by Ted Dekker
He tried to remember what he was sorry for but after a while even this began to fade. Yes, he’d failed Bethany. Perhaps if he’d been in the house that night, the killer would have thought twice. Perhaps if he’d been a loving father, the killer wouldn’t have chosen Bethany in the first place.
Perhaps if he’d slept by the front door with a shotgun cocked in his elbow, ready to blow the head off of any demented maniac who dared step one foot in his home…
He spent some of the time imagining how he might kill BoneMan. He might put a gun in his mouth and pull the trigger. He might hit him in the face until it became bloody and lifeless. He might jab him in the eyes with a sharp stick, then shove the stick up into his brain. He might take a rock and crush his head.
He thought about how he would rescue Bethany. About how she would rush into his arms and weep into his neck. About how he would sweep in with a shotgun, end BoneMan’s life with a load of buckshot, then pluck his daughter from the jaws of death.
Mostly, he imagined how he would crush the man who dared cost his daughter one night of sleep. The thoughts made him wear his jaw tired from all the grinding.
But after hours of contemplating the manner in which he could kill BoneMan and save his daughter, he was left with only himself. Alone. Useless. Seated in the hot sun.
Hopeless.
The desperation that had sent Kahlid on a mission to kill children to save many more children. It was a sickness, and Ryan began to wonder if he’d been infected with it.
ALVIN FINCH WALKED up the hill fifty yards, then cut to his right, working his way around so that he could come up behind Evans without being seen. His heart was beating in his chest like a fist, and he began to sweat—something he hadn’t counted on so soon after applying the lotion.
It took him twenty minutes to position himself directly behind some boulders to the rear of the man, who still had not moved. If the man surprised him and tried something foolish, he would use the gun in this pocket, but with the daughter safely stowed, Evans couldn’t risk anything stupid.
“Do not turn around, Ryan Evans,” he said.
The man jerked upright, but he did not turn around.
“That’s good. Just stay where you are. Don’t try to stand up. Just stay seated.”
The man was stiff like a board. Alvin would prefer to see his eyes, but he couldn’t risk showing his own face yet.
“You’re a smart man, Mr. Evans. It worked. You called to me and now here I am. That’s pretty good if you think about it. Pretty amazing, isn’t it?”
But after two days of sitting in fear and trepidation, the poor man couldn’t get his vocal cords going.
“Say something,” Alvin said.
“Yes,” the man said.
He sounded pretty rational, after all.
“You know who I am?”
“Yes.”
“Do you think you’re me, like they say?”
The man hesitated, as if seriously considering this possibility. Could it be true? Alvin thought about it for a moment then decided that anything was possible.
“No,” the man said.
“I agree. But they are right about one thing. I have your daughter and I am going to break her bones. Unless—”
“I’ll do anything.”
“I’ve been watching your daughter through the cracks in the wall and I think I’m going to have some challenges breaking her arms without breaking her skin; it’s so frail you know. So soft. She looks like she’s never had to work a day in her life.”
The man said nothing, but his body was now trembling.
It was such a strange and wonderful sight.
Alvin peered out at the shaking man and let him quake for a while.
“If you bring me the father of lies, I’ll give her back to you. I’ve given you some directions on this note that I’m going to leave back here. You either have the stomach for this or you don’t, so I’m only going to give you until morning. Bring me the father of lies and I can show you how to break his bones. Or do you already know how to do that?”
The man didn’t respond.
Alvin set the folded blue note on the rock and backed away silently.
It took him only five minutes to reach his truck and another two before he was on the gravel road again, cutting a line due south to the place of hiding. The father had spoken back there as he retreated, but Alvin didn’t hear him, nor did he care. He was on his way now. Back to the hole.
Back to daughter.
23
THE JOY THAT swept through Ryan at the sound of that voice was like cool water to parched lips in a cracked, barren wasteland. It was soft but perfectly clear. Like the voice of an angel. There could be no mistake. BoneMan had come! Everything Ryan had prayed for, all of his waiting, the hours of hopelessness, they’d all delivered him BoneMan, and he nearly shouted out in his thankfulness.
The many ways he’d considered killing BoneMan flooded his mind at once now. The breaking, crushing, shooting, slashing—all of it at once to make sure that the voice behind him was truly dead.
He became aware that he was trembling. The air remained silent for some time and he just sat there, shaking. Then the man spoke again.
“If you bring me the father of lies, I’ll give her back to you. I’ve given you some directions on this note that I’m going to leave back here. You either have the stomach for this or you don’t, so I’m only going to give you until morning. Bring me the father of lies and I can show you how to break his bones. Or do you already know how to do that?”
Father of lies… father of lies… Ryan didn’t have to look at a blue note to know who the father of lies was.
“Yes,” he said.
There was no response.
“Hello?”
Still nothing.
The man had left! Ryan turned around and stared at an outcropping of rock ten yards behind the tree against which he’d been leaning. There on the closest rock that rose three feet lay a folded slip of blue paper. His heart rose into his throat, thinking of the man, standing right there just a moment ago.
