The Seekers, page 25
“Joe, anything happen?” Angela asked.
“No, no, but can you get your tech wizards on the Truth Seekers again? Particularly the two who are not from New York—Mike Lerner and Serena Nelson. I’m trying to find out if they have ties to the city and might know about rich New Yorkers and private schools and—”
“Barbara Chrome’s family?”
“Yes.”
“They’ve done initial checks, but I’ll have them dig deeper.”
He thanked her and hung up and looked over at Carl. Now, his mouth was open. He hadn’t heard the call. He was gently snoring.
* * *
Keri accepted Dallas’s hand to help her crawl over a piece of the stone wall that still half surrounded the cemetery. They’d let Jamie, seated in his patrol car, know that they were walking around to the graveyard.
As they neared it, Keri could see in the gray dusk light that two of the forensic team members remained behind by the church. One was putting a box in the back of their van. The other was waiting for Dallas.
Keri noticed that Dallas paused and looked around the graveyard, as if making sure that they were the only people in the area.
“I’ll be right over there,” Keri said. “I think that’s Hank’s grave with the small headstone and the brass plaque.”
“All right. You get over to me if you see anyone at all coming toward you.”
“Yes, sir,” she told him.
She watched him head toward the forensic team. Then she walked over the tangled weeds and broken stone that brought her to the grave of Hank Bergen.
It was simple and rough-hewn with his name on a brass plaque: Hank Bergen. No middle name, and no indication that Hank had been short for Henry. It listed his date of birth as 1885 and his date of death as 1926.
Beside it was another plaque with a brass marker just like Hank’s. This one had an angel etched into the metal and didn’t list dates at all. It simply said, In memory, an angel in life, may she rest with the angels, wherever her earthly remains may lie. Beatrice Marie Bergen, daughter of Hank. Loved by those graced by her kindness.
Keri stood by the grave and closed her eyes, letting the breeze rustle through her hair. A part of her still wanted to insist that it was all too much. Talking to ghosts. How could it even be possible?
Another part of her knew that she had the power to help, that she could allow a good man to finally rest.
“I have enough. I’m not an attorney, nor have I any political power,” she said. “But I can gather information and get it out there, using all the right sources. People will know that you were innocent. I sincerely believe, from all that I have read, that you were truly innocent, Hank. And I will do my best to write it all up and hand it out to the public. I believe that people will see what I have seen, and perhaps others may offer information, and the truths that I have found will be amplified. I hope that this helps you.
“Beatrice, I am so sorry. I know now that you were there, that you would have helped Julie if you could have and that you cried for her because she met your fate, and you knew what she suffered.”
Keri opened her eyes.
They were both there, Hank with an arm around his daughter’s shoulder, smiling at her.
“Thank you.”
She wasn’t sure if he said the words, or if she heard them on the breeze. Or, perhaps they were just whispers in her own mind, and it was all a trick of the light.
But she realized that Dallas had come up behind her. He stood very still, and she knew that he saw them, too.
“Sir,” Dallas said softly, “Miss Bergen. If you could help us...”
When Hank Bergen spoke next, Keri knew that she was hearing him and not a fantasy she was making up in her mind.
“They wear hoods, ridiculous hoods,” Hank said, his words bitter and biting. “They have an insignia on them, a bird over a human with a ram’s head. They wore them when they attacked me, lest they be seen and recognized. They are despicable cowards. I would help you more... Yesterday, I saw Catrina Billings. She came from the woods and crossed in back of the tavern, sneaking around. She didn’t want her own police officers to know she was here. She went into the church.”
“We never heard her scream,” Beatrice said.
“When they took you, what happened?” Keri asked her.
“My father told me not to go near the tavern,” Beatrice said. She glanced his way sorrowfully. “But I heard that Newby was hiring housekeepers and... Well, we’d had troubled times with the harvest that year, and I wanted to help. I could have been a very good maid. Newby asked me down to the basement, and when we were there...he knocked me out. And...”
Hank set his arm around her shoulders, pulling her to him.
“Those ‘fine gentlemen’ brought in by the coroner,” Hank said. “I believe at least two of them were in on it. They waited until it was late at night. The rumors about the tavern were getting out of hand. People were starting to wonder about Newby—travelers who started out from the east sometimes didn’t make it to their destinations.
“Those men killed. They sacrificed to their demon god or their own depravity, but they found those who were tragically poor, who had nothing, who came through with no real destination. Who notices when a drifter drifts on? But then, Newby killed Beatrice, and I started asking questions, and they knew that I would not let it rest.”
Hank seemed to take a breath, and he appeared to Keri just as clearly as if he stood there in the flesh. “I believe that the same thing happened here again. Catrina was furious. She killed the FBI agent. She killed her here, in the church, and I bore witness. She ordered one of her hooded helpers to get the body and the blood down to the cellar, and then...you know. Catrina and all of them knew that there hadn’t been a padlock on the cellar door in years. They were wearing the same hoods. Not even I can tell you the rest of the members.”
