The Heaven Trilogy

by Ted Dekker

  Friday he’d found three bodies, to shuddering sighs of relief. Two on the East Coast and one in Salt Lake City. He downed two long slugs of liquor at the find. Tom Brinkley. Thank you, Tom Brinkley. I love you, Tom Brinkley!

  Tom Brinkley had died of a gunshot wound to the stomach, and according to the records, no one seemed to have a clue about him beyond that. From all indications the man had shot himself, which also indicated to Kent that there was at least one other thing known about the man. He was an idiot. Only an idiot would attempt suicide with a bullet through the gut. Nevertheless, that is precisely what the authorities had concluded. Go figure.

  Now poor Tom’s body sat awaiting cremation in Salt Lake’s largest mortuary, Peace Valley Funeral Home. Kent had tagged his “fish” then—processed an order for a transfer of the catch to McDaniel’s Mortuary in Las Vegas, Nevada. Reason? Relatives had been located and wished a local burial. Now I lay my fish to sleep. The funeral home had informed him by e-mail that the body had already been stripped and prepared for cremation. Not a problem. Will pick up as is. It was in a sealed box. Did he want it in a body bag? A body bag was customary. Not a problem. Will pick up as is.

  He scheduled a “will call” Saturday between 3 and 5 P.M. He would pick up the fish then. Only he knew it was not a fish, of course. It was just one of those interesting quirks that a mind gone over the edge tends to make. It was a dead body, as cold as a fish and possibly gray like a fish, but certainly not a fish. And hopefully not slimy like a fish.

  He confirmed the order an hour later from a pay phone. The girl who answered his questions had a bad habit of snapping chewing gum while listening, but otherwise she seemed cooperative enough.

  “But we close at five. You get here a minute past, and you won’t find a soul around,” she warned.

  It had taken a mere forty-five minutes with his fingers flying nervously over the keyboard to make the changes to Tom Brinkley’s FBI file. The tingles of excitement had shortened his breath for an hour following. Actually that had been the first crime. He’d forgotten. Breaking into the FBI files was not a laughable prank. It had not seemed so criminal, though.

  Kent let the memories run through his mind and kept his eyes peeled as he negotiated I-70 west. The trip over the mountains was uneventful, unless you considered it eventful to bite your nails clean off every time a patrol car popped up in your rearview mirror. By the time Kent reached the outskirts of Salt Lake, his nerves had frayed, leaving him feeling as though he’d downed a dozen No-Doze tablets in a single sitting. He pulled in to a deserted rest stop, hurried to the back of the truck, and popped the refrigerated box open for the first time.

  A cloud of trapped vapor billowed out, cold and white. The cooler worked well enough. Kent pulled himself up to the back bumper and then into the unit and waved his hand against the billows of vapor. The interior drifted into view about him. Metal shelves arose on the right. A long row of hooks hung from the ceiling on the left like claws begging for their slabs of meat. For their fish.

  Kent shivered. It was cold. He imagined the gum-snapping gal at Peace Valley Funeral Home, clipboard in hand, staring up at those hooks.

  “What are those for?”

  “Those? Oh, we find that bodies are much easier to carry if you take them from their caskets and hook them up. You guys don’t do that?”

  No, the hooks would not do. But then, he was not some white-trash bozo from Stupid Street, was he? No sir. He had already planned for this eventuality. Cruiser had told him that all trucks carried thermal blankets to cover the meat in case of emergency. Truck 24’s blankets lay in a neat stack to Kent’s right. He pulled them off the shelf and strung two along the hooks like a shower curtain. A divider.

  “What are those for?”

  “Those? Oh, that’s where we hide the really ugly ones so people don’t throw up. You guys don’t do that?”

  Kent swallowed and climbed out of the cooler box. He left the rest stop and slowly made his way to the mark on his map that approximated the funeral home’s location. To any other vehicle parked beside him at a light, he resembled a mortuary truck on a Saturday run. Right? The magnetic signs were dragging on the street, exposing the meat packer’s logo, right? Because that would look obscene. So then why did he have such a hard time looking anywhere but straight ahead at stoplights?

