Tennessee Night (The 8th Jack Nightingale Novel)

by Stephen Leather

  ‘I have grown to like it rather,’ said the woman, ‘it is young and strong, disarming to the little ones. They instinctively trust it, and it makes controlling them that much easier. I think the new one will not be so appealing.’

  ‘Maybe not, but you can’t keep that one, it will be too easily recognised and connected with events here.’

  ‘I guess so.’

  ‘There’s no guess. You need a new shell. You can use Nightingale until a more suitable shell becomes available.’

  ‘It will be easy enough to find one. There is much to be said for inhabiting a female. They are considered so much less threatening.’

  ‘Never judge a book by its cover,’ said Tyrone, and he laughed savagely.

  Nightingale felt the car slow down, then make a sharp turn to the right, and he guessed they had arrived. He had no idea how long he had been out, but had a pretty good idea where they would be ending up. The house in Nashville was the perfect venue for whatever Tyrone had planned.

  He heard gravel under the wheels, and a moment or two later the car stopped. The doors were opened, and Nightingale was dragged out onto the gravel by his feet. He heard the front door open, then he was lifted over Dudák’s shoulder, up the steps and dropped in a pile in the hallway, still face down.

  He heard Dudák return a minute or so later and drop something heavy on the floor next to him. Wainwright, presumably.

  Dudák left again, and as he returned Nightingale heard the car start up again and crunch over the gravel, presumably to the garage. Footsteps on the gravel, and the front door shutting again told him he’d been right.

  He heard Tyrone’s voice in his ear. ‘Listen to me, Nightingale, and listen good. It’s kinda awkward carrying you down stairs, so I’m gonna cut the tape on your ankles, and you’re gonna walk down to the basement with us. I still have the gun, but you’ll know how fast Dudák can move, and you’ll have a broken neck before you go two paces if you try anything. So be careful. Not that you’re going to be living much longer anyways, but I guess it’s always better to die later than sooner.’

  Nightingale felt a knife cut the tape round his ankles, and he was roughly pulled to his feet. He collapsed again straight away, and would have cried out in pain, if not for the gag, as the blood flowed back into his feet.

  The bag was pulled roughly from Nightingale’s head and he blinked his eyes as they became accustomed to the light.

  Wainwright was lying on the floor, his wrists and ankles bound with duct tape and a hessian sack over his head. For a few seconds Nightingale feared that the Texan was dead but then his chest moved. He was breathing. Tyrone prodded Nightingale in the back with the gun, guiding him down the hallway in the direction of the basement. They went down the stairs and Tyrone shoved Nightingale into a side-room he hadn’t seen before. It was small and furnished only with a long wooden bench and a metal bucket. The walls and ceiling were plain white, and the floor just bare wood. There was a small window high up on one wall, with some steel bars cemented into the frame. The door was solid oak, and a couple of inches thick.

  Tyrone kept the shotgun pointed at Nightingale’s chest. ‘Sit down,’ he said and Nightingale dropped down onto the bench.

  Tyrone backed out of the room and locked the door. A few minutes later Nightingale heard footsteps and the rattle of the door being unlocked again. It opened and Wainwright stepped into the room. The sack had been taken from his head to reveal the duct tape gag and his hands were still bound. Tyrone prodded him in the back and Wainwright staggered into the room.

  Wainwright recovered his balance and turned to face Tyrone. He said something but the tape muffled the words. Tyrone laughed. ‘I’d take off the gag,’ he said. ‘But you know, fuck you.’ He slammed the door shut and locked it.

  Nightingale shuffled along the bench to give Wainwright room to sit. Wainwright dropped down next to him and grunted. The two men looked at each other. Nightingale could see anger and frustration in Wainwright’s eyes, but no fear. He hoped that he looked as resilient, but he doubted it. Nightingale was afraid. Very afraid.

  Wainwright began to contort his face, gritting his teeth and moving his jaw from side to side. At first Nightingale thought he was having a fit, but then realised he was trying to loosen the duct tape around his mouth. Nightingale followed his example and concentrated on trying to move the tape. The exaggerated facial expressions were accompanied by a lot of grunting and at one point Nightingale started to chuckle, despite the pain in his jaw from where Parker had cold-cocked him. Wainwright also began to laugh and despite their predicament the two men were soon trembling from laughter, the sound muffled by the tape.