Beatrice still seemed to be sobbing softly, held in her father’s arms.
“Maybe we can leave now,” Hank said, smoothing down his daughter’s hair.
“Maybe,” she whispered.
They were still there, but not as solid as they had been. There was no ray of light. They did not soar up to the heavens.
“I’m all right, Papa,” she told him. “I’m all right now.” She turned to Keri just before she faded away, the same as she always had before.
“I will help you, anytime that I can.”
* * *
The high-pitched, terrified scream from somewhere brought Joe leaping to his feet. He ran for the stairs.
“Wait!” Carl screamed.
“Follow me!” Joe ordered.
He meant to tell Belinda to follow, to be ready for trouble, but Belinda wasn’t there. Had she run up already, beat him to the draw after the scream? Impossible. He had run out of the museum like a bat out of hell.
He took the stairs two at a time, bursting into room 208 where Brad and Serena were supposed to be staying.
There was no one there.
With Carl on his heels, he covered every room on the second floor.
They must have gone downstairs.
The scream sounded again, this time as if it was coming from underwater. Joe drew his gun and threw open the basement door.
Carl was at his heels, but gasping. “Can’t move... I don’t know...”
For the moment, Joe had to ignore Carl’s problems. He took the stairs quickly, alert, ready for whatever, and near the bottom, he nearly tripped over a body.
Belinda.
The basement was dark; shadows were moving. He started to stoop down to check for a pulse.
“Oh, God!” Carl screamed.
Joe spun around quickly, ready to shoot.
He couldn’t; a figure in a black robe and hood held Carl precariously in the middle of the staircase. There was a knife at his throat.
“He’s so pretty, isn’t he, Mr. Dunhill? The poor boy is passing out in my arms. He must have had one of those energy bars. I hope you appreciate the irony in that—energy bar?”
Joe knew the voice. “Let him go. Anything you do from this point forward will work against you. We know that Detective Billings killed Special Agent Julie Castro. Right now, you can stop this, tell us your side of the story, how you were coerced into this—and you could walk or do just a few easy years.”
“Oh, Mr. Dunhill. Please. Do you really think that any of us would fall for that?”
“Well, you could take off that ridiculous hood.”
“You know who I am?”
Carl was slumping. If Joe didn’t do something quickly, Carl would wind up dying because the razor-sharp edge of the hooded figure’s knife would slide through his flesh as he stood.
“What do you want from me?” Joe asked. “Why would you be doing this now? Law enforcement is going to come down on this place like a hammer soon.”
“Ah, but it won’t be soon enough. You, sir, have been a thorn in our sides. So, drop your weapon. Or Carl dies. I can draw a little blood, if you like...”
“More FBI agents are on their way.”
“Yes, and they’ll find me just coming to. Come on, no one will be out here until tomorrow, and by then... You’re stalling. Put the gun down. Aren’t you supposed to save lives? Seriously. You’re not getting out of here now. You’ll just make him die as well.”
Joe wasn’t getting out. That meant someone else was in the basement and surely had a gun trained on him as well.
Joe set his Glock down. They might shoot or kill him now—and God knew, Carl could die anyway—but he needed to play for time. And hope there would be a chance to use the knife strapped at his ankle.
Behind him, the shadows moved. In his peripheral vision, he saw a giant candlestick coming down on his head. He tried to spin, to stop the blow...
He managed to shield himself from the brunt of the hit, but even as he crashed to his knees, pain tore through his head like a rocket. Through the haze, he saw Carl tumble down the stairs.
Then, as he cursed himself, the world began to fade.
Keri.
He had promised her that he’d be there when she returned. And he had failed her.
As the world went black, he heard someone laughing. “He should have had an energy bar. Easier than a thump on the head.”
* * *
“Is that how how it usually is?” Keri asked Dallas, walking back toward the inn. “You see the dead, sometimes in your dreams and sometimes the way we just saw them?”
“There really isn’t much of a usual. I’d have imagined that those two remained behind to find someone who could prove the truth, but you told them that you would do that. So there’s another reason they’re still here, I think, because they want to move on.” He smiled at her. “Three of our agents are brothers. The McFaddens first saw the dead when their parents, a pair of famous actors, were killed by a crashing chandelier on stage. Their spirits are still hanging around—talk about your in-law problems. But they’re charming, too, and they stay because they’re convinced that they help. And they weren’t ready to leave their sons. I can only compare being a ghost to...going to the gym. The more you work at it, the better you become. But no one’s experience is ever exactly the same. Somehow, Beatrice and Hank got into your mind as you slept and led you out here, where we found Detective Billings.”
They came around the corner of the inn. Dallas paused for a minute, looking out at the patrol car.
“What the hell is Jamie doing?” he muttered.
“Probably getting very tired,” Keri said. “I’m going to run in.”
Dallas headed for the patrol car. “Great,” he said. “I kept them because I trusted them, and he fell asleep.”
