The Messenger (2011 reformat) (35 page)

She thought
further. Okay. There's some hokey piece of iron that people believe is part of
this bell. I can deal with that. Dhevic thinks it's in my branch. If it is, the
logical thing to do is let him get it, and maybe all of this will end.

"You want
me to let you into my post office to look for this thing, is that it?"

"Yes,"
Dhevic said.

"Well, I
don't know if I can do that," she told him. "People will ask questions,
and the police already want to bring you in for questioning. I'm probably breaking
some law by not telling them that I know where you're staying."

"I've
committed no crimes."

Jane peered at
him. Everything was opposites. Whenever she looked at him she couldn't believe
he was anything but benevolent, if a bit bizarre.

"Tell me
how to find the icon. If I find it, I'll bring it to you."

"It's a
very dangerous object. It's very powerful-"

"It's
only powerful if you believe in it. I don't believe in it. I just want this to
stop. I'll go along with whatever charade I have to end it."

"Is this
a charade?" he asked in a softer voice. "Look at me. I want to show
you something."

Jane grit her
teeth. "No."

"You'll
believe ... if you look at me."

"No!
You're hypnotizing me-"

"Very
well." The man was smiling gently. "The icon will be hidden in some
dark place, below ground, a basement, a crawlspace or a conduit-"

"Of
course. How creepy!" she mocked.

"Because
its owner exists in dark, low places."

"Fine."
She thought about it and thought about it. Maybe I should let him go with me,
find this thing, and be done with it. She kept feeling like she could trust
him, without knowing why. "I have to go to the bathroom," she said,
distracted.

"Right
over there," he told her and pointed.

She got up
hesitantly and looked around at the dilapidated accommodation. "I
mean-there aren't, like, roaches and rats in there, are there?"

Another smile.
"No. I evicted them all personally. I told them that if they expected to
stay, they'd have to split the cost of the room with me."

Jane spared a
laugh and went in. Actually, Dhevic had cleaned the bathroom quite well-that or
the housekeeping staff, but Jane doubted that this motel even had a
housekeeping staff. She sighed and looked at herself in the mirror over the
sink. Her eyes had dark circles; she was tired, worn out. All the more reason
to get this over with, she thought.

She stiffened
at a skittering sound. Roach, probably. The things made her hair stand on end.
Forget about going to the bathroom and just leave, she suggested, but a morbid
curiosity seized her.

The skittering
came from the bathtub behind her. She pulled back the shower curtain and,
indeed, saw a large palmetto bug roving around near the tub mat.

But that's not
why Jane nearly had a heart attack.

Lying on top
of that rubber tub mat was a slim naked woman with her throat cut. Jane's feet
felt nailed to the floor. The woman was young, with long flowing mocha hair,
her mouth agape in death.

At the end of
the tub sat a pile of clothes. Jane recognized the colors at once: the
light-blue shirt and the slate-blue shorts. A post-office uniform. And that's
when she knew who she was looking at; it was Doreen Fletcher, one of her newest
employees.

Carved on
Doreen's chest was the likeness of a bell with a star-shaped striker.

Jane sucked in
her scream. She popped open the narrow bathroom window, crawled out, and ran.

There was no
time to think. Her biggest fear was that her heart might begin to fibrillate from
the shock of what she'd seen. The car, the car, she thought manically. What if
Dhevic was waiting for her? Fortunately, she'd parked toward the end of the motel,
in front of the office. When she peered around the corner, her car remained,
and there was no sign of Dhevic.

She took a
chance, jumped in, drove away with her foot to the floor.

Police,
police, police, came the next staccato bursts of thought. Steve, I've got to
find Steve. She could pull over right now and call him but she didn't want to
stop. It would only take a few moments before Dhevic realized that she was
gone-and what she'd seen and he would be after her. She pulled off the main
road onto a side street, cutting across town. There was a county sheriff's
station just up the road. I'll be safe there. I can call him from there-

But the rest
of her thoughts severed.

Hands were on
her from behind.

Rough hands
first cupped her breasts, then slid up to her throat. Now she truly believed
her heart would stop.

Dhevic's right
behind me, in the back seat...

But as the
hands tightened, her terrified eyes shot to the rearview mirror, and that's
where she saw the face.

Not Dhevic's
face at all.

It was the
face of Aldezhor.

Suddenly
ghosts of the fallen angel's hands were covering her own on the wheel. She
heard a chuckle and a whisper, felt the faintest kiss at the side her neck,
then a foul hot tongue licked her skin.

She heard
words not in her ears but in her head.

You will not
foil me. And you will not challenge my servants.

The hands were
forcing Jane's to steer to the side- The arrival of the Messenger is at hand...Jane's
car thudded over the curb, plowed down into a ravine, and collided with a
yard-wide oak tree.

I

Jane awoke in
a fog, the most obscene nightmares tittering at the fringes of her memory. Had
she awakened to the sound of a bell?

She raised a
hand to her throbbing head, felt a fat bandage there. When her vision cleared
she noticed with some shock that she was in a hospital room.

What happened?
Her memory was a blank.

"Hi,
Jane."

She looked
aside and saw the smiling Dr. Mitchell peering back at her through his circular
spectacles. He was holding a clipboard.

Steve stood
worriedly beside him, holding Jane's hand.

"Don't
worry, you're going to be okay," Steve said.

