A small part of him, however, hoped The Father would change His mind and grant him permission to boast another car. This he prayed for in private.
As he walked along Highway 45, his Salvation Army bag slung over his shoulder, the rising sun shined brightly on his back. It felt good.
It felt like the light of God washed over him, blessed him, and guided him toward his destiny.
Last night, Adam dreamed of a camp hidden deep in woods somewhere where the men lived like kings, and the women were their devoted slaves. It was a place Adam dreamed of before. He was never sure of its significance, until now.
The Father instructed him to go there once he had his hands on Eve. He said the way to Armageddon would be then clear.
He got an instant hard-on just thinking about Armageddon, and what would inevitably come after that.
Resurrection. Paradise.
The time was drawing near. Adam could feel it in his gut. Soon all his hard work and patience would pay off, as The Father promised. Eden would be restored to Her former glory.
With a spring in his step and a large grin on his face, Adam sauntered along the outskirts of a town called Saraland, ready to reap.
Chapter 39
Layne was grounded for a month. That was his punishment for staying out late doing, as his father called it, “God knows what.”
The sentence almost made him laugh, but in Kelley’s domineering presence Layne restrained himself.
If they only knew what happened. If they only knew the truth.
But they never would. Layne would never tell anyone. He would take this secret to the grave no matter how much sleep he lost, no matter how much his stomach tightened with worry, no matter how much longer the nightmares persisted.
He just hoped it wouldn’t come back to haunt him. He just hoped Billy Brown’s disappearance remained a mystery. He just hoped he never got caught.
But don’t the bad guys always get caught eventually?
Not without a body. No body; no murder.
Layne pulled into a space in the high school parking lot and killed the engine. He forced hiself to think about Amy and the decision he had come to this morning.
He was going to man up and tell her how he felt about her while he still had a chance. While he was still free. While no one has yet to accuse him of murder and throw him behind bars. And while Amy wasn’t afraid of him, while she didn’t know what he truly was. He hoped she never found out like Marianne. did
No! That would never happen. I could never do that to Amy.
But how would he know? He hadn’t been able to control Zero before. How would Layne stop him if it tried to harm Amy?
What if she rejects you, just like Marianne did?
He didn’t want to think about it.
Layne closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and climbed out of the Pathfinder. In a matter of seconds his worries subsided, and he hurried to class wondering if Amy listened to the mixed CD he made her. He hoped she liked it.
Chapter 40
From breakfast to the moment she was dropped off at school, Amy barely spoke to or even looked at her father. She was still too unsettled after the things she heard him say over the phone last night. And she was still rattled by her nightmare and what the blue woman had to say.
“What? I don’t even get a hug?” Hank asked when she opened the passenger door, and got out of the truck.
She leaned over to hug him. He engulfed her in his flannel-clad arms and squeezed tight.
She shuddered when he kissed her lips, and thought of her dream and the blue woman.
“Love you,” Hank said.
Amy lifted her backpack from the floorboard. “Love you, too.”
She climbed out of the truck, trudged up the concrete steps to the entrance of the school and let herself be swallowed by her fellow students flocking inside.
She was aware of the stares and snickers directed her way. Word must have spread over the weekend about what happened to her at Catherine’s party. She didn’t care. She had other concerns.
She sat in her desk next to Catherine in her English class but ignored her friend’s attempts at conversation. She pulled out her essay on “The Captured Goddess” and read it over. She’d written about female enslavement and abuse by the hands of men.
“We’re all captured,”
the blue woman had said. What did she mean by that? Did it have anything to do with the poem?
The Captured Goddess, placed in bondage by man. What was the significance? Amy didn’t know. It was a puzzle.
“Tell Henry.”
Henry, Amy knew, was her father’s legal name. Grandma Snow had called him Henry, but everyone else called him Hank.
So who was Hannah? Was she the unhappy bride in the wedding photo? Was she the ghost, the blue woman?
Is she Dad’s sister? Do I have an aunt no one told me about?
An aunt who, according to last night’s dream, was abused in the worst way by the two men in her life who she should have been able to trust the most?
The thought sickened Amy. But was it true?
What happened to Hannah? Who was the man she unhappily married? How did she die? And what did it all have to do with Mom and her killer? What did it have to do with the Nightmare Man?
There was only one person who could answer those questions, and Amy was scared to death of confronting him with them.
But Hannah apparently wanted her to.
“Why aren’t you talking to me?”
Amy jumped. She placed a hand on her heart. “Shit, you scared me.”
Catherine raised her eyebrows. “Where were you just now?”
“I can’t talk about it.” Amy looked away from her friend and massaged the locket hanging around her neck. “Please don’t ask me again.”
Chapter 41
Richard Barrett parked in a handicap space close to the front entrance of the school, stepped out of his Cadillac and waved to the security guard coming his way in a golf cart.
“Help you?” asked the security guard, who had flabby, red bulldog-cheeks and empty, bloodshot eyes.
Richard smiled and held up the manila envelope in his left hand. “My granddaughter left this at my home. It’s an assignment she needs for a class.”
The security guard, who reeked of sour sweat and liquor, looked at him skeptically for a moment but nodded and without further comment drove on in his little golf cart
Frowning, Richard straightened the folds of his trench coat and walked quickly toward the front entrance.