He stood slowly. Then bounded up to the rock, ripped the note off the surface, and ran for the black Taurus.
He slid behind the wheel, slammed the door closed, and unfolded the quartered note with quaking hands.
BoneMan’s handwriting. Scrawled in block letters.
FATHER OF LIES.
MENARD–7 MILES SOUTH
WEST–2 MILES
BENEATH THE CROWS
I’LL BE WATCHING, FATHER.
He sat, staring at the piece of paper for a full minute, maybe two minutes, maybe five minutes, in part because he knew what he was expected to do now, in part because he wanted to give BoneMan as much time as he needed to get away.
The man was on foot, making his way back to his vehicle. What if Ryan ran into him? This wasn’t the kind of man who would turn over the location of his daughter just because he’d been caught red-handed.
And this location on the blue slip of paper wasn’t where he’d find his daughter, he knew that. BoneMan would be watching and would bring her in only if and when Ryan complied with his demands.
He fired the car and backed it hastily over a bush before whipping it in a dusty circle and angling down the dirt path that led out of Crow’s Nest Ranch.
No sign of any other vehicle. Good. He didn’t need any attention. He certainly didn’t need the involvement of any authority beyond what BoneMan was demanding.
Ryan pulled up to the highway and looked first left, then right. No cars.
He glanced at the round clock on the dash. Ten minutes past noon. It would be dark in seven hours.
He shoved the accelerator to the floorboards, shot out onto the blacktop, lined the car up between the yellow dashes and the white edge, and took the Taurus up to ninety. Out here west of Fort Davis, cops would be scarce—not so as he closed in on Austin, where he was still public enemy number one. There were only so many roads leading into Austin, and
the FBI would be waiting on all of them, with arms open wide, waiting for BoneMan to rush into their trap.
He had to make good time while he could. After three days of stillness the rush of the wind sounded like the voice of God, roaring out of the sky to save this one.
Texas was dry this time of year, a near desert. He kept his head down and gripped the wheel tightly and sped into their arms. But he had no intention of giving himself up, not now when he finally had at his means the way to save Bethany.
An hour passed before he thought to slow down, and then only when he passed a cop going the other direction. Evidently Texas cops didn’t pull over cars doing ninety.
Ryan breathed a prayer of gratitude, slowed to eighty, and flew east. A storm was coming, the radio said. Black clouds boiled on the horizon.
He fixed his eyes on the road ahead and took the car back up to eighty-five.
What are you doing, Ryan? You can’t do this!
The horror of what BoneMan was asking of him suddenly struck him.
You can’t do this…
But what choice did he have? BoneMan had Bethany!
A CRACK OF thunder rattled the phone booth. Ryan instinctively kept his head low as large raindrops pelted the glass. Storm clouds had cut off the sun early, hastening nightfall, but there was still an hour of dim light before blackness settled over the Hill Country. The phone in his hand was ringing on the other end. He pressed it closer to his ear so that he could hear better.
Rivers of water distorted his view of the western horizon. Pick up, Father. Please pick up.
If the drive had been only three hours, he would have been able to get it done before his conscience had the time to consider the moral implications of what lay ahead. Ignorance was bliss, but hours of time and thought had shattered that bliss.
Slowly the horror of what he was about to do swallowed him until he found that he had to make a preemptive confession, not for his sake, but for Bethany’s sake, should it all go terribly wrong.
“Hello?”
The father’s voice crackled on the line.
“Hello?”
“Father?”
A long beat.
“Ryan…”
“Listen to me, Father. You have to listen to me. I know I’m AWOL and I know the FBI’s made contact with you. The CO’s probably climbing down your throat—”
“Slow down, Ryan. I can hardly hear you. Take a deep breath.”
He took a deep breath through his nostrils, then blew out slowly. He was playing a dangerous game, calling Hortense.
“Can I still talk to you, Father? I need someone to talk to.”
“Of course you can. But you have to know that command is climbing all over me. They’re cooperating fully with the FBI. This is a publicity disaster for them.”
“I need some time. I’m going after my daughter and I need you to give me some time. If you call the FBI and tell them about this call, she could die.”
Father Hortense didn’t respond.
“Do you understand what I’m saying? Her life’s in my hands and now her life will be in your hands.”
“We can help you, Ryan. You can’t take this all on your shoulders.”
“I talked to him, Father. He found me and he talked to me. And now I’m going to do something that no one will understand. But I need you to understand, Father.”
“What are you going to do?”
Yes, Ryan, what are you going to do?
He stared out at the rain streaming over the glass, like tears from heaven. A knot formed in his throat and for a moment he thought he might join God and begin to cry.
“God’s done many things that have been misunderstood, right?”
“Ryan—”
“He’s destroyed whole nations to save those he loves, isn’t that what he did? Nineveh?”
“He spared Nineveh.”
“Jericho?”
“Please, Ryan. I don’t like the sound of this. It is critical that you turn yourself in. No good can come of this.”
“How far would you go to save your daughter, Father?”
