BoneMan's Daughters (26 page)

An hour passed before he thought to slow down, and then only when he passed a cop going the other direction. Evidently Texas
cops didn’t pull over cars doing ninety.

Ryan breathed a prayer of gratitude, slowed to eighty, and flew east. A storm was coming, the radio said. Black clouds boiled
on the horizon.

He fixed his eyes on the road ahead and took the car back up to eighty-five.

What are you doing, Ryan? You can’t do this!

The horror of what BoneMan was asking of him suddenly struck him.

You can’t do this…

But what choice did he have? BoneMan had Bethany!

A CRACK OF thunder rattled the phone booth. Ryan instinctively kept his head low as large raindrops pelted the glass. Storm
clouds had cut off the sun early, hastening nightfall, but there was still an hour of dim light before blackness settled over
the Hill Country. The phone in his hand was ringing on the other end. He pressed it closer to his ear so that he could hear
better.

Rivers of water distorted his view of the western horizon.
Pick up, Father. Please pick up.

If the drive had been only three hours, he would have been able to get it done before his conscience had the time to consider
the moral implications of what lay ahead. Ignorance was bliss, but hours of time and thought had shattered that bliss.

Slowly the horror of what he was about to do swallowed him until he found that he had to make a preemptive confession, not
for his sake, but for Bethany’s sake, should it all go terribly wrong.

“Hello?”

The father’s voice crackled on the line.

“Hello?”

“Father?”

A long beat.

“Ryan…”

“Listen to me, Father. You have to listen to me. I know I’m AWOL and I know the FBI’s made contact with you. The CO’s probably
climbing down your throat—”

“Slow down, Ryan. I can hardly hear you. Take a deep breath.”

He took a deep breath through his nostrils, then blew out slowly. He was playing a dangerous game, calling Hortense.

“Can I still talk to you, Father? I need someone to talk to.”

“Of course you can. But you have to know that command is climbing all over me. They’re cooperating fully with the FBI. This
is a publicity disaster for them.”

“I need some time. I’m going after my daughter and I need you to give me some time. If you call the FBI and tell them about
this call, she could die.”

Father Hortense didn’t respond.

“Do you understand what I’m saying? Her life’s in my hands and now her life will be in your hands.”

“We can help you, Ryan. You can’t take this all on your shoulders.”

“I talked to him, Father. He found me and he talked to me. And now I’m going to do something that no one will understand.
But I need you to understand, Father.”

“What are you going to do?”

Yes, Ryan, what are you going to do?

He stared out at the rain streaming over the glass, like tears from heaven. A knot formed in his throat and for a moment he
thought he might join God and begin to cry.

“God’s done many things that have been misunderstood, right?”

“Ryan—”

“He’s destroyed whole nations to save those he loves, isn’t that what he did? Nineveh?”

“He spared Nineveh.”

“Jericho?”

“Please, Ryan. I don’t like the sound of this. It is critical that you turn yourself in. No good can come of this.”

“How far would you go to save your daughter, Father?”

“Half the state is out there looking for you because they believe that you’re the one playing the devil here. You are not
God, Ryan. You’re one man and you’ve broken the law.”

“This is no different than what we do in any war, Father. Collateral damage is a part of what we do to achieve justice. Setting
the captive free comes at a cost. Just because it’s less personal from a bomber doesn’t make it any different than what we
must do here, on the ground, one on one.”

“That sounds like a desperate attempt at justification.”

“Am I wrong?”

“No one will understand that kind of logic!”

“They’ll misunderstand me like they misunderstand God,” Ryan said. “What I’m going to do, I’m going to do for my daughter’s
sake. And if you don’t give me some time then both me and my daughter will be killed.”

“Ryan, you listen to me—”

“I don’t want to do this, Father.” Ryan’s throat constricted and he had to swallow to continue his confession. “You know me,
this is the last thing I would do, I was there, I’m not up for this, but I have no choice!”

Father Hortense waited a few seconds before responding. Finally, he was listening.

