White Heat (34 page)

 

Closing her eyes to avoid seeing the crowd, Rachel focused her thoughts on Nate. They'd given her something, a drug, that made it difficult to remain lucid. The noise around her seemed so loud, deafening, the movement dizzying. What was happening?
I love you.
Nate had said that.
I'm pretty sure I've loved you since that night at my condo….

Or was it Ethan? Ethan stood next to her, spreading her legs and anchoring each ankle to a separate corner of some weird bed. Rachel fought him, but it was no use. She had no strength left. She began to shake.

 

Ethan was at the height of his glory. He'd never felt so powerful. This wasn't a ritual he was performing in the pit for the pleasure of a few trusted members. He was giving the entire church a spiritual experience they'd never forget, one he'd long dreamed about. He'd once idolized Charles Manson, but this was far beyond anything Manson had been able to accomplish. It was on a whole new scale.

“Praise the Lord!” he cried, and relished the echo that came back to him. The religious fervor was electrifying.

He looked to Bart—his lover, his best friend, the one person who knew him better than anyone else—and believed he saw admiration in his normal eye.

Lifting his robe, Ethan tied it above his waist, proudly displaying his manhood to the cheering and whistles of all. He'd taken Viagra an hour ago, just in case he ran into any problems on the performance end. But he was so pumped up on adrenaline, the precaution had no doubt been unnecessary.

Still, he was the Holy One, the first to consummate this sacred marriage. He had to put on a good show.

It was time to bury the sheath of power he'd preached about. And he didn't plan to be gentle. The more degrading this was for Rachel, the more he'd enjoy it. The more Bart would enjoy it, too.

The crowd was ready. Bart could barely hold them back. There was even one man, wearing the hooded robe, who was too eager to wait. He'd worked his way around to the side and was approaching the altar.

Ethan would've yelled for Bart to make the man take his rightful turn, but he didn't want to break the mo
mentum. Why ruin this climactic moment? Let the over-eager bastard watch the action up close. It wouldn't hurt anything.

“And now I mount the Vessel!” He started to climb onto the altar, only to be yanked back by the man he'd thought so harmless a few seconds before.

“What are you doing?” He tried to push the hooded figure away but couldn't. Knowing the ritual would be ruined if he got angry, he fought to wriggle out of the grip that held him so tightly.

It was no use. He stopped trying when he felt the man's arm go around his neck and the barrel of a pistol nudge his left temple.

“Drop your skirt before I put a bullet in your head.”

Nathan Mott!
But Bart was supposed to have taken care of him. According to Bart, he'd been shot twice last night!

Fingers shaking, Ethan untied the knot in his robes and let them drop, and the crowd went silent. Everyone was beginning to realize something was wrong. The Covenanters stared at him through the slits in their hoods as if they couldn't believe what they were seeing. Even Bart didn't speak. Or move. That frightened Ethan as much as anything. It meant Bart had no idea what to do, which was completely unlike him. Bart had an answer for everything.

“Tell your gay lover to untie Rachel.” Nate's voice growled in his ear.

Gay lover. He
knew.
How? And what now? How did he get out of this? Nate didn't seem to be doing well. He was hurt and sweating profusely; the dampness came through his robes. But it didn't take much effort to pull a trigger. Not for a man as determined as Nate.
As far as Ethan could tell, there wasn't any way out of this. All he could do was buy time until Bart came to his rescue.

“Who—who are you?” he asked. “What do you want with me?”

“You heard me. Do it now or say goodbye to your people.”

Finally, Bart stepped forward, but he stopped well short of them.

“Untie…” Ethan's voice failed him. Pretending it was because Nate had too tight a grip, that it was choking him, he tried again. “Untie the Vessel.”

The one eye of Bart's that focused correctly cut between him and his captor. “Mr. Mott, put the gun down,” he said coolly. “Even if you shoot Ethan, you won't be getting out of here. Neither will Rachel.”

That wasn't the response Ethan had expected. Had he heard correctly?

“Unless you want your prophet's brains blown all over your bathrobe, I'd untie Rachel,” Nate responded.
“Now.”

Ethan could feel Nate's tension and his struggle to remain coherent. He was afraid Nate might get confused or panic and fire, anyway. He could hear how hard Nate was breathing. “He'll shoot me, Bart! Don't mess around. Untie her!”

When Bart continued to hesitate, Ethan's panic escalated. Bart didn't seem particularly concerned about whether or not Ethan was going to die. This was the man who supposedly loved him? What was going on?

“What are you waiting for?” Ethan cried. “Do you want me to be murdered, for God's sake?”

“Of course not,” Bart replied. “But there are other considerations.”

It wasn't until that moment that Ethan realized the frenzied thoughts that had passed through his brain a second earlier were actually right on target. Bart didn't care if he died. Bart had played him, had known from the beginning that he had issues with his sexuality and had set out to seduce him. He'd been using Ethan the whole time. “You bastard,” he shrieked. “You said you loved me.”

