Stanton’s hand slid down to the firearm at his side.
“I wouldn’t do that,” the man said. “You’re going to want to hear what I have to say.”
The young lady at the podium closed her talk and the man stood up and cheered. He whistled and hollered and everyone turned to him. He shouted, “Fucking A!” and sat back down.
“I don’t want to spatter your brains in a church,” Stanton said. “Come outside quietly and I’ll just arrest you.”
He laughed mirthlessly. “How’s Emma doing?” Stanton didn’t respond and he kept talking. “She’s quite the fighter. When I fuck her I bet she’s going to put up-”
Stanton had his throat and pressed him against the pew. The man tried to laugh but only a low hissing would escape his lips. Stanton pulled out his cell phone and dialed Emma’s number. It went straight to voicemail. He dialed again; straight to voicemail.
“What did you do?” Stanton whispered.
He tried to speak but nothing would come out as he began to turn red. Stanton let go of the man’s throat and sat back, his hand on his firearm.
“She’s fine,” he said, coughing. “Oh, man. This is fun. I’m glad we did this.”
“Tell me where she is.”
“I’ll do better. I’ll take you there. But you can’t call anyone. Just me and you. Two buddies.”
Stanton shook his head. “No way. I’m hauling you in.”
“You’ll never find her and she’ll starve to death.” He held out his hands as if in surrender. “I don’t have weapons. You can keep your gun, I don’t care. I promise you, I’ll take you to her.”
After a couple moments of thought Stanton spit out, “Stand up and walk outside. If you run I’ll shoot you in the back.”
“Spoken like a true disciple of Christ.”
The man stood up and they headed out the double doors. Stanton walked behind him with his hand on the Desert Eagle at his hip. They got out into the sunlight in the parking lot and the man took in a deep breath and turned to Stanton.
“Let’s take your car, Jon. You probably wouldn’t trust taking mine. It’s a little bit of a drive.”
Stanton removed his firearm and held it low so not to cause panic. He led him over to his car and the man got into the passenger seat. Stanton climbed into the driver’s seat with the gun held to the man’s chest.
“I could shoot you right now and no one would question me.”
“But you won’t. I did some reading up on you. Quite the Boy Scout. Sorry about your wife. Is she really marrying someone from the Chargers? Never liked football. Too much aggression. I think you’re the same way, aren’t you, Jon?”
“Stop calling me that.”
“It’s your name, isn’t it?”
Stanton struck him with the weapon lightly on the head and pressed the muzzle against his temple, his head pushed against the glass of the passenger side window.
“Did I do something to upset you, Detective?” he said with a chuckle. “It couldn’t have been those little kiddies I fried, could it?”
Stanton took out his phone.
“I have to urge you, Detective, not to do that. I will clam up and ask for a lawyer and she will starve to death. She’s somewhere no one ever goes. All I’m asking for is that you take a drive with me out there. After that, I will turn myself in.”
“No you won’t.”
“I give you my word.”
He pulled the gun away from his head. “You don’t want to turn yourself in. You want to die.”
The man grew quiet. “And you presume to know too much. Now are we going to go see Emma or go to the station and let her die?”
Stanton bit his cheek. He transferred the gun to his left hand and pulled out the keys with his right before starting the car.
“I knew you were as smart as you looked, Detective.”
They pulled out of the church parking lot onto San Bernadisto Drive and got onto the freeway.
“Stay in this lane,” the man said. “It’ll be about twenty minutes.” He leaned back in his seat as if on a leisurely drive. “I read that you almost died and were in the hospital for nearly a month. Your partner, what was his name? Sherman? Or whatever it was. I read they found out it was a fake name and don’t know who he is or where he is. He got away pretty free and clear, didn’t he?”
Stanton didn’t respond.
“Anyway, I was in a hospital for a long time too. It’s an odd place, isn’t it? Not quite prison and not quite freedom. You seem to turn in on yourself. Your mind begins to eat itself like your body does when you don’t give it nourishment. I had to read a lot to keep that from happening, but who knows? Maybe it happened and I’m just not aware of it? That’s always puzzled me, Detective. I know you have a doctorate in psychology. Tell me, how does one know when one has gone crazy? If you’re crazy, you can’t tell you’re crazy, right?”
Stanton said nothing as a car cut him off and he slowed down.
“Are you really not going to not talk to me this whole trip? It would make it quite boring, you know.”
“How many?” Stanton said.
“In total? I don’t know.”
“No, you know. You keep track.”
“I used to keep track. But after the first few, you begin to forget things. You would be amazed how mundane killing can get, Jon. How banal. It’s like anything else. If you do it enough, it gets boring.”
“But you can’t stop.”
“No, I can’t stop. I wouldn’t want to. It’s still fun. One day it won’t be but right now it is. Do you remember the Zodiac Killer? How they never found him and they think that he was locked up on other charges or died? I don’t think so. People don’t consider that murder just started boring him and he moved on to something else. That’ll probably happen to me as well. But you know how that is, you’ve killed a lot too.”
“Not like you.”
“Why? Because you did it for the ‘good’ of the public? What if someone you had killed, let’s say one of the murderers, would’ve killed someone who was going to kill others down the road. Like by being a drunk driver? Is that then an evil or good act he’s performed? If you measure it by substantive parameters, it was a good act that saved lives. There are too many variables in life, too many unknowns to say what’s good and what’s evil. Those terms have become outdated.”
“When you equivocate good and evil, only good loses out.”
He chuckled. “That seems to be the curse of this time, doesn’t it? I’ve been gone many years and coming back even I was shocked with what I saw on television, what was considered acceptable behavior. I can see, physically see, that society has become more Godless and corrupted. My father had predicted it, but I never believed him. He was a preacher; you and he, I think, might’ve gotten along. Except of course that he raped all the women that surrounded him.” He laughed. “I think some of the animals too. Every man has his appetites I suppose. You’re going to want to merge with this interstate.”
Stanton swung left and they followed Interstate 15 for what was easily another half hour. They were in a low-income area and Stanton could see several government housing projects blotting the landscape. Covered in graffiti, one had an abandoned car in front that had been taken apart piece by piece.
Getting off the freeway, they drove another few minutes. They came to a line of abandoned homes and the man pointed to one and said, “Stop in front.”
Stanton took out his cell phone. “She’s not here,” the man said. “You may want to wait before calling it in.”
“You said you were taking me to her.”
“I am. Be patient, Detective.”
He got out of the car and Stanton followed.
CHAPTER 48
Daniel Childs lifted over three hundred and fifteen pounds on the bench press before sitting up and taking a swig of fruit punch creatine. The gym was packed and two women in spandex were working out in front of him. He smiled to the one on the right, wearing a flower-print tube-top, and she smiled back.