“Half the state is out there looking for you because they believe that you’re the one playing the devil here. You are not God, Ryan. You’re one man and you’ve broken the law.”
“This is no different than what we do in any war, Father. Collateral damage is a part of what we do to achieve justice. Setting the captive free comes at a cost. Just because it’s less personal from a bomber doesn’t make it any different than what we must do here, on the ground, one on one.”
“That sounds like a desperate attempt at justification.”
“Am I wrong?”
“No one will understand that kind of logic!”
“They’ll misunderstand me like they misunderstand God,” Ryan said. “What I’m going to do, I’m going to do for my daughter’s sake. And if you don’t give me some time then both me and my daughter will be killed.”
“Ryan, you listen to me—”
“I don’t want to do this, Father.” Ryan’s throat constricted and he had to swallow to continue his confession. “You know me, this is the last thing I would do, I was there, I’m not up for this, but I have no choice!”
Father Hortense waited a few seconds before responding. Finally, he was listening.
“Think about what you are doing, Ryan. God spare you if you become BoneMan.”
Ryan knew what he meant and it didn’t help him. He’d been a fool to place the call.
“If you report this call, Bethany and I will both die.”
“How much time do you need?” the priest finally asked.
“A few hours.”
“Maybe.”
“I need a yes.”
“Then yes. I will give you a few hours, and then I will call the FBI.”
“Tell them to look seven miles south of Menard. He’ll be watching. I need till first light. If they come before morning, we’ll all die.”
The line remained quiet.
“Father, promise me.”
“What are you going to do, Ryan?”
Ryan hung up.
24
RYAN DROVE INTO Austin under cover of darkness, thankful for the hard rain, which alone might have been responsible for the ease with which he drove to his destination undetected.
The black Taurus had surely been reported stolen by now, but no one had publicly connected the car to him. Even if they were looking for it, on a dark stormy night it suited him.
He knew his destination precisely because he’d been there twice before, two months earlier, before the restraining order had forced him out of town. The gated community sat on the west side of Austin, in a neighborhood called Spanish Oaks. He was surprised that the construction code he’d acquired earlier still worked. Either way, he would have simply followed another car past the gate.
He parked under a tree a full block from the large white colonial and slid down in his seat to wait. Rain pelted the roof and windshield, a thunderous cacophony that smothered the sound of passing tires on the wet pavement. Not that it mattered; he had committed himself. The time for careful planning and meticulous execution was now far past.
The rain was on his side. The brashness of what he was about to attempt was on his side. Speed was on his side. His gun was on his side.
Time was against him. Sanity was against him. The law was against him. Reason was against him. Morality was against him.
He could do nothing but sit low and urge his mind to shout over the voices of caution that kept filling his mind.
The rain had eased enough by ten o’clock to give him full view of the Cadillac that pulled into the driveway and disappeared behind a rolling garage door. Ryan waited another two hours before he shouted down the last warning barking in his head, fired the Taurus, and pulled up to the sidewalk that led up to the front door.
He withdrew his pistol, disengaged the safety, and stepped out into the drizzling rain.
Without bothering to look to
his right or to his left, he walked up to the front door and tried it. Locked, naturally. He pulled his collar up, hunched his shoulders, and shoved the metal stock of the gun through the door panel.
The glass broke and crashed to the floor inside. Rain muted the sound, but not entirely. He reached in, twisted the dead bolt, and pulled the door open to the sound of a loud beep that accompanied a countdown to the alarm.
Ryan cut to his right where a large door looked like it might lead to a bedroom. But it turned out to be a darkened study.
The alarm’s warning began to speed up. At any moment it would begin to blare.
Dripping on the large tiles, he ducked into a second hallway and this time was greeted by a large atrium that led to an entire wing. His rubber soles squealed with each step now, but the sudden wailing of the alarm on all sides shattered any thought of creeping in unnoticed.
He spun into the master bedroom just as the form on the four-poster bed rose from its slumber. The man was too stunned to react properly, and Ryan moved in while he still had the full advantage.
He shoved the gun barrel in the man’s face, grabbed his collar, and jerked him from the bed.
“Shut up!” The man hadn’t uttered a peep, but he said it anyway. Again. Because it covered the shame he felt. “Shut up!”
The gun’s barrel had already split Welsh’s lip but he found his voice and began to deliver the expected protest. “What in God’s name—”
Ryan hit him upside the head. “I said shut up.”
He dragged the district attorney around and shoved him forward, out into his own living room, where the sound of the shrill alarm was nearly deafening. “Outside, if you want to live.”
The man wore thin cotton pajamas but his feet were bare. He stumbled through the front door, pushed by Ryan, but pulled up when the rain hit him.
“In the car!”
The man stood in a crouch, as if unsure what to do, so Ryan helped him out. He kicked the man with his heel in the small of his back. “Move!”
He moved, grunting with pain.
“In the car.”
Burt Welsh was still reeling from the suddenness of the attack, but he was a big man and he wouldn’t just take such a violation lying down for long. Not without Ryan’s help.