CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Griffin sat in his living room, phone at his ear, listening to Carl tell him about his morning. Griffin had to fight the urge to seek out the people paying for the product the Phillipses were manufacturing and leave them all in pools of blood. He hated the term ‘child pornography’. It was a misnomer, giving the term a legitimacy it didn’t deserve. Pornography to some degree implied consent. Not in all cases obviously, but quite a few adults willingly created porn. There was no question of consent where a child was concerned. An image of a child involved in a sexual act was a picture of a crime. Period.

When Carl wound down, Griffin said, “That conversation I mentioned with Pete Blankenship may be coming sooner than I thought. Odds are when you get the Phillipses singing, you’re going to find a connection to Blankenship.”

“You’re probably right, Wade,” Carl said. “But don’t go off half-cocked. When it comes time to confront Blankenship, I want to be there. We’ll go together. Speaking of which, you feel like taking a ride up to the Mount Zion Church of Faith? I have a warrant all ready to go.”

“I do indeed.” Griffin smiled, remembering how the man Fry had refused to let him search the grounds. We’ll see about that Mister Fry. We surely will.

Carl said, “Think I should bring Thelma along? Just in case we do find the girl.”

Griffin considered that for a moment. “No, better make it just you and me. We might have to do something slightly illegal.”

“And wouldn’t that be a shame? Me being the Sheriff and all.”

“Scandalous.”

“I’ll pick you up in half an hour, Wade.”

“I’ll be ready.”

* * *

The sun cut blades of light through the caul of clouds that blanketed the sky, and pools of brightness lit parts of the road and the surrounding trees, a reminder that it was barely noon and not almost most time for the sun to set. The storm that had been threatening for the last few days looked like it was about ready to unleash a proper torrent, and the rumble of thunder not far away echoed a proper agreement.

They talked as they rode up to the church and Carl let Wade know about Tammy being in town and what he had decided to do. For just a moment he half expected his friend to pat him on the head and tell him he was a ‘good boy’. Happily that did not happen. It would have been a shame to shoot Wade. It would also be a shame to defend himself from Wade if he missed.

Simple fact of life: Wade Griffin was a scary motherfucker when it suited his needs. Happily they’d never been the sort to try killing each other. It went against the grain of their friendship.

Instead of risking life and limb Wade pulled a normal Wade stunt. Nodded and said, “About time, Carl.”

Carl returned the nod. That was pretty much exactly what he’d expected from his long-time friend.

Griffin pointed to the church’s parking lot and Carl pulled in and eyed the place. It was a small, whitewashed church with a couple of satellite buildings attached. Wade was right; they looked to be dorms or apartments. They could check them out after they’d searched the church if needs be. One step at a time, and from what Wade had said and what Carl could see, it was the Mount Zion Church of Faith that had the thick padlock and the chain through the reinforced doors.

“Not really standard equipment on most churches.” Carl looked toward the other buildings. The odds were good they were locked up tight as well. The difference was the bolt cutters in the back of his truck would handle the padlock with the greatest of ease. Proper deadbolt locks took a bit more effort. Push came to shove, there was still a battering ram back there, too.

The locked compartment in the back of the Ford gave up the bolt cutters and Carl slung the long-handled device over one shoulder. The warrant was in his shirt pocket.

There were no cars to be seen in the parking lot. Just Carl’s truck.

“Cheery place, isn’t it?” Carl squinted as a beam of sunlight prodded him in the eye.

“Oh yeah. Real homey.”

“Might have to see about booking this place when you and Charon get married.”

“We’re thinking about eloping. Saves all the fuss of decorating the church and renting a tux.”

“Thank God, because I hate weddings.”

“Well, then the good news for you is that we’re nowhere near that level yet.”

“You’re sounding a little defensive there, Wade.” One Cheshire-Cat grin was provided at no extra charge.

Griffin eyed him up and down, taking his measure. “Which knee was it you wrecked back when you played football?”

“Left one, why?”

“Just checking. Hate to hit the same one you already got fixed.”

“You wouldn’t hit a man in uniform, would you?”

