Knock Out

16

TITUSVILLE, VIRGINIA

Sunday evening

Joanna and Autumn wore clean jeans and T-shirts, and probably clean socks on their feet. Ethan thanked the Lord he had convinced them to unpack, to stay with him at least while his deputies were out searching for Blessed. But he hated waiting. He hated not knowing what he was up against.

After a dinner of macaroni and cheese with a side of peas and a salad Joanna made without anyone asking for one, he set Autumn in front of the TV in his bedroom and took Joanna to the living room. “Sit down.”

She said, “Why don’t you throw that sweatshirt away? It’s got a hole under the right arm and it’s all frayed around the neck. I know, I know, you’re a guy and you’ve worn that sweatshirt since you were sixteen.”

“Seventeen, actually.”

“And why don’t you have shoes and socks on? You’ll get splinters.”

Ethan put his feet up on the coffee table, arched an eyebrow at her.

She said, “I finally tossed a Fort Lauderdale T-shirt last year a boy brought me when I was eighteen.”

“There you go. Tell you what, I’ll be strong and toss my sweatshirt if you tell me everything you know about these people.”

“That’s a beautiful piano. Do you play?”

Anything to divert him. He nodded. “Thank you. It was my grand-mother’s piano. I’ll play some jazz for you later if you like. You know, Joanna, I’ve been patient with you, but now it’s time. I’m worried about my deputies as much as I’m worried about you and Autumn. What if they get close to Blessed? What will he do to them? Tell them to run off a cliff? You have to tell me what you know about him. I think you owe it to us, don’t you?”

She chewed on her lip, studied the inch of cold coffee at the bottom of the mug, then said, “I don’t want anyone to be hurt, I really don’t.”

He nodded. “Go on, then. Talk to me. Please.”

She put her feet up on the coffee table next to his, frowned at those two pairs of feet, put hers back on the floor, and said finally, “We were in the cemetery at my husband’s funeral, just a week ago. Blessed caught a young man hiding behind a gravestone. He had a camera and was taking pictures, like a Jimmy Olsen cub reporter. Blessed went into a rage, screamed at the kid, ‘Well, if it isn’t little snotty-nosed Nat Hodges,’ and jerked him to his feet, looked into his eyes —the young man never said a word. Blessed told him to drop his camera and stomp on it. Nat Hodges did it, no hesitation at all. At first I thought he was just scared to death, but then he simply stood there, all still and quiet. Blessed laughed at him and started making him do things, like elbow-crawl on his chest, rip off his shirt, rub dirt in his hair, humiliating things. The boy didn’t seem to be there any-more. He was completely in Blessed’s control, just like Ox was last night.

“Then Grace said, ‘Stop it, Blessed, we’ve got guests and we’re burying Martin,’ and Blessed huffed out in a pissed voice, ‘Can’t have the little scheiss taking pictures.’ Then he shook the kid until his head snapped back. I remember I took a step toward them, but Grace said in my ear not to worry, that Blessed was just bringing the boy back, something I really didn’t understand. But the boy seemed to wake up.

“Then Blessed grabbed the kid by the collar and told him he was going to run back to his boss at the newspaper and tell him he quit. And he said, ‘If I catch you around here again, I’m going to put you in one of those graves, you hear?’

“I remember the young guy was moaning, said his head hurt. I watched him run, just like Blessed told him to, trying to hold his head at the same time. I watched Blessed take the smashed camera and throw it into the open grave. He said, ‘Now Martin can take pictures of all the saints.’ He turned to his mother, Shepherd, and she nodded, didn’t say a word, simply nodded, and it was over.

“I was so shocked, so terrified, I stood there like a stone, my hand over Autumn’s eyes. She was plastered to my side. I could hear her breathing.” Joanna stopped a moment, looked over his left shoulder toward the grand piano.

“Since it happened, I’d been thinking about it, though, what we saw, and it seemed that being shaken or hit, or jarred, is what brought the boy back to himself. That’s what I was trying to do last night with Ox. I have no idea what Ox would have done, though, if you hadn’t hit him so hard. No, I do know. He would have killed us to get Autumn.

He nodded. “It was like he was hardwired to do whatever he had to do to get his hands on her. Dr. Spitz still won’t accept that Ox was under the control of someone else. He checked him for drugs and alcohol, and he wants Ox to have an MRI and an EEG, to see if his behavior was the result of a seizure or a brain tumor.

“You spoke about a cemetery, and you mentioned your husband, and you were there for his funeral. Tell me about the rest of the family, and why you were there with them.”

“I hadn’t met any of them before last week.” She didn’t say any-thing else, just began to worry her thumbnail.

Ethan said, “Blessed—his name makes me think of some sort of weird-ass preacher for one of those off-the-wall religions that doesn’t have much to do with God.”

“All their names are like that. For example, Grace.” “Grace? Yes, you mentioned his whispering to you. Blessed and Grace? What, they’re brothers?”

“Yes. Martin’s brothers.”

“Okay, what can you tell me about Grace?”

“Grace is thin as a rail, holds himself real quiet. But you’re always aware of him when he’s around. He’s creepy.”

She started to say something again, and he sat forward, touched her wrist. “What? Say what you have to say.” “I could be wrong, really wrong.” “What, Joanna?”

“I only heard Grace speak a very little bit. His voice was soft, sort of hollow, almost dead.” She shuddered. “That sounds ridiculous. I can’t really explain it, but—”

“But what?”

“Ox, last night, when he spoke—”

He waited.

“Ox sort of sounded like Grace. Not all soft and quiet like Grace but the cadence of his voice.

“It sounds crazy, I know. It’s not that it was Grace’s voice, but it was the way he spaced out his words, like I said, the cadence—it was so familiar.”