“I love all God's children,” Bart murmured, and Ethan immediately recognized it as something he might've said himself.

“You love no one but yourself!”

“Are we so different? You have to understand, Ethan—this might be the only way for the church to survive.”

“You think you'll take over?” How could he have missed such overwhelming ambition? It would never have occurred to him that someone as homely and easily overlooked as Bart would ever aspire to so much. “You'll never make it without me.”

A half smile curved Bart's lips. “I knew the time was coming. You're not the man you used to be. You let the drugs win. And now I have no choice but to step up and lead our people. I can't give in to Mr. Mott's demands. He'll take the Vessel and bring the police.” He lowered his voice so that only a select few could hear. “And you know what'll happen then.”

“Nothing will happen!” Ethan cried. “We could be long gone. Together. What if he had this gun to
your
head?”

“That's what I
am
wondering,” Bart said. “Would you sacrifice what you want most—for me?”

Growing impatient, Nate jerked Ethan to the left and fired. Pain seared Ethan's foot. He screamed, thought
he might pass out and began to beg. “Let me go. Please. I haven't done anything to you. It was Bart. It was all Bart. I wasn't even there last night!”

The disgust in Bart's sneer didn't matter to Ethan. Bart had betrayed him first.

“Look at what you're afraid of.” Bart pointed at Nate. “He's so injured he can barely stand, yet
you
start sniveling? I hope he sends you to hell,” he said, and parted the crowd as he left, head held high.

Despair settled in as Nate put the gun back to Ethan's temple. He wasn't going to get out of this. He couldn't believe it. All his life he'd been able to avoid any consequences he didn't like. There'd always been someone to bail him out, some way to escape. Frantically, he searched the crowd for another savior. But there was no one.

“Tell your people what you've done with Martha,” Nate said. “Tell them what you've done or the next bullet I fire will be fatal.”

He had to comply. Nate knew the truth. “M-Martha's in the pit.”

“Louder!”

“Martha's in the pit,” he screamed. “But she deserved it! I was only meting out God's justice. She failed us all!”

“Is it God's justice to rape her until she hemorrhaged?” someone else shouted. It was Todd, Martha's husband. He pushed his way to the front, carrying his wife's lifeless body. A bedraggled Sarah followed closely behind. “You raped her and then you left her to bleed to death! Sarah will confirm it,” he announced to everyone else. “Sarah, who's never told a lie in her life, will explain how our prophet holds secret meetings be
neath the Enlightenment Hall, where he and the other Guides drug our wives and rape them at will. Look at her! She's dead,” he sobbed. “You can see for yourself!”

“It's true,” Sarah added, also crying. “They killed Martha in the vilest way imaginable. I watched them myself.”

One by one, the hoods came off, revealing dumb-struck faces as, one by one, each Covenanter came to see or touch Martha. It was almost too much for Ethan. A few minutes earlier, these people had been chanting in unison with him. He could do no wrong in their eyes. How could they gaze at him with such abhorrence now?

“And Courtney?” Nate asked.

Ethan scrambled for the lie he'd been telling since Courtney's disappearance. “She's—”

The gun nudged him harder. “Don't do it,” Nate said. “Tell them the truth or I will. Either way I'll search until I find her body if it means I have to dig up the whole compound.”

“She's d-dead,” he said with a sob. “Bart killed her!”

“No!” Joshua's wife gasped and looked to her husband for a denial. But Joshua said nothing. He didn't have the chance. Bart had returned with the armed guards who'd been walking the perimeter.

“Ethan Wycliff is a fallen prophet!” he shouted. “Take him into custody for crimes against us all.”

The security staff moved to respond, but Todd and Sarah and several others intervened. “No! Bart, the twelve, they're all just as guilty. They've lied and used every one of us.”

Those words rang in Ethan's ears.
They're all just as guilty.
There would be no Armageddon, no final battle.
They'd lost their strength because they'd lost their unity. Because of Bart. The one person he'd loved and trusted above everyone else had betrayed him….

Weak-kneed, Ethan no longer felt capable of supporting himself. When he sagged against Nate, Nate let him sink to the ground. It was over. With Martha's corpse there for all to see and her husband crying over her, Paradise had fallen into upheaval, a melee of blame and recrimination. This was the end, and no one could change that. Didn't Bart realize? Didn't he know what he'd done? The covenant of secrecy had been broken, and Paradise depended on the covenant. “This is your fault,” he wailed at Bart. “You caused this!”

“No,
you
caused this.” Bart appealed to the guards again. “All are guilty—except me. Arrest them! Arrest the Brethren, along with the unbelievers. They're the devil's own. I have no doubt they had a hand in all of this.”

The guards, young men Ethan had prayed over and led, put their rifles to their shoulders. They were turning on him, just like Bart. Ethan couldn't watch. His end would be as ignominious as Manson's.