  Liberty Valley’s wrought-iron gates loomed suddenly on Kent’s left, bordered by long rows of pines. He caught a glimpse of the white building set back from the street, and his heart lodged firmly in his throat. He rounded the block and approached the main gate again, fighting the gut-wrenching impulse to drive on. Just keep on driving, right back to Denver. There was madness in this plan. Stealing a body. Brilliant software engineer loses sanity and steals a body from funeral home. Why? It is yet unknown, but some have speculated that there may be other bodies, carved up, hidden.

  Then the gate was there in front of him, and Kent pulled in, clearing his throat of the knot that had been steadily growing since entering this cursed city.

  The long, paved driveway rolled under him like a black snake. He followed a sign that led him to the rear, where a loading bay sat empty. A buzz droned in his head—the sound of the truck’s wheels on the pavement. The steady moan of madness. He backed up to the door, pulled the parking brake, and left the engine running. He couldn’t very well be seen fiddling with wires to restart it.

  He set himself on autopilot now, executing the well-rehearsed plan. From his briefcase he withdrew glasses and a mustache. He fixed them quickly to his face, checked his image in the rearview mirror, and pulled out his clipboard.

  A blonde-headed girl with a pug nose pushed open the rear door of the funeral home on his second ring. She was smacking gum.

  “You from McDaniel’s?”

  He could feel the sweat breaking from his brow. He pushed his glasses back up his nose. “Yes.”

  She turned and headed into the dim storage area. “Good. You almost didn’t make it. We close in fifteen minutes, you know.”

  “Yeah.”

  “So, you from Las Vegas?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Never heard of McDaniel’s. You ever win big money?”

  Big money? His heart skipped a beat. What could she know of big money?

  She sensed his hesitation and glanced over at him, smiling. “You know. Las Vegas. Gambling. Did you ever win big?”

  “Uh . . . No. I don’t gamble, really.”

  Coffins rose to the ceiling on all sides. Empty, no doubt. Hopefully. She led him to a huge side door made of steel. A cooler door.

  “I don’t blame you. Gambling’s a sin.” She popped the door open and stepped through. A dozen coffins, some shiny and elaborate, some no more than plywood boxes, rested on large shelves in the cooler. The girl walked over to one of the plain boxes, checked the tag, then slapped it.

  “This is it. Grab that gurney there, and it’s all yours.”

  Kent hesitated. The gurney, of course. He grabbed the wheeled table and pushed it parallel to the casket. Together they pulled the plywood box onto the gurney, a task made surprisingly easy by rollers on the shelf.

  The girl slapped the box again. Seemed to like doing that. “There you go. Sign this, and you’re all set.”

  Kent signed her release and offered a smile. “Thanks.”

  She returned the smile and opened the door for him.

  Halfway back to the outer door he decided it might be best if she did not watch him load the body. “What should I do with the gurney when I’m done?” he asked.

  “Oh, I’ll help you.”

  “No. No problem, I can handle it. I should be able to—I’ve done this enough. I’ll just shove it back through the door when I’m done.”

  She smiled. “It’s okay. I don’t mind. I need to close down anyway.”

  Kent thought about objecting again but decided it would only raise her curiosity. She held the door again, and he rolled the brown box into the sun. From this angle, with th
e truck parked below in the loading dock, he caught sight of the Iveco’s roof. And it wasn’t a pretty sight.

  He jerked in shock and immediately covered by coughing hard. But his breathing was suddenly ragged and obvious. Large red words splashed across the roof of the Iveco’s box: Front Range Meat Packers.

  He flung a hand toward the bottom of the truck’s roll door, hoping to draw her attention there. “Can you get the door?” If she saw the sign he might need to improvise. And he had no clue how to do that. Stealing bodies was not something he had perfected yet.

  But Miss Gum-Smacker jumped to his suggestion and yanked the door up like a world-class chain-saw starter. She’d obviously done that a few times. Kent rolled the gurney down the short ramp and into the truck, gripping the ramp’s aluminum railing to steady his jitters. As long as they remained down here, she would not have a chance to see the sign. Now, when he drove off . . . that would be a different story.

