J. Gonzalez - They

Vince sat down at the table with his coffee and took a glance through the Sports page of the Lancaster Intelligencer . Frank puttered in the kitchen, tending to the eggs and bacon, serving them up as they were finished. By the time he seated himself at the table Vince was already halfway through his breakfast, which also consisted of a glass of orange juice. “This is great,” Vince nodded, wiping his mouth with a napkin. “Thanks, Frank.”

“Don’t mention it,” Frank said, digging in.

“I’ve already told this to Frank and Mike,” Reverend Powell said, pausing from his breakfast. “I spoke to Tom Hoffman this morning. He wants to meet them.”

Vince glanced at Mike as he chewed on a piece of bacon. Mike nodded. “I think it’s a good idea.”

“Tom Hoffman is a brother in the Lord,” Reverend Powell said, returning to his breakfast. “And he’s a solid law enforcement man. He also has first-hand knowledge of the crime scene at Maggie’s home, so he’s seen what we’re up against. I didn’t tell him everything we discussed last night, but… he seems to have a feeling for what’s going on.”

Vince looked at Mike. “Are we going to tell him?”

Mike shrugged. “I don’t know. I want to meet him first.” He looked at Frank. “Right?”

Frank nodded as he dipped his toast in egg yolk. “Yeah, I think it’s a good idea. But I still say we play our cards close and don’t reveal too much. I want to check the guy out.”

Mike turned to Reverend Powell. “Do you have a personal computer?”

“Yes. In my office.”

“Mind if I use it?” Frank asked.

“No, I don’t see why not. Can I ask why?”

“Just some things I want to do,” Frank replied, taking a bite of egg-yolk dipped toast.

“You want to check out Tom Hoffman, is that right?” Reverend Powell sounded both surprised and slightly angry at the idea.

“Hank,” Mike said in a soothing tone. “We have to make sure—”

“Make sure of what? I can assure you that Tom Hoffman is a man of good standing. Why, he’s a deacon at First Presbyterian Church here in Lititz!”

“I understand that and I apologize,” Mike said. “But we have to check. Please respect our cautionary approach to this, Hank, but—”

“No, you’re right,” Hank Powell said, holding up his hand. He attacked his breakfast, spooning eggs and bacon into his mouth. “You guys have been in this battle longer than I have. You know what we’re up against. I won’t say anything.”

They were silent for a minute. Vince could tell that Hank Powell was irritated at the thought of Tom Hoffman being checked out. Vince would have felt the same way last week, but now he felt glad they were taking such extreme measures. They had to.

Mike broke the brief silence as he finished his breakfast. He took a sip of coffee. “Okay, here’s the plan. We meet briefly with Tom Hoffman. Where did you say we were to meet him, Reverend?”

“The Family Cupboard Restaurant and Buffet on Newport Road at ten-thirty,” Hank said, still eating his breakfast. “He has an early shift today. Ten-thirty is his break-time. I told him we’d meet him there for coffee.”

“Fine,” Mike said. “That gives us enough time to grab quick showers and head over. When we get there, Vince will have to ask about the investigation. I’ll be acting as his lawyer and Frank will act as a body guard.”

Frank snorted. “Falling back on that cliché again, I see.”

Mike ignored Frank’s wisecrack. “Naturally, you’re interested as a friend of the family. If Tom Hoffman refers us to the state police or a homicide detective, we go from there. If he has information he’s willing to share, we listen and take notes. If he tries to solicit information from us , we don’t tell him anything we discussed last night.”

“What do we tell him?” Vince asked.

“We tell him we have reason to believe that the people responsible for your mother’s death may be trying to kill you, too,” Mike said. “We don’t want him to find out on his own. He can learn this easily himself. And if he finds out we’ve been withholding information, he may not cooperate.”

“You’re damned right he won’t want to cooperate,” Reverend Powell muttered. He’d put away his breakfast in less than two minutes. He scooped up the rest of the egg yolk with the last remaining piece of toast and finished it off.

“Tom Hoffman needs to know Vince may be in danger because it might help him give us more information,” Mike continued. He took a sip of coffee. “If it does, and if it feels right, we can talk later about sharing more information with him. We can discuss that after our meeting with him at the Family Cupboard. Then we’ll come back here, Frank will do some checking on the computer, Vince will call the Irvine P.D., then we’ll take a look at the report on Tom that comes up and decide whether or not we want to meet with him again.”

“Report?” Reverend Powell asked. “You guys have access to some secret database or something?”

Frank Black finished his breakfast. He took a hearty drink of orange juice. “Mike developed a complex database that has all the available information on Children of the Night cult members and their affiliates, including photographs, physical descriptions, aliases, that kind of thing.”

“Plus, Frank has a way to access certain computer systems and files on known cult members,” Mike said. “It shouldn’t take long to run a check on Tom Hoffman.”

“Well, you won’t find anything,” Reverend Powell said.

“All right,” Mike said, standing up. “Let’s get a move on!”

FRANK BLACK STUCK out like a sore thumb as the four men entered the Family Cupboard Family Restaurant and Buffet on Newport Road. Mike Peterson, Hank Powell, and Vince Walters looked like the kind of men that would frequent the place—farmers, real-estate agents perhaps, or maybe salesmen. But Frank Black, with his black Levi jeans, his Anthrax T-shirt, his black leather jacket and gloves, snakeskin cowboy boots, his dark sunglasses and his long black hair, looked like a biker from hell.

At Mike’s insistence, all four men were armed. Reverend Powell had given Vince a Kahr K9 compact 9mm handgun and an extra seven round magazine. Vince had started to tuck the gun into his waistband the way he’d seen Frank do it, then had second thoughts. Suppose the gun accidentally went off and blew his balls off? Instead, he put the gun in his right front hip pocket and the extra magazine in his left pocket. He transferred his wallet to his back hip pocket.

He knew Frank was carrying his handgun in his waistband, and he probably had a second firearm somewhere in his jacket. Mike was carrying some kind of semi-automatic handgun in his waistband, and he’d watched as Reverend Powell slipped a gun similar to the one he’d given him in a shoulder holster then drawn a vest over it, concealing it.

If Tom Hoffman saw that they were packing heat he didn’t indicate that he cared. He was seated in a back booth and he nodded at them as the four men approached him. “Good morning, gentlemen,” he said.

Introductions were made and Frank drew up an extra chair. A waitress approached and Tom Hoffman asked for a pot of coffee. Once coffee was served and the small talk was out of the way, Tom got right down to business. He looked at Vince. “Reverend Powell tells me you ran into a little bit of trouble out in California when you got home last week.”

Vince nodded. He told the cop a simplified version of the attempt on his life. “That’s why I called Mike,” he said. “I thought he’d be able to help, and he did. He hired Frank as my bodyguard until this thing blows over and that’s why we’re out here, to see if any progress has been made on my mother’s murder.”