Caught in the Web Read online

  Jason had called him thirteen times? He should have known better than to leave a voicemail, but there it was. His screen showed three new messages, all of them from Jason. Then again, if anyone was likely to leave him a message, Jason sometimes did just because he knew how much it annoyed him, but three of them this morning?

  Sullivan shrugged and put the phone back into his pocket. Maybe he’d call him back in an hour or so. First, he had to do his morning ritual. After all, he needed to piss, shit, and shower. Maybe he’d think about dealing with people after that. It was too early to think about it. Right now, he just wanted to get the day started so he could get it done. He was already looking forward to when he would be able to go back to bed.

  He stepped around a pile of books and his toe clipped on the bookcase.

  “Ow!” he hissed in pain as he crashed over into the door frame to the bathroom. Flashes of pain shooting from his toe, he lost feeling in the tip. His other foot stumbled, and he tried to keep from falling. His foot landed on something sharp, and he felt himself falling, the world around him rising up. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the bathroom sink coming at him. Then his knees crashed down, and he was barely able to reach out and grab the sink, keeping himself from slamming into it.

  “Fucking shit!” He flopped over, turning so he could sit in the small bathroom, which was barely big enough to stand in. Now he was sitting in the bathroom and the hallway at the same time. He had to fight with the slim door frame to pull his foot up and examine it. First the one that had stepped on something sharp, then the one he had stubbed. No blood. Good. At least he hadn’t cut himself.

  He hung his head. This was going to be a great day. The pounding in his head was getting worse, his feet were now sore and he could feel a little wetness, which meant he had pissed a little on himself. What the fuck? Could this shit get any worse?

  The pounding in his head seemed to grow and shake, making the walls around him tremor in their wake. He felt it cave in on him. The pain clouded his thoughts, a vice grip tightening in on his attempt to think. It beat in time with…

  Damn it! It wasn’t his headache that was making the damn walls shake. Someone was pounding on his fucking door. Who the fuck could it be and, whoever it was, they weren’t going to like what they were about to get.

  Sullivan stood, wobbling a little. Whoever was there, it had better be good.

  * * * *

  Jason pounded on the door, the intensity shaking the cheap metal of the camper, and cursed his best friend. Why did the man insist on never growing up, making Jason’s life so damn hard? It was like the podcast they did. Why did Jason always have to do all the work? Sullivan was never on time, he never did his research and, other than making obscene references, he was pretty much useless. Well, except for the fact that his laid back attitude and obscene humor probably made the show as entertaining as it was. It sure as hell wasn’t Jason’s dry wit.

  How was he ever supposed to trust Sully watching his mom’s bar? What was he thinking? There was no way he could trust him. Honestly, he only had to drive across town. He was probably going to be longer just trying to wake up Sully and get him over there.

  The door crashed open, pulled so quickly that it slammed against something near it. He heard cursing from the other side, more things crashed to the floor, something sounded like glass hitting the fake linoleum on the floor, but he didn’t hear it break. The door still wasn’t open all the way, and he saw it continued to be jerked inward, probably slamming into more clutter until, finally, it could be opened enough for Sullivan to emerge.

  “For fuck’s sake, man!” Sullivan snarled at him. Jason noticed he didn’t open the screen door or invite him in. Not that they had time. Jason couldn’t let this become a snarling match, although his first instinct had been to retort back about how he had to come over there because the lazy ass wouldn’t answer his phone or get himself out of bed. He was angry, frustrated and, with how his friend was standing there ready for a fight, he wanted to give it to him.

  His blood burned with frustration. He hadn’t realized just how pent up he had been getting, and having a willing partner for a verbal assault made him just want to lash out. Why was he having to take care of the bar? Why did he have to worry about his aunt and his sister? His aunt was supposed to be their watcher, their babysitter. Why was he having to take care of her? Why the hell did the whole damn world seem to always come down on his shoulders, leaving him to fix everything? His mom got to run away. His dad ran away years ago, never to return. He tried to run away. He went off to school to get away, but how did that work? When responsibility came, when he had to take care of his mom’s stuff, his sister, and now his aunt, there he was. Why did it always have to fall onto his shoulders?

  He hadn’t realized just how much anger and hurt he was carrying until he stood there, his friend in the door, snarling at him. He just wanted to scream back. To lash out at his friend who didn’t have to worry about anything. When Sully needed money, his parents, still married and living on the other side of town, were there to give it to him. He was the boy who never had to grow up. Why did Jason have to take care of everything, but Sullivan got to live without a care in the world? And Sullivan wanted to yell at him for trying to wake him up? He wanted to fight with him? Well, what about all the shit that had been thrown at him?

  Oh yes. Those fires suddenly burned through him. The thoughts didn’t fully race into his consciousness, but they hovered there on the fringes. He felt the heat, the rising flames in his chest, the burning sensation behind his eyes, and that annoying sense of just wanting to scream and hurl himself at this boy-man who was his friend.

  He had to swallow and push it all back down. He couldn’t let go. That wasn’t him, and that couldn’t be him. He would still leave. He would go back to school. He had to be the responsible one.