  It occurred to him then that the casket would not fit on the shelves designed for meat. It would have to go on the floor.

  “How do you lower this?” he asked.

  She stepped in and looked at him with a raised brow. “You’re asking me how to lower a gurney?”

  “I usually carry ours—battery powered. All you do is push a button. But this is a new rig. It’s not outfitted properly yet.” Now, there was some quick thinking. Powered gurneys? There must be such a thing these days. She nodded, apparently satisfied, and lowered the contraption. Together they slid the coffin off and let it rest on the floor. Now to get her back into the warehouse without looking back.

  “Here, let me help you,” he said and walked right past her to the warehouse door, which he yanked open.

  She wheeled the gurney up after him and pushed it through the door. “Thanks,” she said and walked into the dim light.

  “Thank you. Have a great weekend.”

  “Sure. Same to you.”

  Kent released the door and heard its lock engage. He glanced around and ran for the cab, trembling. What if she were to come back out? “Hey, you forgot your clipboard.” Only he hadn’t forgotten it. It was in his right hand, and he tossed it onto the bench seat. With a final glance back, he sprang into the truck, released the brake, and pulled out of the loading dock, his heart slamming in his chest.

  He’d crossed the parking area and was pulling onto the long, snakelike drive before remembering the rear door. It was still open!

  Kent screeched to a halt and ran to the back, beating back images of a shattered box strewn behind the truck. But not this day; this day the gods were smiling on him. The box remained where he’d left it, unmoved. He pulled the door closed, flooded with relief at small favors.

  He pulled out of Liberty Valley’s gates, shaking like a leaf. A full city block flew by before he realized that the jerking motion under him resulted from a fully engaged parking brake. He released it and felt the truck surge forward. Now, that was a Stupid Street trick if there ever was one. He had to get control of himself here!

  Two blocks later the chills of victory began their run up and down his spine. Then Kent threw back his head and yelled out loud in the musty cabin. “Yes!”

  The driver in the Cadillac beside him glanced his way. He didn’t care.

  “Yes, yes, yes!”

  He had himself a body. A fish.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  HELEN SCANNED the note again and knew it said more than it read. This fishing business was hogwash, because it didn’t bring a smile to her face as in, Oh, good. He’s gone to catch us some trout. I love trout. Instead, it brought a knot to her gut, as in, Oh, my God! What’s he gone and done?

  She had felt the separation all day, walking the streets of Littleton. It was a quiet day in the heavens. A sad day. The angels were mourning. She still had energy to burn, but her heart was not so light, and she found praying difficult. God seemed distracted. Or maybe she was distracted.

  Helen had walked the same twenty-mile route five days now, stopping briefly at the hot-dog stand at Fifth and Grand each day for a drink and a quick exchange with its proprietor, Chuck. She’d suspected from the first words out of Chuck’s mouth that he was a man holed up in his religion.

  Today she had helped him out of his shell.

  “You walk every day, Helen?”

  She’d nodded.

  “How far?”

  “A long way. Longer than I can count.”

  “More than a mile?”

  “I can count a mile, young man.”

  “Longer?”

  “Longer than I can count.”

  He’d chuckled nervously. “Ten miles?”

  She sipped at the lemonade he’d served her. “Longer.”

  “Twenty?” he asked incredulous.

  She shrugged. “I don’t know for sure.”

  “But that’s impossible! You walk twenty miles every day?”

  She looked right into his eyes then. “Yes, I’m an intercessor, Chuck. You know what that is, don’t you? I will walk as long as he requires me to.”

  He glanced around quickly. “You mean you pray?”

  “I pray, and I walk. And as long as I’m walking and praying I don’t feel strain on my legs at all.” She eyed him steadily. “How does that sound, Chuck?”

  He stood there with his mouth open, possibly thinking that this kind woman he’d served over the last five days was stark-raving mad. “Sound strange? Well, there’s more, Chuck. I see things too. I walk on legs that have no business walking, and I see things.” It was the first time she had been so vocal about this business to a stranger, but she could hardly resist.

