The Rapture: In The Twinkling Of An Eye (9 page)

“So is it worth a story?”

“That’s just it, Buck. I don’t know what to do with it. These types of guys have been around forever, but as an observer of the religious world, I’ve got to tell you, I’ve never seen anything like this. These guys aren’t healers, aren’t miracle workers—those types naturally draw big crowds and lots of response. But here are these two flat-out salvation preachers seeing some sort of response even they have never seen before. I talked to them both, and they both used the same word for it: harvest.”

“Sounds like a horror movie,” Buck said. “The Harvest of the Dead.”

“Um-hmm.” It was clear Borland’s mind was somewhere else.

“This is really bothering you, Jimmy. Why?”

“I don’t know. I guess because I’m finding out that it’s happening all over the place. All over the world. Anybody involved in this game—even if they’re sincere and not just playing at it for who knows what motive—is seeing the same kind of thing. It’s becoming a story as big as all the natural disasters. But what can I write about it? The whole world is coming to Christ? I’d be laughed out of the profession.”

“Truth never hurts. But maybe all the disasters are causing this renewed interest in God.”

“I’ve thought of that,” Borland said. “Sure, people are scared, and they want to somehow keep nature from falling in on them, but wouldn’t the conventional response be to blame God or to question Him? These people seem to be genuinely embracing Him, and this is from all over. You know, Buck, the U.S. is not immune.”

“To what?”

“Same phenomenon, and it’s happening in churches all over. Attendance is up. Conversions are up. No one knows what to make of it.”

“Well, there’s your angle, your story. But frankly, you seem handcuffed by it.”

Borland stood and looked out at the Manhattan skyline. “That’s the best assessment I’ve heard about its impact on me,” he said. “I flat don’t know what to make of it. Are we experiencing another revival, this one global? It’s been a century since the last one. Something’s up, Buck. Something’s happening, and I have no idea what it is.”

“Tell me something, Jim. You ever envy these people, wish you had a little of what they’ve found in all this?”

“Seriously? No. I don’t believe the message, don’t get it, consider people weak who go that route. But I can’t deny that whatever appeal this ever had has somehow escalated. People are getting religion like never before, and it’ll be interesting to see what it means to society as a whole.”

“We can be kind,” Matei told a pale and whimpering Ecaterina as she cowered in the backseat. “This is not your fault. This is Stefan’s fault. You have to suffer, and he will be forced to care for you.”

“I’m sitting in someone’s blood,” she said, her voice quavery. “What are you going to do to me?”

“My associate here is going to give you an injection to dull the pain. Then we are going to break your tibias. Without the anesthetic, you would pass out.”

“No, no!” she wailed. “You don’t have to do that! Isn’t there anything I can do?”

“You can sit still for the injection. This has to be done. You don’t have to understand it. We don’t have to understand it. We’re trying to make it as easy as possible. But I warn you, nothing can make this pain-free.

The less you move about, however, the better. We will leave you where Stefan can find you, and it would be wise of you to tell him immediately that you should be moved only by professionals and treated as soon as possible.”

“Oh, please!”

“Hush.”

“What did he do? Why aren’t you hurting him}”

“Trust me, he is already suffering. Now the best thing you can do is submit to the injection. This is going to happen either way.”

“Do you have to break both legs?”

“Afraid so. You must be totally dependent on Stefan for a while.”

“I’m going to kill him,” she said. “Whatever he did, I had nothing to do with it.”

Whether Lazar acted too quickly following the administering of the anesthetic or Ecaterina simply had too low a pain threshold, she passed out from the pain of the first break.

“Do I need to do the other?” Lazar said.

“It will be easier,” Matei said. “We’ll just have to be careful moving her. And Stefan better hope we reach him so he can get to her before she’s fully into shock.”

The park bench where they placed her, wrapped in a scratchy woolen blanket and quivering uncontrollably, was six blocks from Stefan’s place.

When they reached him by phone, he cursed them, sobbing.

“Are you up for a while, sir?” Fortunato said on the phone at about midnight.

“I plan to retire by 1 am,” Carpathia said. “Come now.”