  Reigning in his rage, he looked at his friend. “Man, come on. I really need you. Please, dude,” Jason said, cutting into the rant Sullivan was still lost in.

  Sullivan stopped and looked at him. It really didn’t take much more than that. He didn’t know what his friend saw there. He could only imagine how he looked…tears threatening, rugged, downtrodden, his voice soft and pleading, defeated. Whatever it was, he saw Sullivan’s shoulders sag. He knew that his friend, as frustrated as he was, was still his friend.

  CHAPTER 4

  “Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take. Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to keep…”

  He didn’t know how long he had been chanting. He was sitting alone in one of the pews of his church. The sun was hot against his skin as it attacked him through the multicolored window depicting Jesus on the cross. His stump hurt, he was warm, and the dry cottonmouth he was experiencing made him realize he must have been sitting there for some time. Had it been hours? He barely even remembered leaving his little sleeping room in the back of the parish.

  He remembered the fires that had flooded through his nightmares, and the man that had been coming for him. The man with the red eyes and the dark skin, but not black in the way of natural skin color. This man’s skin was pitch black, like burned coal. He wore a black suit, and the only thing that was discernible about him, as he had walked towards Father Carpenter in his nightmare, had been those burning red eyes that pierced deep down into his very soul. He felt them singe at his heart, his blood burning its way through his veins. He tried to stop looking, to turn away, but as he ripped his gaze away to look down at the ash at his feet, the smell of the man attacked him. The rotten meat, the burning flesh, all mingled to make his stomach turn. The smell grew stronger as the man approached.

  Even awake, he couldn’t help himself. He felt a tremor of fear run down his spine. He couldn’t shake the feeling it was more than just a dream. He had never felt anything like that. This one was so vivid, it had felt real, the heat from the flames burning him.

  Father Carpenter
slowly stood up, his old knees shaking. He wasn’t sure if it was from siting for too long or from fear. He wanted to believe it was his age, but the moisture at the edge of his eyes told him he was lying to himself. He could feel that tightness in his chest. That feeling like he was on the verge of a panic attack, that something inside him just wanted to drop down, roll up into a ball, and just cry and hide from everything.

  He couldn’t let it. He had to keep his composure. It was only a dream, and he couldn’t let it paralyze him. He would have to use it, have to come up with a new sermon, using this fear when he spoke to his people.

  A long breath escaped him. He took in another deep one and, closing his eyes, focused on pushing it all away as he exhaled. It was a trick he had learned from those hypnosis tapes he had used to quit smoking. Breathe in a long deep breath, hold it, count to ten, then visualize all that pent up frustration and pain, seeing it escape as you let it all out. Just breathe.

  “Father, are you okay?”

  He opened his eyes to see Cynthia standing at the end of the aisle. He hadn’t heard her come in, and she had snuck up on him. He must have been deep in his trance to not notice because her shoes always echoed loudly in the large space of the expansive church.

  “Yes, I’m fine.”

  “Are you sure?” She stepped closer to him, not coming into the row he stood in, but the one in front of him. He had to smile at how she kept her distance, not wanting to invade his space…or maybe it had more to do with her respect for the cloth.

  Cynthia wasn’t one of the oldest members of his parish, but she was in her late forties and he sometimes worried that maybe she had a thing for him. She seemed to like to hover around, and she was always there in case he ever needed anything. She had been there when his wife of twenty years had passed away. Was she there as a friend, or someone who wanted more? He would like to think that all she wanted was to be closer to God, and thought she could achieve that by being closer to him. But sometimes there was a heat that came off of her, a burning he could feel emanating from her when she was close. It made him question her intentions.

  She was so much younger than him. Her golden blond hair was starting to turn a silvery white at the fringes, and her face was still untouched by wrinkles that would soon mark her years. The years were being much better to her than they were to him, and he briefly thought about their age difference. He was getting up there, as he was reminded of every morning by looking at the pale, wrinkled face in the mirror. It was an ancient face, but with the little fat that he carried, it had that slight chubbiness to it that showed he was not wanting. He felt that the roundness added a fatherly quality. He didn’t have the hard lines, and he knew that his smile was warm.

  He smiled at her now, his near perfect dentures glistening, and he watched as her expression softened, the look of concern disappearing as she smiled back at him.

  “I told you, I’m fine.” He reached out and took her arm, looking in her eyes. He wanted to make her believe him and not have to worry. After all, it had just been a dream, and he had to push it out of his mind. Just let it go, breathe it out, let all the negative energy release out of him.

  Once again, he noticed how warm she was, but there was something else now. He could feel an energy. Her grip twisted, then she was holding his wrist. The warm sensation passing through her turned hot, and the iron grip she had on his wrist hurt. He winced in pain as he looked first at his wrist, then up into her eyes, pleading with her to let him go.

  His mouth went slack, hanging open when he saw the dark man standing behind her, his arm touching her shoulder. The father felt a weight on his chest, and something gripped his heart. The air around him seemed thick and it was hard to breathe, and when he did pull in breath, he smelled that putrid scent. The large space of the church suddenly felt small and full of rotted meat.

  “Father?” He saw her mouth say the words, but he heard the deep, gravelly voice of the man behind her. “Father, are you okay?”