  It took almost ten minutes for Wainwright to get the tape off his mouth and Nightingale followed suit a short while later. The two men sat on the bench breathing heavily from their exertions.

  ‘Well this is another fine mess you’ve gotten me into,’ said Nightingale eventually.

  ‘That British sense of humour never flags, does it?’ said Wainwright.

  ‘Just trying to lighten the moment,’ said Nightingale. ‘What the hell is going on, Joshua? Tyrone’s your guy, right?’

  ‘I thought he was,’ said Wainwright. ‘But it looks as if he’s branching out on his own.’

  ‘He’s a Satanist, right?’

  ‘He was on the fringes, I thought, but it looks as if he’s been making progress without my knowing. Fuck it, how did I miss this?’

  ‘You think Tyrone summoned Dudák?’

  ‘If you’d asked me that before today I’d have laughed, but now I’m not so sure.’

  ‘So the sorcerer’s apprentice is now the master? That’s not good news, Joshua.’

  ‘You’re telling me.’ Wainwright grunted. ‘If we get out of this, I’ll make him suffer, he’ll wish he had never been born.’

  ‘Yeah, well the “if” worries me. I’d be happier if you’d say “when we get out of this”, to be honest.’

  Wainwright laughed. ‘You got any ideas?’

  ‘The cavalry would be nice.’

  ‘Yeah, well without our cellphones I don’t see any way we can be calling for help, do you?’

  Nightingale flashed him a tight smile. ‘Actually, I do.’

  CHAPTER 70

  Nightingale lay down on the wooden bench and tried to relax. Wainwright was sitting on the floor, his back to the door. Nightingale took long, slow breaths and closed his eyes. He filled his mind with thoughts of Alice Steadman, and willed himself to sleep. Almost an hour passed before he managed to get himself into a trance-like state, but then he felt himself rising from the bench, moving upwards towards the ceiling, and then out above the mansion, until he was walking across grass and surrounded by mist. He kept the thoughts of Mrs. Steadman firmly in his mind, and started to look for her. She had warned him about visiting the Astral Plane on his own, but he didn’t see that he had any choice. She was his only hope.

  The mist cleared, and he saw a figure moving towards him, getting much closer with every second. It was too large to be Mrs. Steadman, but he couldn’t make it out yet. Closer still it came, and now he could see it clearly, its scaly limbs changing colour and number as it ran, the facial features blurred and indistinct as the head grew and shrunk, the huge mouth opening and closing, revealing the giant, spittle drenched-fangs.

  The creature roared and leaped at him, and Nightingale screamed, and was immediately awake again on the hard bench in the cell.

  Wainwright was standing at his side, looking down on him. ‘What happened?’ he asked.

  Nightingale was covered in sweat, gasping for breath. He sat up and shuddered. Somehow Tyrone set something foul and dangerous to guard any approach to the Astral from the house.

  ‘We’re screwed,’ he said. ‘We can’t get help that way.’

  ‘We’ll think of something,’ said Wainwright, sitting down on the bench.

  ‘I hope so,’ said Nightingale. ‘But at the moment, I’m out of ideas.’ He looked around the tin
y windowless room. ‘What is this place?’ he asked.

  Wainwright smiled ruefully. ‘You won’t like it,’ he said.

  ‘Just tell me.’

  ‘It’s the sacrifice cell.’

  Nightingale leaned back and groaned. ‘Terrific.’

  ‘I told you that you wouldn’t like it.’

  CHAPTER 71

  The Memphis PD police cruisers had responded within minutes to the call from the security guards at Graceland, but there was nothing they could do for Carmen Garcia. The damage to her heart had been immediate and catastrophic. Two Homicide detectives attended as a matter of routine, but the witness statements from the guards were convincing, and they recognised at once that there was nothing for them here. It was a suicide, plain and simple. The child was carrying no ID, and it was not until the following morning, when Mrs. Garcia went to wake her daughter and found her missing, that the police were able to begin the process of identifying the dead child. By then, the story of yet another public child suicide had been all over the news channels for hours.

