"Don't know 'bout no hydras," Charlie said, his voice thick. "But I don't see us gettin' outta this alive. Leastways not together."
Gia glanced at him. His expression looked stricken, as if he were about to cry.
"It's okay, Charlie. We'll make it. We've just got to keep—"
His expression hardened, as if he'd come to a decision. He stuck out his hand. "Gimme the cross."
"I'm doing okay with it."
"No, you ain't." He grabbed her arm. His eyes had a strange look. "Not nearly. Gimme."
"Charlie? What are you doing?" Gia leaned away from him but he was stronger and had a longer reach. He caught hold of the cross and ripped it from her grasp. "Charlie!"
Without a word he bent and began hacking at the hands imprisoning her left leg. As soon as that was free, he grabbed it, lifted it, and placed her foot on his back. Then he went to work on her right leg. When that was free, he lifted her and placed her on the dirt which had now piled to above his knees.
As soon as Gia hit the dirt, new arms emerged like snakes and grabbed her. Charlie immediately went to work on these.
The dirtfall redoubled. Gia could barely see him.
"What about you?" Her throat constricted as she realized what he was up to. "Charlie, you've got to get your feet free!"
"Too late," he said without looking up. He was waist deep in the dirt and kept hacking away at the new hands as soon as they sprouted, allowing Gia to stay atop the rising level of dirt. "Can't get to 'em."
"You can if you do it now! We can both make it."
He shook his head. "Nuh-uh. Then we both be in the same sinkin' boat."
"No!" Gia couldn't, wouldn't let this happen. She began clawing at the dirt around his waist. "We'll take turns! We'll—"
A ghost hand shot up from the loose earth, gripping her wrist and jerking her down. She cried out as her face hit the dirt.
Charlie slashed at the hand, freeing her, then roughly shoved her back.
"See? See?" He was looking at her now and she could see tears in his eyes. His lips trembled as he spoke. "I know what I'm doin', okay? But I don't wanna do it for nothin'! Let it mean somethin', huh?"
"But Charlie—"
At that moment the dirtfall stopped.
Gia looked up, looked around, looked at Charlie. It had ceased as suddenly and mysteriously as it had started. Why?
"Praise the Lord!" Charlie sagged forward. The dirt had piled up to the lower part of his chest. He cradled his head on his arms and spoke toward the ground. "He's delivered us from evil!"
Just then Gia felt the dirt shift under her, felt it change, become finer, grainier. It began to move, surging and flowing like thick fluid.
And rising.
"Oh, no!" Gia cried. "What's happening?"
Charlie straightened and began slashing at the soil as it rose to his armpits.
"Don't know! Please, God, stop it! Stop it!"
The dirt, though dry, was lapping at him like water, swallowing him, but Gia remained afloat, buoyed on the grainy swells. She cried out and grabbed his free hand, tugging on it, trying to pull him up to her level but he was anchored fast below.
As the soil reached his neck his wide terrified eyes found her, held her, pierced her. "Oh, please, oh, please, Lord, I don't wanna die!"
And then the dirt swirled into his open mouth and he coughed and choked and gagged and writhed, stretching his neck. Gia, crying and whimpering with terror, tugged on his arm but couldn't budge him. The dirt rose past his mouth and into his nostrils, and his eyes were wider, bulging, pleading, and then with a final surge the loose earth rose and engulfed his head, leaving only his raised arm in sight.
Gia screamed and dug at the dirt, frantically pawing at it like a dog as she tried to clear it away from his face.
"Charlie! Charlie, hang on!"
But it was like trying to dig through soup. It flowed around and through her fingers and immediately filled back in behind her hands. She could feel his face, touch his hair but couldn't clear away enough to see him. If only she had a hose or a pipe, something to feed him air until—
Suddenly Charlie's other hand broke the surface, still holding the cross. She grabbed the wrist and pulled, throwing her back into it, but nothing! Nothing!
And then as she gripped him she felt agonal tremors radiate through his arms and spread to his hands, saw the fingers straighten, stiffen, drop the cross, claw the air for an instant, then fall limp and still, twitch, then go still once more, and not move again.
"No!" Grief spilled through Gia like acid. She'd met Charlie only twice before and yet he'd given his life for her. She knelt and clutched his cooling hands and cried out in a long, drawn-out wail that trailed off into sobs. "No!"
"I'm sorry." Tara's voice.
Gia looked up. What had been a pit was now a smooth, shallow depression in the earth. Tara stood half a dozen feet away, staring at her, looking as sweet and innocent as ever, but not looking sorry at all.
"Why? This was a good man! He never hurt you or anyone else! How could you kill him?"
Tara stepped closer, her eyes fixed on Gia—not on her face, but her abdomen.
"Because he'd only be in the way."
Gia's grief chilled, sliding toward unease. "In the way… of what?"
"Of what happens next."
Crystals of ice formed in Gia's veins as she rose unsteadily to her feet.
"I don't understand."
Tara smiled. "Your baby becomes my baby."
14
"No-don't-please!" Bellitto cried, squirming in the chair as Jack pressed the tip of the silencer over his left knee. He stared down at the sheet of paper in his lap. "Please! I've never seen that before in my life!"
"Lie!"
"No! I swear!"
"Read it now then. You've got ten seconds."
The darkness within Jack pounded on the bars of its cage to be set free and let it pull the trigger and blow this puke's kneecap into the floor. But he held it back. Bellitto wasn't exactly a spring chicken. Didn't want to lose him to a heart attack or stroke.
Almost had a heart attack himself a moment ago when he'd walked into the office at the other end of the apartment. A small room, no place for a guy Minkin's size to hide, but Jack had checked the storage closet anyway. Empty. On his way out of the room he happened to glance at the sheet of paper lying in the fax machine's tray. His gaze skittered off the handwritten lines as he passed, and he was stepping through the door when one of the words he'd seen snagged in his brain, caught like a sheet of newspaper in a fence.
… Westphalen…
With a cry of alarm he'd leaped back to the machine, snatched up the sheet, and read:
Success! The ladys Visa records show a hefty charge to something called Pint-Size Picassos which turns out to be a summer camp right outside Monticello. I checked and the Westphalen package is there. All it needs is to be picked up and we're in business. A. can handle the job no sweat.
BURN THIS!
Jack read it again, then a third time, still not believing… Westphalen… Pint-Size Picassos… that was Vicky. Bellitto and his gang had their sights on Vicky!
How? Why? They couldn't possibly know Vicky's connection to him—they didn't know who he was!
Or did they?
He needed some answers.
Bellitto looked up from the note. "I don't know what this is! I've never seen it before! It must be a mistake!"
"That does it." Pressed the silencer muzzle deeper into Bellitto's knee.
"Jesus, Jack!" Lyle, standing behind Bellitto, staring with wide, sick-scared eyes.
"Hey, I'm reasonable." Didn't want to get into gunplay here and now. Once it got started you never knew where it would take you. But he had to know. Had a feeling Bellitto was just a nudge away from opening up. "I'll let him choose which knee first."