Johnny Gruesome (24 page)

“I think I know who you mean. Did you speak to each other?”

“Well, yeah. Like I said, I wanted to lock up, you know? But he threw his weight around because his old man’s a big shot. You know who I’m talking about.”

“So what did you say to him?”

“Nothing, I let him have his way. What else could I do? Rich kids have it like that in this town.” His eyes brightened. “Hey, does this have something to do with him?”

“Yes, it does.” Opening the envelope, Matt removed a handful of photos and fanned them out across the table. Leaning forward, Darryl examined them. For a moment, his expression remained blank. Then realization shocked his features.

“Oh, shit. Oh, shit.” He looked at Matt. “Is this real?”

“It’s real. His body was discovered this morning.”

Darryl’s face wilted. Then his eyes widened. “You think I had something to do with this?” He looked at Dan, who regarded him with cool eyes. “Oh, shit. I didn’t do this. I don’t know anything about it. You have to believe me. I didn’t do it!”

Matt showed no sign of emotion. “Are you willing to take a polygraph test, Darryl?”

“Hell, yes. That’s what I want. Let me take a lie detector test.”

“Okay. We’ll make that happen. It might take a few hours.”

Darryl ran one hand through his hair. “Oh, shit. Whatever, man. Let’s just do it.”

Matt stood. “Make yourself as comfortable as you can. If you want anything to eat or drink, Officer Heller will take care of you.”

“Yeah, okay.” Seeing his cigarette had finished, Darryl lit another one with shaking hands.

B
less me, Father, for I have sinned.”

Sitting in the Saint Luke’s confessional booth, Father Webb frowned. “Are you ill, my son? Your voice sounds strained.” Not that he cared: at forty-four years old, he had grown sick of tending to his flock of mindless sheep.

“It’s just the weather, Father. Nothing for you to worry about.”

“Then please continue.”
And be fast, will you?
Because of the weather it had been a slow afternoon and he wished to lock up early.

“It’s been seven years since my last confession.”

Seven years?
Father Webb raised his eyebrows. “That’s quite a stretch.”

“Yes, sir. I stopped attending church after my mother died.”

“That leaves us with a lot of ground to cover.”
And a lot of sins. This might be good!
Beneath his frock, Father Webb spread his legs, his muscles tensing. “May I ask how old you are?” It wouldn’t be the first time he had masturbated in the confessional.

“I’m seventeen.”

Damn.
Relaxing, Father Webb closed his legs. But he didn’t give up hope. If this young man had stopped attending church at age ten, his time as an unrepentant sinner had spanned the best years. “Please begin.”

“I didn’t come to confess my sins, Father.”

Father Webb knitted his eyebrows together. “Then why are you sitting in confessional?”

“I came to hear
your
confession.”

Father Webb faced the screen separating the two compartments in the dark confessional. Alarm bells rang in his brain. “What nonsense is this?” He projected just the right degree of pious indignation.

In response, he heard quick, heavy footsteps on the other side of the partition. He flinched as the door swung open and a figure stood silhouetted before him.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Righteous anger took over.

As the figure entered the compartment, Father Webb heard the sound of leather rubbing against leather. “Tell me your sins,
Father
.”

Father Webb rose on shaky legs. “What are you—”

The figure seized the front of Father Webb’s frock and twisted it in his fist, then pulled the priest closer. Father Webb gagged on foul-smelling breath.

“I’m facing my fears,” the intruder said. “And so are you.”

He’s insane,
Father Webb thought.
A madman!
A thought tugged on his brain stem: perhaps he had known this hooligan before—as a boy …

The intruder swung Father Webb in a circle, trading places with him, and shoved him out of the confessional. The priest staggered back and fell on the dark red carpet before the church dais, a startled cry escaping his lips. He wiggled into a sitting position just as his attacker emerged from the booth. The young man passed a row of candles, and their flames flickered in his wake.

Father Webb leapt to his feet. He had been correct: the young man was a hooligan, a denim-and-leather-clad punk hiding behind a black ski mask. Father Webb extended his right arm and forefinger.

“Stand back or you’ll regret it. I served in the army and I know how to box. Touch me again, and you’ll leave me no choice but to resort to violence.”

The punk seized Father Webb’s wrist with one cold hand and pulled his finger back with the other, snapping it. Father Webb cried out in shock as much as from pain. Releasing him, his attacker pulled the ski mask off his head, revealing long unkempt hair that framed a narrow face. For a moment, Father Webb thought the young man had painted his face with the makeup heavy-metal bands had favored when he was a boy. Then he recognized the young man before him and realized his ghoulish countenance was not the result of special makeup.

Impossible!
His eyes widened. Johnny Grissom had died a week ago.

“Remember me, Father? That was a beautiful memorial service you performed, you fucking hypocrite.”

With a terrified shriek, Father Webb twisted free of Johnny’s grip and fled down the aisle between the pews. His feet pounded the carpet, and he threw himself against the double doors leading to the vestibule. They didn’t budge, and he bounced off them and staggered back. He whirled around, his heart thumping in his chest.

Johnny had already come halfway down the aisle. “The doors are all locked, Father. There’s no way out. It’s just you, me, and God in here.”

