Resurrected (Resurrected Series Book 1) (22 page)

Chapter 19

I wasn’t overly surprised to find myself sitting across from Judge Willis McGrath. I was still trying to think of a way out of this for Eric but we were heading back out onto the lake now, and Eric and I were restrained and disarmed. Struggling against zip ties wasn’t a good idea – the plastic would only dig into your flesh. So Eric and I both sat as still as we could, occasionally being jostled by a wave from a passing boat. I glanced down at his wrists and noticed a thin red line where he was starting to bleed. Eric had been right. We were fucked. I figured I couldn’t make this any worse.

“So Willis,” I asked, “we’ve apparently got some time to kill.” I bit my lip. Maybe I could make it worse. Eric just snorted. “How did Lottie do what she did? The mechanics of it, how’d she do it?”

Willis raised an eyebrow at me and I fully expected him to play dumb again, to tell me the same bullshit we had heard in her apartment in Baton Rouge. But Willis McGrath was full of surprises. He told me the truth. “She didn’t do anything. We can’t control something like this.”

What the hell? I swallowed. I really wanted some water. I would have even settled for a Budweiser. “Then how did this happen?” my voice sounded small. I hoped it only sounded that way in my head. Jesus, how pathetic.

Willis was unconcerned, bored almost. “We don’t know. Some of you people are like that. The first few times it happened, we assumed it was our doing, and tried to reuse the bodies, with the same effect. There’s nothing to be done for it, unfortunately. Such a waste of an otherwise perfectly good body too.”

Holy shit. “So Lottie … my Lottie … I mean, my fiancée, it was her brain …?” I was stuttering. Willis was still bored by me; Perry was still leering at me. And I felt incredibly seasick.

“I suppose there may be something different about her brain. It’s been a long time since this has happened; we wanted to do an autopsy on Lottie, but I suppose, given your affiliation, we will just have to trust to keep each other’s secrets.” How could this asshole sit there and talk about cutting apart Lottie so calmly, casually, like she was a frog in a high school biology class?

“And who the hell did you think Lydia was going to tell?” Eric snapped.

Willis slightly raised a shoulder. In some ways, he reminded me of my mother. We didn’t even deserve a full physical response from him. “Lottie’s case is unusual for a number of reasons, not the least of which she sought out her past and you went along with it,” he was still directing this to me. Eric was already dead to him. “This is the kind of thing that would drive most people crazy. In the past, it often did. Even if we didn’t kill them, they typically didn’t live very long. As you can imagine, if people at home knew this was a possibility, well, would you pay to come here?”

“It’s my understanding you’re already doing quite a bit of lying.”

“It’s sales, Dietrich. Besides, losing one’s mind is far worse than losing one’s life.” Judge Willis McGrath was the kind of pretentious asshole who would use words like “one” instead of “you.” Kind of like using “whom” instead of “who.”

But I thought about what he’d said; Lottie had insisted she never intended to run into me but she had also given in so easily, had told me far more than she should have that day in Houston. And she also knew she had given me enough hints to find her if I’d wanted to. She may not have expected to see me in the coffeehouse that day, but once I caught up to her, she had gambled on me, on my love for her, on our love for each other. Those two years had been a Hell for her, too, but Lottie hadn’t gone crazy. Some part of her had clung to the hope that one day, somehow, we would be together again.

When I was seventeen years old, I met the most incredible girl on the planet at a college party I hadn’t wanted to go to; that night, I thought she was beautiful and smart and funny, with a sarcastic wit complemented by this unbelievably sexy smirk. As the years passed, I had often thought she was even a little weird like me, except in a much more endearing kind of way. When I was 27, two years after she was killed in a car accident and I had fallen into my own afterlife, my own personal Hell of a world deprived of her in it, I discovered there always
had
been something unique and wonderful and extraordinary about the woman I had always known I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. It wasn’t so much that her mind had inexplicably resurrected itself; it was how deeply her faith in me ran that had allowed her to survive without losing her mind.

