Saint (26 page)

Time after time he'd held back his power while they continued to strip Johnny of his identity.

The cup stopped shaking and rose an inch.

There had been days of reprieve, of course. Assignments to kill in which he'd shown his victims more than a bullet. But on balance, the whole experience had tried his patience to the snapping point.

He glanced at the cup. It flew vertically and stopped in his hand.

The question he had to settle in the next three or four hours was a simple one: Should he kill the mother now or use her as leverage if Johnny managed to surprise him?

For that matter, should he kill Sally first or Kelly first?

They both had five letters.

They both ended in
lly.

They were both two syllables.

They were both dear, dear, dear to Johnny, Johnny, Johnny.

One had given birth to Johnny, which was an offense worthy of death in and of itself.

The other had humiliated Englishman a hundred times, which would earn her a place in the hall of wide eyes and open mouths on sticks.

He lifted the cup to his lips and drank the scalding coffee.

Which would it be? Maybe both. Yes. Why not both?

28

D
o you see anything?” Kelly asked, adjusting the small duffel bag on her shoulder. They'd hidden the other bag with their papers, the money, and two pistols behind the seats and brought two hand-guns, the knives, and their personal effects with them.

Johnny studied the rocks ahead. “It's a canyon.”

“I can see that. He's not here.”

“He said at the mouth of the canyon. This has to be it.”

“Maybe this is the wrong canyon.”

“My mother was specific.”

Johnny stared up at the towering cliffs on each side. Night was coming fast. Already the canyon was encased in deep shadows. The encroaching darkness was comforting.

“I think I've been here before,” he said. “It's like a tunnel.”

“You remember being here, or does it just remind you of where you've been?”

“No . . . No, I think I've actually been here.” Johnny headed into the canyon.

“This is the mouth. We should wait—”

“I've been here!” He began to run. “It's coming back! I've been up here before.”

She ran after him. “Johnny!”

Johnny spun around and skipped backward. He flung his arms wide and yelled at the tops of the cliffs. “I've been here! I've been here, Kelly. I can remember it now. I remember.”

Kelly grinned despite herself. “That's good, Johnny.” Her eyes scanned the sheer stone walls on each side. “Meanwhile, our truck's down in the town. Englishman's probably sifting through it right now. We should have left.”

“We
are
gone. How will he know about this place?”

“I don't trust him.”

“Then trust me! I've been here, and there's no way he knows about this place.”

“Johnny!” The voice echoed softly through the canyon behind him. Johnny spun. There, thirty yards up the canyon, stood the old man from the hospital. David Abraham.

“That's him,” Johnny said under his breath. “Do you recognize him?” “He was on the stage at the president's press conference.”

They walked up to David. When they stopped twenty feet from him, he approached them, wearing a mischievous grin.

“The helicopter dropped me off twenty minutes ago. They'll spend the night on top of the cliff.”

“And us?” Kelly asked.

David's eyes shifted to her. “Kelly, I presume.”

“This is Kelly Larine,” Johnny said.

David let his gaze linger on Kelly for several long seconds. “Welcome to ground zero, Kelly Larine. As for us, we will be spending the night around the corner. Come.”

David turned on his heels and angled toward a massive boulder on their left. Johnny followed with Kelly hurrying to catch them. The wall behind the towering boulder split to reveal a second, smaller canyon.

“I've been here,” Johnny said, picking up his pace.

The older man's chuckle bounced eerily off the cliffs.

Johnny grinned. He'd been here. He was so eager to embrace the memories triggering the distinct déjà vu that he began to sprint. Past David, around the boulder, up to the mouth of the smaller canyon, where he slid to a halt.

The smaller canyon ran thirty meters in and then stopped abruptly at a rock slide that rose sharply to the top of the cliffs. A small log cabin had been built on the sand at the base.

This was wrong. He didn't know why or what, but something was wrong with the scene. The déjà vu popped like a soap bubble meeting a needle.

