“You don’t want to fight?” Danny scowled. “Then what’s the deal with telling the guys you wanted to meet me in Gethsemane? What’s that all about?”
“I wanted you to come there so we could talk. Not fight.”
“Yeah, right.”
“I’m serious, Danny. Why would I want to fight you?”
“Why,” Danny sputtered. “Maybe because I told on you? Because you got in trouble?”
Matt smiled. “That was all just a misunderstanding. Let’s talk about it. I’m sure we can reach an agreement. Work things out. We’re friends, Danny. We shouldn’t let something like this come between us.”
Danny frowned. Something was wrong. Different. Matt wasn’t talking like himself. The voice was the same, but the words, the grammar—they belonged to an adult.
“Come up to the cemetery with me,” Matt urged him.
“Why? Whatever you have to say, you can say it here.”
“No,” Matt said. “I want to show you something.”
Danny lowered his fists and took a step backward. “No way. I don’t know what’s gotten into you, Matt, but just get the hell away from me. I’m not going anywhere with you.”
“What’s gotten into me?” Matt laughed. “You don’t have any idea, little boy. None at all.”
Danny’s stomach clenched. “You’re not really Matt are you?”
Sighing, Matt turned his back on him. Hesitant, Danny took a step forward, reaching for him. Suddenly, Matt whirled around and punched him in the face. Danny’s lips burst. He stumbled backward, stunned, and collapsed to the pavement. Matt took full advantage of Danny’s position and kicked him in the balls. Danny cried out, gagging from the pain.
“That hurts, doesn’t it?” Matt aimed another kick, catching him in the thigh. “I know. I’ve been kicked there twice myself in the last three days.”
Danny sucked air and tried to respond.
“I tried to do this the easy way,” Matt said, looming over him. “But you had to be difficult. My Master wants you in the cemetery, and I’m going to haul you there if I have to.”
Coughing, Danny rolled over and curled into a ball. Through teary eyes, he glanced around the street, hoping for an adult or passerby, but the sidewalks were deserted.
“You think you’re something special, don’t you? Just because you learned a few tricks from that old man, you think you can screw me over and get away with it?” Matt’s grabbed Danny’s hair and jerked his head up. “Think again. Nobody fucks with me! Nobody fucks with Tim Wells.”
The name cut through Danny’s pain. Tim Wells? Wasn’t he the rapist who’d died a few years ago, gunned down by the cops when he wouldn’t surrender? Timothy Wells had worn a Casper the Friendly Ghost mask while he committed those crimes. He’d even raped his wife. He was crazy.
This was crazy.
“Get up,” Matt ordered, yanking Danny’s hair. “Let’s go. Don’t make me carry you.”
Grunting, Danny struggled to his feet. His lips pulsed and blood ran down his chin. His testicles felt like grapefruit.
“Is that who you are? Tim Wells?”
Matt grinned, tipping an imaginary hat. “Pleased to meet you. Hope you guess my name.”
“How did you get inside my friend?”
“I was given a second chance. And you almost fucked it up for me. But now, now I’m going to fuck you up instead.”
Danny shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
“What are you going to do about it?”
“You told me your name,” Danny said. “Names have power, dumb ass. If you know something’s name, the rest is easy.”
Matt/Wells lunged at him, and Danny unleashed the energy inside him. The power left his body in a rush, a wave of energy that erupted from his fingers and struck the other boy in the chest. There were no pyrotechnics announcing the attack; merely thought and the action that followed. Danny focused, tried to visualize pulling the shade of Timothy Wells from Matt’s body, and blasting it back to the grave.
But that wasn’t what happened.
Matt screamed as his flesh blistered, turned gray and sloughed onto the sidewalk. His eyes dribbled down his face, his exposed bones blackened. He took a step forward and his charred ribcage snapped, spilling his insides with a wet, red splash. He fell apart, liquefying where he stood, decimated by gravity and his own violent convulsions. His bones cracked and splintered. The skeletal fragments turned to dust.
Danny stared in revulsion. His stomach heaved. He turned away and threw up all over his shoes. His vomit splattered into the puddle of gore. Something dark coalesced in the center of the remains—a dark, swirling form that grew in size and then erupted into the air. It was a shadow, a human shadow, and it screamed.
Then it was gone.
The street remained empty. There was no movement from the windows of the homes. The yards were deserted. Nobody had seen. That didn’t make it better. Danny trembled, horrified at what he’d just done. Just like the liquor store, the destructive wave had flowed out of him, uncontrollable and overpowering. And now, one of his best friends was dead as a result. Because of him.
Because of magic.
No, he thought. That wasn’t Matt. It was somebody else.
But was it really? Yes, Timothy Wells’ shade had been inside of Matt, but where had Matt gone? Could his spirit—his consciousness—still have been trapped inside his own body, a prisoner? If so, then Danny was a murderer.
He stared at Matt’s remains and willed his friend to come back. He balled his fists and pushed with his mind, wishing for it to be reversed. He visualized the puddle reconstructing itself, flowing and shaping into a body.
Let me take it back, please!
Instead, the thing that had been Matt dribbled down a storm drain.
Danny sobbed. Gustav had told him that magic had a price. He’d said that sometimes sacrifices had to be made.
But he hadn’t told Danny that it would hurt so much—or that the cost would be so high.
789
Bedrik felt Timothy Wells die for the second time.
Cursing, he picked up the phone and dialed the police.
789
Edward T. Rammel watched the house through Tony Amiratti Junior’s eyes. The old man and the woman were inside. There was no sign of the boy.
Edward had enjoyed his new life so far. Power, wealth, sex—what wasn’t to like? He got to play a tough guy, just like the mobsters in the movies he’d loved when he was alive. It had been daunting at first, pretending to know people he’d never met and trying hard to fit in, to not give away that he wasn’t who they thought he was, but he’d managed. Maybe the fear Tony Amiratti inspired in people had helped. But since taking possession of Tony’s body, Edward had given them all new reasons to fear him.
A police car rolled slowly down the street. Edward grinned in satisfaction. The others were arriving right on schedule, eager as he was not to disappoint their Master. Bedrik was already angry over Wells’ failure. If they screwed this up…he shuddered, unable to contemplate the ramifications.
The car pulled to a stop in front of the house and two men got out. They glanced in his direction, looking at the bushes where he was hiding, and then quickly turned away.
Careful, you morons, he thought. Don’t let him know I’m here.
The others approached the house and Edward tensed, preparing himself.
“Showtime!”
789
Gustav felt their presence seconds before they knocked on the door; three men who were not men but something else.
He glanced at the bedroom. Danny’s mother slept soundly. He’d checked on her throughout the day and was satisfied with her progress. Another twelve hours or so and she’d awake, fully recovered.
Moving quickly, he ducked into the kitchen and rubbed salt onto his hands, feeling the tiny grains scratch against his calluses.