Gnosis (24 page)

“I’ll give it a glance when I get some free time. And listen, Eric, I really do appreciate it. I’ll make sure certain people up the food chain are aware of the time and effort you put in on this. It won’t go unnoticed.”

“Don’t worry about it. I only regret that nothing positive came of it.”

“We gave it a shot and it didn’t work out. It happens. I don’t like coming up empty any more than you do, and I especially don’t like it when the man who sent us on our quest knows the answer and won’t reveal it. That pisses me off.”

“You think Eli knows who the killer is?” Eric said.

“Oh, yeah.”

“And do you believe the same person killed those two boys, Colt Rogers, and Devon Fraley?”

“I’m positive they were all killed by the same person.”

“Then it doesn’t take much to understand why Eli is keeping secrets. He’s protecting himself.”

“Or others.”

The man sitting in the chair next to Eli’s bed was late middle-age, thin, with dark hair and piercing blue eyes. Handsome by any standard, with chiseled features and an unusually clear complexion, he looked much younger than his actual age, thanks to the extensive facial surgery he underwent more than three decades ago.

Surgery deemed necessary in order to remain alive.

He was a killer, a stone-cold assassin with more than thirty major hits to his credit. Before his twenty-first birthday, he was already considered the ace of aces among hit men. If a target had to be eliminated, or an old score needed to be settled, he was the preferred choice to handle the task. Operating as an independent, owing loyalty only to the person paying the bill, he was among the most respected men in the Organization. And the most feared. Legend holds that Jimmy Hoffa once wet himself when elevator doors opened and he found himself standing face to face with the Mob’s top mechanic.

He had the reputation and the credentials to back it up.

Then, almost overnight, following the death of his benefactor and mentor, things changed and his world went topsy-turvy. Allegiances were shattered, contracts broken. Old friends became enemies. Enemies sought revenge. Suddenly, almost without warning, the most feared hunter of them all became the hunted.

His choice was simple: change or die. 

Now, all these years later, sitting in this room on a late afternoon, watching the dying Eli Whitehouse sleep, the man could only reflect on the circumstances that brought them together. The cruel winds of fate were responsible, a moment, a split-second in which the innocent became a prisoner to evil, and silence became the difference between living and dying.

Chance, providence, bad luck, shitty karma—call it what you will. It didn’t matter. In his world, words meant nothing, actions everything. He had been forced to act and he did, in the only way he knew. He killed.

When danger threatened, old habits kicked in. Survival trumped everything. People had to be eliminated.

He thought the killing had ended thirty-one years ago when he laid down his gun and walked away from the business. At the time, even though his life was in danger, a voice in his head said no more, this is enough. It wasn’t his conscience whispering to him; in truth, he had no conscience. Nor was it fear or burnout. He couldn’t explain what it was, other than a desire deep inside him to stop taking money for killing. He wanted no more blood on his hands.

So, he left it all behind. He relocated, changed his appearance, made arrangements for his wife to join him, and became what he had previously despised—a civilian.

Despite the changes, he understood that men like him are never truly free from the past. Those who operate in shadows forever remain in shadows. Then or now, theirs is a world of dark places where the light, if it is allowed to penetrate, means death, either for them or for those unlucky enough to get trapped in its glare.

Like those two nameless victims in the old barn twenty-nine years ago. He did not want to kill them, but he had no choice. A light threatened his shadow, an invasion that was not acceptable. Light equaled death for him. Killing those two innocent, luckless kids made a point to certain people—silence equals life.   

Now the silence had been broken. He had been betrayed, and this betrayal had set in motion a series of events resulting in the death of two more innocent, luckless victims. And now, in this prison infirmary, as the evening shadows crept across the room, he looked at the innocent, luckless man sleeping peacefully in his bed.

Eli Whitehouse.

The man did not claim to really know Eli. They had no real relationship, then or now. Not friends, not enemies. Only two men from different parts of the world thrown together forever by the oldest of reasons: a whisper overheard, a secret revealed. Knowledge, as it often does, became the X factor, the invisible chain that bound them to one another.

Knowledge was the light that could penetrate shadows.

His instinct was to kill Eli, to make him pay for his betrayal. In the past, he would have done so without hesitation. But killing Eli now was not only dangerous, it made no sense. Eli was already dying, slowly being assassinated by those cancerous cells inside his body. In this instance, nature was doing the dirty work. Eli’s silence was guaranteed; what the man had to do now was find out if there were others who needed silencing.

He rose from his chair, went to the bed, and gently touched Eli’s shoulder. Several seconds passed before Eli awoke. Even then, it took more time before he recognized the man standing above him.

“Have you come to kill me?” Eli said, his voice barely audible.

“That’s up for grabs,” the man responded. “Depends on the answers I get.”

“Why did you kill Colt Rogers?”

“I don’t learn anything by answering your questions, Eli. So I’ll do the asking, you do the answering?”

“As you wish.”

