Takedown (22 page)

“We’re
on
a fast,” Mullens said. “That seltzer’s our lunch,” he pointed out.

“Do you want us to cast him into another tortoise?” Hartington asked, apparently serious, possibly even excited about the
idea.

“Been there, done that. This time I want him in a real jail with real guards on a suicide watch. The only problem is that
I can’t arrest him.”

“I thought you said he drove through your house with a cement truck and killed your decorator,” Lauer said.

“He did, but I can’t prove it. At least not yet. There’s blood in the cement truck that will prove to be his, but we can’t
place him at the scene, and we’re not allowed to just force a blood test on someone. I mean, what am I supposed to do, stab
him with a knife and then test the knife? Not that the thought hasn’t been entertained. Obviously, if I did anything like
that and it proved a positive match, even a bad lawyer could have it thrown out of court for improper procedure. Enjoyable,
but improper.”

“I say we kick his butt,” Mullens said. “Spiritually speaking, of course.”

“What if he were to
confess
to the crime?” Benjamin wondered aloud. “If he were to admit to you that he did it, wouldn’t that be just reason to arrest
him and take a blood test?”

Gavin shrugged. “Sure, but how would I get him to confess… especially to me?”

“You beat him in the wrestling ring,” Benjamin suggested. “Isn’t tonight one of those Armageddon challenges?”

“How did you know that?” Mullens asked.

“I watch the WWX once in a while… purely to see who I should be praying for, of course.”

“Of course,” Mullens muttered.

“Let me get this straight,” Gavin said. “You’re talking about me going in the ring with Krogan and beating him into a confession,
and then arresting him based on that confession?”
I’ll be killed,
Gavin thought.

“Yes,” Benjamin said. “We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers
of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.”

“Buck told me that. And it doesn’t make any more sense hearing it from you.”

“Getting him to confess shouldn’t be any harder than casting him into a tortoise, and you’ve already done that,” Lauer reasoned.

“I just got done telling you, I didn’t do anything. Buck did all the work.”

“That’s where you’re wrong, Gavin,” Hartington spoke up. Other heads were nodding, as if they knew what Hartington was going
to say. “Buck may have been an instrument, but it was God’s will and power channeling through him, and it will be God’s will
and power channeling through you.”

Gavin said nothing, but at that moment he felt a chill run up his spine.

“We’re ready to stand by you, Detective,” Lauer offered boldly. “We’re all prayed up and fasted up. We’re ready to go.”

“Go?” Gavin looked around at the intent faces of the ministers. All appeared confident.

“Absolutely. We’ll stand in the upper four corners of the Nassau Coliseum… north, south, east and west.”

“I’ve got the south,” Mullens said with a wink.

“You can count me in,” Hartington said.

“We’ll be your prayer support,” Benjamin said. “Jesus said ‘Where two or more are gathered in my name, there I am in their
midst.’With the four of us, I would imagine Krogan will be seeing enough angels to beg you for mercy.”

“I somehow doubt that,” Gavin said.

“Then that’s the next order of business,” Hartington declared. “Your faith.”

“Now you sound like Buck again.”

“We’ll take that as a compliment,” Benjamin said. “Do you know God, Gavin?”

“I don’t usually get to know the good guys as well as the bad guys. But if the bad guys exist, I guess He does also.”

Benjamin shook his head dramatically. “We’ve been called not to just believe He’s there but to
know
Him. Are we to be content to know about God intellectually when we’ve been created to know Him spiritually?”

“Are you asking
me
?” Gavin said, feeling intimidated.

“You’re a logical man, Detective,” Lauer said. “So I’ll give you an analogy. Think of your faith as a telescope. All this
time you’ve been wondering about it—how it fits into your life, its size, its shape, its color, how it works, how it doesn’t
work. You examine it for what it is, but you never look through it. The time has come for you to look through it.”

“Yes,” Mullens agreed. “Then we can go to the coliseum, get you a good spot in line, and start claiming some ground. Gentlemen,
we’re going to war.”

While the ministers nodded and smiled at one another in confident agreement, Gavin felt a gnawing in the pit of his stomach.
For all their enthusiasm about “going to war,” Gavin still couldn’t picture himself as the guy to be leading the charge.