  She pointed to the overcast sky and gave it a faraway look. “You see those clouds there? Or this air?” She swept her hand through the air. “Suppose you could tear away this air and expose what lay behind. What do you think you would find?”

  Chuck the hot-dog man was stuck in the open-mouth, wide-eyes look. He did not answer.

  “I’ll tell you what you would find. A million beings peering over the railing at the choices of one man. You would find the real game. Because it’s all about what happens on the other side, Chuck. And if you could tear the heavens apart, you would see that. All this other stuff you see with those marbles in your head are props for the real game.” She flashed him a grin and let that sink in. “At least, that’s one way of looking at it all. And I think there is a game over your soul as well, young man.”

  She had left him like that, holding a hot dog in one hand with his mouth gaping as if he were ready to shove it in.

  It had been the high point of the day, actually, because she knew Chuck’s life would change now. But the balance of her walk had been a somber one.

  Back at home, Helen picked up the phone and called Pastor Bill at home.

  “Bill Madison here.”

  “He’s gone off the deep end, Bill.”

  “Helen?”

  “Yes.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Kent’s gone off the deep end, and I smell death in the air. I think he may be in trouble.”

  “Whoa. You think he may die? I didn’t think he could die in this thing.”

  “I didn’t either. But there’s death in the air. And I think it’s his death, although I don’t know that. There was a lot of silence in the heavens today.”

  “Then maybe you should warn him. Tell him about this. You haven’t been . . . you know . . . told not to, have you?”

  “No. Not specifically. I’ve had no desire to tell him, which usually means that I shouldn’t. But I think you may be right. I think I will tell him the next time I see him.”

  They let the phones rest silent for a moment.

  “Helen, are you walking tomorrow?”

  “Did you awake this morning, Bill?”

  “What? Of course I did.”

  “The answer to your question should be as obvious, don’t you think? I walk every day.”

  He continued after regrouping himself. “Would
you mind if I walked with you for a spell tomorrow? Before church?”

  “I would like that, Pastor.”

  “Good. Five o’clock?”

  “Five-thirty. I sleep in on Sundays.”

  IF KENT thought he could have managed it, he would have driven straight back to Denver. But his body was in no condition to pull a twenty-four-hour shift without sleeping. He had to rest somewhere. At least, that was the way he’d planned it on paper.

  He pulled into Grady’s Truck Stop two hours outside of Denver, near midnight. A hundred sleeping rigs lined the graveled lot to the west of the all-night diner, and he pulled the little Iveco between two large, purring diesels. So far, so good. No flat tires, no routine pullovers, no breakdowns, no boulders from the sky. He could easily be a real driver for a mortuary, handling just one more body in a series of a hundred.

  Kent locked the truck up and walked briskly toward the café. The cool night air rushed softly under the power of the towering trucks on all sides. What were the odds of being recognized in such a remote spot? He paused by the front wheel of a black International tractor-trailer and studied the diner thirty yards away. It stood there all decked out in neon like a Christmas tree. Two thoughts crossed his mind simultaneously, and they brought his pulse up to a steady thump.

  The first was that the Iveco back there did not have a lock on the rear door. That had been an oversight on his part. He should have bought a padlock. A grisly wino on the prowl would find his little Iveco easy pickings. Only when the vagrant got back to his lair would he and his cohorts discover that the brown box did not contain rifles or beef or a priceless statue or any such treasure, but a cadaver. A smelly old fish. A dead body—not fit for the eating unless you were on an airplane that went down in the Andes and it was either you or the bodies.

  The second thought was that entering Grady’s diner, all lit up like a Christmas tree, was starting to seem like one of those stupid mistakes a criminal from Stupid Street might make. “Yes sir, everything was going perfect until I ran into Bill at Grady’s Diner, and he asked me what I was doing at one in the morning toting a cadaver around in a meat truck. Imagine, Bill at Grady’s Diner! Who would have possibly thought?”