A Thousand Years of Darkness: a Thriller (35 page)

Many of the real stars were burned out and dead a million years before their light finally reached Earth.

Sharon argued that the enemy wouldn’t try against her again, not after the last incident at her apartment had been hammered by Zenergy and talk radio. It would be too conspicuous if something happened to her now. Besides, Zenergy was going to double her security.

“These people not attack open-like,” Big C predicted gloomily. “They make it like an accident.”

“Paul Revere never wavered,” Sharon returned. “I’m afraid we don’t have much time left.”

Nail, still weak from his wound, promised to remain in Scranton until he recovered. Sharon’s doctor friend warned that too much activity would likely reopen the bullet holes and invite infection. Nail also posed more of a hindrance to her in New York than an asset, as Homeland Security would be sticking to her tighter than shingles on a roof, looking for him.

Left unspoken was the vow he took:
I couldn’t save Jamie—but I’ll kill every commie in Washington all the way up to the White House if that’s what it takes to save Sharon.

She led them in a final prayer, asking God to keep them safe in the trying days ahead. Neither of them mentioned marriage; that would have to wait until this was all over and they had lives again. And then she was gone alone on the drive to New York. Bodyguards would rendezvous with her en route.

Big C departed the following morning after a cryptic cell phone call from Lieutenant Jack Ross’ wife in Tulsa. Big C turned on the speaker mode to allow Nail to listen in on the conversation. Marsha’s voice sounded thin and distressed.

“Thank God I found you, Corey. I tried to get James. It was on the news that he was shot.”

“I’m right here, Marsha,” Nail said. “I lost my phone. What’s the matter?”

She sobbed openly. “They’ve... They’ve taken my husband.”

“Marsha, who took him?” Big C cried.

“I didn’t know where to turn except to James and you.”

“Who took him, Marsha? Where did they take him?”

“He disappeared. That’s all I know, Corey. I haven’t heard from him in a week.”

She was crying now, big, wet sobs of desperation. “I—I think they’re listening in on my phone calls.”

“We better hang up,” Big C agreed. “Don’t do nothing till you hear from me.”

“Corey—”

“We get him back. I promise.”

Big C clicked off and he and Nail sat looking at each other, the same thoughts going through their minds:
It could be a trap.

Nonetheless, Big C threw his things together. Nail walked him to the junker the big man had picked up in Alabama. They had agreed that Nail, who was in no condition to travel, should remain near Sharon in case she needed him.

“I pick up a new pay-go phone and call you the number,” Big C promised. “I keep you informed.”

He looked at Nail and nodded, as though to himself. Before he drove off, he advised, “Lift up the back seat of your car.”

Nail discovered the 30.06 Winchester rifle and sniper scope underneath the seat of his Toyota. He stared at the weapon for a long minute, recalling Sharon’s admonition that there had been enough killing. Killing, she said, ultimately destroyed the soul.

“I do only what I have to do,” he had replied. “For everything there is a season... A time to kill, and a time to heal.” A paraphrase from the King James Bible, which was among the books she purchased for him.

Nail checked the Winchester to see if it was loaded. Next to it was a full box of ammo.

Chapter Sixty-Two

Washington, D.C.

Judy Sparks-Taylor’s apartment was set in a fashionably rundown neighborhood occupied mainly by students and grad instructors a couple of blocks from George Washington University. Pizza huts, sandwich shops, a McDonald’s, used text book shops and used furniture stores, apartments
For Rent
tucked back into alleys and above dry cleaners or Laundromats. Instead of Big C’s picking Judy up at her apartment, which could be dangerous, she packed a bag to meet him in front of Quizno’s.

“I never know when Dennis might show up,” she explained.

Big C spotted the slim, bleached-blond figure in jeans and sneakers on the street in the bustle of the lunch crowd. He parked down the street and watched for signs that it might be a setup. He had no reason to distrust her, especially not after she had stuck out her neck for James. Still, she
was
a crooked politician’s babe and... Well, politicians were parasites, as they continued to demonstrate, and capable of any damned thing.

