Hailstone (19 page)

Joseph disentangled himself. He didn’t look her in the eye. “I owe you, Mags,” he said.

“Are you okay now?” She tried to see his face, but there were too many shadows. “Are you Joseph again?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t think I’m anybody I recognise. But I have to stop this.”

“Stop it how?”

“Tell me who you got the firecrackers from.”

“It was just a black market deal. Jo
seph, do yourself a favour and get out of Hailstone like you were planning.”

“I can’t, any more than you can. I have to go now.”

“Joseph!” Magda watched the curtains close behind him, leaving her alone in the cold, sterile cubicle. She jerked forward; the IV drip rattled and almost overbalanced.

She sat back and tried to breathe through the sick feeling that settled in her stomach. She wished Kat was back. She wished Adam was there with her. She wished she knew what the hell she was doing, because right now it felt like she’d damaged Joseph even more than Preacher had.

Wednesday

Magda had no idea what they’d put in the drip. She didn’t even remember going back to sleep after Joseph left; but when she opened her eyes again, it was dark and cold. She shivered under the thin hospital blanket. Moonlight spilled through the window and lit up the clock on the wall. Midnight. She struggled to throw off the drowsiness that clung to her brain. Midnight? Where the hell was Kat?

She reached for the glass of water on the bedside table and put it to her lips. Paranoia prickled at the back of her mind. Why would the hospital leave her water when she was still hooked up to the IV? She wasn’t sure how any of it worked. She tipped up the glass and let it dribble over her chin. The water ran down her hospital gown, cold and wet. She lay back down and used the blanket to soak it up. She closed her eyes and listened to the room.

The clock ticked. The sound echoed like thunder. Something creaked on the floor. Then the softest, softest footfalls approached the bed. She didn’t think it was Kat, come to check on her. Kat smelled like newspaper
s.

The hand that curled over her mouth smelled of wax. She hated that smell. She flailed, swiped at the emergency button on the wall, but big hands removed the drip and scooped her off the bed before she could reach it.

Magda kicked at the man, but her bare feet met only cold air. The hand on her mouth pressed harder and cut off her oxygen. She couldn’t grab it because he had her arms pinned to her sides.

The man hurried out of the ward. She tried to scream, but no sound came out. Her head pounded in time with his feet when he broke into a run; the dim, sterile hospital wall raced by. The surprised face of a nurse, who dropped her folder. Then they were out in freezing night air. The man opened a car door and bundled her inside. “Don’t move,” he said.

Magda gasped for air and stayed where he’d thrown her. Zack. She’d have known if she hadn’t been so disoriented when she woke. What the hell was he thinking?

He piled into the driver’s seat. The locks on all the doors went down; he started the engine and
dialled a number on a hands free set at the same time.

Magda curled up in a ball and listened to the ring. She was awake now. Wide awake. Preacher’s voice made her skin crawl. Static crackled over the line.

“Yes?” he said.

“She’s safe
.”.

Magda made a face into her hands. Safe?

“Did you give her the water?”

“She had some. Not much.”

“Bring her home before it wears off.” The line went silent.

Wow. The paranoia sure had paid off. Magda weighed her options. She
didn’t much feel like playing chicken to Zack and Preacher right now. Her best bet was to get out of the car and go find Kat. She turned her head and watched him drive.

Zack glanced in the rear view mirror at her. His voice was soothing. “This will all be over soon, sweetheart,” he said. “I’ll make you a good husband, I promise. I’ll make you happy and you can put all this madness behind you. You’ll be free of that woman.”

Woman?

Magda leaped up from her seat and dug her fingers into his eyes. Zack yelled and the car swerved across the highway when his hands went up to tear her fingers from his face. He lashed at her with the back of a fist and caught a glancing blow on her temple. Magda jerked back, hit her head on the roof and landed on the rear seat where she’d started.

Zack grabbed the wheel and veered away from the steep slope that towered over the side of the highway. He swerved around an oncoming car. A horn blasted into the night.

Magda put her hands over her ears to stop the throbbing, but she couldn’t shut out the sound of Zack’s voice when the car was back on the right side of the road.

“Try that again and she will pay the price,” he said.