And I had nothing left to ask Willis McGrath. I didn’t care anymore about their world or their manipulation of people living here or even what he had tried to do; I only wanted to get home to Lottie. Preferably with Eric. But as we continued driving out farther onto the lake, I still had no solutions. Eric was going to die. Why had he done this? We could have waited. We
should
have waited for others to arrive. Surprised them. Negotiated with something other than another human life. Hell, surely someone knew how to be a pirate and could have boarded a moving boat had they taken off again. At this point, it probably didn’t matter what his motivations were, so I asked him, hoping he’d offer some clue, some hint that he’d had a plan all along.

“Eric, what were you thinking? Why would you do this?”

Eric looked at me, and typical Eric, with a serious, grave face, told me, “Did you know your wrists are bleeding? It looks kinda painful.”

“Really? I hadn’t noticed.”

“You owe me a case of Budweiser, by the way.”

“Yeah, I’ll leave it on your grave. You want Bud Light?”

“Dude, I’ll be dead. I won’t give a shit about calories. Get me the full calorie crap beer.”

Even Willis, who I am certain didn’t even have a sense of humor, was watching us with a bemused expression. “I’ll bring you a good
hefeweissbier
too. You know, as an ‘I’m sorry you went and got yourself killed’ gesture.”

Eric smiled at me. Only Eric would have started making jokes when he knew he was about to be murdered. Only I would have gone along with it. “That’s really thoughtful of you, Dietrich. You would definitely be my kind of guy if I were gay.”

“Any guy that buys you beer would be your kind of guy.”

Eric thought about that. “Hm, maybe, but you’d still be my favorite.”

“What the hell are they doing?” Perry asked Willis. It was a good question. Eric was just being Eric, and I was just trying to enjoy the last moments I had with my best friend before these fuckers killed him. But after everything we’d been through together, we could joke about some really weird shit. Willis just shook his head. “Let’s just hope
his
personality and memories aren’t restorable.”

And that’s what finally pissed me off. They could have beaten the shit out of us and it wouldn’t have pissed me off as much as Willis McGrath – cocksucker extraordinaire – putting down my best friend; the man who had recognized talent and potential in me at only 18 and led me to a career in something that paid well and I thought would be exciting; who had saved my life and whose life I had saved; who had never once judged me for being a little weird or asocial; who could joke with me about dying; who had kept me company in my Hell of an afterlife after Lottie had died. I glowered at Willis. “He would be
lucky
to become even half the man Eric is.” Whatever tiny spark of amusement I had found bantering with Eric had been extinguished. I was cold, filled with ice, unfeeling and I wanted them dead.

“Hey Dietrich, remember your question?” Eric asked. Of course I remembered. I never forgot anything.

“Two part answer. One, I sort of meant it. I mean, I care about Lydia, but I did it for you and Lottie, because you’ve both been through more shit than anyone should ever have to live through … or die through … Christ, I don’t even know, this whole thing still fucks with my head. But I want y’all to be happy. And I can’t imagine Lottie getting over the death of Lydia, not entirely, not ever.”

I wished I hadn’t asked. There was no way I was ever getting over the guilt of my best friend being willing to die for my happiness.

“And two, do you remember that time we were in Damascus?”

Maybe it hadn’t been such a stupid question after all. “Yes,” I took my time answering, trying to figure out what about that trip was so significant right now. The most memorable part of that trip to me was that it was in Damascus that I had witnessed a man being tortured with those thin, sharp, flat metal rods. And then I knew. I concentrated on keeping my breathing steady, my heart rate down, to keep myself from perspiring. Given their size, those rods were relatively easy to hide from someone like David, someone who didn’t have professional training like us to look for those kinds of things. And wherever Eric had it hidden, it was accessible behind his back. He was cutting through the zip tie around his wrists. I realized I needed to say something though. These men weren’t professionals, neither of them had had the forethought to sit behind us. I didn’t want either of them to move.

