The Demon Pool (29 page)

Kevin sat on the floor. He looked at Bruce with a
mixture of mild confusion and guarded alertness.

“She wants to talk to you,” Bruce said, holding
out the cell phone.

“She who?” Kevin asked.

The voices in Kevin’s head began a low,
snickering laugh, like the laugh track from a bad sitcom, only with the volume
turned down. Bruce shook his head and gave Kevin a look that again reminded
Kevin of his asshole father.
When this is over, you’re a dead man, Clark.

“Give me that,” Kevin demanded.

He snatched the phone from Bruce’s hand and put
it to his ear.

“What?” Kevin asked.

“Kevin, you made a mistake today.”

A moment passed as he recognized Kat’s voice.

“I was trying to help you,” Kevin pleaded. “Give
you something to bargain with. They knew that. They should have told you.”

“I’m not talking about your plan. The problem is
the old man who showed up in the truck. He saw you wearing the trooper’s belt,”
Kat said. “Then you sent the video to Demore and in the video your prisoner is
without his belt.”

Kat paused to let the facts sink in.

“I sent the video to Demore,” Kevin replied. “No
one else. The old man knows nothing. How do you know about the video?”

“The old man was part of Demore’s investigation.
He called Demore. They talked,” Kat said. “I know, Kevin, because I have
helpers. You can’t see them, but they see everything and they tell me
everything.”

“But, the old man doesn’t know why we’re here. We
can make them all disappear. No one will know. I know how to make people
disappear.”

Smugness returned to Kevin’s voice. Kevin had
made many women disappear and they all stayed disappeared. No one would find
them. The voices in his head quieted. It was as if they appreciated Kevin’s
special talent. A talent they had helped him develop.

Kevin smirked at Bruce and turned away. He did
not want Bruce to see his face as Kat continued correcting and instructing him.

“No one will know what?” Kat asked. “We know that
the old man saw you with the trooper’s gun and belt. We know that you sent
Demore a video. We know that Demore talked to the old man after he left the
estate. We know that Demore asked the old man questions about the gun, and that
the old man told him that you were wearing a belt like the one the other
trooper wore.”

Kat paused and the voices snickered at him again.
Just a little. Just enough to make Kevin feel uncomfortable.

“We are going to presume that Demore knows where
you are located and what you have done,” Kat continued. “We are going to
presume that Demore will not follow your instructions and that others will
know. Do you understand?”

Kevin wanted to argue. Demore was a goody-goody.
Surely, he would follow Kevin’s instructions and not put his friend’s life at
risk. Surely, Kevin had covered all of the bases. The voices snickered again.

Kevin had always believed he could control the voices.
They had always responded positively to his adventures. Now they appeared to
have gained some level of independence. Before, they always helped him. Now
they mocked him, ordered him around, demanded things from him, ganged up on
him. First, they were friends. Now, they were little more than demonic drill
sergeants.

“Tell her you understand
.
Obey her
.”

The word “obey” echoed inside his skull. Kevin
hated orders. He wanted to tell them to shut up again, but he was afraid they
would punish him. Maybe it was better to go along. For now. When this was over
he would find a girl and he would please them, please himself. They would be on
his side again. The voices became a climaxing chorus, a crescendo.

“Tell her you understand.”

“Obedience is better than sacrifice.”

“Obey her.”

“Obey. Obey. Obey.”

Kevin’s will collapsed under the weight of the
demonic diatribe.

“I understand.”

“Good. Now we solve this problem. We will assume
that Demore knows where you are, so we might as well bring him to you. Call him
tonight. Tell him to come alone if he wants to see his friend alive. Send him a
video of the dead girl. He will know you are serious.”

Kevin felt naked, betrayed. He had been careful,
so careful. Kat knew about the dead girl. Did Clark tell her? Or was it the
voices? If the voices, why were they doing this to him? The chorus rose again,
indirectly answering Kevin’s question.

“Because she commands us.”

Kevin will had collapsed, but not his hatred. He
got up off the floor and walked across the room, farther away from Bruce. His
voice went soft and conspiratorial.

“What about your four-eyed friend here?” Kevin
asked Kat. I don’t think he likes my plan.”

“That’s not your concern. I’ll handle Bruce. Same
way I handled the little problem you were having.”

It was almost too much. Kevin heard his voice
rise.

“Little problem? I was going out of my freaking
mind.”

He glanced back at Bruce. Bruce stared back,
blinking.

“I control the voices, Kevin. They obey me,” Kat
told him. “I think you understand that now. I know their secrets and I know
your secrets. Your darkest, vilest, dirtiest secrets. I know where you took the
girls, Kevin, and I know what you did with them. From now on, your secrets are
my secrets, your will is my will.”

Kat’s voice took on a more soothing tone.

“You have to trust me Kevin. You do trust me,
don’t you?

The voices started again.

“Trust her.”

“Trust her.”

“Trust and obey.”

Kevin wanted to scream back at them. Anger and
anguish intertwined and propelled his mind toward another breakdown. A chorus
of softly forceful voices sang a calming, but persuasive, chant.

