And began to cry, tears coming down her cheeks as if her eyes had become waterfalls.
The doctor cleared his throat and started to move forward. Vickie didn’t want him to stop her, not then.
She leaned forward and told the girl, “It’s going to be all right now. You’re not part of the cult anymore. You’re safe. You’re going to have a good life. But the blood came from another woman. It was a lot of blood. Please...is she dead, do you know? And what about Alex?”
Saying the name Alex seemed to trigger something.
“Audrey had Alex. I wasn’t a part of that. Alex would watch the Dearborn brother and sister, and Audrey would take care of him. It’s all right. Alex is a vessel—he is a messenger. He doesn’t know it, but he will show the way,” the girl said.
“So, they do have Alex,” Vickie said. “Why? Because he is so smart?”
“Yes, our leader, the high priest, knows that Alex is very smart, especially when it comes to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. That is why you may and may not live—you are a speaker for the past. You have been seen. You are watched.”
“Is Vickie in danger?” Griffin asked, the sound of his voice like sandpaper.
“Vickie is like Alex. She may be a messenger,” Gloria said. “Messengers are exalted. They must understand that they are messengers.”
She started to weep again.
“We want to help you,” Vickie assured her, “and we need you to help us.”
“I am so...lost!” Gloria said.
“Gloria, do you think, if you tried for a while, you could remember your last name?” Griffin asked her.
Again, her face crinkled and puckered.
Vickie didn’t think that anyone could feign that much pain.
“My last name,” she repeated. “I am to forget my first. I am to become Mary—we are all Mary. We will bring Satan’s children in the flesh. We will all bear fruit. And we will be rewarded.”
“Rewarded by who?” Griffin burst out, sounding frustrated.
The red-haired girl looked over at him and said solemnly, “Satan, of course. The devil. He will deliver us with his children, and the earth and his power will be ours.”
They were all silent for a minute. Vickie asked quietly then, “Where do you live, Gloria? You aren’t Mary, and you aren’t going to have Satan’s child.”
“I live...”
She stared blankly at Vickie. She frowned, appearing painfully confused again. “I live somewhere in the woods.”
“With other people?” Devin asked.
“Yes. There are others.”
“Close to Boston? Far from Boston?” Griffin asked.
“We go in the van. We may travel far. We may stay in one place as we feel that we’ve traveled far,” the girl said. Then she buried her face in her hands again. “I’m so sorry. These are the answers that come to me. I know that they’re...crazy. And... I have been with Satan. I will have Satan’s child. He came to me at the ceremony. I must have his child. If we don’t embrace Satan, we are for sacrifice. If we don’t please Satan, we will die. We must be chosen. We must...”
She stopped again, shaking her head.
“What about the blood that was thrown at me?” Vickie asked. “Do you know who it came from?”
“Mary. We are all Mary. But she hates him. She fights him,” Gloria said. She began to cry softly again. “I don’t know... I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I don’t want to die. Thank you. And I’m still so afraid and... I don’t know where I was. I don’t remember... I don’t remember anything before the woods, before...being Mary.”
“Agents? Detective Barnes?” the doctor said, pressing them to leave.
Griffin nodded. He walked over and took Gloria’s hand. “It’s okay. Thank you. Thank you for trying to help us.”
“I need to pay for what I did!” Gloria said.
“No. You were coerced into what you did. You were naive and foolish and they twisted and warped you. But you’re away from them. You need help,” Vickie told her. “Please keep trying to remember.” She hesitated. “Alex, he is alive, right?”
The girl nodded solemnly. “Alex is the way. He is the messenger.”
The doctor cleared his throat. “My patient is distressed,” he said firmly.
“We’ll be back!” Vickie promised cheerfully.
She smiled and squeezed the girl’s hand, and then rose. She felt a fierce rise of anger and tension as they headed out of Gloria’s hospital room.
It was very frightening. Gloria had said that women—plural—died. Those who did not please Satan—or the high priest, or whoever was playing Satan in the flesh.
They had to stop what was happening, stop anyone else from dying.
And they had to find Alex. He sure as hell wasn’t going to bear Satan’s child, but at any point, he might just rebel, refuse to help and refuse to believe...
And then, messenger or no, he might well find that he was a sacrifice himself.
“Where do we go from here?” she asked, turning to look at Griffin as he, Devin and Rocky and Detective Barnes joined her in the hallway.
“She might remember more and more,” Griffin said. “And she might not.”
“Alex is being kept somewhere. There’s an entire group living and surviving somewhere—and we don’t know where,” Vickie said, frustrated. “It seems to me that we have to find them.”
“And they could all be living in plain sight,” Rocky said. “Like the woman who went by Audrey Benson. They could all just be living and working somewhere—and then meeting up at an unknown destination, or a destination that changes.”
“But they have a prisoner. At least one prisoner. Alex. They have to be keeping him somewhere,” Vickie argued. “We have to find Jehovah.”
“And you think that you can?” Barnes asked, the tone of his voice dubious.
“I can try, and I can come darned close,” she said.
“What about Professor Hanson?” Devin asked.
“What about him?” Griffin asked, frowning.
“He wants to borrow one of Vickie’s dad’s books,” Devin explained.
“Really? What book?” Griffin demanded.
“He just wants to borrow a book,” Vickie said. “He’s an esteemed professor—there’s no reason to suspect him of anything.” She smiled at Griffin, though she had to admit she was feeling suspicious of everyone out there, as well.
Yeah, why the hell did the man suddenly want to borrow one of her father’s books?
Vickie gave herself a mental shake.
“You think that Milton Hanson could be involved in any way?” Detective Barnes asked. “That’s just crazy.”
Vickie turned to look at Barnes. “It’s all crazy—the very concept of everything going on is crazy. I’m sure you’re right, but we can keep an eye on him. We’ll start by checking out the book he wants.”
“And,” Griffin said, “since Gloria mentioned music, and since Audrey isn’t really Audrey, we should know if Cathy and Ron Dearborn are really Cathy and Ron Dearborn. Cathy said that they’re from Athol. Can we find out if they’re who they say they are?”
“And I expect you want that checked out with Milton Hanson, too?” Barnes asked, his tone on the dry side.
“Actually, yes, we should do that,” Griffin said. “Anyone could be a suspect. We don’t even really know what we’re looking at yet. Gloria said that women died. We don’t know who—we don’t know how many. We have to find out.”
“And that means finding Jehovah,” Vickie said determinedly.
10
“I think that I definitely need to find the book that Milton Hanson wants and look it over first!” Vickie told Griffin.
They’d gone to her parents’ apartment. While the elder Preston pair were in Europe, Vickie felt as much at home in their place as she ever had, and completely welcome.
She adored her folks—and was really close to them. She was their only child.
But she was very grateful that her parents were away, that they weren’t there to fret and worry about her when it simply made them crazy and wasn’t helpful to anyone.