Love Lies Dying (21 page)

John picked up the receiver and listened to the dial tone. At least they could call for help if they needed it.

He turned around and stared at the spiral staircase leading up to the platform attached to the wall. It was an old wrought-iron staircase that was beginning to rust in some areas. John put his foot on the first step and tested to see if it would take his weight. It moaned but stayed firm. Satisfied that the whole thing wasn’t about to fall on him, he continued to climb until he was standing on the platform and looking down over the church below.

Zoe was still working at the fireplace, balling up the sheets of newspaper and pushing it under the logs.

John walked to the lectern and placed his hands upon an old dusty copy of a King James Bible. The Bible was large and heavy, its leather cover stiff and cracked.

“The Lord giveth,” he said in a deep booming voice which reverberated around the church.

Zoe turned around to look at him with a smile on her face.

“And the Lord taketh away,” he continued.

“Should we pray for the Lord to watch over us in our hour of need?” Zoe called to him.

“Can’t hurt,” John said. “We need all the help we can get.”

Zoe turned back to continue building the fire.

“Is that fire going to be long?” John asked. “It’s cold in here.”

“I’m working on it,” she replied.

“Okay, I’m going to take a look around outside, just to make sure everything’s okay.”

“Okay.”

“I won’t be long.”

“Okay.”

“Everything looks safe in here.”

“Ah-uh.”

John watched as Zoe balled up more newspaper and buried it under the firewood.

“If you hear me screaming, that’s just me dying,” he smirked.

“Okay.” She continued to focus on the fireplace.

John shook his head.

Once she’s concentrating on something,
he thought.
You can’t break her.

He turned from the lectern and was about to climb back down the stairs when he noticed a small square doorway set into the back wall at the base of the large cross. The doorway was no more than three feet high and looked more like an access hatch. But access to what? John bent down, rested the fireplace poker on the floor, reached out and grabbed the handle of the door with both hands. He pulled but the door wouldn’t budge. He noticed the small keyhole under the doorknob. The door was either locked or jammed. He pulled at it a couple more times just to make sure, but it wouldn’t budge.

“
Johnny!
” Zoe squealed.

John jumped up, spun around and looked down at the fireplace.

Zoe was standing with a scared expression on her face and had her hands covering her open mouth.

“
What?
” he called, his eyes darting around the church. “What is it?”

Zoe ran her hands over her hair and checked her bun.

“Sorry,” she said. “I looked up and I couldn’t see you. I didn’t know where you had gone. Then I heard that rattling noise.”

John let out a deep sigh. “It was me. I was up here,” he said.

“I know that
now
,” Zoe replied. “But when I couldn’t see you I thought maybe, you know, that you’d –”

“Well don’t think anything like that. I was only up here looking at some sort of service hatch. It’s down at the base of this platform. You can’t see it from where you are. I tried to open it, but I think it’s locked.”

“Strange place for a hatch,” she replied with her hands on her hips now.

“I know.” John walked over to the staircase and descended back to the church floor. “Now, as I said before, I’m going to have a look around outside. Okay?”

“Alright.”

“I don’t think you heard a word I said a few minutes ago,” he walked towards her.

“When was that?”

“When you were working on the fireplace. I had a whole conversation with you, but you seemed miles away.”

She tried to smile, but it didn’t work. “I’d like to be miles away from this place,” she whispered.

He opened his arms and she stepped into them. He hugged her hard.

Me too,
he thought.
With you.

“I know,” he replied. “And soon we will be. All of us. You, me and Helen.”

She looked up into his eyes.

“But what if that
doesn’t
happen?” she asked.

“Don’t think like that.”

“But I have to. What if I’m forced to go with Ricky tomorrow? What if he hurts Helen? Or what if he hurts me? Or
you?
”

“You can’t dwell on these things.”

“I must! I know Ricky and I know what he’s capable of. You have to understand that there’s a pretty good chance that he’ll only let the two of you go, and there’s even a better chance that he’ll let
none
of us go.”

She burrowed her head back into his chest.

“I’m sorry, Johnny. But I thought you should know. You don’t know who you’re dealing with here and tomorrow’s going to be very dangerous.”

“I understand.”

“Probably the most dangerous day of your life.”

“I know.”

“I just hope you’re right and I’m wrong,” Zoe replied.

John rubbed her back and let her smell waft over him. She was beginning to shake and John wasn’t sure if it was from cold or fear.

“Okay,” he said after a moment or two. “Why don’t you get that fire started so that when I come back inside it’s all nice and warm in here.”

She nodded and stared back up at him.

“Okay.”

“Good, I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

She turned and walked back to the fireplace. He watched her as she went.

We’ll get out of this,
he thought.
All of us.

The security floodlights illuminated the moment John stepped out the church door. He waited for his eyes to adjust to the brightness before he took a step further. 

Once he could see without squinting, he stared out into the trees and bushes that surrounded the church. He listened for any kind of noise, but the night was quiet. Almost unnaturally quiet. There was no breeze to rustle through the pines, and no sound of any animals either.

