I, Weapon Page 7

  He could feel the burning blacktop pulsating up through the soles of his tennis shoes. The inside of his Chevy was like a furnace. He should have parked under a tree. He slid in and the seat burned the back of his thighs. Just before turning on the ignition, he noticed the big man leaving the gym. The man carried a large black gym bag. Gemmell frowned. He felt more than ever as if he had seen the man before, but he couldn’t place where. The gym bag, did the man keep a gun in there?

  “Don’t be stupid,” Gemmell told himself. He started the truck and headed for the street.

  It was Wednesday, so he drove toward CR on West Main, Celebrate Recovery. The Christian organization helped addicts of all kinds. He didn’t go for the cheap meal, though that was a bonus. Three bucks paid for macaroni and cheese, hot dogs or for whatever they were serving that day. He went to CR to sing.

  It took him twelve minutes to reach the church parking lot. He hurried over the blacktop and welcomed the coolness entering the church foyer. It seemed like everyone used air conditioning except for him. There was a table with felt-tipped pens and nametags. He wrote “LUKE” on one, peeled off the back paper and pressed the nametag to his chest. Then he headed for the sanctuary.

  “Hello, Luke,” an older woman said, a greeter. “How are you doing today?”

  Stooping, reading her name, Gemmell said, “I’m fine, Sheila. How are you?”

  “Just good. We’re glad you’re here.”

  He grinned. It felt good being accepted. Besides Dr. Parker and Hector his boss, this was the only place where he felt wanted. He never missed the meetings if he could help it. People here always asked about him after he’d been away for a time.

  He headed through the sanctuary door. He accepted a tiny pencil and bulletin from Bill, an old guy with an eye patch. Then he went along a side aisle and soon walked down a pew, sitting on the cushioned wood. The song leader came on stage and spoke a few words. He had a guitar with a strap over his neck. Other band members readied themselves as a trio of lady singers smiled at the song leader.

  There were about one hundred and twenty people scattered throughout the sanctuary. They weren’t ordinary-looking churchgoers, however, but a much rougher crowd. Most of the people had been hard partiers in their younger days. It especially showed on their faces. Many had done drugs or been alcoholics. A lot of them had been porn addicts. In truth, a lot of them still used meth, smoked or drank and many still were hooked on porn. The important thing was they fought their addictions, asking Jesus to help them because they were too weak to handle their demons on their own.

  Besides being accepted, Gemmell liked the honesty. People here didn’t pretend. They admitted they had problems and sought help.

  “The first song is about God’s love,” the song leader said. He bobbed his head twice and began strumming his guitar. The band joined in, although the drummer missed his first beat.

  Around Gemmell in the various pews, men big and small, ugly and lady charmers alike lifted their hands and sang loudly, most of them out of tune. It didn’t matter here. Some swayed from side to side. One guy had huge hands, and he held them up with his fingers splayed wide. Gemmell sang too, but he kept his hands down on the pew backrest in front of him. He felt uncomfortable raising his hands, but he liked that others did it.

  Feeling at home, Gemmell glanced around. He liked looking at the smiling features of people who had faced the worst crap of life and still thought it worth living.

  Gemmell swayed in surprise. In the back row, he spied the big man from the gym, the one Fred had asked about and who had carried a black gym bag. What was the man doing at CR?

  He can’t be following me, can he? No. That was absurd. Who was he that anyone should follow him? Still, it made Gemmell nervous, and he found that he couldn’t sing anymore. That troubled him, and then he felt a tiny surge of anger well in his heart.

  That was bad, and it frightened Gemmell. He came to CR to help keep the anger bottled. It always surprised others in Group afterward hearing that he had an anger problem. They said he was so quiet, so self-contained. He would nod, never saying anything about the meds he took. He had signed a paper saying he’d never talk about the meds, and Dr. Parker had made it clear that if he did talk about them anyway—breaking his solemn word—that the government would take away his health insurance. Then Gemmell would be on his own with his anger, and he knew that would be bad.

