Play with Fire

chapter Fifty-Eight

MORRIS AND CHASTAIN were up early, too – although, in truth, they had barely slept at all. Libby Chastain was up most of the night preparing contingency spells, and Morris was too tense to manage more than an hour’s doze in his room’s easy chair.

Through a combination of phone calls and checking several churches’ websites, they had learned that the earliest religious service in Oakley this morning would be the eight o’clock mass at St. Joseph’s Roman Catholic Church. The last, as far as they could tell, was the worship service at Kroner Baptist that began at noon.

Their strategy for preventing the end of the world had been articulated by Morris just after four in the morning. “We’ll take separate cars and cruise the churches, beginning about seven thirty. If you get a whiff of black magic at any of them, you’ll pull over and find a place to put the anti-combustion spell into operation. I’ll keep moving, in case what you smell is a fake-out, like last time. If I find any church on fire, I’ll call you on my cell, and you’ll hightail it over there, while I try to disrupt their spell any way I can.”

“And if the church where I am turns out to be the real deal, then I’ll call you,” Libby had said.

“And I’ll get back there, quick as I can. I don’t imagine Ware and his bunch will take kindly to having their plans disrupted, and you may attract some hostile attention, once they figure out that you’re in the field.”

“Hostile attention.” Libby had mustered a thin smile. “A fancy way of saying that they’ll probably try to kill me.”

“Yep – but I don’t plan to let ’em,” Morris said.

“Good.”