‘Yeah. I checked mine. Not even one dot.’
‘Fuck.’
Outside, Beau was hurling a constant stream of insults at the window, alternating them with demands that I bring Lizzy downstairs and ‘give’ her to him, while Mick and Keith, front paws resting on the sill and heads poking out of the window, answered him with increasingly frenzied barks.
‘Could he have cut the phone wire?’ I said.
‘He hasn’t had enough time.’
‘Hey Kain! Bring her out here now, you fuckin’ limp dicked, pussy faced mother fucker!’
‘What are we going to do?’ Lizzy said.
‘Try and fool him first,’ I said, ignoring Beau. ‘If that doesn’t work, I’ll have to go outside.’ I leaned out of the window and held the phone high so that Beau could see it, shouting to make myself heard above the pups as I had no intention of taking them away from the window and calming them down. I wanted Beau to see how much they yearned to get at him.
‘See this? I’m calling nine-one-one.’
Beau made a face, mocking me. ‘Oh I’m so scared!’
‘What the hell’s wrong with you anyway?’
‘You’ve got Lizzy in there. I want her. She’s mine!’
‘Oh for fuck’s sake, Beau, get a grip. She’s dead and you’re drunk, deluded and sound like a villain from a B movie. Now, last warning: fuck off or I’m calling the sheriff’s office.’
‘You do that.’
I sighed and walked back to Lizzy as Beau turned his attention to Mick and Keith, yelling at them to shut the fuck up, which only made them bark more.
‘I’m going to have to go outside and shove him into his truck,’ I said. ‘Perhaps even drive it to the highway.’
‘Is he armed?’
‘I couldn’t tell, but best to assume that he is. I’ll go outside with Mick and Keith.’ I returned to our bedroom, dressed, holstered my Glock and then walked towards the stairs.
‘Bruce, are you sure? Couldn’t we just-’
‘What?’ I said, looking at Lizzy over my shoulder. ‘Wait for someone to notice that Beau has crawled out from underneath his rock and go looking for him? It’s not a problem, Hon. Just another asshat that a Kain has got to deal with.’
‘What if Gary or he’s outside?’
‘You mean the entity?’
Lizzy nodded.
I stared at her, trying to feel brave and failing impressively. She had a point.
‘Why don’t you take Father Kearney’s bottle of holy water?’ Lizzy said.
‘After Gary got in, I’m no longer convinced that it works.’
‘Maybe it only works on spirits.’
‘Maybe.’
‘Take it anyway.’
‘Okay. Can’t hurt I guess.’
‘Be careful.’ She smiled wryly. ‘I don’t want to have to come outside and save your arse.’
‘Maybe if you came outside and decked him, Beau would leave us alone.’
‘I’ll think about it.’
I grinned at her and then went over to the window. ‘I’m giving you one last chance, Beau. Get the fuck off my property. A deputy is on his way and until he arrives, I’m coming out with my dogs and this.’ I held up the Glock so that he could see it.
Beau sneered and started to say something, then his expression suddenly went blank. A humanoid shape, even darker than the impenetrable blackness that lurked beyond my floodlights, appeared behind him and stepped into Beau’s body. Intelligence returned to his face, but it wasn’t Beau Harkinen who looked up at me.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
While it still had the same leathery skin, the large nose, green eyes and white beard, it seemed as if someone, or something, was wearing Beau’s face.
‘Hello Dashwood, you cunt,’ a deep, scratchy voice said. ‘Miss me?’
I heard Lizzy gasp and turned around. She was standing several feet from the window. There was no way that Harkinen could have seen her.
‘No,’ she said, backing away, Mick and Keith now standing in front of her, alternately whining and growling. ‘No.’
‘Why don’t you come outside?’ Harkinen said. ‘I brought an axe. It’s nice and sharp. C’mon, I’ll show it to you.’
I turned back to the window. In the time it took me to do so, Harkinen had vanished. I leaned out and stared into the darkness. Somehow, he had left the front yard without making a sound and in just a few seconds. From where he had stood, that was physically impossible.
‘What the hell?!’ I said.
