Haunted Air

"You believed him?"

The priest shrugged. "One is after hearing many strange things in the confessional. I took him on his word and told him to receive absolution he must be turning himself in to the authorities. He laughed and said he couldn't do that. In fact, he was going to kill another child in the following week under the dark of the moon. And then he left."

"How did you know he was Eli Bellitto?"

"I followed him," he said, looking a little ashamed. "I didn't know if he was deluded or telling the truth. Either way he was certainly daft. I left the confessional, removed my collar, and trailed him to his store. It wasn't far. But as I stood outside his shop I thought of a third possibility: perhaps he was after having some grudge against the church and trying to see if he could make a priest compromise the holy privilege of the Sacrament of Confession. I needed a way of protecting the Church and protecting any child he might harm. I thought of you."

"Me? How does a priest even know about me?"

"One of my parishioners once confessed to me about hiring you."

"Confessed? You mean I'm a sin?" Jack didn't know whether to be offended or pleased. "Who was it?"

"I can't be telling you that, of course."

"Oh, yeah. I guess not."

He decided being a sin was kind of cool.

"Someone was after being hurt as a result of my parishioner hiring you and the lad was afraid he'd si

"It would be," Jack said. "I don't know about the hundreds he told you about, but yeah, more than one. Many more."

Father Ed gasped and crossed himself. "Saints preserve us."

"You hear about that house in Astoria this morning? He was part of that."

"Then I did the right thing. But why was he telling me? Why did he confess?"

"Arrogance, I guess. He kept trophies from his victims on display in his shop. I gather he thought he was some sort of superior being and liked to flaunt it."

"Hubris." The priest shook his head. "Sometimes we can be thankful for it, I suppose." He glanced at Jack. "And where would Mr. Bellitto be now?"

"Gone."

"Gone where?"

"Not sure. Just... gone. And don't worry. He won't be coming back. Ever."

Father Ed took a deep breath. "Like my parishioner, I'm feeling I might have a need to confess. Would that be true?"

Jack shrugged. "Not my call."

"How about you? Would you be needing to confess?"

"I don't think so. I had it on the authority of a good man that I was doing God's work."

EPILOGUE

When Jack arrived at Menelaus Manor two weeks later, Lyle was in the yard watching a landscaper replace the dead foundation plantings. He greeted Jack warmly with a two-handed handshake.

"Jack, how are you? Come on in."

Jack followed him inside to the kitchen where Lyle popped the tops on a couple of Miller Genuine Drafts.

Jack lifted his can. "To Charlie."

He'd died saving Gia's life. Jack would be drinking toasts to him indefinitely.

"Amen to that." After each took a long pull, Lyle said, "How's Gia?"

"Still shaken up, but she's handling it. Having Vicky back has helped a lot."

"And the baby?"

Jack gri

Gia had had a sonogram two days ago. Too early to tell the sex, but everything was as it should be. What a relief that had been.

But he still hadn't figured out how he was going to become the baby's legal father.

"I'm really glad you could come over, Jack."

"Glad to make it." He meant that. "Would have been by sooner but for all the company you've had."

In the weeks since Charlie's death, the police, using some sort of ground sonar, had recovered eight bodies from the cellar. They were sure they'd found them all. Sweeps of the surrounding grounds had yielded nothing.

Lyle smiled. "Yeah, well, the cops finished up. At last. I've finally got my house back."

"Not that you would've been home much anyway."

During the past week Lyle had been a ubiquitous presence on the tube. Every talk show, from Today and GMA in the morning to Oprah in the afternoon, to the Rose-Leno-Letterman-O'Brien axis at night, had had him on.

"Yeah, I guess I've been doing a bit of traveling, haven't I."

"You're good on the tube." True. Came across as a very personable, likable guy. "You ought to have your own show."

He laughed. "Been offered two already." His smile faded. "But I might have to broadcast from jail if they link me to Adrian Minkin."

Minkin's body had been found the following day when clerks from Bellitto's store came looking for him.

"They won't. We left that place clean."

Lyle shook his head. "What a night. I still can't believe I was there. Did you hear the latest? Eli Bellitto is a possible suspect."

"Speaking of Eli," Jack said. "Where is he?"

"I have no idea. Not a trace of him in the house."

"So he just vanished, body and all?"

"Tara has him."

Jack was struck by the certainty in his tone.

"Hope she's having fun with him."

Lyle nodded. "She is. Oh, she is."

Again that certainty. "How about visits from Tara?"

"Not a one. She's gone for good." Lyle frowned. "But Bellitto's circle of child killers is still around. I wish there was a way to give them a share of their leader's fate."

"I've taken care of that," Jack said.

"How?"

"Made a call that night to a pair of brothers I know." The Mikulski brothers. Jack saw no reason Lyle needed to know their name. "Told them Bellitto's address and that I'd left the door open. They called me the next day. Said they paid a visit, went through his files, stole his computer's hard drive. Lots of interesting stuff there, including names and addresses of Eli's ring."

"Are they detectives?"

"No." Jack didn't know the Mikulskis' story, and figured he could live without knowing it. "But they've got a thing for pedophiles."

"A thing?"

"Yeah." Jack leaned against the counter and took another sip. "They're very serious about this. They know my word's good, but even so they won't take it. They'll check out the guys on Eli's list themselves-watch them, break in and toss their digs. Once they're satisfied someone's the real deal, they'll make their move. People will start to disappear."

"You mean, they'll kill them?"

"Eventually."

"Eventually?"

"Yeah. Eventually they'll die. Long after they want to."

Lyle rotated his shoulders, as if shaking off a chill. "What else have you been up to?"

"Still trying to figure out the whats and whys of what happened here. Especially Tara telling Gia that something wants her dead."

"I've been chewing on that one too. It has to be the Otherness you told us about."

"I thought you couldn't buy into that."

Lyle looked at him. "I buy into a whole lot more than I used to. You said this Otherness feels it's got a score to settle with you. The best I can figure it is maybe it can't strike at you directly. Maybe something's guarding your back. So it tries to strike at you indirectly, through the people you love."

Jack had wondered about that. Kate was gone, and the Otherness probably deserved the rap for that. And if things had gone differently two weeks ago, Gia, Vicky, and his unborn child would be gone too.

Lyle sipped and said, "Let's take Tara at her word: The Otherness brought her back to get Gia. She was certainly playing to Gia all along. But somewhere along the line Tara developed her own agenda. I guess the Otherness can't always fine-tune the forces it sets into motion."