“You wearing a uniform? Looks like jeans and a shirt to me.”

“You know damned well I never wear the khakis unless I have to.”

“I’m just saying, that doesn’t look like a uniform. Be a shame if someone mistook you for a civilian.”

“I got the hat back in the truck.”

“Too late now. We’re already to the door.”

“Why’d I bring you along again?”

“You didn’t bring me along. I allowed you to work as a consultant on my case.”

“So you’re paying me, Wade?”

“It’s like an honorary doctorate. It doesn’t really mean anything and it doesn’t give you any money.”

“That line used to actually work for me back in college.”

“Well, that was before you got the beer gut.” Wade flashed a shit-eating grin at him.

“Not funny.”

“It is from here.”

Carl looked at the padlock. Someone really, really didn’t want anyone getting into the church’s main building.

Just because he felt like being polite, he knocked. No one answered.

He looked to Wade and his friend nodded. They were both armed, they were both perfectly willing to deal with anyone who might not appreciate them going inside.

It was a good lock. Took all of four seconds to cut through the metal.

Wade went in first. Carl hadn’t really planned for that to happen – officially he should have gone first as he had the warrant, then again, officially he shouldn’t have a civilian going in with him so screw it – but Wade tended to do as he felt best and Carl seldom felt a need to argue with the man.

Wade took two steps into the building and stopped. Damnedest thing: someone had the air conditioner set so low in the place that Carl could actually see Wade’s breath. “What the hell? Cold enough?”

There was a small foyer that led to the main church. They were in that area and looking toward another closed door. It was from there the cold seemed to emanate. Carl stepped in next to Wade, could actually feel the air in front of him change temperature. Colder than it should have been, pure and simple.

Wade moved to the door and touched the handle. The door to the interior of the church was not locked. Wade moved forward, pushed the door open carefully and stepped into the main area. He took four steps and slowed to a standstill. Carl stepped after him and moved with a careful attention to all that he could see. And like Wade he stopped in his tracks, just as stunned by what he saw as his partner was.

The inside of the church was dark. The only windows were stained glass and the images were all dark red and blue, and the light from outside was faint enough that the images couldn’t even be deciphered with a casual glance. That was the only sort of attention the windows were getting from either of them.

The bodies sitting in the darkness of the church took away from the desire to look at the décor.

Wade was completely silent, his eyes looking at the same sight as Carl’s.

The pulpit was at the far end of the large room, emptied now, except for the large cross adorning the back wall. The cross was easily seven feet tall and almost five wide, and a wooden carved figure of Jesus Christ hung from the cross, hands and feet pinned to the cross by thick nails and a halo of stylized thorns cutting into his wooden brow. His mouth opened in a silent moan of sorrow, his eyes turned toward the heavens above and silently implored the Almighty to offer him mercy, perhaps, or at least some sort of wisdom. Whatever the case, the figure was gaunt and reflected a man who suffered the weight of the world upon his shoulders.

A double row of pews led from the raised pulpit toward the area where both men stood. The space between the pews was easily fifteen feet wide and led straight to where the effigy of Christ suffered perpetually.

The cold in the room was worse still, and the air was motionless. Carl wondered absently how it could be so damned cold in the room without even the hum of an air conditioner unit to break the complete silence.

There was enough space in the pews to handle perhaps a hundred people seated comfortably. Most of those seats were taken. From their perspective all Carl and Wade could see was the backs of the parishioner’s heads. For one crazy moment Carl tried to make himself believe the figures in the seats were mannequins – surely that would explain why they did not move, did not breathe – but the hair was too disarrayed, too imperfect to allow for that. The hair on those motionless heads was real, damn it. Hairspray, gray roots, false colors and all. Besides, who the hell would ever make mannequins that had receding hairlines and bald spots? No. They were not dummies or dolls. They were people.

But not a one of them moved. No one took in a breath of air or exhaled. No one coughed or shifted in their seats. They all, to the last, faced the crucified Christ.

Wade spoke very softly. “Not good. Not good at all.”

