The Tenth Circle by Jon Land

Author:Jon Land
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
Published: 2013-11-04T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 50

Panama City, Florida

“You killed my dog, mister! You killed my dog!”

Rule heard the words, but the boy before him didn’t speak them, his lips never moving. In his mind, he could squeeze the rock in his hand as if it were soft and spongy. In his mind, it was coming forward, the boy first this time and then the dog.

Oh my God, it’s happening again!

“Mister?”

But Rule heard nothing. It was thirty years ago again and he was living out of the bug-infested rear of his van, sleeping in a sauna that became more like a steam bake by dawn that found him drenched in his own sweat with even his boxer shorts soaked through. Frustrated, bitter, lost. That awful part of him he’d thought was gone forever was just dormant, waiting to be awoken. His true self, his true nature.

“Something wrong, mister?”

The voice was the same, everything was the same, even the drool-infested snarls coughed his way by the boy’s dog. The sounds bounced about his head, pangs of agony left behind that had to be quelled. Just one way to do it. The rock smashing bone, brain matter and skull fragments hurled mist-like into the air to be scattered by God’s winds. The only way, the only way. Then as well as now.

The reverend started toward the boy, hiding the rock behind him. The dog gone crazy now, the clinking sound of the chain fully extended, stretched to its absolute limit just as Rule was.

Another step, then another, the boy starting to retreat, back up the stairs, losing his balance and grabbing a rusty railing to regain it.

Just one lunge away now, time having sped backward, the color washed out of the world so there were only sepia tones that vibrated in the super-heated air.

Rock starting forward.

The door jerking open to reveal a massive shape, too big to emerge without ducking under the jamb.

“Dad,” the boy said.

The dog stopped barking.

“What the …” The shape in the doorway’s voice froze there. His heavy work boots hammered the steel stairs until they stopped at the bottom, eyes narrowing with recognition as the sun hit his bald head, rife with tattoos. “Wait a sec, I know you… .”

Rule stood there speechless, the rock gone from his grasp to thump against the parched earth.

“You’re that reverend, the one hates all the damn Muslims.”

Addressing him like one of the faithful. Rule could see it in his eyes, which the sun couldn’t make squint, hear it in the giant’s voice. He’d never seen a man this big and layered so heavy with muscle.

“That I am,” he managed, “that I am.”

“I heard of you, I heard all about you.”

The man stopped there, his expression opening into a smile. A few of the teeth Rule glimpsed were chipped, the residue of bar fights perhaps, except the reverend couldn’t imagine anyone mixing it up with this guy, at least not doing so and coming away to talk about it. He towered over the world, stretching nearly to the size of the mobile home minus the concrete slabs on which it was perched.

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