  So as the anger welled in him now, he faced forward and concentrated on his favorite singer on stage. She was tall, with brunette hair, nice eyes and a nicer smile. Gemmell liked to pretend that she was smiling at him. Once, he’d even come for supper and said hello to her. She’d said hello back, and he’d thought about her every night that week until the next CR meeting. She hadn’t shown up, though, and the following week he’d been gone on one of his vacations. By the time he returned, he decided she’d think him one of those freaks if he kept pestering her. Besides, thinking about it more carefully, he realized that it would be unfaithful to his wife—his dear departed wife—if he starting hitting on other women right away.

  Three years, he figured, and then if the pain departed, he could think about someone new.

  Gemmell squeezed the top of the backrest in front of him. He shook his head. He refused to let anger touch him here. What would the people of CR say if he went ballistic? Maybe they’d kick him out, and then he would never get better. God might get angry with him, thunder and lightning-bolts angry like He did sometimes in the Old Testament.

  Song-time ended, and old Bill with the eye patch went up and read the third rule of CR. Anonymity and confidentiality are basic requirements. What is shared in the group stays in the group. Then Rosalie walked onstage and told about her childhood. It was a sad story of how her father remarried and the new stepmother had hated her. At fourteen, Rosalie had run away from home. She fled to LA and had become a crack addict. She went to prison for shoplifting and there she found Jesus. There began the long and painful journey to here, sixteen years later. She was married now and had two kids. She ran CR, helping those who clung to life’s bottom rung.

  Gemmell listened, and he absorbed the tale in all its sadness. Still, he couldn’t help thinking about the muscleman in the last pew. The man must have followed him, and try as he might, Gemmell couldn’t bottle up all of his anger.

  He recalled that Dr. Parker had said there might be times like this. He was supposed to go home, lock himself in and take another pill, one of the big ugly green pills. He didn’t like those. They always seemed to move walls around inside his head. Even so, this felt like one of those times.

  Rosalie said the finishing prayer, which most everyone else recited aloud. Then she explained that first-timers should come up front for the Newcomers Meeting, while everyone else could go to their group. It was women’s groups for women and men’s groups for men. They never let the opposite sex do the counseling.

  Gemmell wanted to stay at CR for his group. He wanted to explain to his group that he was feeling angry, but he knew that would make it worse. It was time to go home, lock himself in the house and take the green pill.

  As Rosalie dismissed them, Gemmell moved down the pew. The aisles filled with people, and his buddy Henry called to him. Gemmell didn’t bother turning around or waving to Henry as he moved past others. Gemmell kept his head down, not wanting to see Mr. Muscleman in the back waiting for him. Maybe he was wrong about that, but he didn’t think so. This was bad.

  “Excuse me,” Gemmell said to a woman he bumped into from behind. “Sorry, I’m in a hurry.”

  The woman turned around. It was Sheila. “Where are you going? Aren’t you going to stay for Group?”

  Gemmell shook his head, and he concentrated on putting one foot ahead of the other. Anger was bad because he did bad things if he got angry. He had to bottle it. He had to get home and swallow a green pill, maybe two green pills.

  “Luke,” a man said.

  Gemmell brushed by a trio of chatting women.

>   “Luke, where are you going?”

  Gemmell glanced back. It was Max, a compact man in a black shirt. Max drove trucks and he used to be a biker. He looked the part with his black boots and a wallet-chain sticking out of his back pocket. Max could have used a shave, with his dark stubble. He didn’t fit in CR. He was too competent, too confident and…wolfish. He was dangerous, and Gemmell could never figure out why Max had taken a liking to him.

  “Aren’t you staying for Group?” Max called.

  Gemmell shook his head, and he finally broke free of the crowded aisle. He strode out of the sanctuary, keeping his head down, hurrying for the table of felt-tipped pens. He just wanted to get home, needed to get there, which was too bad. It was hot in his house. He’d have to strip down once he got home and take a cold shower. Then he’d spend the next several hours listening to his radio as he sat in front of the fan, trying to keep cool in the heat. It would have been much better staying here at CR in the air conditioning.