"What
happened?"

"In
clinical terms," Dr. Mitchell answered, "you have a minor orbital
concussion and sequent but extraneous abrasions."

"In not
so clinical terms?" Jane asked.

"You
dumped your car into a ravine off of Craker Avenue, banged your head pretty
hard. One of my patrol units spotted you and called an ambulance. Jane, what
were you doing out there?"

She felt
bewildered. "I...I don't remember."

"A
retrograde amnesic effect, Jane," Dr. Mitchell said. "It should pass in
twenty-four hours, and so should the blurry vision and grogginess. If symptoms
persist, though, call me."

"I think
you should stay the night," Steve said.

"No, I
don't feel that bad, just a little light-headed." She winced in frustration.
"I just...wish I could remember what happened. Is my car-"

"Totaled,
I'm afraid," Steve said. "We towed it into town. And the kids are
fine; I posted a female officer at your house to look after them. Christ, Jane,
I was worried."

"Well I
still am! What the hell was I doing so far away from the post office?"

After Dr.
Mitchell had released her, Steve took Jane home to his house. She wanted to
talk about what happened, but the frustration just kept overwhelming her.
"Why can't I remember anything?" This is just so aggravating.

"You
heard the doctor," Steve said. "That smack on the head gave you a temporary
loss of short-term memory. But you gotta do what they say, get some rest, take
it easy for a few days."

Sure, she
thought. Take it easy. Gimme a break. She couldn't remember anything. But in a
moment, her eyes widened as a single memory popped into her mind.
"Steve...I think."

Steve brought
her some coffee to the kitchen table. "What? You remember something?"

"Dhevic,"
she whispered. "That's where I was."

"Dhevic?
Where is he?" Steve stood poised at the information. "How did you get
there?"

"He...left
his address the day he came to my office."

"We've
been trying to find out where he is all week, but- Why did you go there? I told
you the guy's dangerous!"

"I had to
talk to him. There were so many things he's said, things that were too uncanny.
There was no one else to ask, Steve. But when I got there ..."Jane closed
her eyes, struggled to remember.

The next flash
of memory slapped her in the face. Her new employee, Doreen, lying naked and
dead in Dhevic's bathtub. "My God, Steve, I remember now. You were
right-"

"What?"
He was leaning over, intent. "What do you remember?"

"There...
there was a dead body in his bathtub, one of the girls who works for me. Her
throat was slashed and ... she had that bell-shaped symbol cut into her
chest-"

"Jesus
Christ!" Steve exploded. "I told you he's the guy behind all this!
You're lucky he didn't murder you too!"

"I got
out through the bathroom window before he could get to me."

"Where's
he staying?"

Jane gave
Steve the slip of paper; he snatched the phone. "Dispatch, this is Chief
Higgins. We finally got an eyewitness for capital murder against Alexander
Dhevic. Send all units ten-six to the Palms Motel on thirty-fourth Street.
Arrest Dhevic on sight, multiple homicide. And put out a state-wide
all-points." He paused to ask Jane: "Any idea what he's driving?"

She'd seen
that, too, hadn't she? The big SUV right in front of his motel-room door.
"A Ford Explorer. It was silver. I know the make and model because I
almost bought one once."

Steve piped
the vehicle description to the dispatcher, and he hung up. Then he hugged Jane.
"I'm sure he's not dumb enough to be anywhere near the motel now, but at
least we can take him in when we find him."

"Where do
you think he'd go from there?"

II

It was almost
as if the woods conspired against him. Dhevic's footsteps crunched through
heavy thicket; fallen branches snapped like firecrackers. He knew he had to be
very careful now; he'd avoided the main road and came in through the other side
of town, on foot. They'll be looking for me, he realized.

He wasn't
terribly worried though. He knew that his Lord and Master would protect him.

Where is it?
he thought. Had he lost his sense of direction? It should be coming up any
second.

His hand
reached out and pushed away some branches...and there it was.

The west
branch post office sat alone in the moonlight. Dhevic looked for signs of
police, saw none, then jogged to the building, using shadows for cover. There were
no cars in the lot-would there be maintenance people here this late? I'll find
out real soon, he thought. He opened a tattered briefcase, extracted his lock
picks, and was in through a back door in little more time than it would take to
open with the key.

Dhevic stepped
inside and closed the door behind him.

III

The coffee was
helping her feel better, even after the grisly recollection.

"You're
right, though," she said at the table. "I'm sure he would've left the
motel once I got away."

"Sure,
but now that I've got an APB out-plus your description of his vehicle-every cop
in the county is going to be looking for him. There's no way he can get
away."

"God, I
hope you're right."

"Relax, I
am right." He poured more coffee for them both, then grabbed the phone
again. "Let me call in and get a status report."

Jane went to
the kitchen sink while Steve was on the phone. She needed some cold water in
her face. It livened her, as she'd hoped, but it also sharpened the images of
her memory: Doreen in Dhevic's bathtub. She could hear Steve talking in the
background.

"Yeah,
dispatch, it's Chief Higgins again. I need a status report on that APB."

IV

The strong
flashlight beam roved over the darkened aisles, feeders, and collators. Just
doesn't feel right up here, Dhevic thought. It would be an easy vibe. He
spotted a door, hoped it led to the basement, and when he opened it, he was
right. The only problem, now, was going down there.