Carl nodded in agreement, trying to remember how to speak. The cold in the room. He was beginning to suspect he knew why it was there. There was an odor under the thin miasma of old incense. He knew the scent well, having been around it far too often in his time.

Death has a scent. It is neither good nor bad, though most would agree it was unpleasant. That smell was strong enough that even though Carl made himself breathe through his open mouth, he could still smell it. Oh, hell, he could damned well taste it.

A quick look toward each other and a mutual nod and the two of them started forward. They moved with light treads, as if afraid they might somehow wake the dead around them. That thought wanted to become a bad joke in Carl’s mind, the sort that becomes unpleasant laughter, that leads to just possibly screaming. Not one or two bodies. No, closer to a hundred of them. South of a hundred but north of eighty. Enough that Carl didn’t want to look, didn’t want to identify the corpses. Christ, how many of them did he know? How the hell did this sort of thing happen in his county without him knowing or even suspecting?

Gonna have to call this in. Gonna have to make some serious adjustments to the budget because the overtime for this sort of cluster fuck is going to be epic. He shook his head and made himself take a deep breath. His thoughts were trying to slide into the irrational zone. He couldn’t let that happen.

Wade wasn’t looking any calmer. Oh, most people would have seen the expression on Wade’s face and thought only that he was a man in control, calm and rational and downright chilly, almost as cool as the interior of the church that was refrigerating corpses – ha ha ha, isn’t that a fucking scream? But Carl knew better. He knew Wade’s face, his expressions, well enough to know that even the man who had dealt more than a few times in shady situations was not at all comfortable with their discovery.

They moved in unison, both of them looking at the dead around them, seeing the bodies, the nice clothes, the way that each corpse was positioned to look as if it were simply waiting for the Reverend Lazarus Cotton to step forward and start sermonizing. Maybe the bastard would tell them about the wages of sin. Perhaps he was the sort who liked to talk about why he was killing people and placing their bodies on display. Maybe he thought he was somehow saving the parishioners he’d murdered from some fate worse than death. Jim Jones had offered poisoned Kool-Aid for the Jonestown Massacre. What had Lazarus Cotton offered? Not a one of the bodies seemed to have any marks on them. A full autopsy would tell of course. And wouldn’t that be some hefty damned overtime? He shook his head. No. No time to worry about bills. This was too big. This was, well this was the sort of shit that would put Brennert County on the map for all the wrong reasons.

There was a family to his left. A pretty enough woman, a little round in the face, sat with a young boy on either side of her. To her right, not even seven feet from Carl and holding hands with the younger of the two children, a burly man was dressed in his Sunday best, his eyes staring at nothing.

His eyes were staring. The dead man’s eyes were open and staring.

Hadn’t they been closed before?

“What the fuck, Wade?” Carl heard the faint tremor in his voice and hated it.

“Something’s very wrong here.” Wade was sounding a bit shaky too. That made him feel a wee bit better.

Well wasn’t that a goddamned epiphany! He pushed the thought aside.

“Wade, I think there’s something really, really screwed going on...”

He looked to Wade for only a moment. When he looked back toward the loving family the father’s head had craned toward his voice and the dead man was looking right at him. The mother’s eyes were open. They had been closed, damn it! They had been closed! Neither of the children had stirred, but he could barely focus on them. Mother and father alike were doing the impossible.

“Carl…” Wade’s voice rose half an octave. He felt Wade’s fingers slap lightly at his forearm in an effort to get his attention. It worked. Carl looked right at him.

The interior of the church flashed into full color for a moment, the light so bright that both of them blinked their eyes at the sudden illumination.

And an instant after that the explosive BOOM of thunder shook the entire building and echoed off the nearby hills, bouncing back and forth like demonic laughter.

Carl didn’t actually piss himself, but it was close. His heart was hammering frantically to get out of his ribcage. Nothing doing. He needed it to stay where it was.

“Carl. We have to go. Now.”

Carl nodded. He didn’t quite trust himself to speak.

The sound of wood creaking, cloth rustling. Carl had looked away again and when he looked back the burly father was standing, looking right at him. The calm, expectant expression was gone from the man’s face, replaced by a deepening look of rage.