The hairs on Magda’s arms stood on end. She peered at him through her hands, unwilling to move again from her foetal position with her head throbbing like that. “She?” she whispered.

He swung the car off the highway. “Preacher finally realised there was only one way to get your attention. I presume he now has it.”

Magda curled her fingers into the fabric of the seat. It was firm, but old. She could feel springs near the surface. She used them to pull herself into a sitting position. “Where is she?”

“She’s safe.”

“Safe? Safe like me?”

“Safer.” His lips curled. Magda thought they looked like little fat moustaches in the darkness. She wondered what the police had done with her gun after she tried to shoot Preacher. If she’d had it now, she would have put a bullet in Zack’s brain and never felt a second of regret.

An image of Adam flashed through her mind, bleeding. Amanda with a gun to her own head. A sob shook Magda’s ribcage so hard she thought the bones would break, but she didn’t allow it to escape her mouth. She’d promised Kat she’d tear the city apart looking for her if they were separated, and she would, but Zack had just pulled into the driveway of her house, a place she had hoped never to suffer again. A shadow loomed outside the car. The moment the locks went up, Preacher yanked open the door and hauled her out of her seat.

Magda put her feet on the ground to maintain her balance. When Preacher shone a torch in her face, she let every ounce of hatred she’d ever felt for the man show. Then she turned her back on him and walked inside, since there didn’t seem much else to do.

Preacher and Zack followed. Magda put her head down and headed for the kitchen, where she knew she could lock them out, but Preacher caught up to her in a few steps. He yanked her around. “Where are you going?”

“No idea, since I’m already in hell!” she yelled.

The back of Preacher’s hand struck her face with enough force to slam her into the wall. Magda clutched her cheek and looked past him at Zack. His face was blank, his features schooled. Just like John. She backed toward the kitchen. Preacher followed. He laid a hand across her forehead and pinned her to the wall. His eyes closed. He spoke through
clenched teeth. “Hear me now Satan. These are your last hours. You will come out of my daughter! You will return her to God!” He pushed hard and Magda’s head banged against the wall. “Do you hear me Satan!”

“I hear you, you crazy old man!” Magda screamed. “Take your God damned hands off me!”

Preacher pushed her. Already unbalanced, Magda lost her footing and stumbled into the kitchen door. She fell awkwardly to the floor, backed into a corner and curled up there.

Preacher looked down at her. “Tomorrow you and Zack will be married. Then we’ll take you to an outreach centre to learn how to be a good wife.” He turned his back and spoke to Zack. “You know what to do.”

He left.

Zack crouched down in front of her. “I’m sorry, Magdalene,” he said.

Magda narrowed her eyes. “Why? Because he hit me? Or because you didn’t have the balls to stop him?”

“I’m sorry because there’s no other way. Please, come and sit with me. I’ll make you a chamomile tea.”

“Fuck off. You just want to drug me.”

“I would never do that.”

She tilted her head. “You’re so full of shit it’s unbelievable. I know what Preacher puts in the holy water. I know everything you’re doing.” She rose to her feet. “I’m going to bed.”

Zack followed her down the hall. Magda’s head throbbed out of control. When she went into her room and closed the door, he put a foot in it.

“What are you doing?” she leaned on the door, hoping to God it would break his foot, but no such luck.

“You’re not to be alone,” Zack said.

“You’re not to be in my bedroom, because we’re not married. Or have you and Preacher completely abandoned that little thing you call a religion in favour of this lunacy?”

Zack forced the door open. He followed her into the room and shut the door behind him. The lock clicked under his hand.

Magda backed away. She looked down at her paper-thin hospital gown. Christ, it showed everything. She retreated to the bed and sat with her back to the wall. “Get out of my room.”

“Deep down, that
’s not really what you want.” Zack lowered himself onto the edge of the bed. The mattress sank beneath him. “Magdalene, do you have any concept of how beautiful a girl you are? Christ’s light shines through your face, even when you are consumed by evil.” He brushed a lock of hair from her eyes. “I have loved you from afar for years. I watched you grow unhappy with John. I watched you fall into a darker path and I longed to be the one to bring you help. Now I have that opportunity, and God help me, I fear it.”