“Think about what you are doing, Ryan. God spare you if you become BoneMan.”

Ryan knew what he meant and it didn’t help him. He’d been a fool to place the call.

“If you report this call, Bethany and I will both die.”

“How much time do you need?” the priest finally asked.

“A few hours.”

“Maybe.”

“I need a yes.”

“Then yes. I will give you a few hours, and then I will call the FBI.”

“Tell them to look seven miles south of Menard. He’ll be watching. I need till first light. If they come before morning, we’ll
all die.”

The line remained quiet.

“Father, promise me.”

“What are you going to do, Ryan?”

Ryan hung up.

RYAN DROVE INTO Austin under cover of darkness, thankful for the hard rain, which alone might have been responsible for the
ease with which he drove to his destination undetected.

The black Taurus had surely been reported stolen by now, but no one had publicly connected the car to him. Even if they were
looking for it, on a dark stormy night it suited him.

He knew his destination precisely because he’d been there twice before, two months earlier, before the restraining order had
forced him out of town. The gated community sat on the west side of Austin, in a neighborhood called Spanish Oaks. He was
surprised that the construction code he’d acquired earlier still worked. Either way, he would have simply followed another
car past the gate.

He parked under a tree a full block from the large white colonial and slid down in his seat to wait. Rain pelted the roof
and windshield, a thunderous cacophony that smothered the sound of passing tires on the wet pavement. Not that it mattered;
he had committed himself. The time for careful planning and meticulous execution was now far past.

The rain was on his side. The brashness of what he was about to attempt was on his side. Speed was on his side. His gun was
on his side.

Time was against him. Sanity was against him. The law was against him. Reason was against him. Morality was against him.

He could do nothing but sit low and urge his mind to shout over the voices of caution that kept filling his mind.

The rain had eased enough by ten o’clock to give him full view of the Cadillac that pulled into the driveway and disappeared
behind a rolling garage door. Ryan waited another two hours before he shouted down the last warning barking in his head, fired
the Taurus, and pulled up to the sidewalk that led up to the front door.

He withdrew his pistol, disengaged the safety, and stepped out into the drizzling rain.

Without bothering to look to his right or to his left, he walked up to the front door and tried it. Locked, naturally. He
pulled his collar up, hunched his shoulders, and shoved the metal stock of the gun through the door panel.

The glass broke and crashed to the floor inside. Rain muted the sound, but not entirely. He reached in, twisted the dead bolt,
and pulled the door open to the sound of a loud beep that accompanied a countdown to the alarm.

Ryan cut to his right where a large door looked like it might lead to a bedroom. But it turned out to be a darkened study.

The alarm’s warning began to speed up. At any moment it would begin to blare.

Dripping on the large tiles, he ducked into a second hallway and this time was greeted by a large atrium that led to an entire
wing. His rubber soles squealed with each step now, but the sudden wailing of the alarm on all sides shattered any thought
of creeping in unnoticed.

He spun into the master bedroom just as the form on the four-poster bed rose from its slumber. The man was too stunned to
react properly, and Ryan moved in while he still had the full advantage.

He shoved the gun barrel in the man’s face, grabbed his collar, and jerked him from the bed.

“Shut up!” The man hadn’t uttered a peep, but he said it anyway. Again. Because it covered the shame he felt. “Shut up!”

The gun’s barrel had already split Welsh’s lip but he found his voice and began to deliver the expected protest. “What in
God’s name—”

Ryan hit him upside the head. “I said shut
up
.”

He dragged the district attorney around and shoved him forward, out into his own living room, where the sound of the shrill
alarm was nearly deafening. “Outside, if you want to live.”

The man wore thin cotton pajamas but his feet were bare. He stumbled through the front door, pushed by Ryan, but pulled up
when the rain hit him.

“In the car!”

The man stood in a crouch, as if unsure what to do, so Ryan helped him out. He kicked the man with his heel in the small of
his back. “Move!”

He moved, grunting with pain.

“In the car.”