“Damascus was a mess. Hot as Hell. And it took us two weeks to find our target.” I was actually just making shit up. I should have watched more spy movies then I would have known what kind of spy-sounding-words to use to make my story sound more plausible to them. “I remember you hooking up with some journalist.” That part was
true. “Shit, Eric, you didn’t get her pregnant, did you? This is kind of extreme to get out of child support.”

“Nah, at least I don’t think so.” We needed to keep the attention on me.

“I tried dates. Found out I don’t like dates. I’m talking about the fruit, obviously.” Also true. Apparently, I’m kind of a picky eater. “We spent a lot of time following people around. And taking turns napping because it is
really
fucking hot in Syria.” Not true. Except for the part about it being really fucking hot in Syria. “Oh, and I ran into someone from Germany, which kinda pissed you off because you don’t speak much German and couldn’t keep up with our conversation even though we were just BS’ing about politics and shit.” That was sort of true. It had happened but not in Damascus; we had been in Cairo.

“You do have a good memory,” Eric said. Smartass. “But I also figured you wouldn’t let me go off to my death without coming with me, and you’re forgetting one of the most significant things that happened there.” I didn’t look down to see if he had finished cutting through the zip tie, but I didn’t have to. Eric’s hands were free. “I learned how to use these.” He lunged across the table and stabbed Judge Willis McGrath in the throat. Perry Dennison still had a gun, and neither of us had forgotten. My hands were still bound behind my back but my legs were free. I jumped up from the chair I had been sitting in and kicked the gun out of Perry Dennison’s trembling hands, his eyes wide with shock. From behind me, I could feel Eric sawing at the zip tie around my wrists, then felt the snap of the plastic as it came loose. Eric and I were both free.

Eric was on the ground again on top of Willis McGrath, his severed carotid artery wasn’t killing him quickly enough, and Perry was watching me, wide eyed, and the strong odor of urine filled the cabin space around us. Perry Dennison had just pissed himself. I threw myself at him, the force of my elbow shattering into the side of his face, and felt the familiar sensation of bone and cartilage crushing beneath my arm, under the weight of a man who knew how to use his entire body to throw as much force as possible into these blows. That’s why using our fists was avoided when we could; we had far too high a risk of breaking the bones in our own hands.

Blood splattered across the tan-white walls of the interior of the yacht, leaving drops of red dots all the way to the ceiling. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Eric heading toward the stairs. I wanted to call out to him, tell him to wait for me, but I didn’t expect to be much longer. After all, we were in control now, able to work together in that way of ours without speaking, as we so often did, knowing what needed to be done without having to give voice to it or decide who would do what. Eric was going to find David and I would be right behind him.

I turned my full attention back to Perry himself who had just had half of his face broken, shattered, unrecognizable underneath the blood and exposed bone and muscle and tattered skin. He was trying to talk to me. Beg me. He had been willing to kill my best friend so he could sell his body – I could only assume two different payments would have been made, one on both sides - and he thought I was going to have pity on him? Maybe if I had rescued a stranger; maybe if he hadn’t bartered the life of the only person I had ever known that I honestly, truly, idolized. So many maybes. But he had evaluated Eric like a head of cattle, a prized breed and put a price on him, was willing to deprive this world of a man that had helped me learn how to become a man myself. I had never had that in my life before. He wasn’t just my best friend; he was family. The only family I’d had after Lottie died, and these fuckers
mocked
him. For Perry Dennison, there was no saving himself now.

I stepped over the lifeless body of Willis McGrath and pulled a limp Perry to his feet, slammed him against the wall of the cabin and heard the back of his head hit the wall with a sickening crack. Then just like Jackson, Perry Dennison died of a broken neck.

The motor of the yacht was still running, so I moved cautiously up stairs. I couldn’t hear anything except the motor and the waves hitting the side of the yacht as it continued cruising farther out into the lake. I stepped a little higher, and saw David, his gun pointing at Eric, and Eric, holding a gun pointed back at David. Shit. I was unarmed. Eric had taken the gun Perry had been holding. I held my breath. Eric was a better shot, better able to anticipate any movement of David’s, anything David might be planning or thinking just by watching his eyes. Both of us had been in similar situations before. Eric could get out of this.