Magda wrapped her arms around herself and inched further back into the wall. She could barely hear him over the pounding in her head. She wondered what Doctor Baker would say about avoiding stress now. “Leave me alone, Zack,” she whispered. “I’m not well. Let me just sleep.”

“I know you’re not well. That’s why I’m here. I’m going to show you the way back.” He moved further onto the bed and planted his knees on either side of her. He closed his hands around her wrists. “Let me show you what it truly means to be a woman.”

Pain flickered through her head. Magda was torn between fear she’d black out again, terror of what he intended and the urge to laugh herself stupid at the image that popped into her head of Zack wearing women’s clothes. He wasn’t laughing, though. He’d already prised her hands off her shoulders. He shifted his weight on top of her and pinned her wrists to the pillow. She struggled to free herself, clenched her fists and kicked out, but that only resulted in swift evidence of Zack’s excitement.

“You sick fuck,” Magda hissed. “This is nothing to do with your God. This is just you getting your rocks off. Since when did Preacher sanction rape?”

“Relations between a husband and wife are not rape.” Zack’s breath was hot on her ear. His hand tore at the hospital gown. “A wife submits to her husband in all things.”

“You’re not my husband!” Magda twisted her head away from his mouth when he tried to kiss her. She wondered if they’d done this to Jonah Sand, too, before he killed himself. She wondered if it had been better that Adam was unconscious when Amanda did this to him. No doubt Zack was supposed to have drugged her first, but he obviously enjoyed her being conscious. She felt sick at the thought Preacher had sanctioned this, all of this. This must be his standard treatment method for anybody who was gay. She wondered how many more would die before he realised how wrong he was.

The gown gave way. Zack ran a hand over her breasts and down her body. Magda desperately tried to think of some way to make him stop. She wondered exactly how much he bought into the Satanic possession crap.

He moved away slightly to loosen his pants with one hand, the other still pinning both wrists.

Magda hissed at him. When that didn’t get his attention, she made a low growl in her throat. “She’s mine,” she said in her deepest voice. “If you touch her, I will come at you with one thousand demons and claw your brain from your skull. I will make you into an
abomination who eats snakes and spiders and crawls around in the gutter.”

Zack went white. His hand paused on his zipper. “Out, Satan,” he whispered.

“You have no authority over me!” Magda screamed. She jerked awkwardly and freed her hands. Zack came back quickly, pinned her wrists with one hand and covered her mouth and nose with the other. Magda experienced a moment of blind terror with the airflow cut off. Pain speared through her head. She sank her teeth into his hand.

Zack yelled, snatched his hand away and slapped her face. If he’d feared her Satan impression a moment ago, now he was lost in rage. He grabbed her legs, pulled them apart and entered her.

Magda screamed. She pummelled his chest with her fists and hurled every insult she knew, but it was over within moments; he went rigid, closed his eyes, cried out and went limp. Then he rolled off her.

Magda curled up into a ball and squeezed her eyes shut. Zack stroked her hair.

“You’re on the path now,” he said. “We’ll fight Satan together, Magdalene, and soon you’ll have no need of that woman.”

A few moments later his snores filled the room.

Magda slid off the bed, unlocked the door and went into the bathroom. She stared into the mirror for a full minute. The woman who stared back at her was bruised, dirty, dishevelled, but her eyes were dry. Her head didn’t throb. She wasn’t stressed or in danger of blacking out.

All of the emotions she knew so well were
channelled into one overwhelming ball of rage.

She
walked into a hot shower and washed every inch of her body to get his smell off her. She shampooed her hair and scrubbed her skin until it was raw and red, but she still didn’t feel clean.

When the hot water ran out, she
towelled herself dry. There was Adam’s dress, still hanging where she’d left it. She pulled it on and smoothed the folds of material over her body. She wondered what Adam would have done. He hadn’t gone after Amanda and tried to kill her; he’d just tried to separate himself. Maybe he was a better person than she was.

She went back to the mirror and brushed her hair so it lay flat over her ears. Then she padded back to the bedroom, walked softly over to her closet and turned on the little light in there.
She found Adam’s knee high boots and pulled them on, and then a long coat, because it was cold. She found a dark red lipstick and ran it over her lips, then used an eye pencil to darken the outlines of her eyes.