happened? It was Seth’s face the broken bottle should have laid open, not his own. How could Seth have gotten hold of him and twisted the broken glass around like that?

And why couldn’t he remember it happening?

He could only remember charging at Seth with the shattered bottle, feeling the warmth in his belly as he anticipated the razor-sharp glass sinking into Seth’s flesh.

But it hadn’t happened. The glass had sunk into his own flesh instead, and torn at his own face.

Had he tripped?

But he didn’t remember tripping.

All he remembered was Seth watching him, staring at him—

He caught a flicker in the mirror and whirled around, half expecting to see Jared again standing in the doorway to the bathroom.

But the doorway—and the hall beyond—were empty.

Chad turned back to the mirror, and froze. The image was back, but this time it wasn’t just a flicker of motion. This time it was a face, and the face was clear.

It was Seth Baker, and Seth was staring straight at him, his eyes cold and boring deep into his.

As he gazed back, something inside Chad Jackson began to understand the truth, and he knew that the pain he was feeling now wasn’t the pain of his own wound.

Now he was feeling the agony of all the wounds he had ever inflicted on Seth Baker.

As the seconds stretched out, Chad’s eyes remained fixed on the image of Seth in the mirror, and a terrible urge came over him. Against his own will and with his eyes still fixed on the image of Seth Baker, which seemed to be suspended somewhere deep in the infinity behind the mirror, Chad opened the top drawer of the counter beneath the bathroom sink and picked up the razor that had been his grandfather’s and was now his father’s and would someday be his.

But he needed the razor now.

He picked it up in his right hand, opening the blade with his left. He didn’t test the blade—didn’t even see it, really.

All he did was raise it so its point lay against his neck just below his left ear.

He knew what was going to happen next but there was nothing he could do to stop it. It was as if the force of Seth Baker’s will had taken control of his body, and it was a force Chad Jackson was utterly powerless to resist.

With one quick motion he pressed the blade of the razor deep into his neck, cutting through skin and muscle and sinew. As blood began to flow from the wound, he jerked the razor across his throat, and watched in shocked awe as his throat gaped open and the flow of blood surged to a pulsing gush as the blade ripped through his larynx and aorta.

As his life drained away, the razor fell from Chad’s hand and clattered into the sink, but as he sank to the floor and the darkness of eternity began to close around him, all he heard was the faint sound of laughter.

Seth Baker’s laughter.

In the quiet of his own room, Seth clung to the fading image of Chad Jackson for a few more seconds, watching as Chad’s life drained away into the pool of blood spreading around him. Only when Chad lay still and the flow of blood had slowed to a trickle did he finally turn away from the mirror over his dresser, in which the vision of Chad’s death had been so vivid that Seth was certain it had happened exactly as he’d seen it.

The day of reckoning had come, and the first of his tormentors had fallen.

Chapter 44

LL AFTERNOON JANE BAKER HAD BEEN TRYING TO
make sense of what her husband was saying, but after more than three hours, she still didn’t understand. Still, she knew better than to try to argue with Blake when he was angry, and when he’d come home this afternoon, he was angrier than she’d ever seen him and telling her things that just sounded crazy.

Like Seth attacking Zack Fletcher last night. Seth was terrified of Zack, and always had been. But if he’d finally decided to fight back, wasn’t it about time?

And witchcraft? Where had that come from? Of course, she’d heard the stories about what had happened in Roundtree centuries ago—who hadn’t? But surely Blake didn’t believe them! And what was he doing talking to Father Mulroney anyway?

But Blake had been too upset and too angry for her to reason with him, so she’d just listened and tried to understand, and waited for his rage to pass before it focused on her. And for a little while—the last half hour, anyway—she thought it was going to be all right.

But a few minutes ago they heard Seth going up the back stairs, and then Blake’s fury came flooding back, and suddenly she wished she could take back the words she’d just spoken: “What are you going to do to him?”

“I’m going to get the truth out of him,” Blake rasped, his eyes as hard as his voice. “I’m going to find out where he’s been and what he’s been doing.”

As he turned on his heel and started toward the stairs, Jane stood up and reached toward her husband, as if to stop him. But she said nothing as he mounted the stairs, and let her hand drop to her side, certain that anything she said or did would only make matters worse.
Besides,
she told herself,
he won’t hurt Seth.
Sinking back onto the sofa, Jane picked up a magazine and began leafing through it, believing that if she could concentrate on something else, she wouldn’t dwell on whatever might be happening in Seth’s room.

And it was better not to know, really, since there wasn’t anything she could do about it anyway.

Seth heard his father rap once on his door. Then, as always, he opened it without waiting for Seth to respond. But this evening, for the first time in his memory, Seth didn’t feel frightened.

“What the hell have you been doing?” Blake Baker demanded, stepping into the room and closing the door behind him.

With a strange feeling of detachment, Seth turned around to face his father. He could see that his father was furious with him, but somehow his father’s rage wasn’t tying his own stomach into knots, or making his knees tremble, or bringing him to the brink of crying.

In fact, his father’s anger wasn’t making him feel anything at all.