He could see the man well enough. He could see the lack of color in the skin, the slightly waxy translucency to the flesh that was a sign that blood was not flowing through the epidermis. He wasn’t an albino. He wasn’t pale the way the Blackbournes were. He was dead. His skin was a dead man’s skin. The flesh was cold and lifeless, but the man was standing up, heading for Carl and Wade alike.

Several of the dead people had turned their heads to watch as Daddy Dearest moved with slow, deliberate intent. He wanted a piece of Carl, a chunk of Wade. They were both too damned stunned to consider retreating, even though the man was moving slowly.

Carl shook his head and felt anger starting to swell irrationally in his chest, in his brain. “You’re dead. You hear me? You’re dead.” It wasn’t a threat. It was a statement of fact, a solid denial of the impossible.

The dead man did not seem to care. He reached out and grabbed at Carl’s arm.

Carl backed up a step and then drove his fist into the dead man’s face. He pivoted at the hip and slammed his knuckles against flesh that was even colder than the air. It wasn’t refrigeration. The cold seemed to come from the dead man’s skin.

He may as well have hit a brick wall. The man’s head barely even moved to acknowledge the force used.

The dead man’s expression shifted from anger to a nasty little grin. Dead Daddy spoke, his voice soft and low, barely above a whisper in the silent church. “Do you know Jesus?”

Carl took a step back.

Wade slipped in closer and drove his foot into Dead Daddy’s stomach and ribs. Simple rule: Wade Griffin kicks a man, the man feels it.

Dead Daddy didn’t seem to care in the least.

The dead man grabbed Wade’s wrist and tried to pull him closer. Revulsion clear on his features, Wade went with the motion and used the added momentum to drive his elbow into the man’s forearm.

Carl heard the bones in Dead Daddy’s arm break. He had no doubt at all that Wade felt the bones give way. The dead man kept grabbing, not the least bit concerned about the way the bones were jutting at an angle under his dress jacket.

Wade hit him again. Again. Again. Each time with just a bit more frantic desperation.

Simple rules should not get broken. When Wade Griffin hits a man, the man should feel it. Should stop. Should, goddamn it, let the hell go of Wade Griffin’s wrist. Dead Daddy refused to follow the rules. He hauled Wade closer still and might very well have done the man permanent damage, but Wade also knew how to break most holds a person tried to use on him and he twisted his hand and shifted his arm and slipped free from the grip. Carl could see the white, outraged flesh that had been gripped hard enough to force the blood from the surface for a moment.

Wade backed away, looking at Dead Daddy.

Dead Daddy looked back and moved toward them. His hands were ready for round two, his broken arm should have been dangling uselessly, but no one wanted to make him follow the rules, damn it, and he lifted that ruined limb without any show of effort and took another step toward them into the aisle.

A few rows ahead of them, another dead person was looking in their direction, one hand gripping the back of the pew as the parishioner started to stand, to come to the aid of Dead Daddy, as if the bastard might somehow need help.

Too much. Too damned much. Carl drew his pistol and leaned past Wade. Carl said, “Fuck you!” From four feet away he put three holes in Dead Daddy’s chest. The jacket kicked, cordite burned in the cold, cold air and Dead Daddy took another step toward them, not the least bit bothered by the lethal wounds that should, by God, have killed his sorry dead ass. His smile was bigger, meaner than before. It showed the changes to his teeth. They had to have changed because there was no way in Hell any man living in Brennert County had gone his entire life with a mouthful of knife-sharp fangs where regular teeth should have been. Every damned one of those pearly whites ended in a nasty looking point and the incisors looked like they belonged on a vampire bat. His eyes were wide open and he looked damned eager to get his dead damned hands on Wade and Carl.

Wade and Carl looked toward each other and then turned on their heels. The door wasn’t that far away and they needed to not be surrounded by dead people who were intent on adding them to their ranks.

* * *

Griffin hit one of the two doors with his shoulder and Carl slammed into the other, and then they were out in the daylight. It was still overcast, but compared to the interior of the church the sunlight seemed very bright. They went down the stairs and then Griffin turned to look at the doors. If these... people were what Griffin thought they were, then they wouldn’t come into the sun.

