“It’s called
She kissed him on the lips but he felt only the faintest warmth of her mouth. Her breath smelled of rotting garbage. If his muscles could still gag, he would have started vomiting.
She disappeared out of view. Her mother smiled at him with a mouth full of large, crooked teeth. “This is not a curse, but a blessing.”
Then his eyelids lost their dying strength and he was gone in a world of black.
8
He made Ellis drive Chloe’s car.
“What happened to all your followers?” Anthony asked. “No one came to save you.”
“The Temple is sound-proof. Doesn’t matter. They all know by now. I’m not worried.”
“Because they’re coming to save you?”
“No,” Ellis said, “because God has a plan.”
Ellis drove them to the Hidden Hills Trailer Park. It was a community of winding roads through curving hills with low-income housing. Anthony had paid good money to raise a family in a gated community that promised serenity through security. Oh, the irony.
“If you’re driving me somewhere else, somewhere where my boy isn’t, I will bury this hammer in your head, you got that?”
Ellis nodded. “I don’t believe in subterfuge.”
Anthony laughed. “That’s a good one.”
“You have a chance to be saved, Anthony. You’re walking away from it and that saddens me.”
Anthony brought the hammer to Ellis’s temple, just barely touching. “Is that making you sad or is it the thought of your brains splattered on the window?”
“Do you know what Jesus said to his doubters?”
“Good luck?”
“He told them that he would have mercy on them as he tried to snatch them out of the fires of Hell. I, too, will have mercy on you while I try to save your soul.”
“I don’t want to save my soul,” Anthony said, “I want to save my son.”
“Don’t worry about him. He’s already been saved.”
* * *
Ellis drove slowly around parked cars and down sudden steep slopes. Anthony had to tell him to hurry up, stop wasting time before he buried the claw end of the hammer into Ellis’s leg. That encouraged him to speed up.
He slowed down and stopped behind a small hatchback. A large guy in the driver’s seat noticed them in the rearview mirror and almost jumped out of his seat. The driver’s door was open a moment later and Dwayne was standing there, a surprised, though not worried, expression on his face.
“Where’s my son?” Anthony hissed.
Ellis looked at him. “Doing God’s work.”
Anthony got out of the car and went right for Dwayne, who held up his hands in innocence. “What did you do with my son?” His shouts bounced off the surrounding hills.
“Keep your voice down, Anthony,” Dwayne said. “Someone is going to call the cops and you don’t want that.”
“No,
“If that happens, you’ll lose your son.”
“
“Dad?”
Brendan had come around the corner of a line of bushes. He was wearing work gloves and carrying a can of gasoline. His face was wet and smeared with black splotches. A strange expression floated on his face.
“What are you doing?”
Brendan looked from Anthony to Dwayne. “I was going to stay, to guard, but I heard the screaming and …”
“
Tears gathered in Brendan’s eyes and Anthony fought the urge to drop the hammer and take his little boy in his arms. He had to stay strong right now while Ellis and Dwayne were around. There would be plenty of time for hugs later.
“I’m only trying to help,” Brendan said in a slow, fragile voice.
“Help?
“Tyler.”
Anthony stopped. What did that mean? “Help Tyler how?”
Brendan stumbled for an answer.
Behind him, large flames licked up the front of a house. They had completely engulfed the front door and thick, black smoke was spiraling above the house and into the sky.
“Oh, my God,” Anthony whispered.
9
He heard Dad’s scream and came running. He felt like he hadn’t seen Dad in days, maybe longer. Dad had become a stranger to Brendan, someone for whom Brendan would do anything and yet someone who he no longer really knew.
Before turning the corner of the Karras’s driveway, Brendan slowed. He had wanted to see him, hug him, and beg for his understanding but that urge died. Dad wouldn’t understand why Brendan had placed starter logs doused in gasoline before the main escape points of the Karras’s house. He would never forgive Brendan for Delaney’s death if he ever discovered what really happened. Dad was more likely to have him arrested or committed to some crazy-people hospital than take him in his arms.
Horror and desperation drew across Dad’s face and gritted in his voice. Brendan wished he had stayed where he was. The weight of the gun sagged the pocket of his coat. He hadn’t touched it since Dwayne entrusted him with it, and now he knew why he had really run toward Dad’s voice. He hadn’t wanted to shoot anyone.
“I’m only trying to help,” Brendan said. He felt like he might start crying. Dwayne was staring at him with equal parts rage and frustration. How was he supposed to please anyone?
“Help?
“Tyler.”
Dad’s face went blank. “Help Tyler how?”
The starter logs Brendan had placed on the Karras front porch burst with an explosion of heat. Giants flames ate at the front door and the smoke quickly engulfed most of the house’s front. Smoke also billowed from behind the house where the other starter logs ignited.
“Oh, my God.” Dad walked toward him in slow, dead steps. He spoke in a shocked whisper. “What did you do? My God, son,
“I had to, Dad. Tyler needed my help.”
“Help? Help how?” A hammer dangled in one hand.
Ellis spoke up from behind them. “Brendan is God’s disciple now. He was not afraid to do what was necessary to protect his family. He is the embodiment of all that the First Church of Jesus Christ the Empowered stand for.”
Dad was shaking his head. “You didn’t.
Brendan couldn’t say anything. God wanted him to do this. There was no rational way to explain what was inherently irrational. Dad might never understand it and Tyler might even be angry, but at least Tyler would be grateful. It might take a while, but he would be grateful.
“You have a choice now, Anthony,” Ellis said. “Come with us and we will keep you protected. Turn against us, and you will pay with all you have.”
Dad rested his hand on Brendan’s shoulder. “Go away,” he said with little energy. “Leave me and my son