Refusing to see the scorn in their faces, he looked away, but soon saw that he wasn't the only one in whom they'd lost faith. At Nate's insistence, and with Todd and Sarah's support, two members of security forced Bart up against the altar—beside Ethan. Others went after the Guides who'd slunk off, hoping to get away in the confusion.

 

When Nate released her, Rachel felt as boneless as a rag doll.

“You okay?” he whispered, covering her with a Covenanter's robe.

Was she? She didn't know. Her thoughts were spinning. But she understood that Martha was dead. Martha and Courtney. She tried to speak, to express her sadness, but the words wouldn't come. How would they ever break the news to Courtney's poor mother?

At least Mrs. Sinclair would have some closure, Nate said, which made her wonder if she'd managed to express herself after all. She'd been right about her daughter—Courtney would've come home, despite their differences, if she'd had the chance. Ethan had taken that opportunity away from both of them. But he'd never be able to hurt anyone again. Nothing else seemed to make sense, but that did. He'd finally fulfill his dream to be like Charles Manson because he, too, would spend the rest of his life in prison. So would Bart and all the other Guides. Even Maxine, the housekeeper, would have to answer to the law.

The rest was confusing to her, a kaleidoscope of swirling colors and sounds. “You're going to be okay,” Nate told her. She must've asked about Sarah, because he said that, in time, she'd be fine, too.

Feeling stronger as Nate led her away from the crowd, she allowed someone she didn't even know to help her into a Jeep. Nate was getting in, too. That was all that mattered. She was going where he was going, and the man behind the wheel said that was the hospital.

T
his
diamond was the real thing. Rachel had been wearing it for three days, ever since Nate had surprised her with it in Prescott, but she still couldn't believe he'd actually proposed. As they drove away from the cabin where they'd spent the previous two nights, she kept glancing down at the large solitaire as if it might disappear. A lot had changed in the past two weeks. Not only were they engaged, they'd taken time off to visit tourist sites in Arizona; in fact, they'd been on the road ever since Nate's release from the hospital. Rachel thought she'd never had more fun. The Grand Canyon had been the final stop on their list. They were on their way home now. But she didn't mind. Nate was planning to move in with her once they hit L.A. They were looking forward to sharing the rest of their lives with each other.

“What are you thinking?” Nate asked.

The thrumming of the tires had lulled her into a mellow state. Or maybe it was the way Nate had made love to her before they'd left the cabin…. “I'm thinking I'm glad that you fixed the air-conditioning. It's hot out.”

He gave her a mock scowl. “That's
not
what you were thinking.”

She arched her eyebrows. “It's not?”

“You were thinking how much you like that ring,” he teased.

She laughed. “True. And I was reliving what we did in the shower this morning.”

“Don't remind me, or I'll have to pull over. I was hoping to be at least two hours down the road before I was dying to get in your pants again.”

“Such willpower.” Smiling, she laid her head on his shoulder, and he shifted to put his arm around her.

“What do you think Milt and everyone else at Department 6 will say when we tell them we're getting married?” he asked.

Rachel hesitated. She wasn't sure Nate was ready for the answer that sprang to her lips. But she was so excited she couldn't keep her news a secret any longer. She'd almost told him a dozen times already. “Not as much as they'll have to say when we tell them we're going to have a baby.”

Suddenly slamming on the brakes, he pulled to the side of the road and turned to give her his undivided attention. “What are you talking about? I mean…are you saying you wonder how they'll react when we
decide
to start a family? Or are you saying that we're
already
starting a family?”

Butterflies rioted in Rachel's stomach. She didn't imagine Nate would have a problem with the pregnancy. It wasn't as if they'd been able to use any birth control when they'd made love in the Enlightenment Hall. He hadn't even mentioned birth control since then.

But he'd never said he wanted a child, either.

“I'm saying I took a pregnancy test after we got back from the grocery store yesterday.”

“And…”

Unsure whether he was excited or upset, she licked her lips in an effort to calm her nerves. “And it was positive.”

“Really?”
He gave her a goofy smile. “Wow.”

Wow
was good. His expression confirmed it. Rachel knew in that moment that she'd never loved anyone more. Maybe Nate had once been reluctant to return her love, but he hadn't shown any sign of that since he'd made a commitment to her.

“So…you're okay with it?” she said.

“Are you kidding me? Come here.” Pulling her closer, he kissed her gently, but it wasn't long before those gentle kisses turned into hungry ones and his hand found its way up her blouse.

“There's just one problem,” he said as he unsnapped her bra and raised her shirt so he could gaze down at what he'd uncovered.

Rachel felt her pulse pick up. “What's that?”

“We'll have to get another motel room.”

“Why?”

He gave her a lopsided grin. “I'm not going to make it two hours.”

She laughed. “We could do it in the desert….”

“
Now
you're thinking,” he said, and drove to the very next turn, which led them to…paradise.