‘Is he still there?’
‘No, he’s gone!’
‘Gone?’
‘Yeah.’ I looked at her, bemused. ‘Just … vanished.’
‘Vanished?’ Lizzy walked over and stood beside me.
‘Yeah, as if he was swallowed by the darkness.’
She gazed out of the window. The night had gone silent. No owls, coyotes, tree frogs … Nothing.
‘I’m going outside,’ I said.
Lizzy stepped in front of me, blocking my way. ‘Are you nuts? That thing’ll kill you!’
‘Thing?’
‘It’s the entity. He’s outside with Beau. I recognized his voice.’
‘It’s not with Beau, it’s inside Beau. I saw it enter his body.’
She put a hand to her mouth. ‘Oh God.’
‘I’m not taking any more of this shit. If it’s inside Beau’s body then I can kill it.’
‘You can’t kill it. All you’ll do is kill Beau and the entity will escape and look for another person to possess.’
‘Okay, so I’ll either restrain it or knock it out, then tie it up and let the county- mounties deal with it.’
‘No.’ Lizzy shook her head vehemently. ‘I’m not letting you go out there. That’s what it wants. We’ll keep trying the phone until we get through to the sheriff’s office.’
‘And what if we don’t get through? Then what?’
‘We’ll wait.’
‘For what?’
‘For Cole and Eddie. They’ll be here in five and a half hours. If there’s three of you, then maybe you can overpower it.’
I cocked an eyebrow. ‘Maybe?’
‘You know how powerful it is, Bruce. Don’t underestimate it.’
‘What if it tries to get inside?’
‘Then we do our best to stop it until Cole and Eddie arrive.’
‘We can’t wait that long. I need to do something. Now.’
‘But-’
‘You know I’m right.’
‘No, you’re wrong.’
I frowned. ‘I’m going.’
I gently moved her aside and took a step forward but the expression on Lizzy’s face and the tears forming in her eyes stopped me.
‘Lizzy …’ I took her into my arms and she hugged me fiercely. ‘I’ll be okay.’
‘No you won’t! Just stay with me until Cole and Eddie arrive. Please?’
‘We can’t afford to wait, to give it time. I have to do something.’
Lizzy unwrapped her arms from my waist and stepped back. ‘Then I’m coming too.’
‘The hell you are.’
‘You can’t fight him. I can.’
‘You said that it couldn’t hurt you, not that you could fight it.’
Lizzy opened her mouth to say something, but I cut her off.
‘And that was when it was in spirit form. Now it’s using Beau’s body. It can hurt you.’
Shocked comprehension spread across her face. ‘Oh God … I hadn’t thought of that. Like Gary …’
I nodded and then kissed her. ‘Stay inside, keep the Glock with you and keep trying the phone. And start praying, too. As soon as I’m outside, turn the security system back on. If it tries to get in, then the alarm will automatically alert the monitoring station and they’ll contact the sheriff’s office.’
‘So why don’t we just trigger the alarm?’
I felt
like an idiot. ‘Shit! Of course!’ I rolled my eyes and grinned at her. ‘Beautiful and smart.’ We went into the office and I showed Lizzy how to do it. ‘As they can’t contact us by phone to verify that it’s a legitimate emergency, a dispatcher will contact you through the control panel and then contact the sheriff’s office. If for some reason they can’t get through, then they’ll assume there’s an emergency and contact them anyway.’
Lizzy nodded. ‘Okay.’
‘Now go and get your gun. If he manages to get inside, shoot him.’
‘Bruce-’
I gave her a look. Lizzy sighed and walked back to the bedroom, returning a few seconds later with the Glock 19.
‘Happy now?’
I nodded and kissed her again, then went downstairs to the kitchen, hurriedly put on my sneakers, took the bottle of holy water from the shelf near the door, saw that it was half empty and sighed. Typical. Why the hell hadn’t I kept it full? Idiot.
Don’t know why you’re bothering, a harsh, critical inner voice said. Won’t work.