Father Webb darted to his left, running behind a pew. Johnny made a parallel move, then jumped on top of the pew. He skipped from one pew to another, like a child hopping from stone to stone in a shallow stream, his heavy footfalls echoing through the church. Father Webb ran in the opposite direction, then sprinted up the aisle, back toward the dais—and the confessional. Maybe he could hide in there until someone else arrived …

He heard Johnny land on the carpet behind him, heard footsteps gaining ground. Then a hand grasped the back of his collar.

“Help! Somebody help me!”

Johnny thrust the priest forward, and he sailed past the confessional and sprawled out on the dais. Rolling over as Johnny advanced on him, he saw the plastic crucifix tucked at an angle behind the creature’s leather belt. The skull on Johnny’s belt buckle leered at him with anticipation.

“You’ve got a lot to answer for, Father. No one’s going to save you. Not even God.”

Father Webb’s voice cracked. “What manner of demon are you?”

Johnny laughed. The wicked, cackling sound came to a sudden end. “I was ten when my mother died.”

Father Webb nodded. “She was a good woman. A religious woman …”

“Yes, she was. I came to you—came
here
—for guidance. I wanted to understand why God took her from me.” Johnny drew the crucifix from his belt and thrust it forward like a dagger. “And you tried to take advantage of me.” He raised his eyes to the cathedral ceiling. “That’s why I never came back.” Looking down, he grinned. “Until now.”

Tears ran down Father Webb’s face. “I’m sorry,” he said. “So sorry …”

“Save your sorrow, you sanctimonious piece of shit. I’m not the forgiving type. You must have me confused with someone else. Maybe it’s the long hair. I walk on ice, not water.” He paused, his eyes unblinking. “I should have turned you in back then, but I was afraid. That’s how monsters like you get away with their crimes.” Johnny gazed at the statue of Christ crucified above the altar. “Their sins.” He took two giant steps forward, towering over the priest. “Monsters like me are a different story. It doesn’t matter who you tell. No one will believe you.” Pinching the end of the zipper for his jeans, he drew it down with a slow motion. “I got away, so you didn’t get to put your filthy hands on me.”

Father Webb’s eyes bulged in their sockets.

“But how many others were there?” Johnny groped his underwear and pulled out his penis.

Sobbing, Father Webb averted his eyes from the discolored member as if he had laid eyes upon Satan.

“What’s wrong? Don’t you want to suck it anymore? Don’t you like dicks that have gone through puberty? Or is mine just too ripe for your taste?”

Father Webb gagged on some invisible obstruction. Mucus bubbled in one nostril and popped.

Johnny shoved his penis back into his pants and zipped his fly. “I feel so
old
now.” Drawing the crucifix from his belt, he tapped it against an open palm. “So
rejected
.” He dropped to his knees and Father Webb fell back with a helpless groan. Johnny rolled him over and hiked up his frock. The priest tried to crawl away, but Johnny pulled him back and yanked down his slacks and briefs. The stained-glass windows cast multicolored reflections on the middle aged man’s flabby buttocks.

“Are you ready to accept Jesus?” Johnny said with a sneer.

Father Webb heard the sound of plastic scraping leather and metal.
The crucifix.
His testicles shrank. “No!”

Raising his right hand over his head, Johnny drove the crucifix straight into the priest’s anus.

With his strained eyes focusing on the statue of Christ, Father Webb screamed and pitched forward onto the carpet. Intense, burning pain radiated through his lower body. He reached back with trembling fingers and made a feeble attempt to remove the crucifix sticking out of his ass, but was too frightened to touch it.

Leaning forward, Johnny spoke into his ear: “Listen up, Holy Roller. I don’t know what you really believe, but I can tell you that heaven exists and so does hell. I know this for a fact. You hear me?”

Wide-eyed and whimpering, Father Webb nodded.

“I don’t care what book you read or what rituals you follow. There’s no forgiveness for your crimes. Understand?”

Father Webb stopped blinking, and his lips quivered.

“That means there’s only one place left for you to go. The sooner you kick, the sooner you’ll get there.” Standing, Johnny slapped his palms against each other as though he had completed an unpleasant but necessary task. “My work here is done. I reckon I’ll see you on the other side. Spread the word.”

With a satisfied snort, he turned and strode toward the vestibule, leaving the sobbing priest bleeding at the altar.

E
ric’s feet crunched crusty snow on the sidewalk along Main Street. The sun broke through the gray haze, causing the snow around him to sparkle. He passed the iced-over cherry orchard, halfway to the Grissom house from the school. The temperature had risen, but he still saw his breath. He had avoided Gary at school even though Gary could have given him a lift, because he did not wish to see Karen with him. He felt bad about blowing her off, but he found it unconscionable for her to spend time with Gary.

A Dodge Neon the color of Pepto-Bismol slowed to a stop at the curb ahead of him. He only knew one person with such an ugly car, and his heart fluttered as Rhonda leaned across the front seat and opened the passenger door.

“Where are you going?” she said.

“To see Johnny’s father.”

“Come on, get in.”

He jogged over and got in beside her. “Thanks.”

“He’s on this side of the street, right?”

“Yeah. I’ll tell you when we get there.”

The car stuttered forward.

“I can’t get over what happened,” Rhonda said.

“Neither can I.”

“They think it was Todd.”

Eric said nothing.

“I heard you were one of the first people to see the body.”

“Yeah.” And one of the only people to see the head.

“Do you think Darryl did it?”

“I don’t know.”

“Part of me doesn’t want to believe he could do something like that. I mean, we saw him every day. But the other part of me just wants this to be over.”