  Bonnie Parker had been asleep at home when the story broke, so didn’t catch up with it until she turned on the television to go with her morning coffee. Her husband had pulled an early shift at the firehouse, and wouldn’t be home till mid-afternoon, and her son was on his way to school. She watched the news bulletin with growing horror, as the reporters stood outside Graceland detailing the events. They had no name to announce, but Bonnie Parker was in no doubt. ‘Carmen Garcia,’ she muttered to himself. ‘Carmen Garcia, for sure.’

  She picked her mobile phone up from the coffee table and punched in Nightingale’s number. She let it ring for a good minute before she gave up.

  ‘You bastard,’ she yelled at the phone. ‘What the hell is all this about? My God, you better be right about Emma, I just hope she’s far enough away from all this. Anything happens to her, I will track you down and kill you, I swear it.’

  CHAPTER 72

  It was almost midnight when the door opened. Nightingale and Wainwright hadn’t been given any food or water and they were both dog-tired. Tyrone was holding his shotgun and Dudák was standing behind him. They were both wearing hooded black robes with thick black cords tied around the waist.

  ‘It’s time,’ said Tyrone. Nightingale was going to make a crack about stating the bleeding obvious but he knew that any attempt at humour would be futile so he just glared at Tyrone and stood up.

  Tyrone noticed the bits of chewed duct tape on the floor and he nodded. ‘Well aren’t you the clever ones?’ he said. ‘It doesn’t matter, the chapel is sound-proofed.’

  Tyrone stepped to the side and motioned with his shotgun. Nightingale and Wainwright walked out and headed into the chapel.

  ‘Sit,’ said Tyrone, pointing at the front row of red leather-upholstered pews.

  As they moved to the row, they saw Naomi asleep on the floor.

  Wainwright gasped her name and took a step towards her, but Tyrone prodded him in the back with the shotgun. ‘I said sit. So sit!’

  Wainwright did as he was told. ‘You don’t have to do this, Tyrone,’ he said.

  ‘You don’t know what I have to do or don’t have to do,’ snarled Tyrone.

  ‘Whatever you hope to achieve by doing this, I can do it for you without you having to kill my niece.’

  Tyrone shook his head. ‘She has to die. That’s the deal.’

  ‘What deal?’ asked Wainwright. ‘What have you done?’

  ‘Nothing you haven’t done,’ sneered Tyrone. ‘I’m just following your path.’

  ‘You should have come to me. I would have helped you.’

  Tyrone shook his head. ‘I was your servant, nothing more. A hired hand. You kept the real power to yourself.’ He grinned triumphantly. ‘And look where all your scheming has got you.’ He handed the shotgun to Dudák. ‘If either of them moves, shoot them.’

  As Dudák kept the gun trained on the two men, Tyrone went about his preparations. He placed a small dark wood altar in front of the table at the top end, directly in front of the statue of the Goat of Mendes. He covered it with a blood-red cloth, which had designs embroidered on it in gold, which Nightingale could not make out clearly from where he sat, but he guessed they might represent the sigil of whichever demon Tyrone was in thrall to. He placed a golden inverted crucifix on top of the cloth, and four black candles in black wood holders, one at each corner.

  ‘Tyrone, please,’ said Wainwright. ‘Don’t do this.’

  Tyrone turned and grinned savagely. ‘Your niece is a blood sacrifice to my master, in exchange for the power I’ve been promised. She’ll offer herself up to him freely, that’s the whole point. Dudák will feed on the death energy, and my master will take her soul as a willing sacrifice. It’s a win-win. Except for your niece, of course.’

  ‘Why my niece? Was that your idea? Why would you do this to me after everything I’ve done for you?’

  ‘You’ve done nothing for me, Wainwright. You used me. Now it’s payback time.’

  ‘Is that why you’re using Naomi?’ asked Nightingale. ‘You wanted to hurt Joshua?’

  ‘I was told that she has to be the final sacrifice,’ said Tyrone.

  ‘By who?’ asked Nightingale.

  ‘By whom,’ corrected Dudák.

  ‘Bloody hell, once a teacher always a teacher, even when you’re possessed by a demon from Hell,’ said Nightingale. He turned to look at Tyrone. ‘Who told you to sacrifice Joshua’s niece?’

