Hell on Church Street (25 page)

“You’ll have to earn it.”

With his free hand, he peeled off his undershirt. I took a step back.

“What are you doing?”

He kicked off his shoes and dropped his pants and boxers. His belly hung down to his thighs. “Ashes to ashes and dust to dust,” he said.

Keeping the gun on me, he knelt in the grass naked as a baby.

I didn’t move. “Why would you make me do this?”

 
“You wanted to be a bad man, Paul. Well, here’s your chance. Starting tonight, you can quit pretending.”

“I’m not a fucking murderer.”

“You will be. You’ll either leave this field a murderer or a corpse.”

He dropped his arm to his side.

I hesitated. I took a deep breath.

He grimaced and started to raise his arm.

I pointed the gun at his chest and pulled the trigger and the bullet exploded so loudly I pissed myself.
 
My eyes snapped shut and my ears rang, but I could hear him moaning in the grass in front of me. I stepped back, and he started crying. The night air suddenly stank like gunpowder and blood. When I opened my eyes, he was clawing at the grass.

I left him dying in the middle of that field and ran up the road. The blacktop stretched out in the moonlight and snaked over a hill. Blood pounded in my ears. I ran up the hill, and his cries and moans chased me like an angry dog. They only got stronger the harder I ran. By the time I got to the top, Webb was screaming like a man on fire.