After watching for ten minutes and seeing nothing to trigger his cop’s radar, he got out of his car and merged into the flow of pedestrian traffic as best his six-six frame permitted. He carried a Beretta 9mm stuffed underneath his shirt in the small of his back where he could get to it. Judy hurried to meet him. She took his hand and drew him round the corner.

“I’m afraid,” she confessed.

“Do he know?”

“Dennis has been pecking around like an old barnyard rooster. Asking a lot of questions about my cousins.”

“Maybe you better change cousins to uncles.”

She gave him a stern look. “Corey, I ain’t kidding. The people Dennis is with are mean enough to shoot neighbors’ dogs. He come over last night after you called on the phone. He knows I was fibbing when I told him I was going to Oklahoma for a few days ’cause my mama needs me. I thought he was going to hit me. He goes, ‘Nobody from Bugfuck, Oklahoma, leaves Congressman Dennis Trout until
I
say I’m through.’”

Anger welled in Big C’s chest, but he resisted the impulse to suggest she walk away from that cheap dump Trout rented for her and keep going. The idea of Trout touching her again disgusted him. Still, where would she go? It was risky enough for her to be with him for the next several days, and selfish of him to have asked her. He was already starting to regret it.

“Looky here...” he began.

She clasped her small hand across his mouth, as though anticipating his objection. “Corey, you’re the only man in a long time that don’t treat me like I’m some kind of Dust Bowl trash. Wait right here. I left my bag in Quizno’s for safe keeping. Don’t worry. He’s in Illinois. If he wants me, he’ll call me on my cell. We got a whole week, Corey. Just me and you. A couple of Okies going back home.”

* * *

It would have been faster to take a flight, but airport security all over the nation would be on the alert. The clunker Big C purchased in Montgomery under his assumed name of Vernon Smith was a 2000-model Chevrolet Impala, color green, a reliable working class car. There was a time when a black man and a white woman traveling together would have attracted unfriendly attention, especially from small town cops. Times had changed some since then.

Although Big C wasn’t overly concerned about being recognized, he nonetheless remained in the car when they stopped for fuel or takeout and let Judy handle it. No use pressing their luck. They took I-95 south from Washington, then I-40 west, traveling hard to reach Oklahoma as quickly as possible. Exhausted, they stayed part of one night in a Motel 6.

C took his shower first at her insistence. Then she showered and came out wearing a brief black nightie to climb into the same bed with him, although there was another bed available. He thought he had never seen a more lovely vision. He felt an overwhelming desire to draw her into his powerful arms, but he was almost afraid he would crush her like a delicate flower.

“You sure?” he asked her.

“No,” she admitted—and moved against him. “I forgot to turn out the light.”

They made love slow and languorously. Afterwards, Judy sat up in bed and wept. Big C held her against his broad chest. His heart went out to this country mouse who had gone to the big city and ended up mistreated and tossed about by one abuser or another.

“What can I do?” he asked gently.

She sobbed in great heaves. “Don’t ever stop being you, Corey. Promise?”

“We get to Tulsa, we walk across the River Bridge again and buy Sno Cones.”

“Somebody might recognize you.”

Things were never going to be normal again. Not for them, not for the rest of America.

It was a good trip mostly, in spite of Big C’s rush to get to Tulsa and find out what lay behind Marsha Ross’s call. To Big C’s continuing delight, he found his buxom travel companion quick and agile, uneducated but not at all intellectually slow.

She had had to quit school in the ninth grade, she explained, because her dad ran off with a barmaid from the Dew Drop Inn in Vian, leaving her mom with five kids to raise. As the elder sibling, she lied about her age to waitress in cafes. Later, she worked bars and clubs until her brothers and sisters were out on their own.

“I always wanted to get my GED and go on to college,” she said wistfully. “I never did seem to get around to it. Dennis told me I didn’t have the mind for education.”

She drew food stamps and went on welfare for a spell before she discovered big boobs, blond hair and a well-shaped behind were assets better than a gold mine in Washington, D.C. Trout was her second sugar-daddy politician. The first had been a fat, bald senator with a wife and three kids back in Ohio. He dumped Judy and ran for cover to avoid a scandal after his wife learned he wasn’t spending all his time debating on the Senate floor.

