Page 22 (1/2)

He assumed that when he had Becoifts bestowed on hier to fulfill hisonly a portion of his consciousness in his real body, he ht beach Froazed up at his house on the bluff He saw his own naed body at thestaring down

In Jewish folklore there was a creature called a golem Made of mud in the shape of a man, endoith a foreance

Bryan could create an infinite variety of goleh them stalk his prey, thin the herd, police the world But he could not enter the bodies of real people and control their minds, which he would very much have enjoyed Perhaps that poould be his, as well, when at last he had Becooleh , caused it to change shape It tripled in size, assus

Sometimes an effect could spiral beyond what he intended, acquire a life of its own, and resist his efforts at contain his techniques and exercising his power in order to strengthen it

He had once created a golerants in an encaeles freeway overpass His intention had been to slaughter two of the quick, and leave the others with the ment But then he became excited by their abject terror at the inexplicable manifestation of thatthrough their flesh, the heat of spurting blood, the rank steaile as chalk sticks in his ly shrill at first but became weak, treht have surrendered, so exhausted by the intensity of their passion that they succuhs, whispers, shudders For a few minutes he was the creature that he had created, all razored teeth and talons, spiked spine and lashing tail, having forgotten about his real body in which his ained his senses, he discovered he had killed all ten men beneath the overpass and stood in a charnel house of blood, eviscerated torsos, severed heads and liree of violence he’d wroughtnly that he’d killed the control was vital if he were to accomplish his mission and Become

He had used the power of pyrokinesis to set the bodies afire, searing them with flames so intense that even bones were vaporized

He always disposed of those on whom he practiced because he didn’t want ordinary people to know that he walked a them, at least not until his power had been perfected and his vulnerability was nil

That was also why for the ti he focused his attentions pri tore shape at will, their coed losers with drug and alcohol addictions And when they vanished from the face of the earth, no one would care or attempt to discover what had happened to the holy terror and divine judgment to people in all strata of society So he practiced

Like ahis dexterity

Control Control

On the beach, the winged form leapt off the sand froht, like a truant gargoyle returning to a cathedral parapet It hovered before his , peering in with lu until he projected part of himself into it, the pterodactyl was nevertheless an is fluidly fanned the air, and it easily re the bluff

Bryan are of the eyes in the jars behind hi

"Be gone," he said to the pterodactyl, indulging in theatrics for his audience

The winged reptile turned to sand and rained on the beach below

Enough play He had work to do

Harry’s Honda was parked near thecoht Their enormous, distorted shadows played over the car

As she and Harry crossed the sidewalk toward the Honda, Connie said, "Saard’s house and have a look around"

"What for?"

"I don’t have a clue But it’s the only other thing I can think to do

Unless you’ve got an idea"

"Wish I did"

As they approached the car, she saw soular and softly glea beyond the moth shadows that swarmed over the windshield As far as she could recall, there had been no airfreshener or ornament of any kind tied to the ot a close look at the silvery rectangle before Harry did It was dangling on a red ribbon from the mirror shank Initially she didn’t realize what it was She took hold of it, turned it so the light struck it more cleaM, and saw that it was a handcrafted belt buckle worked with Southwest ot in behind the wheel, slammed his door, and sahat she held in her hand

"Oh, Jesus," Harry said "Oh, Jesus, Ricky Estefan"

Most of the roses had taken a beating froh the storht breeze The petals caught the light spilling fro as if radioactive

Ricky sat at the kitchen table, from which his tools and current projects had been reo and had been sipping port wine ever since He wanted to get a buzz on

Before being gutshot, he’d not been much of a drinker, but when he had wanted a drink, he’d been a tequila and beer man A shot of Sauza and a bottle ofTecate were as sophisticated as he got After all the abdoer of Sauzar any other hard liquorgave him intense heartburn and a sour stomach that lasted the better part of a day The same was true of beer

He learned that he could handle liqueurs well enough, but getting drunk on Baileys Irish Creaestion of sobefore he did any dao doell, either, but port proved to be just the thing, sweet enough to soothe his delicate gut but not so sweet as to induce diabetes

Good port was his only indulgence Well, good port and a little selfpity now and then

Watching the roses nodding in the night, he soaze back to a closer point of focus and stared at his reflection in theIt was an i to hi spirit; but perhaps it was an accurate reflection, after all, because he was a ghost of his former self and in some ways dead already A bottle of Taylor’s stood on the table He refilled his port glass and took a sip

Sometimes, like now, it was difficult to believe that the face in the as actually his Before he’d been shot, he had been a happy iven to troubled introspection, never a brooder Even during recuperation and rehabilitation, he had retained a sense of humor, an optimism about the future that no amount of pain could entirely darken

His face had become the face in theonly after Anita left

More than two years later, he still had difficulty believing that she was goner figuring out what to do about the loneliness that was destroying hi his drink, Ricky sensed soht it to his istered the lack of a portwine aromar the faint, foul smell of what had replaced it He stopped as he was about to tilt the glass to his lips, and sahat it contained: two or three fat, uorously around one another

Startled, he cried out, and the glass slipped froers