“What happened?” Johnny asked.

“So then you do remember,” David said. “The monastery that used to be here. Project Showdown.”

“No. Samuel and my mother both mentioned Project Showdown. I . . . I know that I've been here, just like I know I lived in Paradise and that my mother is Sally. The rest . . .”

“The rest will come,” David said. “Shall we?”

They walked to the log cabin in silence. Inside, an oil lamp burned on a crude wooden table flanked by two benches. There were no stairs leading to the loft over the kitchen, only a rather unstable ladder made of twine-bound branches. One bed upstairs. Two beds in a bedroom along the back wall. That was it.

“Outhouse is behind,” David said. “It's not the Waldorf, but it allows me to get away and reflect on Project Showdown whenever I am tempted to doubt. If you ever find yourself in that same place, doubting, you may come here. In fact, I strongly recommend it. Please, have a seat.”

Kelly and Johnny sat on one side of the table facing David, who still wore his mischievous grin.

“Your mother and the Smithers left Paradise?” David asked.

“She said she'd make the arrangements. They'll spend the next two days in Delta.”

An image of the young boy who'd confronted them in New York filled Johnny's mind. Samuel was a younger version of his father. Staring at the older man now, Johnny was sure he did know them both as they claimed. Samuel had been his friend.

But that was impossible.

“How could I have known Samuel?” Johnny asked. “He's still a boy.”

“Is he?” David looked at Kelly. “What I say tonight must stay with you. No one can know. Not a soul. I don't think anyone would believe you, but that's not the point. What I tell you tonight is sacred. I don't mind saying that I'm nervous about your hearing this, Kelly.”

“Then maybe you shouldn't tell me. I've done my share of damage already.”

“She has to hear,” Johnny said. “Without her I'm lost. What sense does it make to love someone you can't trust? If I'm ever going to be normal again, it will be with Kelly's help.”

“As you insist. But I don't think you'll ever be normal, Johnny.”

Then I'd rather die
. He kept the thought to himself and watched David's kind eyes. There was a mystery hidden there that Johnny had to uncover.

“You shot the president?” David asked.

Johnny hesitated. “Yes.”

“He saved the president,” Kelly said. “If not for Johnny, Englishman would have been given the assignment, and the president would be dead.”

“I know. And so does the president. He's given us a window while he decides what to do. It won't be easy convincing the authorities that the president's shooter was actually his savior.” David drummed his fingers on the table. “My, my, where to begin.”

“Who am I?” Johnny asked. “Start with that.”

“You're Sally's son. You grew up in Paradise—”

“Not my history. Who I am.”

“You're someone who knows how to ask the right questions. That's a start.”

David cleared his throat and continued when faced by silence. “To know who you are, you have to believe some things you may not want to believe. How do you think you managed to affect the bullet's flight path?”

Johnny thought about his training. Lowering the heat in his pit. The electric chair. He glanced at Kelly.

“By affecting the zero-point field,” she said. “The quantum theory behind observable telekinetics. Are you familiar with quantum theory?”

“Quite. I was fascinated with the theory years ago. There's some merit to zero-point-field research, more than most realize, but I can guarantee you that Johnny's power doesn't originate in his mind.”

“Then where?”

David took a deep breath. He drummed his fingers again. “Do you believe in the supernatural, Johnny?”

DALE CROMPTON parked the truck behind the large theater and strode down the yellow dashes of the lone paved street in Paradise, Colorado, imagining the showdown that once occurred here.

The town was empty, as far as he could see. He stopped in the middle of the road and studied the buildings in the waning light. It had all started here. Fitting that it would also end here. Even more fitting that it would end because of him.

A screen door slammed to his right. He turned slowly and saw her standing on the porch of a white house. Johnny's Sally.
Hello, Mommy
. For a moment they just looked at each other. No surprise from either him or her. The stuff of a perfect plan.
May all ye who don't
kiss my feet rot in hell. Amen
.