Griffin’s heart was still pounding and he was as close to blind panic as he could ever remember coming. He looked at Carl and saw that the Sheriff was staring at the door just like he was, hoping that it would stay closed.

Slowly the door swung open.

The burly man in the dark suit staggered out. He stood for a moment on the top step, his hand shielding his eyes. Then he caught sight of Griffin and Carl and grinned again, showing that mouth full of impossibly sharp teeth. He began to make his way down the stairs like a man wading through heavy surf. He was coming slow, but he was coming.

“Son of a bitch,” Griffin said. There had to be some way to stop this thing. Even the Moon-Eyes, for all their power, reacted to some forms of physical force. Griffin drew his .357, suddenly very glad that he had loaded it with hollow points. Maybe if he blew a limb off, that would do the trick.

The man took another step closer and Griffin aimed at his left knee and squeezed the trigger. The bullet tore a hole through the man’s pants leg and exited through the back of his knee. It should have blown the knee apart, but if the man felt any discomfort, he didn’t show it. Griffin put one more round through the same knee and got about as much reaction from it as the first. The man was still coming, and two more of his brethren had appeared from within the church. Time to get the hell out of Dodge.

“Head for the truck, Carl,” Griffin said, backing away so he could keep an eye on the man.

“Don’t have to tell me twice,” said Carl, hurrying to the driver’s side.

The burly man seemed to be picking up speed, as if he realized his quarry was about to get away. Griffin fired off two more futile rounds and then ran to the truck. Carl already had the engine going and as he spun gravel, Griffin had a nightmarish moment where he was sure the truck was going to get stuck in the loose stones. But a second later, the truck went hurtling backwards. Carl wasn’t even bothering to turn around. He backed into the road and then wheeled the truck around and shot back down the narrow two lane roadway.

“Jesus,” Carl said. “What were those things?”

Griffin, who still didn’t seem to be able to take a proper breath, looked out the back window. The burly man had stopped in the driveway and was watching them go.

Griffin said, “I think they’re vampires.”

“They can’t be fucking vampires, Wade. They were sitting in the middle of a goddamn church. Big crucifix on the wall. And I thought vampires couldn’t move around in the daytime.”

Griffin shook his head. “I don’t know about any of that. But that mouthful of teeth on that bastard sure looked like a vampire to me. And those people were dead. They were just sitting there dead and then they woke up. We need to talk to Charon.”

“How about your buddy Decamp?”

“Out of town. Charon will be able to fill us in on what vampires can and can’t do. And more importantly she’ll be able to tell us how to kill those sons of bitches.”

“I can’t believe we’re even having this conversation,” Carl said. “Vampires, Wade? Vampires?”

Griffin looked over at his friend. Carl’s eyes were wide and his mouth was hanging open. On the edge. Way out on the edge. Griffin doubted if he looked any better.

“We’ve seen stranger things. Hell, maybe I’m wrong. I’ll call Charon. You get us to Gatesville without killing us on these mountain roads.”

* * *

Half an hour later, Carl pulled to a stop in front of Baba Yaga’s. The closed sign was in place, but Griffin could see Charon standing inside the front door, keys in hand. Griffin opened the door and slid out of the truck, almost falling as his knees buckled from delayed reaction.

He noticed Carl didn’t look too steady himself as the two men walked up to the door. Charon opened the door to let them in, then relocked it after they were inside.

“Griffin you look terrible,” Charon said, giving him a hug. “What happened?”

“Let’s go in the back and we’ll tell you all about it.”

“You don’t look so good either, mister,” Charon told Carl and she hugged him as well.

“Rough afternoon,” said Carl. “Don’t suppose you have any coffee, Charon?”

“Just so happens I made a pot when Griffin called and told me to lock up and wait for you two. Now tell me what’s going on.”

Griffin and Carl helped themselves to coffee and then Griffin gave an account of what they had witnessed in the Church of Faith. Carl pitched in whenever he thought Griffin wasn’t giving enough details, which was often.

