Chapter Forty-five

Leland walked back into what had once been his father's opulent quarters and had since become Alan Hobbes's bare flat.

As he stepped over the threshold, he felt another jolt inside him.

It was a little like when he touched the book downstairs, but this one was much stronger. For a moment, the past was superimposed upon the present. The fire was burning beside him, crackling and flickering, and yet it was somehow also black and dead, the coals cold in the iron grate, and it was also gone entirely, bricked up behind the featureless wall. He stared around, keeping tight hold of the book, and watched as furniture appeared and vanished. A baby laughed. The painting of a flayed saint appeared on the wall and then danced away. A door that was not there anymore suddenly was.

And his father's voice swirled like a storm.

You must never go in there.

Do you hear me, Edward? Nothing matters more.

Leland shook his head.

The present solidified around him again. Now there was just the squalid chamber with its bad air and bloodstains. The door was gone. And only the faintest trace of his father's voice remained echoing in his head.

You must never go in there.

He headed through.

Christopher Shaw was where he had left him. In the time Leland had been downstairs, the boy had removed his gag and loosened the bindings around his wrists sufficiently to free his hands. Neither mattered. He was still cuffed to the leg of the bed, which was bolted securely to the floor. The boy was trapped in the place where he had been meant to die all those years ago.

Leland took a lighter from his pocket and flicked the flame alive.

Shaw flinched. "Don't. Please."

Leland just smiled. And he was about to toss the burning lighter into the corner of the room when he heard a sound from outside again.

He stopped and listened.

Tires on gravel.

Another car.

He snapped the lighter closed, and then stepped over to the ruined wall and stood on tiptoes to peer out through the open brickwork. Far below, he could make out the flicker of red and blue lights at the front of the house.

The sound of a car door slamming.

And then quick footsteps behind him.

He turned, knowing it was too soon for the police to have made their way up. It was the woman—the boy's sister. Somehow she had gotten past Banyard downstairs and followed him up here. But she hadn't known what she would find, and the sight stopped her cold. Even as Leland darted toward her, she was still trying to make sense of what she was seeing.

"Katie!" Shaw cried out behind him.

Thank you, Leland thought. Because her attention snapped over to where her brother was lying, and that gave Leland the chance he needed to close the distance. With the lighter clenched in his fist, he punched her hard in the face, felt her nose crunch beneath his knuckles, and then watched as she crashed backward against one of the cabinets and fell to the floor.

Blood began pouring down over her mouth.

"You brought the police," he said.

She shook her head, half-dazed, then spat blood out to one side.

"Not me," she said, slurring the words.

"Who, then?"

"Maybe you're not as untouchable as you thought."

He took a step toward her, the anger rising. While everything he had told her downstairs was true, the police being here right now meant it would be difficult for him to walk away unscathed. Money could buy many things, but even money had its limits. This was not what was meant to happen. It was not right.

Leland had the sensation of being a puppet.

Of his brother still somehow pulling everyone's strings.

You can still burn the boy.

That was true. Not only would the fire send Christopher Shaw down to hell with his father, where the two of them belonged, it would have the benefit of confusing the scene up here. It might give him the chance to work out a story he could sell.

And if not… well. His faith was strong.

Deus scripsit.

He turned around. Shaw was staring at him with open hatred now. The fear from earlier was gone, replaced by rage at what Leland had just done to his sister.

"Leave her alone," the boy said.

Despite everything, Leland actually laughed. The boy's expression darkened with frustration. He knew Leland could do whatever he liked. And the fear resurfaced as Leland approached him.

Leland clicked the lighter on and—

The police won't let you keep it.

Leland looked down at the book he was holding in his other hand. The realization was stark, and it sent a chill through him. Whatever story he told the police now, he would inevitably be placed into custody at first, and the book would be taken from him—perhaps never to be returned. The thought was intolerable, and it caused the fury inside him to blaze up once again.

Even now, Alan had thwarted him.

Except…

He had a couple of minutes, didn't he?

Yes. If he was quick enough, he did—and that might at least be something. Keeping hold of the lighter, he began to tear the protective wrapping from the book. It came away almost too easily. If he had been thinking clearly, it might have occurred to him that the book wanted to be read, but he was too distracted by the urgency of the task, and then any thoughts at all were knocked off course by the much stronger jolt as his fingers finally touched the leather cover itself.

His father's words…

The book's pages fell open easily. He flicked through, scanning a few of the entries. Every sentence was clearly visible to him, but for a moment he still couldn't understand what he was seeing.

He turned quickly to the final page in the book.

And then Edward Leland read what had been written.