F Wilson - The Dark at the End

“No. Speaks to me. He comes to me for solution to problems. If he does not wish Myers woman disturbed, okay. I am in her hometown many times. I can find other way perhaps.”

“In Jersey? What for?”

“Is not your concern. The One gives me many things to do and I am taking care of them all.”

Many things to do?

“Like what?”

That smirk again. “If the One wishes you to know, I am sure he will tell you.”

Had Drexler been taken out of the loop? Hank didn’t like that. Not one bit. Because if Drexler had been booted aside, Hank might be next.

… You might be the most surprised of all…

Hell, he might have been given the boot already and didn’t even know it.

Dawn followed Dr. Heinze through the Midtown Tunnel onto the Long Island Expressway. Her stomach totally knotted when he turned off on Woodhaven Boulevard and headed south into Rego Park. She’d grown up in this area. He continued on to Forest Hills where he eventually parked his car in the driveway of a two-story brick house with a manicured lawn and shrubbery that probably looked beautiful in season.

Home again, home again, jiggety-jig.

Now where had that come from? Oh, yeah. Her mother used to recite that nursery rhyme line every time they pulled into their driveway.

Dawn’s throat tightened. God, how she missed her.

She shook it off and stared at the house. Well, Dr. Heinze, I now know where you live.

What she was going to do with that information, Dawn hadn’t a clue, but she tucked the address away, just in case…

She wound her way back to Queens Boulevard and Rego Park, and slowed as she passed the Tower Diner where she used to wait tables… where she first met Jerry Bethlehem or whatever his real name was… where he started spinning the lies that led her into his bed and got her pregnant with the child she was now chasing.

Full circle.

Her hands seemed to have a life of their own as they turned the wheel, taking her off Queens Boulevard into the confusing local residential streets. She headed for 68th Drive, which paralleled 68th Road and 68th Avenue. She slowed before an older, stucco-walled house with high-peaked gables and an attached two-car garage. On impulse she pulled into the driveway.

Home again, home again, jiggety-jig.

Mom’s house. The house Dawn had left to move in with Jerry. She remembered it being better kept, then realized it had been almost a year since her mother had died in there, leaving a huge hole in her life.

A sob burst from her as she saw the foreclosure sign. Mom had loved that place, had worked so hard to earn it, and now…

She stared at the darkened windows.

What would you do, Mom? Would you tell me to find my baby or let him go?

Dawn realized her mother might very well tell her to let him go. She’d warned her against Jerry from the get-go, but Dawn wouldn’t listen. And Dawn was totally sure she’d tell her now that nothing good could ever come from something that came from Jerry.

And maybe she was right.

But I can’t let it go, Mom. I can’t.

A car pulled out of a driveway two doors down-the Schanz house. It turned this way and slowed as it approached, the driver probably wondering about a car parked outside the deserted Pickering place. Dawn’s pulse picked up as she recognized Mrs. Schanz behind the wheel. Couldn’t be seen here by that old busybody-not when she was a “person of interest” in her mother’s death.

She turned her head, praying the biddy wouldn’t recognize her in the failing light.

After Mrs. Schanz moved on, Dawn backed out and gunned away. She headed back to Manhattan, but she’d be back in the morning to trail Dr. Heinze from his house to the foundation-just to make sure he didn’t make any stops between.

She shook her head, realizing how this had totally become a sickness. But she couldn’t let go. She couldn’t.

A voice had invaded Hank’s head. A cut from his conversation with Szeto kept playing and replaying as he walked up from the Lodge toward Allen Street.

“The One speaks to me. He will tell me first.”

“I thought he spoke to your boss-”

“No. Speaks to me.”

Couple that with how distracted Drexler had seemed the last time he’d seen him No, more than distracted-upset. Drexler was pretty damn near the most together, focused guy he’d ever met. But not yesterday. Yesterday he looked like he was being held together by spit and baling wire.

Had something gone wrong at the Order? Their High Council had an inside track on everything connected to the Change, and Drexler was Hank’s connection to those bozos. Hank was counting on riding with them to Mover-Shaker status after the Change.

But then Drexler had made that “the most surprised of all” remark.

Hank had to get all this straightened out, and the only guy he knew who could do that was Drexler.

But he wasn’t answering his phone. Hank had left half a dozen messages.

Only one thing to do. Go over there and get some face time, whether Drexler liked it or not.

Hank reached Allen Street and found it at a standstill. Something must have happened on the outward-bound Williamsburg Bridge around the corner. He’d planned on taking a cab but Drexler’s place wasn’t all that far away. He decided to walk.

“Hello, Mister Drexler.”

Ernst had just stepped into his dark and supposedly empty apartment. He fumbled with the grocery bag he was carrying, almost dropping it in shock at the sound of the voice.

The One would occasionally surprise him by suddenly appearing in his office or apartment. But this was not the One’s voice. Ernst almost wished it were. It would mean…

“Who are you?”

“An old acquaintance.”

Ernst felt for the wall switch, found and flipped it. The light revealed a nondescript man in his midthirties relaxing in a chair on the far side of the room. He looked like someone off the street: jeans, baseball cap, sweatshirt. He was clean shaven, with brown hair, brown eyes… and was that one of Ernst’s Grolsch lagers in his hand?

Something about his face ignited a spark of familiarity, but not bright enough for recognition.

“You look familiar…”

“Remember your little sojourn at the Lodge in Johnson, New Jersey?”

And then it all came crashing back.

“Jack.”

The man nodded. “Your former groundskeeper.”

Controlling his initial shock, Ernst walked across his front room and set the bag on the counter. As the answers to a number of long-running questions began to flash through his mind, he realized he might be in mortal danger.

Might be. Jack certainly had changed from the skinny teenager Ernst had known. He’d filled out but remained wiry instead of bulky. He didn’t look the least bit threatening. In fact, he appeared perfectly innocuous.

But if what Ernst suspected were true, he was anything but. Hard to believe, looking at him now, but no one knew better than Ernst how appearances could deceive.

Talk… get him talking.

“How did you get in here?”

“The door.”

“And how did you reach the door?”

“The stairs.”

Ernst clenched his jaw. The building was supposed to have excellent security. He’d have to have a talk with the management.

“I have armed guards from the Order who routinely…”

Jack was shaking his head. “No, you don’t. Weeks ago I followed you from the Lodge and I’ve been watching this place on and off since. You don’t have any extra security. And why should you? No one outside the Order knows who you are.”

True. He had no enemies. Except perhaps the man seated before him.

Stay cool and keep him talking.