Tom Pawlik - Beckon

Under the floorboard was a thick notebook covered in dust. Jack lifted it out and blew the dirt off. He opened it and felt as if his heart would burst through his ribs. On the inside cover, written in faded ink, was a name.

David C. Kendrick

He held up the book. “It’s his journal!”

Jack thumbed through the pages and found that the entries went back several years before his father’s disappearance. They appeared to chronicle most of his expeditions. Some of it was written in English, but other parts were in Latin. Some in Greek and even some in what looked like Hebrew. But parts of the last several pages were written in…

Jack peered closer. The writing used the same characters he had seen inside the caves. He looked up at Elina, not knowing whether to scream or laugh or cry. A thousand emotions clamored for dominance. He couldn’t wait to pore over the pages of the book. To find out what secrets it might hold. And what answers. He rocked back on his knees, clutching the journal to his chest as though it were his father himself.

They left the office and stepped out onto the street. Jack held the old journal tight under his arm. Down the street he saw Malcolm’s rust-colored pickup parked at the filling station on the edge of town. George Wilcox stood beside it, pumping gas.

Elina waved and shouted, “George!”

“So you made it out of there,” George said as they ran up.

“Barely.” Jack looked up at the shadowy lodge perched at the top of the bluff. “What about the others?”

“Most of them are dead. Or dying. I watched Vale die myself. Just after I told him I had flushed the last of his precious perilium down the toilet.”

Elina peered into the garage windows. “They’ve got my car almost completely disassembled in there.”

“Yeah, mine too,” George said.

Elina shook her head. “They had their own chop shop set up to hide the evidence.”

George pointed to the fenced-in yard behind the station, overgrown with weeds. “They must turn them into scrap metal and stick them out back.”

Jack noticed a large bundle of linen lying in the bed of the pickup. It looked like a body wrapped in sheets.

“Is… is this your…?”

“My wife, Miriam,” George said, putting his hand on the sheet. “I brought her here to try to save her life, but she…” His voice cracked with emotion. “But she ended up saving mine. I’m going to bring her home for a decent burial.”

“Would you mind giving us a ride?” Jack said. “I have an old RV that should still be parked a few miles away.”

George gestured to the cab. “Hop in.”

They climbed into the truck, and as George pulled back onto the road, Jack noticed the old wooden sign at the edge of town.

And it struck him just then how true it was.

Jump in. Hang on.

Tom Pawlik is the highly imaginative, Christy Award–winning author of Vanish , Valley of the Shadow , and Beckon . His thought-provoking, edge-of-your-seat thrillers are infused with nonstop suspense that grabs you on the first page and won’t let go until the last.

Tom’s fascination with the weird, the creepy, and the unknown began at a very early age when he was introduced to a nineteenth-century storybook called Der Struwwelpeter —a collection of nightmarish morality tales by a German physician who obviously had too much time on his hands. The Mother Goose–meets–Stephen King nursery rhymes included “Daumenlutscher” (“Thumbsucker”), a disturbing yarn about a young boy who was warned that if he continued to suck his thumbs, the local tailor would chop them off with his sewing shears. Other macabre tales warned against playing with matches and being overly messy. Needless to say, Tom never played with matches, generally kept his room clean, and to this day retains the use of both his thumbs.

But the psychological damage was already done, and Tom’s warped imagination turned him to writing his own creepy stories at a rather young age. Alas, no publishers were brave enough to bring them to print, so Tom would not realize his lifelong dream of becoming a published author until the ripe old age of forty-two. Today, Tom lives in Ohio and is happily married with five children of his own… who, oddly enough, never sucked their thumbs.

Visit Tom’s website at www.tompawlik.com.

“Fans of Dean Koontz or Ted Dekker will appreciate… this debut psychological thriller.”

“[This] exciting page-turner is as unique and creative as it is suspenseful.”

“Pawlik’s book is engrossing…. The novel’s eerie events are thoroughly detailed, and the payoff is worth the time it takes to read this unique tale.”

“ Vanish captured my interest from the beginning…. I would highly recommend [it] to readers across the age spectrum.”

“The creativity of debut author Tom Pawlik knows no bounds! Vanish suspends reality over a solidly scriptural base for a story that will topple readers into a dazzling truth. It might be best to read this book with the lights on, because there is a thrilling element of suspense in these pages.”

“A chilling thriller in the vein of Stephen King, Dean Koontz, and Ted Dekker. The complex plot, story line, well-developed characters, and shocking ending make Vanish a debut thriller not to miss.”

“Pawlik’s sequel to Vanish is just as thrilling as the first. The fast-paced, intriguing plot and detailed characters make the novel difficult to put down. The profound spiritual encounters will cause readers to think about their lives and faith in a unique way.”

“Extremely well-crafted, highly suspenseful, and anything but expected. The complex plot, thought-provoking premise, and creepy scenes… definitely draw the reader in quickly.”

“The suspense was excellent. Two worlds intertwine with the heart-racing plots that end in a startling conclusion.”

“Filled with twists—including a great finishing one—this is an emotional, uplifting thriller.”

Visit Tyndale online at www.tyndale.com.

Visit Tom Pawlik’s website at www.tompawlik.com.

TYNDALE and Tyndale’s quill logo are registered trademarks of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.

Beckon

Copyright © 2012 by Tom Pawlik. All rights reserved.

Cover photograph copyright © Dan Jurak/Getty Images. All rights reserved.

Author photograph copyright © 2010 by Eric Boothe Photography. All rights reserved.

Designed by Dean H. Renninger

Edited by Sarah Mason

Published in association with the literary agency of Les Stobbe, 300 Doubleday Road, Tryon, NC 28782.

Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible , King James Version.

This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of either the author or the publisher.

Pawlik, Tom, date.

Beckon / Tom Pawlik.

p. cm.

ISBN 978-1-4143-3873-6 (sc)

1. College students—Fiction. 2. College teachers—Fiction. 3. Businessmen—Fiction.