  He burst out of the church, and the heat hit him. It wasn’t as bad as before. It was twilight, but it was still a wall of heat as compared to inside the church. Shoving his hands into his pants pockets, Gemmell hurried toward his Chevy. He’d parked away from other vehicles. He never liked being right beside someone else. A white van was parked next to his truck. Who had done that?

  Maybe it was Mr. Muscleman: the guy with a crooked nose and square features.

  Gemmell swallowed uneasily. What would he do if the man rolled open the side door? What if the man had friends and they jumped out and tried to grab him, kidnap him? Why would anyone want to do that to him? Gemmell swallowed again, watching the van.

  “Hey!” a man called. “Wait for me.”

  Gemmell whirled around, and he felt his eyes widen. It was the muscleman striding after him. The man wore a nice collared shirt and tan slacks. He had a thick chest and broad shoulders, and a thick neck. He looked strong, and his face, he was tough. Gemmell didn’t know how he knew, but he recognized a tough guy.

  Shuffling from foot to foot, Gemmell didn’t know what to do. There was a warning voice inside him. It said he should lunge and chop the man in the throat when he came close. The thought horrified Gemmell.

  “You’re Luke Gemmell, aren’t you?” the man called. The man stepped off the sidewalk and onto the blacktop.

  Gemmell took a step back, and he fingered the keys in his pants pocket, unconsciously putting individual keys between his fingers.

  “Are you okay?” the man called.

  Don’t let him get too close, the voice inside his head said. He’s a street fighter. You can see it.

  Gemmell felt his anger rise. He blinked rapidly, trying to control it, wanting to keep the anger bottled.

  “I need to talk to you,” the man said. “Is there a place we can talk?”

  Gemmell shook his head, and he took another step back. “S-Stay away from me,” he stammered.

  The man halted. He was fifteen feet away, and he frowned. It made him seem even more dangerous than before. His silk shirt was baggy, and then Gemmell somehow knew that the man carried a concealed pistol under his shirt in a gun harness.

  “Look,” the man said, holding up his hands. They were callused, and Gemmell noticed old bruises on the knuckles that indicated a fighter. “I just want to talk. We need to talk. You’re in danger.”

  Gemmell dropped his gaze, no longer able to look the man in the eyes.

  “You’re not in danger from me,” the man said. “I don’t mean you any harm.”

  Gemmell swallowed, and he tightened his grip on the car keys in his pockets. He should charge the man and try to rake out his eyes.

  Gemmell’s face went slack with fear, fear of his own loss of control. His unleashed rage was a monster. He took another three steps back, bumping against his Chevy. He didn’t know it, but he scowled.

  The man licked his lips. “What do I need to do to make you believe I don’t mean you any harm?”

  “What?” Gemmell said.

  “You seem to think I mean you harm. I don’t. I’m here to warn you.”

  “Warn me about what?”

  The man hesitated. “This isn’t the place to talk. Where could we talk?”

  “Nowhere, I’m going home.”

  “Bannon—”

  “What did you call me?” Gemmell asked, as his heart pounded.

  “You have to believe me. You’re in danger. This has gone too far, and I’m here to help you. What they’ve done, it—”

  He heard a boom, a gunshot. The man’s head, the upper half, exploded in a gruesome spray of blood and bone. A fragment skittered across the hot blacktop, striking Gemmell’s running shoe. The man toppled forward and he hit the blacktop face-first. Blood oozed from his scalp. It was sickening and horrifying.

  Gemmell looked up, and he spied a man in black dart out of sight. Max! It had to be Max, or it could have been Max. A few others here wore black. It seemed crazy on a hot day like this.

  Gemmell stumbled to his truck. The man had called him Bannon, and he’d tried to warn him.

  Warn me of what?

  Once inside the truck, Gemmell hunched over the wheel with his hand on the key. He twisted the ignition, cranked the wheel and floored the gas pedal. The tires spun. Smoke billowed and the back end fishtailed. He cranked the wheel again, fighting his truck. The smell of burning rubber stung his nostrils. The squealing tires accused him. Then his vehicle shot for the exit.

  I have to get home. I need a green pill, maybe two of them so this will all go away.