Charon sat very still, and Griffin could almost see her mind working. When he stopped talking she said, “What is it with Wellman? First the Moon-Eyes and now vampires.”

“We were asking the same thing,” Griffin said.

“The Moon-Eyes have always been here,” Carl said. “The vampires are new, if that’s what those things were.”

Charon said, “From what you guys just told me, I think that’s the most likely scenario.”

Griffin said, “I didn’t think vampires could move around in the daytime.”

“And they were in a church,” said Carl. “All seated in front of a great big cross.”

Charon said, “Keep in mind guys, I’m theorizing here. I haven’t had any practical experience with vampires. I wish Decamp were back. But here’s the thing. Most of what people think they ‘know’ about vampires comes from Universal horror movies and the novel Dracula. If you go back to the original folklore, there are as many kinds of vampires as there are cultures.”

“I though most of the legends were European?” Carl said.

Charon shook her head. “No, they go way farther back than that. There was a guy named Montague Summers who wrote a couple of books about Vampires back in the early 1900s. He made all kinds of studies of folklore and he found accounts of creatures that lived on human blood as far back as ancient Greece and Rome. An idea like that, one that keeps resurfacing in every culture, has to have something behind it.”

Griffin said, “Even seeing what I just saw, I’m having trouble believing that vampires actually exist. I mean, wouldn’t someone know about them?”

“Someone probably does,” Charon said. “But look at it this way, sweetie. You and Carl not only ran into a pre-human race. You also came face to face with one of the Great Old Ones, and those aren’t supposed to be real either.”

“Girl’s got a point,” Carl said.

“Believe in one, believe in all, eh?” said Griffin.

Charon said, “Or at least be open to the possibility.”

“Okay,” said Griffin, “so say there is a church full of vampires in the mountains. What do we do about it?”

“I think the first thing we better worry about,” said Charon, “Is what they may try to do about us.”

“Meaning?” Carl said.

“You remember Griffin telling you a couple of nights back that something was casing our house?” Carl nodded and Charon went on. “We thought it might be the Moon-Eyes, but what if it wasn’t?”

“You think it might have been one of the vampires? How would they know where to find you?”

“I told them,” Griffin said. “I gave the man Fry my business card.”

Carl said, “Hmmm, in vampire movies, the vampire always has to have a living, breathing human to look after him during the day. You think Fry does that for the Reverend Cotton and his flock?”

Griffin said, “Seems likely. And since I was snooping around, maybe Cotton sent someone to check me out.”

“Question is, what might he send now he knows that we know his secret?” said Carl.

“That is indeed the question.” Griffin turned to Charon. “Your wards will keep vampires from entering won’t they?”

“They should stop any supernatural being, though I’m not sure a vampire could come in without an invitation anyway. That particular bit of folklore is common to most countries.”

“Then what was a vampire doing at the house?”

“Who knows? Maybe he was trying to get a look at us, or just checking security. Like you said, Griffin, they have a human being working for them. Maybe more than one. My wards won’t stop them.”

Griffin smiled. “If anything human shows up, I won’t need wards.”

Carl said, “Which brings us to the million dollar question. How can we kill these things? Wooden stakes? Silver bullets? What?”

“A lot of that stuff comes from movies too,” said Charon. “The only things I’m pretty sure will work every time are fire and decapitation. There may be more, but we need Carter for that.”

“So a head shot might have done it?” Griffin said.

“I think you’d have to blow the head off. I don’t think just shooting them in the head would do any good.”

“I got guns that can do that,” said Carl.

Griffin said, “Keep calling Decamp, Charon. Let him know we need to see him as soon as he gets back from wherever the hell he is.”

“My friend Andy is pretty up on his folklore too,” said Carl. “I’ll quiz him about vampires. He’ll probably tell me I’m crazy, but he does that anyway.”

“In the meantime, don’t invite anyone into your house, Carl,” said Charon.

Carl made a face. “Only people who’ve come to visit me lately are Blackbournes and ex-wives. At this point a vampire might look pretty good.”