Page 83 of Killer Clone

Stella tried the handle, and the door opened, but the dining room beyond was empty. A faint smell of cooked rice and soap lingered in the air. The lights were off, but enough moonlight beamed through the high windows and the blinds on the door to reveal chairs pushed neatly under clean tables and a floor that had been swept and mopped.

The place was silent. There was no clatter of plates or cutlery. Not even a quiet murmur of conversation from voices deepened by age, illness, and tobacco.

Hagen entered, going left. Stella came behind to his right. “Clear,” they echoed each other as Ander and Anja entered.

Hagen approached the door at the end of the room. A light glowed through the gap underneath. This room should correspond with the sign that had directed guests to the dorm through the second exterior entrance. He put his ear to the wood. Still no sound. Not even a heavy snore from someone who’d fallen asleep too early and wanted to make the most of a night in a soft bed.

Stella took a position by the opposite doorpost. Her eyes met his.

Beyond the door, the shelter had a single dorm room with six beds on each side of the wall. The light was on, and the air contained a thick odor of sweat and unwashed clothes. A door at the end of the room led out to the parking lot.

The place seemed empty.

Next to the dorm, the last interior door led to the meeting room. Here, Hagen heard voices but couldn’t make out the words. Still, the tone was calming, if pleading.

“That’s Father Ted.”

Hagen nodded and motioned for Stella to take point on the other side. Once she was in position, he gently turned the knob and pushed the door open an inch.

A group of men wearing an odd mixture of dirty clothes and clean Christmas sweaters sat on the floor beside the far wall. A priest stood in front of them, his hands pressed together and a look of intense pain on his face.

The cause of that pain was clear.

On top of a Formica-topped table in the middle of the room a man lay face up. He was red-haired and bare-chested. The outline of his ribs showed through pale skin pocked with scabs and fleabites.

His throat had been cut.

Blood ran from the gash in his neck. It flowed over the table, stained the back of his head, and dripped onto a pool that had already formed on the floor. His eyes were wide open, but they didn’t blink or move, and it was too late for them to shed tears. A long knife lay on the table next to his shoulder.

A man in a hoodie stood behind the table. Trevor McAuley. He held a gun and motioned to Father Ted with the muzzle. “Now you see I’m not playing around.”

Stella touched Hagen’s shoulder, signaling she’d go left when they entered, but her touch itself was reassuring.

He watched as McAuley motioned again, waving the gun harder.

“No, no.” The priest’s pleas were hard to listen to. “Please don’t do this. You don’t have to do this.”

Behind him, one of the shelter’s guests jabbed a finger. “You’re a coward, man. You put that gun down for one second,and you’re a dead man. You’re crazy. That’s what you are. Crazy.”

The figure in the hood shrugged. “Yeah, I might be. Might just be crazy enough to kill all of you. You can thank me when the time comes.” He pointed at the body. “Turn him over.”

Father Ted placed his hands on the dead man’s shoulders. He looked as though he were blessing him or reassuring him that all would be well and his life would soon improve. His lips moved. Some quiet prayer for the dead, Hagen assumed, though a prayer when he’d been alive might’ve been more helpful.

The priest lifted one shoulder and pushed with the other.

The body turned easily enough, the movement lubricated by the blood on the table and the thinness of the torso.

Father Ted stepped back, his bloody hands held out in front of him. “Please. Just put the gun down. We can talk. It’s not too late.”

“Back. Farther.” McAuley waved Father Ted away.

Hagen glanced at the door that opened onto the parking lot. From his vantage point, he could tell that the blinds on the window were down but the moon glowed through the slats.

The FBI SUVs shouldn’t be visible from that vantage point. Hagen held his breath.

McAuley didn’t know he had company yet.

“More. It’s not too late. Still got a little time. Now sit down with the others.”

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