She stepped off the porch and made her way to the car parked on the street.

Dale broke his stare and strode for the bar.

“SUPERNATURAL?” JOHNNY said. “I don't know what I believe. I used to, I think. I was a chaplain, but I can't remember my faith. Do I still have a faith?”

“Your faith has clearly remembered you,” David said. “Your power comes from your faith. At least partially.”

“You're saying his power is supernatural,” Kelly said.

“Regardless of what we believe or want to believe, there is evidence of a great power that supersedes anything explained by our current understanding of science. Yes, the supernatural. How is it possible for one man to see events that will happen hundreds or thousands of years after his death?”

Johnny had never heard of such a thing. Actually, he was sure he had, but he didn't remember.

“I don't know.”

“It's a gift. Words that one day come to life. Do you think something like this is possible?”

“I don't see how, but obviously I should. So I'll say yes.”

“Even agnostics can't deny the writings of Nostradamus and certain prophets whose words have come to life. Saint John. Trust me for now, the ability to know the future, however misunderstood by science, is not
unknown
by science.”

“Fine. I'll take your word for it.”

“Good. Because there's hardly a leap between knowing the future and changing the present. Do you remember a man named Samson? He was a prophet—a judge, actually, but like a prophet—in Israel thousands of years ago.”

“Samson?”

“How was it possible for a man named Samson to kill thousands of Philistines with the jawbone of an ass? Or level a massive stone building with one hard push? You think it was a fable?”

Johnny blinked. There was something here that he could remember. Comic books with superheroes that he read when he was younger. Samson was a superhero.

“Supernatural,” he said.

David grinned. “I won't give you all the specifics of Project Showdown yet—they would overwhelm you. All in good time. But let me tell you what you need to understand your power.”

He sat back in his chair. “Twelve years ago a confrontation between good and evil of biblical proportions visited this valley. Many things happened that week. It was then that a student named Billy found, among other things, some books in the dungeons beneath the monastery. Ancient books that demonstrate the power of the word and free will. They were called the
Books of Histories
, first discovered by Thomas Hunter, whose life is documented in the three volumes simply referred to now as
Black
,
Red
, and
White
.”

None of this rang a bell with Johnny. David saw his blank look and moved on without elaborating.

“Never mind. You don't need to know any of this to understand. But these books that Billy found held a power that few have been for-tunate enough to witness firsthand. I mentioned Samson's strength. But there are accounts of hundreds of these sorts of things, manifes-tations of superhuman power that changed the course of history.”

David drew a deep breath. “In the case of these books, certain things written in them would actually happen. Like the scrolls in John's revelation. Do you follow?”

Johnny put his elbows on the table. He didn't know what to think about any of this. None of it was harder to believe than a prophecy, he supposed, and he'd agreed to believe the possibility of at least that much.

“Books that create truth,” Johnny said. “Things that happen because they're written.”

“Correct. At any rate, an event occurred that week that was so inconsequential at the time that we hardly noticed it. Evidently you and two other children each made entries into the books and then promptly forgot about those entries. I don't blame you. There was no evidence at the time that your entries had any significance or would come true.”

“What entries?”

“‘Johnny was given great powers to destroy anyone who stood in the way of truth.' Those were your exact words.”

“That's it?”

David smiled and cocked an eyebrow. “Pretty broad statement, isn't it?”

“What happened to the books?”

“Let's just say that as far as we know, they went missing forever. It wasn't until you earned your first Purple Heart in Iraq that I took any notice. You were a chaplain and braved impossible odds to save a colonel stranded at a post. The rest of your company had been killed. Yet you, a noncombatant, went back. You evidently faced a barrage of gunfire without being hit. I talked to the colonel myself. He described a scene that he himself had difficulty believing. But he was alive. You had to have done what he saw you do. Samuel began to watch you then.”