“Trust her.”

“Trust her.”

“Trust and obey.”

Kevin’s will fled away, finally, chased off by an
irresistible, relentless, damning force that flooded his psyche. The chant
repeated. All of the voices chanting together. Over and over.

“Trust her.”

“Trust her.”

“Trust and obey.”

“No other way, trust and obey.”

Repeatedly they sang the perverted lyrics,
turning the words from the old Christian hymn,
Trust and Obey
, into a
twisted hell song. Kevin wanted to scream at them, but all he managed was a
pitiful sob.

“You told her,” he cried. “The girls were our
secret and you told her.”

Kevin felt part of himself, the me-part, tear
loose. In his mind, he tried to hold on to the feelings, the thoughts, the
memories, the will that made him the special creature that he had come to
believe that he was. The chants grew in intensity and power, until Kevin could
no longer resist. His sense of self, his internal identity, fled. In the
psychic vacuum that remained Legion took control, and Legion rejoiced.

Pedro was not sure what was happening, but he was sure
that, at least temporarily, God had returned to his life. As he drove through
the black velvet night, the oppressive darkness, fed by the shadow that had
been his frequent companion over the last quarter of a century, had done its
best to invade the truck and consume him.

Pedro sang along with the music, not always
understanding the deeper spiritual meaning of the lyrics, but accepting that it
was good to have someone or something to pray to, something to worship,
something greater than a strong drink or a good cigar. The Spanish voices
singing the glory of God and the love of His Christ appeared to be an
impenetrable barrier to the dark forces that stalked him.

Pedro did not know much about being “born again,”
but he did know that for some reason, God seemed to have remembered him. And
now He seemed to provide protection from the spiritual blackness surrounding
Pedro’s truck.

There had to be a reason that Pedro had crossed
paths with Jim Demore. A reason why the Government Man and his evil-looking,
little friend had ended up at the estate that had once been his family’s and
should be his. It dawned on Pedro that life was less about being unfair and
more about being a circle, and for some reason, the circle of Pedro’s life had
almost closed.

As Pedro drove and sang, the darkness around the
truck gave way to the bright glow of urban streetlights. Pedro had no problem
locating Saffi’s apartment, and he parked his truck on the street behind a
Florida Highway Patrol cruiser. Pedro turned off the truck’s engine. The music
stopped and he crossed himself.

“Gracias, Dios. Gracias.”

He exited the truck and walked toward Saffi’s
apartment. He stopped short of the doorstep and glanced around. Fifty yards
down the street a compact sedan, with its headlights off, pulled over under a
darkened street light. Inside the sedan, a light flared and flickered,
illuminating what looked to Pedro to be a woman. But a covey of shadows,
dancing in the flickering light, concealed her face.

A sudden chill enveloped Pedro, which surprised
him in the still warm, autumn night. He heard singing, but not the beautiful
sounds of the Spanish gospel in the player. This was a chorus of discordance.
Yet it transmitted a sense of worship. Dark, powerful worship full of fear and
foreboding. A different kind of worship. Devil worship. The sound did not seem
to come from any of the apartments or nearby structures. Sadness permeated the
aria and it weighed down on him, warring against the sense of hope he had
rediscovered.

“No. No. No. No,” he said.

Pedro fought back against the darkness. He
remembered his friend who gave him the gospel CD. He had said, “Pedro, remember
this — no matter how bad things get in your life, draw closer to God, and he
will draw closer to you.”

Pedro remembered and stepped into the ring of
light around Saffi’s front door.
Gracias, Dios. Gracias.

Pedro knocked on Saffi’s front door. As he
waited, the light around the doorway appeared to dim. Pedro blinked to clear
his vision, but the creeping darkness thickened. The darkness pressed in, as if
it had substance and mass, an existence as real as his own. Pedro knocked
again, harder, as if the rapping on the door would somehow drive away the
darkness. But as Pedro’s feelings of anxiety and fear rose, the darkness pushed
in even closer.
Ayudame, Dios. Help me.

Pedro tried to remember the words to the Spanish
gospel songs, but he found it difficult to think. A feeling of depression and
sadness once again crept over him. Abandoned. Hopeless. Lost. A palpable and
soul-crushing despair gripped him. He was going to die poor and alone, a
broken-down, drunken relic of a forgotten war. Suicide. Pull the plug. The
logical end to an illogical life. Pedro slumped against the door frame as the
darkness consumed him.

***

Jim stared through the door’s peephole. Pedro looked to
be alone, but he also looked troubled as he slumped against the doorjamb. He
looked like if he’d had a gun in his hand, he would have shot himself.

Jim opened the door and glanced up and down the
street. The street lights bathed the neighborhood in a soft, warm glow. Jim
heard the sounds of urban life in the distance, but the street was quiet. A
lone sedan, parked under a dark street light, left the curb, pulled a U-turn,
and sped off.

“Señior de la Garza,” Jim said. “Come in.”

