Ash Return of the Beast

CHAPTER 30



The Next Day…

Kane hustled into the precinct building and whipped off his dripping hat. One of the officers squeezed by him on his way out.

“Morning, Lieutenant” the officer said. His tone was a little too cheerful.

Kane grumbled. “Goddamn rain. It’s supposed to be summer.”

“It’s Seattle,” the officer said, letting the door swing shut behind him.

Kane slapped his hat against his leg to shake off the rain as he made his way to the office where he found Ravenwood waiting by the door. She looked fresh and bright-eyed, holding two steaming cups of Starbucks. He was soaked, bleary-eyed and looked like a pile of crumpled laundry.

“Well,” she said, “look what the cat dragged in. Bad night?”

Kane grunted and unlocked the door. She followed him in and set his coffee on the desk.

“Thanks,” he said, hanging his coat on the back of the door. Yeah, bad night. Couldn’t sleep knowing this was the day.”

“Figured. How’d it go with Morran?”

“All right, I guess. I showed him one of the coins and told him how they were being used. The numbers on them. The whole thing. He thought it was pretty weird. I told him it gets weirder.”

“Uh-oh.”

“Yeah. Wish I hadn’t said that but it just fell out of my mouth. He wanted to know what I meant. Kept pressing me for more information.”

“What’d you tell him?”

“I opened the door and told him to get the hell out of my office.”

Ravenwood grinned. “Well, at least he left with something to chew on. Should keep him busy for a while.” She pulled the morning edition of the Seattle Sound Times from her briefcase and handed it to him. “Seen this yet?”

“What now?”

“No big headline. Just a few paragraphs buried on page three. Seems the wives and some relatives of the dead preachers have all been in communication with each other for about two weeks now.”

“What?”

“They’ve set up a private chat room on the internet where they talk about what’s been happening. Like Morran, they don’t think this string of deaths is just a series of coincidences. They’ve organized an interdenominational prayer group. You know. Hoping for some divine revelation to give them some sort of an answer to what’s happened.”

Kane snorted. “Good luck with that. God quit answering prayers a long time ago.”

She narrowed her eyes and studied his face. The comment was similar to others he’d made over the past few weeks. “And you know this, how?”

Kane didn’t answer.

Ravenwood leaned back in the chair and folded her arms. “Why do I get the feeling there’s something you’ve been keeping from me?” She knew she may have crossed the line and she mentally braced herself for an explosion. Instead, he surprised her by carefully rolling up the newspaper with all the expertise of a seasoned delivery boy and maintained his silence. The look on his face seemed distant. Maybe he was considering revealing his deepest secret. Her eyebrows raised in anticipation.

He lobbed the paper over to her and gave a look of fatherly approval when she caught it. Or maybe it was fatherly pride. In any case, she knew the look. She’d seen it in her own father’s eyes when she was a little girl and he was teaching her how to catch a baseball.

Kane took a sip of coffee. “It’s personal.”

Ravenwood nodded. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to pry.” She was disappointed that she didn’t get more of an answer but relieved that she hadn’t set off his fuse. That, in itself, was a genuine miracle. Proof positive that there is indeed a God. “Anyway,” she said, unrolling the paper and thumbing back to page-3. “There’s more. You’ll love this.”

“I doubt it. What is it?”

“Not all of the members of these families are satisfied with just prayer groups alone. The brother of the second victim is a hard core right wing political activist and he’s talked a few of the others of that persuasion into conducting their own investigation.”

“Great. Here it comes. Just what we need. A roving band of Christian vigilantes.”

She nodded. “That’s one way to put it.”

Over the next few hours they continued to discuss various aspects of the case. There were moments, however, when the conversation would lapse into complete silence, a silence that each of them privately recognized was not nearly as uncomfortable as it would have been even just a week ago. During one of those moments Kane cast a glance at Ravenwood.

“What?” she asked.

“Nothing.”

As the hours passed, they occasionally checked the clock in anticipation of the call they knew was coming. Somewhere in the city, preacher number seven was about to take an unexpected detour through Hell on his way to Heaven and only one person knew where and when it would happen.

At 5:15 p.m., the phone rang.