The man pulled his chair closer to the bed and sat down. Leaning forward, he quietly said, “Why did you bring the detective into this, Eli? And what have you told him?”

“Charlie Bolton mentioned some things to . . .”

“I don’t know Charlie Bolton,” the man interrupted. “I’m talking about Detective Dantzler. Why did you bring him into this?”

“I didn’t,” Eli lied.

“You requested a meeting with him. Why? I thought we had an understanding, Eli. Everybody stays quiet, everybody stays alive. Seems to me you’ve broken your promise. Now everybody and everything is in play.”

“No, you have it all wrong,” Eli protested. “I didn’t request a meeting with Dantzler. He asked to see me. That’s the truth. If you’ve heard otherwise, you’ve been given bad information.”

“Why would he want to meet with you?”

“Like I was saying, Charlie Bolton, the lead detective on my case, mentioned a few things that really got Dantzler interested. Dantzler is writing an article on homicide investigative procedure and he thought my case would be worth mentioning. As a study tool, you know? He only asked me procedural questions. How Charlie and his partner, Dan Matthews, went about investigating the case, that sort of thing. I told him nothing about you. I swear to you. I would never make that mistake.”

“It was a mistake talking to him at all, Eli. And I’m not sure I believe what you’re telling me. Dantzler is doing more than writing an article.”

“You shouldn’t have killed Colt Rogers. That was a mistake.”

“I had no choice, now, did I? Rogers was weak. I couldn’t take a chance and let him talk to Dantzler.”

“But Dantzler knows nothing.”

“You don’t want this to go any farther, Eli. It’s in everyone’s best interest for you to make sure it doesn’t. Should Detective Dantzler continue pursuing this, certain people are going to die. And first on the list is your lovely, precious daughter. Make no mistake, Eli, her death will not be quick and painless. She will suffer.”

“Please, you can’t do that.”

“I can and I will.”

“Not Rachel. She’s innocent.”

“Do you really think that matters to me?”

“You gave your word. You promised.”

“Make it all go away, Eli. Or else.”

Eli turned away, tears in his eyes, his thoughts on Rachel. He realized now that he had unleashed a storm by bringing Dantzler into this. It might have been a mistake, a grave error in judgment that could easily lead to disaster. But it was the right decision to make. He believed it then, and despite the potential for a tragic outcome, he believed it now. If Dantzler was as smart as Eli believed him to be, it would all turn out for the best.

If . . .

Dantzler held the fate of Eli’s family in his hands. And he didn’t even know it.

Think of Jesus’s empty tomb.

What had Eli meant when he uttered that statement? Was it a cryptic message, his way of directing Dantzler to the mysterious name in the obits? Was it even a message at all? Could it be Eli, overwhelmed by fatigue and fear, had confused Jesus’s empty tomb with his own, which, in a matter of weeks, would no longer be empty? Had the words been directed at Dantzler, or was Eli, a man of God, conversing with a higher authority?

He wanted to dismiss Eli’s statement as little more than the incoherent ramblings of a dying man. But he couldn’t persuade himself that the words were meaningless. It was the timing that wouldn’t allow him to simply write off the five words spoken by Eli. The timing, he felt, was crucial. He had been pleading with Eli to give him the name in the obits, yet Eli steadfastly refused. Then, at the last minute, Eli spoke:

Think of Jesus’s empty tomb.

Dantzler was convinced of two things: Eli had directed his statement at Dantzler, and the answer to the puzzle could be found in those five words. But how to go about unraveling the mystery, that was the question. Eli had given him very little to work with, not a Proverb or a Psalm or one of the thousands of familiar biblical quotations. No particular book, chapter, or verse. Only five simple words:

Think of Jesus’s empty tomb.

What are you trying to tell me, Eli? Dantzler said to himself. And why do you persist in making this so difficult?

It was well past midnight, and Dantzler sat on his back deck, watching the moon slowly make its way across the lake that backed up against his yard. The CD player was on, the volume down. Leonard Cohen, his favorite singer-songwriter, was singing a song titled “The Law” that had a lyric Dantzler now associated with Eli Whitehouse.

“
You just don’t ask for mercy while you’re still on the stand.”

This was surely true in Eli’s case. In twenty-nine years behind steel prison bars, the old man had never once asked for mercy, never once pleaded his case. Even now, with death banging on his door, he refused to provide information that in all likelihood would set him free. The name that held the answer to this mystery, along with the reason why Eli took the fall, would soon be locked away forever. Eli was taking it all to the grave with him.

You’re a damn fool, Eli, Dantzler whispered out loud. One stubborn, insane Reverend.

*****

After nearly two hours of solid drinking, Dantzler was more than halfway through a bottle of Pernod. He had long ago zoomed beyond buzzed and was now well on his way to completely drunk. The night air was warm, almost muggy. In the darkness, around the lake, a chorus of crickets and loons sang, competing with Leonard Cohen for his musical attention.