  “Get away, you demon! Get away! Go back to the fires of hell! Stay away!” He closed his eyes, lowering his head and starting to pray.

  “The fires burn,” the voice said. Cynthia’s voice was no longer there and he knew if he opened his eyes, he wouldn’t see her there, either. She would be gone, and that dark man, with those red, burning eyes, would be there looking at him. They would burn into him, tearing away his soul. He couldn’t look at them. He couldn’t open his eyes and look at that face.

  “I saw the fires you bring, you demon. Get away. The Lord will stop you. The Lord will tear away your fires, bringing forth the light of heaven.”

  “Don’t blame me for the fire. Blame your God,” the voice rasped.

  “Dear heavenly Father, we pray in your name. Your rod and your staff, they comfort me. Lead me through…” Tears fell down his cheeks. He could feel their coolness in the suddenly hot room. No, he had to push it away. He had to push that fire away and feel the cool breeze of heaven. His Father was there, his faith was behind him. He had to believe in it and push this demon away, opening himself to the light and the glory of heaven.

  “Dear heavenly Father, your rod and staff, they comfort me.” He felt as the grip on his wrist loosened. “Amen.” He opened his eyes and looked up.

  Cynthia was gone. He was alone in the church, but he still smelled the presence. The dark man had definitely been there.

  Father Carpenter hurried out of the pew and rushed to the front doors of the church. Suddenly, it didn’t feel so big in there, and he had the overriding sensation he needed to get out. Even under the watchful gaze of Jesus looking down from the cross, he no longer felt safe there. Somehow, evil had defiled the place. Even in the house of the Lord, the devil had made his presence known.

  * * * *

  “So is everything in place?!” Sarah yelled as she kept her head down while hurrying out from under the decelerating whirring helicopter blades that spun around above her. Her blazer jacket was billowing out behind her and she felt like she had to hold the jacket closed against the air being blown at her by the blades.

  She was yelling to the man who was standing just outside the range of the blades. Eric Ranger stood there, tall and lean in his pressed suit. He was also holding his suit jacket closed against the force of the wind, although he looked like he would never be put out by any breeze. His hair was always so perfect, it looked like he could walk through a hurricane and not have a strand out of place.

  Of course, he needed to be. Eric was a wannabe politician. He was the one who ran her department, which always seemed to make him feel like he ran her. At least that was how he sometimes made her feel. Like having her rush there by helicopter, knowing she didn’t like to fly, meeting him on the tarmac of the Atlanta airport, rushing to a charter plane, and she still had no idea what was going on. She didn’t like being left in the dark.

  She could tell that he couldn’t hear her as she neared. With the loud whirring of the blades, and the cry of the engine as it was winding itself down, she could barely hear her own thoughts.

  Well, if they were in a rush and didn’t give her any information, she could play the power game, too. Eric should know that women always win. Or was that why he never came to her place anymore? It didn’t matter. He would learn that he was not the boss of her.

  She walked past him. She already knew the plane sitting there was for her and her team, and maybe a few additional team members if Eric had thought they were needed, though she would have liked to have been able to choose her own team. She knew walking past him and just continuing to the plane was sure to agitate him, and that was good. Let him be frustrated with her. Maybe next time he would send some information ahead of time so she could at least look at it while she was on the helicopter.

  “So, is everything in place?! What’s going on and where?!” she yelled to him again as he hurried to catch up to her. She was glad they were starting to get farther away from that damned helicopter. The roar of those turbines no longer felt like th
ey were pounding inside her ribcage.

  “Wheels are in motion. Here,” Eric said, handing her a case file.

  She looked at the extremely thin folder. She opened it and stopped, staring at only five pages. The first was a bio of someone she already knew very well. Bryan. While he wasn’t a part of her team, he was one hell of a scientist and worked on the same floor as she did at the CDC. He would often run his own teams, though he was never one to go into the field. Mosquitos terrified him, and an unsterile location would send him over the edge. In the lab, though, he was about the best there was in identifying pathogens.

  She flipped past her coworker’s dossier, and went to the next page. It was a breakdown of a town. There wasn’t much detail, but it shocked her to see that it was on United States soil, and that this was a hot crisis incident. Had there been a terrorist attack? She didn’t remember seeing anything on the news but, then again, there wouldn’t be if it wasn’t public.

  The town was small and in the middle of nowhere. Why the hell would there be a terrorist strike there? Unless the terrorists were experimenting and something accidentally got loose.

  “It started when I got a phone call from an old friend. A doctor with whom I went to school. Said he had something strange. It was only luck that Bryan was in the area. He had a wedding he was glad to get away from for a while. I guess it got him out of the rehearsal dinner.”

  She turned to the next page. There was the short transcript of Bryan’s call. He said something about spiders, but he could have been delusional. If Bryan hadn’t been heard from since, he must have contracted whatever it was. If he only had time to call in shortly after he arrived, then whatever it was moved fast. That was an incubation time of only an hour, maybe two. That wasn’t good. There could be something to the spider comment, but that meant they were dealing with some venomous outbreak of some type of spider they had not seen before.