  -11-

  “That was too close,” Parker said.

  “It’s why Max and Susan are watching him,” Karl said. They were in a park. A dove cooed nearby walking on red bricks toward them. Karl liked the dove and wished he could have thrown it some grain.

  “The shock of seeing this will have shaken Bannon and possibly stirred memories,” Parker said.

  “So bring him in.”

  “That would be the wrong move,” Parker said. “He has many personalities in him now, many crosscurrents. The Gemmell persona is one of the oldest and most stabilized. It also leaves Bannon in a dumbed-down state and thus more easily controlled. No. We must wait until either the Controller signals it is time to strike or until Bannon breaks out of his Gemmell personality like a chick breaking out of its eggshell.”

  “Are you keeping in close contact with him?”

  “Of course,” Parker said.

  Karl watched the dove cock its head at him and then fly away. “One of these days, Bannon might break free for good. That would be dangerous for all of us.”

  “I have often thought of that. It is why I have taken every precaution.”

  ***

  The next few days were a horror to Gemmell. He had put a green pill on the counter the night of the murder, but he hadn’t been able to swallow it. A voice inside him…it had convinced him to wait and to study the weird tattoos between his fingers. He had, and did, but those tattoos didn’t make any sense to him.

  Now Gemmell kept expecting police cruisers with sirens blaring to come screeching onto his driveway. He could see it in his mind’s eye because he’d watched thousands of cop shows through the years.

  The police would jump out behind their open car doors. As the others cocked their pump shotguns or used their thumbs to click the hammer of their pistols, the chief of police would turn on his bullhorn and demand his surrender. Gemmell would have to decide then. He had a baseball bat for defense, but no pistol, shotgun or rifle at home.

  The days passed one by one. The heat wave broke and nothing extraordinary happened. In the gym, he heard lifters talking about the murder.

  “Remember the guy watching us the other day?” Fred asked, as he flexed his chest and examined himself in the mirror.

  Gemmell gave a monosyllabic answer.

  “Well, he was gunned down at the Community Church. There was a meeting going on Wednesday night. Some sort of C-whatever meeting.”
/>   “CR,” Gemmell said.

  “Huh?” Fred asked, as he turned away from the mirror to glance at Gemmell.

  “It happened at CR.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The name of the meeting where the man was killed,” Gemmell said.

  “Oh yeah, sure, CR. That’s what it’s called. Anyway, some sniper just blew the guy away.”

  Gemmell felt lightheaded, and it took all his concentration to finish his set of squats. He racked the bar, easing the weight from his shoulders, and he sat down on a bench.

  Fred placed two dumbbells on another bench, wiped his face with a towel and stepped near. “They’re a bunch of dope addicts there. You know what I think?”

  Gemmell stared at Fred, waiting for the hammer to fall.

  “They’re a bunch of crack-heads.” Fred laughed. “It must be a dealer’s paradise, having all those addicts in one place. If you want to know what’s really going on, see the priest.”

  “What priest?” Gemmell asked, confused.

  “The one who runs CR.”

  “CR just uses the church. They don’t own it.”

  “Okay. It’s still the same thing.”

  Gemmell shook his head. “There’s no priest at the church or at CR.”

  “What do you mean?” Fred asked. “There’s always a priest.”

  “It’s a Protestant church. They call him a pastor. He heads the Community Church.”

  “Yeah, yeah, it’s the same difference, right? It’s all a racket. They make loads of money. The priest—this pastor—he must front the dealers, letting them use the church. He gets his cut and it boosts his salary. Those so-called ‘holy men’ are all vultures, all a bunch of bloodsuckers preying on the weak-willed.”

  Gemmell kept staring at Fred.

  “It’s a racket,” Fred explained, “the best one going. Tax them all, I say, bunch of child molesters. I bet the murdered guy was a deacon or elder and the one who shot him probably was too. It was probably two thieves shooting it out over who got the collection money.”

  Gemmell hoisted himself to his feet and wandered elsewhere. He wondered why the cops were taking so long to find him. He wondered why Max would have shot the man.