Keri ran up the porch steps and into the tavern. “Belinda?”
She didn’t see the officer in her seat at the far tavern table. Hurrying, Keri rushed through to the museum, but Joe wasn’t there. She shouted his name, but there was no answer.
She hurried into the kitchen. “Belinda? Joe? Carl?”
Silence. She found herself looking at the cutting board on the counter. And the knife that lay on it. She reached for the knife, her sense of alarm growing, and slid it into the pocket of her jeans.
Then she heard a cry. “Please...help!”
Belinda?
Keri started to run to the basement. She froze. This had happened before. Wincing, she realized that she had to go. Someone could really be hurt and desperate for help.
She moved cautiously for the stairs. When she reached them, she felt a touch on her shoulder and turned quickly.
It was the ghost of Beatrice Bergen, and she was looking at Keri with huge, frightened eyes.
“No,” she told Keri. “No.”
Too late. She felt an arm come around her from behind, and the edge of a knife at her throat.
“Quiet. Not a word, or you’ll watch your life’s blood flow away right here, right now.”
They must have Joe. If they didn’t have him, he would have been there.
But Dallas was outside. He would come, and he would find her, and they would find Joe...
She was half led and half dragged down the stairs. At the bottom, she nearly tripped over a body.
Belinda!
As ridiculous as it might have been at the moment, she was glad that the officer she had liked so much was not among these homicidal maniacs.
Did it matter? She was going to die, and Belinda might well already be dead.
On the basement floor, she was surrounded by figures in cloaks and hoods, all bearing the strange insignia of the hawk flying above the ram’s head demon. As she was hauled out through the cellar door, she heard Dallas calling to her. She was ready to scream, but the cellar door shut, and she knew... She could scream...
But he would not hear her, and then all hope would be lost.
16
Joe came to slowly, the burning pain in his head pulsing. For a moment, he couldn’t see a thing. He closed his eyes, and then blinked, and at last, his vision came into focus.
He was in a clearing in the woods, and it was growing dark, but torches had been stuck into the ground and lit. There was an altar, like the one Spencer Atkins had set up in the basement, an imitation of the one used by John Newby in his original torture chamber.
Joe tried to move and realized that he was tied to a tree, seated with his arms bound tight to his sides, and his legs out in front of him. It was a giant oak, and the rope circled the entire trunk. He looked around the clearing and saw no one.
That meant that the members were busy elsewhere, taking down Dallas and... Keri.
A good thing he hadn’t eaten their poisoned energy bar. He’d shielded himself from some of the blow that had felled him, and he was conscious again.
How long had he been out?
Not long, he thought. Darkness had already been coming on. And at the moment, he was unguarded.
He worked at the ropes that bound him. There was not enough time to rub them ragged against the trunk of the tree, but if he could twist around enough, he might be able to slip his knife from the little shield at his ankle. He could still feel it in his boot.
He began to work at the ties that bound him, not trying to break them, but loosen them enough so that he could bend forward.
He could tell himself that he had been on the right track at last, even if it had been a little too late. But then again, the cult members believed that no one was coming until the morning—and Jackson and Angela were on the way right now. By the time they got out here, they’d know that something was very wrong. They would be calling along the way, and when they received no answer... Or, if Dallas was able to sense the trap and escape it, extra law enforcement could already be on the way.
Joe worked and worked at the ties, and finally the rope stretched enough. He tilted his body far to one side, drawing his leg up toward his bound arm, and he was able to reach his knife. Once he grabbed it, he began to twist and turn it against the ties at his side.
The rope began to give.
He jerked free, rubbed his hands, and pushed himself up. For a moment, his head spun again. He stood still, waiting for the dizziness to ebb.
He heard a soft drumbeat.
He crept into the trees, and then he stopped and crouched, watching. He didn’t have his Glock. All he had was his knife. But they were coming now...
They had Keri, he was certain. She had been with Dallas, but her captors must have done something. They had tricked Dallas somehow and gotten to Keri...
He didn’t know who else they had. Dallas, too?
The drumbeat kept sounding. Someone was coming through the forest.
A figure broke into the clearing, gliding quickly to the altar. She lifted her arms and in a single movement, shed the hooded cloak she had been wearing.
She was naked. Slim and pale and very young. Barbara Chrome, the seventeen-year-old Julie Castro had been so desperate to find and save. The girl for whom the agent had given her life.
There was a long, glittering knife on the altar. Barbara picked it up, raised it toward the night sky, and called out, “Dear Lord Satan, tonight, you will drink of beauty. Our sacrifice will be the finest we have found for you, and you will grant us, your willing servants, all the gifts due from that sweet blood sacrifice, and there will be more, dear Lord Satan, more... Tonight, you feast!”
Four more hooded figures had followed her into the clearing, with Keri between them. She was walking on her own, her expression disdainful, her head high. Two more figures followed, carrying a makeshift stretcher with Carl upon it, unconscious.
