Running with the Demon - Terry Brooks [170]
Junior nodded. “Got it.”
“Just remember. Five minutes. It’s preprogrammed.”
Junior set the lunch box back on the coffee table next to the pizza. “Where’s yours?”
Derry shrugged. “Back in the bedroom. Want to see it?”
They got up and went through the bedroom door, finishing off their beers, relaxed now, joking about what it was going to be like come tomorrow. The demon watched them leave ,the room, then rose from the rocker, walked over to the coffee table, and opened the lid to the lunch box. Sandwiches, a chip bag, a cookie pack, and a thermos hid what was underneath. The demon lifted them away. Derry was exactly right; he had set the clock to trigger the explosives five minutes after the slide was pushed.
The demon shook his head in disapproval and reset it from five minutes to five seconds.
Derry and Junior came back out, sat on the couch, drank another beer, and went over the plan one more time, Derry making sure his buddy had it all down straight. Then Junior picked up the lunch box and left, heading for the steel mill. When he was gone, Derry massaged his temples, then went into the bathroom to get a couple more Excedrin, which he washed down with a fresh beer.
Better go easy on this stuff, he admonished himself, and set the can aside. Want to be sharp for tonight. Want to be cool.
He dumped the pizza in the trash and brought out the second device, this one fashioned a little differently than the other to accomplish its intended purpose, and finished wiring it. When he was done, he placed it inside a plastic picnic cooler, fastened it in place, and closed the lid. He leaned back and studied it with pride. This baby will do the job and then some, he thought.
The demon came over and sat down next to him. Derry couldn’t see him, didn’t know he was there. “Better take your gun,” the demon whispered, a voice inside Derry’s head.
Derry looked at the rattling old window fan, matching its tired cadence to the buzzing in his head. “Better take my gun,” he repeated absently.
“In case anyone tries to stop you.”
“Ain’t no one gonna stop me.”
The demon laughed softly. “Robert Freemark might.”
Derry Howe stared off into space. “Might try, anyway.” His jaw was slack. “Be too bad for him if he did.”
When he got up to go into his bedroom to collect his forty-five from the back of his closet, the demon opened the picnic cooler and reset that clock, too.
Nest walked back through the park to her home, Pick riding on her shoulder, both of them quiet. It was nearing four o’clock, and the park was filled with people. She skirted the families occupying picnic tables and blankets in the open areas and followed the line of trees that bordered Sinnissippi Road on the north. It wasn’t that she was trying to hide now; it was just that she didn’t feel like talking to anyone. Even Pick understood that much and was leaving her alone.
Feeders shadowed her, flashes of dark movement at the corners of her eyes, and she struggled unsuccessfully to ignore them.
She passed the park entrance and started down the service road behind her house. Overhead, clouds drifted in thick clusters, and the sun played hide-and-seek through the rifts. Bright, sunny streamers mixed with gray shadows, dappling the earth, and to the west, dark thunderheads massed. Rain was on the way for sure. She glanced skyward and away again without interest, thinking about what she had to do to protect herself. She had assumed right up until last night that the demon and John Ross and the madness they had brought to Hopewell had nothing to do with her personally, that she stood on the periphery of what was happening, more observer than participant. Now she understood that she was not just a participant, but the central player, and she had decided she would be better off