I ignored it and slid the bottle into my back pocket, unlocked and opened the door, Mick and Keith almost knocking me over in their desperation to get outside, their barks echoing in the darkness, and stepped onto the porch. After locking the door, I ran towards the driveway. I could hear Mick and Keith a few hundred yards away, their barking now high, frenzied and terrified, then something abruptly silenced them.
~
Panic consumed me.
The bastard has killed my dogs the bastard has killed my dogs!
The words tore through my mind like fire ripping through a wooden house drenched in gasoline. I vaulted the gate and sprinted up the blacktop, once again thankful for the security lights mounted on the outbuildings, especially those on the hay barn and the carriage house, which stood right next to the drive.
Harkinen stood a few feet from the barn, the pups lying at his feet, a felling axe raised above his head. I stopped six feet away, raised the Glock and aimed it at the center of his torso.
‘Put down the axe and get on the ground, NOW!’
He, it, turned his head and grinned at me.
‘PUT DOWN THE AXE!’
Harkinen turned back to the pups-
‘PUT DOWN THE AXE NOW!’
-brought the axe down, the blade aimed at Mick’s neck.
By then, my focus on Harkinen was so intense it felt like tunnel vision. Everything around us was vague and blurry, my mind empty of thought or feeling. There was only instinctive reaction. I fired four times. Harkinen’s legs buckled and he fell forward across Mick’s body, the axe hitting the blacktop with a clank, Harkinen’s fingers still wrapped around the handle.
Cautiously, I approached him. ‘Let go of the axe and put your hands behind your back!’
Harkinen didn’t move.
‘LET GO OF THE AXE AND PUT YOUR HANDS BEHIND YOUR BACK NOW!’
Still no movement.
I knelt beside his head, the Glock’s muzzle inches away from it, and with my free hand checked for a pulse. Nothing. Beau was dead, the light already fading from his eyes, blood seeping from his torso and onto Mick’s fur. For a moment, I felt relieved. It was over. Then the adrenaline high that the incident had induced began to dissipate and I started to tremble. I had killed an old, rich, powerful man, who had rich and powerful friends, one of whom was my godfather. The gravity of what I had done filled me with a mixture of anger and fear. Why couldn’t he have left us alone? If Beau had stayed away as I had told him to, the entity wouldn’t have jumped him and used his body to attack the pups and then - and I believed this with total conviction – attempt to kill Lizzy and myself. If only the stupid old fool had listened, he would still be alive.
‘Fuck.’ I holstered the Glock and stared at Beau, then stood up and walked around in a tight circle with my hands on my hips, my legs feeling loose and weak, before stopping and staring at him again. ‘Fuck!’
I doubted that Beau had murder on his mind when he drove up to the ranch and it now felt as if I had shot an innocent man. He probably wasn’t even aware of what he was doing, the possession had looked that complete.
With a loud groan, I remembered the holy water in my back pocket. Had I gotten close enough, it might have worked; at the very least it would have distracted him.
‘FUCK!’
I clenched my fists and pressed them against my forehead, feeling completely enervated. The realization that, if I had remembered to use it, Beau might still be alive, perhaps even freed from the entity’s hold over him, turned my anger towards Beau onto myself.
Oh Christ, I thought, what have I done?
‘Shit! SHIT SHIT SHIIIT!’
I took the bottle of holy water out of my pocket and glared at it, wanting to throw it against the barn. Barely suppressing the urge to do so, I slipped it back into my jeans and told myself to get my emotions under control. I had fucked up and I needed to think of a way to get myself out of the knee-high pile of shit I was now standing in. Although I had a basic grasp of California’s ‘Stand Your Ground’ laws, I was unsure if shooting Beau was considered justifiable homicide, even though he had posed a threat to my dogs – labeled ‘property’ under US law – who were there to protect my ranch and those living on it. And could I tell the authorities the truth, that he had been possessed when it happened? Hell no. They wouldn’t believe me and any respect I had in the community would evaporate.
What the fuck am I going to do? I thought. What the fuck am I going to do?
Check on Mick and Keith first. One thing at a time.
Right. Wasting time here. Need to pull my finger out of my ass and take control of the situation.