K
rogan zoomed down Main Street, Hamden, in a flash. The police car that had taken off after him in that speed trap never had
a chance, but it had added to the thrill of the ride. He’d have to take that route on the way back to Long Island, he decided.

“Make the next right,” said the female voice of the Ferrari’s navigation system.

Krogan had spent the ride up thinking about Buchanan—the humiliation the old man had caused him in both worlds, and conversely,
the most humiliating way he could kill him, and how much better the world was going to be for Krogan without him. Yes, this
would be the third and last time they would meet. There would not be a fourth. Every human runs out of luck. This one had
just taken a little longer to come up empty.

Krogan downshifted and made his turn. Time to slow it down.

“Your destination is ahead on the left. Your route guidance is complete.”

Krogan’s excitement was abruptly tempered with caution. If he were between worlds, in the waterless place, he would right
now be under heavy attack from more angels than even he could handle. Just knowing that gave him pause, a rare reaction on
his part. Even in the flesh, he couldn’t think of another demon that would tread this close to the likes of Buchanan. But
Krogan wasn’t just any
demon. Those in the waterless place would see him and know his glory.

Just ahead Krogan could see a white mailbox with small lavender letters that read Samantha’s Dairy Farm.
Very cute,
he thought sardonically. He turned into the gravel driveway and stopped. A wire fence, probably electrified, bordered the
driveway on either side. To his right, several brown cows with pink bows around their necks stopped grazing to stare at him.
How disgustingly adorable,
he thought. If he had the time, he would brand his name into their sides and then slit their throats.

His gaze turned to the house at the top of the driveway. A white two-story with pink shutters and a wraparound porch. Looked
like a little girl’s dollhouse. There was little doubt who the decorator was. To the right of the house was the broad side
of a long, white barn with about two dozen small windows running the length of it, all with pink shutters. Between the shutters
were large detailed paintings of multicolored butterflies.

Krogan drove slowly up the tree-lined driveway. Near the top of the hill, the driveway emerged into the open and he pulled
over. Surprise would be important. Buchanan, with help from his suck-up celestial bodyguards, might realize who he was even
in a host he’d never seen before. He had to admit Buchanan was special in that regard. But even Buchanan could be surprised
… like in Norway, when—
Surprise!
—he and his family were gone. Almost, anyway.

Behind the white barn stood two other structures, a smaller barn and a chicken coop. The old preacher had to be here somewhere.
First Krogan checked the house. He walked up onto the porch and peeped in through the white lace draperies. He saw nothing.
He tried the front door. It was open. He pushed it open slowly and listened carefully. He walked inside, leaving the door
open behind him. If someone came by to check on why the door was open, it would be their bad luck. Curiosity kills.

The house was immaculate. He looked into the living room. Swords of sunlight stabbed through the curtains and cut amber lines
across an old, wide-plank pine floor. He paused to look at some family photos on the wall. A picture of Buchanan and his wife
on their wedding day, looking happy, in love.
Too bad.
He sneered. The only picture he had ever seen was in the newspaper after the crash.

Krogan quickly lost interest in people who were dead and gone. He went into the next room. The kitchen. Again, incredibly
neat and clean. No dishes in the sink. No boots on the floor. Did anybody live here? He checked the refrigerator. It was almost
empty. A tub of butter, an assortment of jelly jars, salad dressing, some eggs, but no real food. Not even milk. What kind
of dairy farm was this?

Krogan went upstairs and checked the bedrooms, just in case Buchanan was upstairs sick or taking a nap. Beds were made and
there were no clothes on the floor. The old man was an utter neat freak.
Disgusting.

He went back out on the porch and looked toward the barns. The closest appeared to have farm equipment in it, probably tractors
and stuff. He stepped off the porch and started toward it. Leaning against a fence post was a pitchfork. He grabbed it. He’d
always wanted to throw a pitchfork through someone. He could probably nail Buchanan from a hundred feet away. He eased up
to the first of four garage doors, took a quick look, then ducked inside. He was right about the tractors. There was also
some kind of forklift with
LULL
written on the side. He wondered how far he could throw a cow with it. Beyond that was a flatbed truck on lifts, the front
wheel off. But no Buchanan.

