He was tired. So very, very tired.
And he had good right to be. Most of the previous three nights had been wasted on fruitless searches through Brighton Beach and Oriental, and now, with the sun setting on another day he found himself moving out into the great wide open again, naked in a wilderness of concrete thieves. And that feeling of nakedness always left him vulnerable.
He looked down at the smudged headline again: Nik Lomas’ name beneath: “Trinity Claims His Tenth.” He felt a warm tingling sensation crawl up the length of his arms, almost as if some miniature farmer was ploughing shallow furrows of delight through the wiry tangle of his steely grey body hair.
He was The Watcher now. Back at the doors of St. Malachi’s. Waiting.
He still felt bad about having to rush the priest. As it was, he had done a sloppy job of it; he’d only just finished the cutting, hadn’t had time to run the stake through his heart to finish the dance of death he’d begun thanks to the interfering old bag and her damn wake-up call.
He rolled down the window, letting the cigar smoke leak out into the foggy evening, and leaned across the backseat to check on his tool bag again. Everything was there, as he had known it would be.
Smiling, he lifted out the sharpened piece of wood he was saving for The Father of All Things Bad with his crown of glass thorns, and tested its point on the pad of his index finger. A dewy drop of red welled up on the tip of the pudgy digit and started to congeal.
I haven’t forgotten, he thought. I can still see your face, Lamenzo. I can still see your face…
Leaning his head out through the open window, The Watcher shouted: “Here I come, ready or not,” as if it was some macabre game of Hide-and-Seek he was playing with the Devil. He gunned the car’s idling engine.