Burt Welsh was still reeling from the suddenness of the attack, but he was a big man and he wouldn’t just take such a violation
lying down for long. Not without Ryan’s help.

The man piled into the passenger seat, cursing bitterly now. Not the sign of humility and cooperation that Ryan was looking
for.

He reached in, grabbed the larger man by his black hair, tugged his head out of the car door, and slammed the gun on his temple
with as much force as he could manage, working in the tight space.

The DA slumped, unconscious. Ryan shoved him in, slammed the door after him, and raced around the car.

He’d succeeded thus far because of his urgency, not through any finesse, and he made no attempt at it now. He whipped the
car through a tight turn and flew through streets running like rivers.

Beside him, the father of lies’ pajama-clad form leaned against the door. He’d known from the first mention of the term that
BoneMan had been very careful in his selection of Bethany. This was far more than retaliation for the district attorney’s
bravado in swearing to bring him to justice.

BoneMan knew that both he and Ryan agreed on at least one thing: Welsh was a pretender who had no claim to Bethany. He was
the father of lies, and of all those BoneMan could have asked him to take, Ryan felt less conflicted about taking this one.

He had to slow down at the exit gate and wait for it to open, but he was already on Highway 71 before the first cop car flew
by and peeled into Spanish Oaks.

The DA began to moan, and Ryan leaned over to give him another blow to the head. He simply could not allow the man to give
him any trouble in the middle of his flight from the city.

Going northeast on 71 and then directly east on 29, the trip to Menard would take about two hours if he moved quickly.

Ryan moved. He cleared the city limits in under ten minutes and took the car up to eighty again. Now a nearly frantic urgency
consumed him to get the man he’d abducted into whatever hole in the ground that BoneMan had prepared for them. He didn’t know
what awaited them, only that it would involve breaking Welsh’s bones, and for the time being he refused to think through what
that might entail.

The man stirred again thirty minutes east of Austin. The human head could only take so much trauma, and having been knocked
out twice, the DA’s head wasn’t a good candidate for surviving yet another blow to the head.

“Whad…” the man was slurring, “whad… whad…” His head wobbled on his neck as he tried to climb back into consciousness.

Ryan rested the gun across his waist, trained on the man’s chest. “Don’t give me an excuse to shoot you. Dead or alive, that’s
what he asked for, and I’d just as soon it be dead.”

Not true, but the only way Ryan could go through with this was to play his part without compromise. He’d set aside his emotions
for the time being and if he did allow any to resurface, they’d best be anger rather than a sudden pang of guilt.

The man eyed him curiously, eyes taking in the gun as if he wasn’t sure it was real.

“What’s… what’s the meaning of this?”

“Are you going to make me hit you again?”

The DA studied the road ahead for a moment. His abduction was coming back into focus, Ryan thought. The man was a bull and
would not make for an easy prisoner.

As if to confirm his suspicions, Welsh frowned. “Now you’ve done it. Now you’ve really gone and done it.”

This was a revelation that either gave the man courage or was meant to frighten Ryan. But the fact that he had “gone and done
it” was no news at all.

“Do you have any idea how many officers are out looking for me now?”

“More than were looking for me? It doesn’t matter, they won’t find either of us until morning.”

“And then what?”

“And then the FBI will follow the directions I left for them. They’ll find us.”

The man didn’t seem capable of digesting this frank admission. He blinked repeatedly in the darkness.

“You’re giving yourself up?”

“Not yet.”

“What are you going to do? You’ll never get away with this—”

“Do you see any cops? I think I just did get away with it.”

“They’ll find us. I’m the district attorney—”

“Do you love her?”

“What?”

“Do you love Bethany?”

“That’s what this about? You’re throwing your life away because I’m sleeping with Celine?”

“Do you love them?”

It took the man a while to form his answer, and when he did he spoke in a low, rushed voice. “I swear I’ll never touch them
again. Just let me go. I won’t press charges, I won’t say a thing—”

Ryan hit the man on his temple again. The DA collapsed in a limp heap on the front seat.