Krogan felt anger bubbling up through his veins, tightening his
jaw, clenching his teeth. Had those blasted angels seen him coming? Did they warn Buchanan, hide him, take him away? He raised
the pitchfork to throw it into the rear wall of the barn. Then he heard a noise outside. He stepped out the door and peered
around, his eyes darting about. Nothing. Another noise. It was coming from behind the barn. He went back in and ran around
the tractor to the rear of the barn, then looked out one of four small windows along the wall. Horses. Three girls on three
horses. He recognized one from a picture in the house. “Samantha,” he whispered with a smile. He looked at the pitchfork and
then back at Buchanan’s granddaughter. He quietly slid open the window with the sharp tips of the fork. The girls were letting
the horses drink from a white bathtub in the field just thirty or so feet away. An easy target. She was dead. He listened
as the girls spoke to each other and the horses. Useless chatter about a horse trial she would never get to see. He didn’t
know where Buck was, but his granddaughter would make a good appetizer.

A door shut behind him. He spun, cat quick, pitchfork raised, ready to throw. He saw nothing. A different door. He ran to
the front of the barn. An elderly black man with white hair had just entered the chicken coop. He must have been in the smaller
white barn, tending cows or something. The door of the coop shut closed. Buchanan! Got him. He would have Samantha for dessert.

Krogan went back in the garage and hurried across each bay until he reached the far end. The chicken coop was just next door,
almost attached. He was about to step out when a thought came to mind. He smiled, almost laughed. He turned around and gazed
at the
LULL
. The all-terrain forklift had an extending boom. Krogan hurried to it. Just as he expected, the key was in the ignition.
He quickly and quietly opened the well-greased garage door. How considerate of the preacher to maintain his farm so well.
He hopped aboard the
LULL
and placed the pitchfork next to his seat.

The
LULL
started after a few cranks. Excellent. If the old preacher saw him and came running, he would get a pitchfork in the neck.
Krogan played with the simple controls. No sweat. He stepped on the gas, drove out through the garage door, unable to stop
himself from laughing. The chicken coop was small. How much fun can a demon have in one day? He would remember this forever.
He drove around to the front door of the chicken coop, blocking any possible way of escape. Through the glass door he could
see Buchanan, tending to his chickens. The old man must have gone deaf. Whatever. Krogan lowered the forks. The chicken coop
was raised off the ground, probably to allow the chicken crap to fall out through the floor. A fatal flaw in the design. He
eased the
LULL
forward, the forks finding the space under the coop. He raised the forks slowly, very slowly, until they touched the floor.
Buchanan still hadn’t noticed, his attention still focused on his stupid chickens.

Krogan yanked back on the fork lever, instantly lifting the front of the coop off its foundation. He stopped and laughed,
as white chicken feathers exploded inside the coop. The frenzied clucking sounded as if the chickens thought this was as funny
as he did. The old preacher turned and raced toward the door, waving frantically at the feather cloud. A pity Krogan could
not make out Buchanan’s face clearly enough to see the fear.

“Where are your bodyguards now, Preach?” Krogan yelled. He yanked on the lever again. The coop rose, angled effortlessly upward.
Buchanan fell away from the door. Krogan pressed the throttle as he continued to pull on the lever. With the chicken coop
tottering at a steep angle, Krogan found another lever that extended the boom. He pushed the lever till the chicken coop was
completely vertical. He heard Buchanan scream in pain as feathers billowed through window openings. He laughed heartily.

Krogan saw movement in his peripheral vision, followed immediately
by the sound of horse hoofs and whinnying. The three girls that galloped around the barn were approaching him from behind.
He extended the boom farther while stepping on the gas. Creaking, glass cracking, feathers flying, he continued to push.

“No! What are you doing? Stop!” screamed the voices behind him as the chicken coop teetered. He pulled back on the boom lever,
put the
LULL
in reverse, backed away, lowered the forks, and rammed the bottom of the chicken coop. Again he raised the forks and drove
forward until the chicken coop flipped completely onto its roof. Buchanan’s screaming had stopped. The frantic clucking had
quieted. Feathers were floating to the ground.

“Yes!” Krogan proclaimed victoriously, stretching his arms to the sky for the unseen world to see. “You’re dead. I’ve won!”
He took a moment to bathe in his glory before his attention was drawn to the next task. Time for dessert.

He threw the
LULL
into reverse and stood on the gas pedal. He cranked the steering wheel to the left, spinning the machine a hundred eighty
degrees.