“I guess you can say Fancy is my name. That’s a Dolly Parton song. ‘Be nice to the gentlemen, Fancy, and they’ll be nice to you.’ Does that make you think bad of me, Corey?”

“Girl, I see your heart and find it noble.”

“I always told myself I was going to be a swan someday.”

“I doubt you ever a ugly duckling.”

She laughed. “You wouldn’t say that if you seen me at fifteen slopping the hogs.”

“Lucky hogs.”

When it was her turn behind the wheel, Big C waved a copy of a slim publication on the cover of which was a likeness of Thomas Jefferson and the title
The Constitution of The United States
. Judy had never read it, not even in school.

“Listen to the disclaimer they put on it.”

He read it to her:

This book is a product of its time and does not reflect the same values as it would if it were written today. Parents might want to discuss with their children how values of race, gender, sexuality, ethnicity and interpersonal relationships have changed since this was written before allowing them to read this classic work.

“Does that mean it’s x-rated?” Judy asked innocently.

“What it mean, girl, is we losing freedom. My great, great granddaddy was brought over from Africa on a slave ship. Socialism the same thing where a small bunch of slave masters tell the rest of us how to live. We all going to be slaves again, no matter we black, brown, white, red or purple.”

FCC To Hold Hearings On Offensive Speech

(Washington)—
Speaker of the House Barbara Teague, members of the National Action Network, and the Federal Communications Commission met Tuesday to discuss “standards of decency” when referring to elected officials and other public servants. In the meeting, Speaker Teague called on the FCC to regulate radio and TV personalities.

“What Rush Limbaugh, Sharon Lowenthal and others have done, I believe, pushes the envelope beyond free speech,” Teague said. “We intend to follow that up with public hearings and bring to task some of them to explain how they justify the use of federally regulated airways to justify offending people with whom they disagree...”

Chapter Sixty-Three

Oklahoma City

It could almost be a law that tall, lanky men like Lieutenant Jack Ross have short, plump, happy wives. When Big C and Judy entered the Pizza Hut located off I-44 in Oklahoma City, the first thing he noticed from across the room was that Marsha Ross’ eyes were swollen from crying and she appeared years older than the last time he saw her. She occupied a booth against a plate glass window that provided a view of the capitol dome in the distance. They had agreed to meet here rather than in Tulsa where he was more apt to be recognized.

A stylish brunette in her thirties occupied the booth with Marsha. Big C stopped at the door. Like all hunted men, he was skittish of strangers. After a moment he escorted Judy through the dinner-hour crowd and past two boys playing a video shoot-’em-up game. He smiled at Marsha when she looked up. It was the first time he could remember that she didn’t laugh with delight at seeing him and jump up to give him a hug. The brunette solemnly moved over to Marsha’s side of the table to leave room for Big C and Judy on the other side. Her name was Carolyn Moulton.

Marsha reached across the table to Big C. His massive hands devoured hers. She batted back tears.

“I always thought Judy was a pretty name,” she said to Judy.

They ordered a large pizza with everything. Judy asked for a Coke and Big C a Mountain Dew. When the waitress left to fill their orders, Marsha said, “I did like you told me to make sure I wasn’t followed out of Tulsa.”

“How about you, Carolyn?”

“I’m staying in Oklahoma City. No one knows I’m here, not even my husband.”

While they waited for pizza, Big C explained about Nail and how he was shot saving Sharon from another probable assassination. “They trying to shut her up,” he said.

“Jack was afraid that would happen. He left two numbers he said I should call if I needed help. Your’s and James’. He said the numbers couldn’t be easily traced. James didn’t answer.”

“I’ll give you his new number. Marsha, what happened?”

Her head lowered as she fought for control. There was more gray in her hair than Big C remembered. After a minute, she looked at him again.

“I-I never really thought this could happen in America.”

“Germans didn’t think it happen there either.”

“That sounds like what Jack would say.”

She took a sip from her glass and continued, “You know about the Oath Keepers...?”