A few minutes later Leon sat across from him in his parlor. “Before I left the car,” Fortunato said, “I assigned the arson.”

“I am stunned, troubled, I must admit, by Vasile’s not cracking yet.”

“He will by dawn.”

“Likely.”

Leon told Nicolae of the other complications and how he had dealt with them.

“You actually had an innocent old woman tossed into the Danube?” Nicolae said, narrowing his eyes at Fortunato.

Leon nodded, heart racing.

“Stand please.”

“Sorry, sir?”

“Stand, I said, Leon!”

Fortunato stood, tensing.

Carpathia approached and looked up into his face. They were nearly nose to nose. “And you had an innocent young woman’s shins shattered?”

Leon nodded slightly, preparing his defense.

Carpathia spread his arms wide and beckoned Fortunato close. He wrapped his arms around the big man and squeezed tight. “I love you, Leon! Do you know that? I love you.”

And Fortunato basked in the affection.

His phone chirped. “I should take this,” he managed, his face pressed into Carpathia’s shoulder.

“Certainly.”

It was Stefan, hysterical. “You didn’t have to do this, you—” and he raged profanely. “Do you know what I had to do?”

“About what, Stefan?”

“You know about what, you filthy excuse for a man! I had to shoot her!”

“That’s distasteful. Shoot whom?”

“You know who! She was dying anyway! There was no time to call anyone. She regained consciousness and nearly passed out again when she saw her legs. You destroyed her, Leon! Her shin bones were showing! She was bleeding to death!”

“I’m sorry, Stefan, but I do not know to whom you are referring.”

“You lying scum! I had to kill my own girlfriend!”

“Well, you shouldn’t have done that. However she hurt herself was surely treatable by competent medical professionals.”

“Tell me where my mother is, Leon! I mean it! I’ll kill you if anything’s happened to her.”

“You’ll kill me? Perhaps you can accomplish that when you return my four thousand, hmm? But don’t let too much time pass. Unlucky things keep happening to those around you.”

“I’ll kill you!”

“Excuse me, will you, Stefan? I need to place another call.”

“Don’t hang up on me! I’ll—”

Click.

“Matei,” Leon said a moment later, seated again under the beam of Carpathia’s smile. “We’d best put the young man out of his misery. He’s no good to me anymore.”

“Done.”

By dawn Bucharest police were searching for the murderers of Ecaterina and Stefan and beginning to process a missing person’s report on one Paraschiva Marin, who had not shown up for work.

There was also the matter of a suspicious fire on the grounds of the breeding ranch of the son of the president of the republic, which had taken the lives of sixteen purebred Arabian stallions valued at millions of euros.

“Mom, it’s Chloe. What’s up?”

“Nothing. I just wanted to hear your voice. How are you, sweetie? I miss you.”

“Doing well. How’s everyone there?”

“Good. Good.” Irene hated that Chloe had not returned any of her sentiments. Couldn’t she say it was good to hear from her mother, that she missed her too, that she wanted to hear her voice? Irene guessed that was too much to ask.

“And how are you doing since your disappointment?” Irene said.

“My disappointment?”

“Your breakup with Ricky.”

“Oh, that! Over it.”

“Are you sure?”

““Course. You know he’s married already.”

“You’re not serious.”

“Yep.”

“That has to hurt. A little anyway. No?”

“Nah! She can have him.”

“Well, that’s a pretty mature response.”

“Oh, you know me, Mom. Ms. Mature.”

Irene asked her about studies and friends and extracurricular activities, getting banal, noncommittal responses until she wanted to scream, to demand whether Chloe ever even thought about her, cared about her at all. Irene loved this child to the depths of her soul, but it was as if Chloe were made of stone.

Irene finally rang off with a series of wishes and expressions of love and cheerfulness, to which Chloe merely responded with courtesy. Hanging up, Irene sat on the edge of the bed and wept.

She thought she heard Rayford on the stairs and quickly wiped her eyes. But he did not come in, so she opened her Bible and reviewed her prayer list:

Rafe, for hie salvation and that I be a loving wife to him.

Chloe, that she come to Christ and live in purity.

Ray Jr., that he never stray from his strong, childlike faith.