  ‘I was told, that’s all that matters.’ He turned back to the altar and poured some herbs from a crystal bottle into a golden bowl, which he then placed in front of the crucifix.

  ‘What were you promised, Tyrone?’ asked Nightingale. As he spoke he was working on the duct tape that bound his wrists, but he was making little impression on his bonds.

  Tyrone stopped what he was doing and turned to face Nightingale. ‘Once this final sacrifice is made, my pact is fulfilled and I’m going to attain the rank of an Ipsissimus of the left-hand path, that’s more power than anyone ever dreamed of. Then I’m going to take your life from you, and Dudák is going to use your body for a new shell, while your soul wanders homeless.’

  ‘And what about me?’ asked Wainwright.

  Tyrone shrugged. ‘You’re to be allowed to live.’

  ‘Why?’ asked Nightingale.

  Wainwright turned to glare at him. ‘Why? What is wrong with you?’

  ‘I’m trying to find out what’s going on, Joshua. Because it makes no sense to let you live, not after this.’

  ‘He is to suffer, for the rest of his life,’ said Tyrone. ‘He will live knowing what happened to his sister and his niece and that he was the cause of their suffering and death.’

  ‘So it wasn’t your idea? You were told what to do as part of your deal?’

  ‘Enough with your questions,’ said Tyrone, turning away. ‘I have work to do.’ He placed a foot-long, golden knife with an intricately carved handle in front of the bowl of herbs.

  ‘You’re being used, Tyrone, can’t you see that?’ said Nightingale.

  Tyrone kept his back turned and sprinkled a red liquid from a vial onto the herbs.

  ‘Whoever you did your deal with isn’t interested in you. This is all about getting back at Joshua. He stopped Abaddon from bringing Bimoleth back to the world and her power and her coven were destroyed. Then Wainwright had me stop Lucifuge Rofocale and his demons in New York. So it’s one of those two pulling your strings, I’m sure. And Abaddon isn’t in a position to do anything to grant you Satanic powers. That leaves Lucifuge Rofocale. You can’t trust him, Tyrone, Lucifuge Rofocale is a devious bastard.’

  Tyrone turned around. ‘I have a deal, a deal that cannot be broken.’

  ‘You can trust him about as far as you can throw him,’ said Nightingale. ‘Actually, that’s not a good analogy, him being a dwarf and all.’

  ‘We don’t call little people dwarves,’ said Dudák. ‘It’s offensive.’


  ‘I’m starting to realise why I hated school so much,’ said Nightingale. ‘Your body has been taken over by a demon and all you can do is correct my grammar and slam me for not being politically correct.’

  Dudák snarled and pointed the shotgun at Nightingale’s face.

  ‘Very smart,’ said Nightingale. ‘Blowing the head off the body you’re planning to move into. Can’t you keep your minion in line, Tyrone?’

  ‘I’m not his minion,’ said Dudák.

  ‘Yes, you are,’ said Nightingale. ‘You both are. You’re being used. You’re pawns in some game that you don’t even understand.’

  ‘Ignore him,’ said Tyrone. ‘He thinks that by talking he can change the outcome.’

  ‘That’s what people do, Tyrone,’ said Nightingale. ‘They talk. They communicate. They negotiate.’

  ‘I’m getting tired of the speeches, Nightingale. You’ll never understand. This isn’t about good or evil, it’s about power, about bending the world to my will. Anyways, I guess you’re not going to shut up, are you? I need to concentrate now, so looks like we’re going to have to gag you again after all.’

  He walked over to Nightingale carrying a roll of duct tape, and re-applied the gag.

  ‘There now, you hush up and enjoy the show. My master particularly wanted you to have a ringside seat. He knows all about how you hate to see pretty little girls suffer. He doesn’t like you very much at all. But then I’m sure you know that.’

  Tyrone took a long black taper from a box on the table and lit it with a wooden match. He lit each candle in turn, then set light to the herbs in the golden bowl. Grey smoke rose up towards the ceiling. He nodded at Dudák.

  ‘Time for you to wake the child, Dudák, and send her to her sacrifice. Time for you to feed.’

  The pretty young blonde woman that held the millennia-old demon inside her body nodded and handed the shotgun to Tyrone.