“You answer me, boy,” Blake said, his voice dropping dangerously. “What have you been doing?”

Seth cocked his head, and his brow furrowed as he tried to decide what to tell his father. Not that it would make much difference—his father wouldn’t believe the truth, and had already made up his mind what he was going to do. He was already unbuckling his belt.

“You’re not going to do that anymore,” Seth said quietly.

His father froze, the belt half out of its loops. “What did you say?” he asked, his eyes boring into Seth with the coldness that always made Seth cower.

This time, Seth didn’t move.

“I don’t want you to hit me anymore,” he said.

“Since when do you decide what I do and what I don’t do?” Blake grated. “You do what I tell you. And since you didn’t answer either of the questions I asked you, you know what happens next.” He pulled the belt free from the rest of the loops and wrapped the tag end around his hand a few times so the buckle was dangling from two feet of leather. “Drop your pants, Seth—I’m going to teach you some respect.”

Seth shook his head.

A vein in Blake Baker’s forehead began to pulse as he slapped the belt buckle against the palm of his free hand. “You don’t want to do this, Seth,” he said. “You’re only making it worse for yourself.”

Seth shook his head again.

Blake’s right fist tightened on the belt, and his arm rose in the air.

And Seth focused his mind.

Blake Baker’s arm began its downward arc, but instead of lashing out at Seth, the buckle whipped around and struck his own face. As the metal tore into the flesh of his cheek, Blake Baker roared in pain, lurched backward, then lashed out at Seth once more.

Again the belt buckle swung all the way around and ripped into Blake, this time catching him in the right eye.

Another howl of agony erupted from his throat, and he hurled himself at Seth, still trying to lash out with the belt.

As if seized by some invisible power, Blake crashed face first against the wall, grunted, and sank to his knees as blood began to gush from his nose. For a moment it seemed he might slide to the floor, but then he gathered his strength and heaved himself back to his feet just as the door flew open.

Jane Baker, her face ashen and clutching a fireplace poker in one hand, gazed at her bleeding husband. “Seth!” she screamed. “What are you—”

Seth whirled around. “Go away!” he yelled. “Just leave us alone!”

But it was too late. Blake lurched toward Seth once more, the belt raised high again. But at the last moment he veered off toward his wife. Instinctively, Jane Baker raised her arms to fend off her husband’s careening body, but it was too late. His full weight crashed against her, and she uttered a muffled grunt as the spur of the poker plunged deep into her own neck. A second later blood began to ooze from the wound. With a look of something akin to surprise in her eyes, she reached out to brace herself against the wall, and the poker fell from her neck, clattering to the floor.

Blake, stunned at the sight of the wound in his wife’s throat, let the belt fall to his side and took a step toward her.

The color already fading from her face, Jane Baker slowly sank to the floor, blood now spurting from the deep puncture in her throat. As the reality of what was happening to her slowly sank in, she gazed up at her husband. Her mouth worked, but instead of sound only blood bubbled from her lips.

Paralyzed by what he was seeing, Blake stared down at Jane, his own face going pale as the geyser of blood from his wife’s punctured aorta began to slow and the last of the color drained from her face. As the gush slowed to a trickle, her body slumped to one side, her head lolling back so the wound the poker had opened gaped lewdly.

As the realization of what he’d done sank in, Blake came back to life. Straightening, he tightened his grip on the belt once more, and wheeled around to face Seth. Blood was still streaming from his nose and his wounded eye, but now his rage overwhelmed the agony of his own wounds. “You killed her!” he bellowed. “God damn you, you—” The belt raised high, he charged at Seth.

And at the last instant, as the belt buckle slashed toward him, Seth stepped aside.

His father lumbered past him, staggered through the open door of Seth’s room, and lurched against the banister over the stairwell. Losing his balance, he pitched forward. For a second or two he seemed almost to hover in midair, his free hand flailing wildly in search of something to hang onto. Then he tilted forward and, just before he fell, his fingers found the banister. But it was too late. Slippery with his own blood, his fingers lost their grasp and he pitched headfirst to the floor below. His single brief howl of shock and terror was cut off as his head struck the limestone floor of the foyer.

As the silence that fell over the house stretched from seconds into minutes, Seth Baker gazed at his mother. Finally, he went over to kneel beside her. Reaching out, he gently touched her cheek. “You never stopped him,” he whispered. “You just let him do it.”

Then he stood, left his room, and gazed down at the floor below. His father’s body lay facedown on the blood-smeared limestone, and Seth could tell by the angle of his father’s head—and the stillness of his body—that he was dead too.

At last he turned away, went down the same stairs he’d come up only a short while ago, left the house by the back door, and walked away into the darkness of the night.

Chapter 45

YRA SULLIVAN HAD THOUGHT THE DAY WOULD
never end. She could barely believe it when Phil Lambert told her that no one had seen Angel since lunchtime. Afterward, she’d gone straight home, certain that Angel would be there. Father Mulroney went with her, and insisted on coming into the house. When they found no sign of Angel, he hadn’t wanted to leave her alone.