The only sounds he could hear were his own footsteps in the dirt and gravel and the occasional cooling sounds of the Jeep’s engine. He walked to the Jeep and checked around it, making sure it hadn’t been sabotaged by having the wheels slashed or something.

You’re getting paranoid!

He checked through the windows too, just to make sure no one was hiding inside, but he could only see the empty seats and luggage in the back.

I better bring in our clothes,
he thought.
But that can wait.

Satisfied that nothing had changed near the Jeep, John slowly began to walk around the church. He walked down the long right side wall first, his path getting darker as he left the security lights behind. He kept his eyes focussed on the bushes and trees around him, looking for any sign of movement. As he passed one of the stained-glass windows, John tried to peer inside, but the warped glass didn’t let him see clearly. He could just make out Zoe’s head to his right; she was still looking downwards and was focussed on the fireplace.

He turned back and continued to study the pines.

It was at that moment he realised he no longer had the fireplace poker with him. He had no idea where he had left it.

Suddenly he felt a little vulnerable with nothing to protect himself. But he wasn’t going back to find it and then have to start this all over again. The only way for him to go was forward.

Let’s just hope I don’t run into any trouble.

He reached the far end of the church having seen nothing suspicious. More floodlights illuminated the area behind the church and John paused at the corner for a minute or two, just to survey the area and to look out for any movement.

The area behind the church was cleared too, but more so than anywhere else. About thirty feet away and down a slight decline was a smaller building, built to resemble the church. But this building was made of wood.

Quickly, he ran over to the building and began to inspect it. It was half the size of the church and the paint on the wooden walls was peeling. While it resembled the church from a distance, up close John could tell that it was nothing more than a storage or machinery shed. There was a double doorway and one window, both set into the front wall. There were no floodlights attached to the shed, so John had to rely on the weaker light from the church lights to help him inspect the area. The trees and bushes began again directly behind the shed, but they had been cleared on both sides.

The double doors were locked with a small single padlock, threaded through the metal latch. John cupped his hands around his face as he pushed himself up against the window, but he couldn’t make much out inside the shed. He could see it was filled with some sort of mechanical equipment, but he couldn’t tell what kind. He guessed it was a tractor of some sort, but it was too dark to tell.

Satisfied that the area was safe and that no one was around – at least, as far as he could see – he turned and walked back to the church.

As he walked, he picked up the faintest smell of smoke in the air. He raised his eyes to the chimney of the church and was sure he could see thick wisps of smoke rising from it.

Well done, Zoe,
he thought.

Realizing that the night was colder than he thought, John began to jog down the other side of the church, checking from side to side to make sure nothing was suspicious.

In the shadows halfway down he spotted a paved path heading off into the pines.

He stopped by the path and ran a hand through his hair. He didn’t want to investigate too far from the church, but he couldn’t risk that the path led to someone watching them or to some other building from where Fox was waiting to spring his attack.

John turned back and stared through a nearby church window. But, just as with the windows on the other side, he could hardly see anything inside.

I’ve got to,
he told himself.
For peace of mind!

He turned and carefully walked down the path. As he did so, he left the comfort of the floodlights and the church behind. Very quickly, the night began to swallow the light and the path became darker and darker.

The silence closed in around him and the cold night air made his breathing heavy and damp.

Just as the last of the light dissipated and he thought he couldn’t possibly continue along in the dark, a new set of lights illuminated from in front of him. He squinted for a moment and braced himself for anything, but the night was as quiet and lonely as ever.

The path ended just in front of him and opened out into a large and mostly empty rectangular space. In the middle of the area was a large circular gazebo painted in greens and creams, and directly behind the gazebo were sets of wooden seats. John scanned the area for any sign of life but there wasn’t any. He took a few tentative steps out into the area and looked around. The ground underneath him was not paved, but it wasn’t dirt either. In fact, it was a clay substance that reminded John of old-style tennis courts.

He looked around once more and nodded his head.

It
was
a tennis court, or at least, was one once. The lines that had been painted on the surface of the court were now almost completely worn away by the weather, but he could just make out fragments of them here and here. Halfway down the court and on each side was a short metal pole, probably once used to hold the tennis net. A metal loop was welded at the top of each pole.

A perfect place to tie the net,
John thought as he fingered the rusty loop.

Against one of the wooden seats leaned an old chalk scoreboard.

John walked over to the gazebo and slowly climbed the steps.

No one’s played tennis here for a while,
he thought as he stood in the centre of the structure.

The gazebo looked new. The green and cream paintwork was not weather-beaten or peeling like the shed or the church door. It had either been just recently built, or renovated.

“I wonder if one of Fox’s ‘business deals’ paid for this,” John mumbled to himself.

The wooden seats surrounding the gazebo on two sides were also made from old pews that had probably once resided in the church.

It reminded John of the place where he and Helen had married.

It didn’t feel like six years ago. Time had gone so fast. But he still remembered it as if it were yesterday.