The old woman working the front desk in the office was far more cordial than the security guard. With a friendly smile, she gladly accepted the envelope and told Richard she would call Amy to pick it up right away.
“Thank you,” Richard said, turning to leave. “I know how important it is to her. She worked hard on it all weekend.”
“Well, you’re a good grandfather to bring it here for her. I’m sure she’ll appreciate it.”
With a smile and a nod, he left the office and prayed that his plan would work out as he hoped. As he stepped past the double doors, he heard that nice office secretary announce over the intercom: “Amy Snow, please report to the office. Amy Snow, please report to the office.”
So far, all was going according to plan.
Chapter 42
“What do you mean my grandfather dropped this off for me?” Amy asked incredulously.
“Just what I said,” answered the gray-haired secretary who looked at her curiously over horned-rimmed glasses.
Staring down at the envelope in her hands, Amy shook her head in disbelief. Was this what he came to her house to give her yesterday? What was it? “What is he up to?”
“Your poor elderly grandfather drove all the way from Mobile to give that to you and that’s how you react. You children these days show no gratitude whatsoever.”
Rolling her eyes, Amy spun around and strode angrily out of the office and toward the front entrance.
She’d had it. Her grandfather had picked at her unhealed wounds too many times, and it was time to do what she was too afraid to do with her father. It was time to confront him about the big things. About thinking only about himself, never about her, and poisoning her father in her mind, making him into the monster she feared.
The late morning sun beamed onto her face as she shoved the double doors open and stepped outside. Shielding her eyes, she scanned the parking lot for his fancy black Cadillac.
When she spotted it parked in a handicap spot, she descended the steps and marched over.
The driver side door of the car opened and her grandfather emerged. Amy’s felt her cheeks burn red at the sight of his ghoulish countenance as she approached. Holding up the envelope, she demanded. “What is the hell is this about?”
Richard Barrett stiffened. “Have you read it?”
Amy felt a temper she never realized she had start to heat up. “Why, what is it? What do you want? I don’t want anything to do with you. I haven’t since Mom died.”
Richard’s chest heaved, his composure failed him. “She’s precisely why I’m here.”
She felt tears come to her eyes, feeling the weight of the pain she endured during the years spent hating her grandparents. “Why the
fuck
are you bothering us now?”
“I think you have a right to know the things your father kept from you and your mother all these years. It is all there in that envelope, the proof. I’m only looking out for your best interest, my dear.”
“No,” Amy snapped. “You only look out for your interest. It’s always been about you and your feelings, your needs. But have you ever stopped and wondered how your actions affected me? I didn’t need the shit you and Grandma Jane brought on me and my father. I was grieving. I hurt! And you just made it worse. You sunk the knife into my heart. You don’t care about me, only yourself!”
Richard shook his head. “No, that’s not true.”
Not wanting to hear any of his excuses, just wanting to be done with him once and for all, Amy held up her hand, silencing him. “Just stay away from me. I don’t care what you think you have against my father. I will never forgive you for what you did. You’re dead to me.” She glowered back at his stunned expression.
“Amy,” he weakly protested. “Please.”
Amy wiped away a tear and stalked back to her class, the envelope still held tightly in her grasp.
Chapter 43
Joe MacCallum popped an aspirin into his mouth, ground it between his teeth, and said into the BlackBerry, “Same M.O.?”
“Yep,” said Patrick Keene who was at the scene of a grisly find in the woods surrounding a private campsite in Citronelle.
“Shit,” Joe muttered, leaning forward at his desk, one hand pressed against his aching forehead. “How long you reckon she’s been there?”
“Week or so.”
“Bet it’s Laura Sullivan. Christ. Two down, one more to go.”
“I still say we should have a good long talk with—”
“Don’t start that shit again, Pat.”
“We take whatever lead we can get. You know that. Right now he’s the only lead we have.”
“Why are you so suspicious of Hank?”
“You know why.”
“I know you still think he’s responsible for Ellen’s death. But what possible connection could there be here?”
“You read those files I sent you?”
Joe glanced apprehensively at the dusty stack of folders on his cluttered desk. “Not yet.”
“I think you’ll find them interesting. I sure did. All right, I’m gonna talk with the old timer who found the body. I’ll be back at the office after lunch. Probably gonna stop by Mary Lou’s BBQ. Want anything?”
“No,” Joe said. “I’ll call Hank, set a time for all of us to talk. Keep me posted if anything develops out there.”
He hung up without waiting for a response and slipped the BlackBerry back in the holster clipped to his belt. “Shit.” He stared at the stack of folders, knowing damn well what Patrick was getting at and hoping to hell he was wrong.
Joe reached for the open bottle of aspirin, popped another bitter pill, and reached for the top folder.
He still couldn’t believe Patrick would spent so long at the main office in Mobile Friday, scouring their archives for these case files. The man sure was persistent.
With a sigh of reluctance, he opened the file labeled BUBBA RAY BUSBY, and flipped through the contents with a tight frown.
Chapter 44
Layne approached the picnic table in the courtyard. “Where’s Amy?”
Catherine shrugged her shoulders. “Beats me. She never showed up for lunch. Didn’t talk to me in class this morning either. Seems in a bad mood. You think she blames me for what happened Friday?”