Cain's Blood (26 page)

he room was dark and smelled like dirt and mold and spiders. Jeff lay curled on the concrete floor. everything hurt.
The cool and damp floor against his face the only feeling
that wasn’t burning, piercing.
They sat with him, the other boys from someone else’s life.

The ghosts born in his head, lurking by a hairsbreadth outside his
real world for years.
James and Matt and ernest.
(Now the souls gathered . . . )
Curtis, Tony, and both Stevens. (
From every side they came . . .
)
I’m sorry, he’d told them.
I’m sorry. I’m sorry.
They’d told him his apologies were unnecessary.
They called him brother. Whispered to him for hours.
his attempt to escape had been short-lived, failed.
I deserve to die.
konerak, the youngest in the gathering, stroked Jeff’s hair in the
darkness.
Be brave, he said.
There was a hole drilled into the back of konerak’s head. Jeff could
see it even in the dark. Long ago, someone had injected hydrochloric
acid into the frontal lobes of his brain while he was still alive. Someone
had wanted to make konerak a “zombie.”
Be brave, he said. Castillo is going to find you.
Jeff closed his eyes.
he heard the door open.
konerak and the others were gone. returned to the underworld . . .
(My heart longed, after this, to see the dead again.)
“Who you talking to?” a familiar voice asked.
It wasn’t Castillo.

ristin was as beautiful as the day he’d first met her. She
shined. Almost two years apart couldn’t change that, Castillo thought. Not a hundred. had it already been two
years since he’d returned broken from Iran? Two years

since she’d helped put him together again?

“Thanks for coming,” he said, sitting in the opposite side of the
booth while his eyes scanned the rest of the small café. “I know I . . . It
means a lot.”