Pedro did not move. He was blinking, but the rest
of his body seemed frozen.

“Señior de la Garza, come on.”

Jim reached out, put his hand on Pedro’s
shoulder, and pulled him forward into the room. At Jim’s touch, Pedro relaxed.
His expression changed and he looked at Jim as if he had awakened from a bad
dream.

“Señior Demore, I am sorry.”

Pedro stepped across the door’s threshold and into
the room. As he stepped inside, Jim took one last look around. The street was
quiet and the city looked at peace. Nevertheless, in spite of the night’s
outward peacefulness, Jim knew that peace would not be part of his life anytime
soon.

Baalzaric watched de la Garza enter the apartment.
While he loved inhabiting a body of flesh, loved the sheer, uninhibited
pleasure of sexual and physical excess, he hated relying on human beings for
this indulgence. While he could possess and control the lower creatures, fish
and amphibians, it was a cold, soulless, unpleasant experience. Flesh without
spirit being only marginally better than spirit without flesh.

The higher animals, while warm-blooded, had no
souls. Unlike humans, other mammals had no self-existent awareness. God had
given the beasts of the field a spirit, a life force, and more intellect than
the lower orders; but, even with bodies of flesh, they remained unsuitable
hosts.

Two-thousand years ago, near the city of Galilee,
the Nazarene had cast a demonic legion into a herd of pigs. The beasts ran into
the sea and drowned, their temporary demon masters unable to control them.
Nevertheless, the demon spirits had outsmarted the Nazarene. Once the pigs
drowned, the spirits were free to roam the earth until they found another
suitable host. They had avoided the pit while the Nazarene eventually got
himself nailed to a Roman cross. Today, that legion found itself safely
ensconced in Kevin Williams.

Baalzaric needed to take even greater control of
Kat, but he remained acutely aware of the risk. Kat, the almost perfect vessel,
would be of little use if he drove her insane or to her death. Fortunately,
Baalzaric had rapidly reestablished his spiritual intelligence network, helping
him to overcome the physical limitations of his host and her idiot partners.

Of course, neither Lucifer’s demons nor Adonai’s
angelic hosts could know what a human was thinking, or what was inside a human
being’s heart, unless actually in possession of the human. Dispossessed demons
and the angels who obeyed God and maintained their estate could only watch,
listen, and guess. Adonai alone claimed to have the power to know all human
thoughts, all human hearts.

Baalzaric had his doubts about that. After all,
why would God allow a battle between his own kingdom and Lucifer’s domain to
continue if he had the power he claimed? Why wouldn’t he just send Lucifer and
his demons straight into the pit? Just get it over with if he had that kind of
power?

Regardless, Baalzaric took no chances. The pool had
become Baalzaric’s safe haven between hosts, but now there existed the hope of
an unlimited supply of vessels. Spiritless shells prepared especially for his
and the other demons’ eternal pleasure. His fellow free spirits would be
thankful to him, and he would stand above them all. For the time being,
Baalzaric would allow Kat to keep enough of her own mind to stay sane, but
everything else would belong to him.

***

Kat found it hard to believe that her future was in the
hands of two absolute morons. Kevin’s kidnapping of a Highway Patrol trooper
had initially appeared to be a stupid, stupid move. But she would turn it to
her own good. Prompted by a “knowing,” an intuition that spread across her
entire being, Kat called The Candle and Wind. Martha answered on the first
ring.

“Hello Kat. I’ve been waiting for your call.”

“I have a problem. It involves Kevin.”

“Kevin does have his issues. You know, Kat, I
have ways of knowing things too. Sometimes dark, secret things.” Martha paused.
“You carry a great power inside you. We recognized that.”

The way that Martha said “we” implied a larger
group than just Kevin and her. The shadows probably?

“Kevin has acquired a new friend who may be
useful to me. A Highway Patrol officer. His name is Carl Johns,” Kat said.

“Carl Johns,” Martha repeated. “I know who he is.
When Kevin acquires new friends, it usually does not go well for them. Like I
said, Kevin has his issues. But then, so does Trooper Johns.”

Kat stayed quiet, waiting for Martha to continue.

“His wife, Kaaneesha, is a customer. She
occasionally comes in to buy her spiritual supplies. Well, apparently, Trooper
Johns had fallen into temptation with a young woman, actually several young
women. She needed a powerful spell to save her marriage and punish the women
who had slept with him.”

“So, she let the cheating bastard get away with
it and punished the girls?”

“Poor girl’s in love,” Martha said. “As it turns
out, Carl Johns didn’t get away with anything after all, did he? How can I help
you, Kat?”

“I need Kevin to spend a little more time with
his new friend. Get the Highway Patrol looking in the wrong direction.”

“Unfortunately,” Martha said, “‘Trooper Gone
Wild’ didn’t work as well as we wished, but ‘Trooper Runs Off With A Badge
Bunny’ has a nice tabloid ring to it. I’ll call Janet Poulet. That should buy
Kevin a couple of days with his new friend.”

“That’s all we need. In two days this will all be
over.”