I walked around Beau’s body, leaned forward, wrapped my hands around the axe handle and pulled. It didn’t budge, staying in his hands as if Beau had glued it to his palms. I swore and pulled again, harder, but even in death, he refused to let go. This was ridiculous. Rigor mortis sets in between two to six hours following death, not two minutes.
I rolled Beau onto his back and knelt beside Mick. He was breathing but unconscious, as was Keith. I exhaled loudly and tremulously, greatly relieved that the dogs were alive, although both had shallow head wounds and Keith had a broken foreleg. I decided to carry Mick and Keith back to the house. Couldn’t leave them there. Hopefully by now the phone was working. I would call the vet and then the sheriff’s office.
As I carefully slipped my arms underneath Keith’s body, I felt a pair of hands encircle my neck.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
I didn’t need to see who it was. It could only be one person, one thing.
It’s not possible! I thought. Beau’s dead!
Then an image of Gary’s charred and rotting corpse flared in my mind and I understood with a moment of sudden, sharp clarity that the entity’s power was beyond anything I could imagine.
Beau’s rough skinned fingers dug themselves into my throat and squeezed. I let go of Keith, grasped the fingers with my own and tried to prize them off, but their hold was ferocious, impossible to release. My vision began to blur, my chest heaving as my body attempted to drag air into lungs that suddenly felt as if they were on fire. I twisted my body to the left, then right. Slammed my elbows into his ribs. Raised my feet and stomped as hard as I could on Beau’s boots. Made no difference. He was too strong and seemingly impervious to pain. I frantically groped for the Glock. Found its hard, reassuring shape. Pulled it out of its holster. Realized with a sickening, hopeless feeling that it was pointless. Couldn’t see him to take aim. If I pointed the pistol behind me and hoped for a lucky shot, I’d probably end up shooting myself.
‘You can’t stop me,’ his deep, scratchy voice said in my ear. It seemed to come from far away, my consciousness falling into a black, bottomless chasm. ‘And don’t even bother to pray. It won’t work. Neither will holy water. I don’t believe in your god. Should’ve used those bullets on yourself, sonny, an option you may well con
sider later, I suspect. I was going to kill you, but now I want you to live, to feel pain. Unimaginable pain. I want you to hate me with such vehemence you can taste it in your mouth, because hate is my food and wine. My sustenance.’
I tried to talk, to tell him to fuck off, to say that I would stop him, I would find a way, but the only sound to escape my mouth was a hoarse choking noise.
What the fuck are you? I thought.
‘What am I?’ He sounded amused. ‘Perhaps who am I would be a better question. We have time. Elizabeth isn’t going anywhere. I’ll show you.’
A flood of images, words, sounds, emotions and smells suddenly engulfed me, pushing all else aside. My mind, my body disappeared. I was no longer Bruce Kain. The entity’s mind became mine. In an instant, I knew everything about him. What, who and why he existed.
He was Ramiro Harkinen, Beau’s great-grandfather.
Born of a Spanish mother and a Finnish father, Ramiro had endured a miserable childhood, regularly abused, both sexually and emotionally, by his father. He grew into an angry, twisted young man, traits he managed to hide behind a high I.Q., a natural flair for business and great personal charm and charisma, the last two qualities inherited from his mother and consciously developed as an adult.
While attending Harvard University, Ramiro became interested in the occult and shortly before his graduation he was initiated into the Order of Aritenkhede. After rapidly making a fortune on the East Coast, he settled in Saxon Falls where he took a local rancher’s daughter as his wife. Ramiro understood the importance of respect. He treated everyone – regardless of race, religion or social status - with kindness and respect and doted on his wife and children. Ramiro built a fine church in the center of town, attending the services every Sunday without fail and becoming intimately involved with every church activity.
Greatly revered within the county, Ramiro used that popularity to rise in power and influence, eventually becoming magistrate judge at Bronson County Courthouse. In private, he continued to study and practice the occult, his rapid rise within the Order of Aritenkhede and his penchant for sexually abusing children – which had begun when he was fifteen – unknown to his wife and most of his friends.
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