“Cut the bullshit,” she replied. “you knew I’d be here. you look terrible.”
Castillo laughed, but his expression and body proved she was right.
“Thanks, babe.”
“I’m sorry.” She found a genuine smile. She’d grown out her hair,
darkened it. her eyes, even with the smile, filled with both pity and anguish. “you know what I meant.”
“This thing is almost over, I think.”
“Thank God.” She grabbed his hands together. he let her, and she
squeezed them tightly in her own, the touch proving so very familiar.
“We can figure this thing out together. you and me. Whatever it is.
Please.”
“It’s . . .”
“Can’t you simply walk away?” she asked. “Just this once?”
“I don’t think so. Thanks.” he took the water the waitress set down,
then waited for her to leave again. “It’s . . . it’s gone too far.”
“‘In this hole lives the Wicked king.’”
“What’s that?”
“A quote.”
“Lady Gaga or Gandhi?”
“Neither, smart-ass. It’s Berkowitz. The Son of Sam.”
“So close.”
“he wrote it all over his apartment wall when he was killing people.”
“Very hallmark. your point?”
“Sounds like you’ve climbed down into some dark places the past
few weeks. Like before. The kind of pits that are sometimes tough to
get out of alone.”
“And you can only walk in Mordor so long before that evil dust gets
in your boots. Is that it?”
“Something like that. I don’t know where you’re at anymore. No
one does.”
“Oh, let me guess. Our old pal Stanforth visited you.”
“fuck Stanforth, this isn’t about him. They traced your phone calls,
yes. They know you called me, and I’ve been ordered to give a full report to someone in the Pentagon. But this isn’t about any of that. Or
national security. Or about the goddamn job. yours, or mine. It’s gone
beyond that now and you know it, too.”
“yes.”
“Why so personal this time? And don’t tell me it isn’t.”
Castillo took a long drink of water. Set the glass down again.
“There’s this kid . . .”
“Try again. There’s always
some
‘kid.’” kristin shook her head, took
both his hands again. “every village in the world, there’s some kid.
Some Shaya. There’s something else.”
“This isn’t about him. And you don’t know anything about that.”
“Because you won’t talk about it. I know he died. And I know you
hold yourself accountable.”
“‘Did he smile his work to see? Did he who made the Lamb make
thee?’ ”
“Perfect. hide behind Blake.”
“you started the quote bullshit. how ’bout Genesis?”
“Gabriel or Collins?”
“funny,” he said. “Bible. Mark of Cain.”
he felt her hands relax. release. “What about it?”
“Something in Jacobson’s office. But the quote wasn’t quite right.
I looked it up in the Bible last night. Do you know why God marked
him?”
“Who’s Jacobson?” her face tightened, deciding whether or not
to follow him down whatever path he’d chosen. “Because Cain was a
killer,” she said.
“yes. But why?”
“Jesus, Castillo, it’s a made-up story. What’s the—” She sighed with
exasperation. “So others would forever know his sin. he was marked as
a murderer.”
“Nope,” Castillo smiled, and her reaction showed him it wasn’t a
pleasant expression. “I always thought that too, but I read it again,” he
said. “God marked Cain so that the others would never punish him.
Never kill him. It was a warning to others to let Cain live. Said whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance would be taken on him sevenfold. he
wanted Cain to live.”
“right. To punish himself later. And?”
“No, not to punish. Never to punish. how could he? All of us,” he
said, wrapping his fingers around the water glass again. “We’re all Cain.
Always have been.”
“We’re all Abel too, Shawn.”
“We were positioned in Towraghondi, a little village twenty clicks
outside Shirabad. The Taliban set up shop there recently, and our assignment was to wait for an important commander to arrive and take
him out. We’d taken position in one of the local homes, with a farmer
named Sajadi. Shaya was his son, twelve years old. Cool kid. funny,
liked Metallica and PayDays. Could draw like he worked for Marvel.
We’d spent two months waiting, waiting in their home, and then we
completed the assignment. Couple days later, we got tip of a weapons
stash one village over and moved in for a closer look. Ambush. Total
ratfuck, but we got out. Got back to Towraghondi, I knew. I just  .  .  .
The whole fucking village was out, staring at us. Looking at me.
They’d . . . the Taliban figured out where we’d been staying. The tip
was bait. The farmer, Sajadi. Whole family dead. Tortured. his two
daughters—”
“Shawn.”
“Shaya’d been nailed to the wall. A brick wall with these metal
spikes. They’d stripped him. Cut away his nose, his genitals. They’d
taken—”
kristin shrank away from the table. Away from him.
“Listen to me.” he leaned forward to follow her, his words a hiss.
“An American genetics company is cloning humans from the DNA of
various serial killers.”
kristin eyed him more steadily, trying to work back to him. “Go
on.” her voice still shook.
“The kids I’m chasing are clones built by the united States government. kids who were systematically cultivated to become killers. you
just quoted the Son of Sam. I’m chasing the younger version. Literally.
his name is David. he’s fifteen.”
She looked away, collected herself.
Castillo leaned even closer to speak in a whisper. “When I was rescued in Iran, it was one of these same science projects that saved me.
One of their ‘distilled’ killers. Something special. Stanforth, the army,
has been using these things for years. And this company’s committed
everything from murder to torturing children in order to make these
weapons. And worse. In the name of science. In the name of national
defense. In the name of cash.”
“And?” kristin suddenly looked back.
“And?” he sat back, smiling at her candor. Amazed he could smile
at anything.
It was kristin’s turn to lean forward. Puzzled and challenging. “And
when has that ever bothered you before? you, of all people, understand
that this”—she indicated the diner and everyone, everything, in it—“has
a price. It’s always been a double-edged sword, Shawn. When did you
latch onto the puerile absolutes that the military is always dangerous,
government is always corrupt, capitalism is always merciless?”
“Not always. Maybe not even usually. But sometimes. And
this
time.”
he placed a flashdrive onto the table.
“What’s this?” she said.
“everything I know. All of it. If I vanish, which is likely, you get this
to Ox or CNN or whoever you can.”
She laid her hand over the flashdrive. “Just walk away.”
“Can’t.”
“Shawn.”
he looked up and she smiled at him, her blue eyes filled with such
sadness. “This time,” he said, “this kid, this boy. Jeffrey.” his voice
cracked a pitch at the end and he looked away in shame. he felt his
hands squeezed again. “Not again. Not this time.”
“God, I love you,” she said.
“They made this kid,” he continued. “They did, we did, I did. The
clone of Jeffrey Dahmer.”
“Jeff from the files?”
“Actually, that’s
another
Jeff Dahmer clone. you’ll get used to it. But,
it doesn’t matter which. They’re both an actual by-product of everything I’ve devoted my life to protecting.”
“you can’t possibly think—”
“But I do. And if I’m willing to die for those ideals on some Pakistani hilltop, I’m sure as hell going to take full responsibility for them
here, too.” he glared at her, not seeing her eyes anymore but those of
another: A boy. Lost, wounded, terrified. Abandoned. “I made this kid,
kristin. Like God made Cain. And I . . .”
“hey.”
“What?”
“I would have gone with you,” she whispered.
“I know.” his hands moved over hers. “But I hadn’t really come
home yet.”
“And now?”
he shrugged, realizing even as he did, that he’d given a credible
imitation of Jeff Jacobson’s favorite response.
“Closer,” he said.
“What do you want me to do?” she asked.