“So you think that by killing those innocent people, you have given your son’s death meaning?’’
“They had no right,’’ he yelled, almost shrieking. “They had no right to live when my son, as pure and good as an angel of God, died. There must have been a reason God wanted him to come home, there must have been a reason that I suffered so much pain.’’
“God forgive you, Bernard, for what you have done, for your misguided acts.’’
“‘And I will strike down upon thee with furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy. And you will know My name is the Lord when I lay My vengeance upon thee.’’’
Juno heard the scratch and flare of a match being lit.
“I only wish you could see what I have planned for you.’’
And the heavy sigh of flame to gasoline was the last thing he heard before he felt the radiating pain of a blunt strike to the base of his neck, and then there was nothing.
Lydia parked her car a few hundred yards from the Church of the Holy Name and sprinted the rest of the way, to keep the element of surprise on her side. She didn’t know how she was certain that Bernard Hugo and Juno were in the church together, but there was not a doubt in her mind. Then as she got closer, she caught the scent of fire.
She ran up the front steps and pushed with all her strength on the wrought-iron handles of the heavy wooden doors. She ducked down beneath the black clouds of smoke billowing out of the open doors. She pulled up her sweatshirt, covering her mouth and her nose. Shouting for Juno, she saw him lying on the altar, surrounded by flames. Above him loomed Bernard Hugo.
“What are you doing, Hugo?’’ she yelled, as she removed the Glock from the pouch at her waist.
When he heard her, he spun around.
As she moved in closer, she could see that Juno was spread out on a cross laid across the altar and that Hugo was preparing to nail his wrists and crossed ankles to the wood with a gigantic hammer.
“Stay where you are, Lydia. You were only to bear witness to the end. You came too early,’’ he said, looking at her with disapproval.
“I can’t let you do this. Stop right now or I’m going to fire.’’
He ignored her and lifted the hammer above his head, preparing to strike an iron nail through Juno’s left hand, the flames rising around him. She fired a round from her gun and Bernard Hugo fell to the ground in a lump.
She ran up the aisle to Juno and shook him, trying to rouse him.
“Juno, please,’’ she begged. But he was deeply unconscious. She dropped the gun, put her hands under his arms, and had begun to drag him to the door, her throat already constricting from the smoke, when she felt someone grab her by her hair. Bernard Hugo pulled her head back violently until it rested on his shoulder. She could just see his eyes and was overcome by his vile breath. She saw the gleam of his scalpel, and thought of the gun she had carelessly dropped to the floor.
“I’ve been waiting for you, bitch,’’ he hissed.
“I’ve been waiting for you, too,’’ she answered. She dropped Juno and thrust her elbow back into Hugo’s abdomen with all her strength. As he doubled forward, he brought the scalpel into her thigh and pulled up. She felt the searing pain and screamed but it was somewhere outside of her as she reached, unthinking, and wrested the instrument from her leg. He had missed the artery that he doubtless had been aiming for, but still, blood sprayed from her wound. She edged away from him, struggling to her feet, the scalpel in her hand.
“Come on, you fuck, I’ll send you to see Robbie,’’ she said as he moved toward her. In one swift motion, he had her wrist in a hard grip she couldn’t escape, and he squeezed until her hand involuntarily opened and the scalpel dropped to the floor. With her free hand she grabbed his shirt and pulled him in and hit the bridge of his nose with the top of her head. He staggered back, stunned, blood pouring from his nostrils. She scampered for the scalpel and brought it around just as he was on top of her again. She jabbed it forcefully into his eye, though she’d been aiming for his jugular. He roared with pain and fell back twitching. She didn’t think it was in deep enough to have touched his frontal lobe. She only hoped the pain was enough to keep him unconscious. She grabbed the Glock from the altar where she’d dropped it and waited. He did not move. The flames were all around her now, licking up to the ceiling.
She shoved the gun in the waistband of her pants and reached again for Juno, her leg beginning to throb, a feeling of light-headedness overtaking her. The only thing she wanted more than to kill Bernard Hugo, was for Juno to live. She fought dizziness and the ardent desire to go back and put a bullet through Hugo’s brain, as she dragged Juno toward the door.
She looked behind her to see if the door was blocked by flames and when she turned to look at Hugo again, he was gone.
“Fuck!’’ she yelled, panic and anger doing battle in her mind.
She struggled to move faster, Juno seeming heavier by the second. The door was ten feet away.
He came at her horribly through the smoke, the scalpel jutting from his eye, bellowing in rage and pain.
She deftly moved to one side and he stampeded past her, tripping over Juno and falling, the scalpel driving farther into his head.
And she was on him, gun drawn. She flipped him over and straddled him, one knee on each of his arms. She stuck the barrel of the gun in his mouth. He was not dead. He struggled for breath, his nose broken and his mouth full of steel. She tried not to smile. She didn’t think anymore about the fire or the debris beginning to fall around them.
“You miserable, cocksucking psychopath,’’ she said. She had forgotten about the flames, about Juno lying unconscious. It was only her and him. The room seemed to wail with sound and fill with light. Everything warped and slowed around her. The only thing she knew in that moment was rage. It was a rage that had been born the day her mother died, and had dwelled within her, growing like a parasite all these years. Today, she realized, was the fifteenth anniversary of her mother’s death. And this thing inside her had devoured every happiness that was ever offered to her, had sucked every possible moment of peace and joy from her heart. And it had led to her being here, straddling a monster in a burning church, holding a gun to his mouth. If she pulled the trigger, she would put an end to him and the havoc he’d visited upon her, and have revenge for his victims. But what would she be, then? Would she destroy the worm that was eating away at her inside or would she become what she most feared and hated?
“That’s enough, Lydia.’’
And she looked up to see her mother standing before her. She looked for Juno and he was gone.
“You came home early because I got caught smoking,’’ Lydia said, sobbing and thrusting the gun harder into Hugo’s mouth. “He killed you because I did something wrong.’’
“He was waiting for her, Lydia. If it hadn’t been that afternoon, it would have been another time. It had nothing to do with you or what you did. Jed McIntyre was sick and so is Bernard Hugo.’’
But then it wasn’t her mother at all, it was Jeffrey. Morrow stood behind him, and the flames were almost out. And she could see the flashing lights from police cars and fire engines through the thinning smoke.
“I want this to be over now,’’ she said, coughing from the smoke.
“Just give me the gun, baby. You stopped him. This is finished and we can go home.’’
She let the gun drop to the floor and Jeffrey came to her and lifted her away from Bernard Hugo. He carried her from the church to the ambulance waiting outside.
Epilogue
Six months later – Hanalei Bay, Kauai, Hawaii
When the bright morning sun and roosters wake Lydia from sleep here it takes her a few moments to remember where she is. She looks out the window to see mystical green mountains rising from a crystalline ocean, the mist rolling in as if from heaven. And sometimes it takes her longer to remember who she is. It’s like that here, where perfect, temperate days run together and the sound of the ocean and Jeffrey’s breathing beside her are a lullaby. Lydia Strong made it through fifteen years without knowing peace. Now that she has found it, she can’t imagine how she survived.