Early the next morning Carpathia called Leon. “What do we hear from Vasile? Surely you would have told me if he had called?”

“Of course. Nothing.”

“What now?”

“I would advise you to involve Jonathan,” Leon said.

“You heard my last conversation with him, Leon. I will not crawl to him asking for his help.”

“I will.”

“You will?”

“Sure. I’ll tell him what has happened up to now, tell him that even if he disagrees and finds it distasteful, now is the time to accept the lesser of two evils and do what he has to do to get Vasile out of the way.”

Carpathia paced. “You scare his family and kill his son’s horses, and he responds in silence? What is he up to, Leon?”

“Frankly, it wouldn’t surprise me if he thinks he is going over your head.”

“Over my head! Who is over my head?”

“Stonagal.”

“Jonathan is not over my—”

“You know that, Nicolae. And I know that. But Jonathan does not know that yet. That’s why I should call him.”

Irene looked forward to Sunday as she hadn’t in a long time. Sure, since she had switched to New Hope she had enjoyed church more than ever. But this was different, special. Even Raymie was eager to hear the last sermon in Pastor Billings’s series on the end of time, and much of it was above the boy’s head.

“Let’s both plan on taking notes,” Irene told him. “Then we can talk about it later.”

“We can tell Dad all about it,” Raymie said.

She hesitated, nodding slowly. “We’ll need to be cautious about that. Judicious. You know what that means?”

“I think so. Careful?”

“Using good judgment, sound thinking, choosing our timing carefully. Something is going on in your dad’s life, Raymie. I don’t know what it is, but he’s not himself.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. His drifting from church is just a symptom. Sometimes when adults get to be your dad’s and my age, they take stock of their lives and aren’t happy.”

“But Dad’s successful! He’s done everything he ever wanted to do. Didn’t he always want to be an airline captain?”

“Yes, but that’s the problem. Sometimes you point your whole life at a goal you think will make you happy, and when you reach it, it doesn’t satisfy you. That’s quite a lesson, isn’t it? You see how you want to set goals that really satisfy?”

Raymie fell silent, clearly thinking. Irene was impressed that he would admit when he didn’t understand something, and he was never quick to respond until he did.

“You mean like if I dreamed of becoming a professional basketball player and making millions of dollars and being famous, I might not like it once I made it?”

“You know what the Bible says about living for ourselves and being rich….”

“Yeah. Something about setting your sights on eternal stuff.”

“Fame and fortune aren’t going to mean a thing in heaven, are they?”

“I guess not. You know, Mom, I’ve been starting to worry more about Dad than ever.”

“Worry how?”

“You know, like when he’s flying. I never used to worry, because he always told me how safe airplanes are. He said that every time I hear or read about a plane crash, I should remember how many hundreds of thousands of flights were made without anything going wrong. Before I never worried about it at all. But now, not knowing if he’d go to heaven if he died, I keep hoping and praying he doesn’t crash.”

“I worry too,” she said.

“You do?”

“Of course.”

“Wouldn’t it be cool if we didn’t have to die to go to heaven? Like what Pastor Billings has been talking about. Do you think Jesus could come back before I get old?”

“You never know,” Irene said. “We’re supposed to live as if it could be today. Nothing more has to happen before He returns.”

“Then why doesn’t He come?”

“Who can know the mind of God?” she said. “But He loves the world so much, maybe He’s just waiting for one more person to turn to Him.”

“Maybe He’s waiting for Dad.”

“Maybe He is.”

Leon stood on the veranda at Carpathia’s estate, watching his boss meander across the property, his face toward the sky. Suddenly he stopped and raised his arms. Then he dropped to his knees.

The head of Nicolae’s security team glanced at Leon and began to advance toward his client. Fortunato waved him off and made a gesture with his cell phone. The security man called Leon.

“Let him be,” Fortunato said. “If he needs you, he’ll let you know.”

“But what if I hang back and then find out I should have—?”

“I’ll take full responsibility,” Leon said.

“No disrespect, sir, but I don’t answer to you. I need to cover my—”

“I said I would take full responsibility. If necessary, you may tell Dr. Carpathia that I forbade you to approach him.”

“Very good, sir. Thank you.”