Divine Evil

and I'll show my deputy here just how much easier it is. On yourfaces, all of you. Hands behind your heads. Bud, the first one of them that moves, kill him.”
    Bud didn't believe it would be easier the second time. Not for a minute. But he nodded. “Yes, sir, Sheriff.”
    Cam was with Clare in three strides, touching her face, her hair. “Oh, God, Slim, I thought I'd lost you.”
    “I know. Your face.” In reflex she tried to reach out to him but was held down by the rope. “It's bleeding.”
    “Briars.” He pulled out his pocket knife to cut the rope. He couldn't break down, not yet. All he wanted was to hold her, to bury his face in her hair and hold her.
    “Take it easy,” he told her and stripped off his shirt. “Put this on.” His hand trembled as it stroked over her skin. “I'm going to get you out of here as soon as I can.”
    “I'm okay. I'm okay now. Ernie. He saved my life.” And his blood was wet on her skin. “Is he dead?”
    He bent down, checked for a pulse, then tore the ripped robe aside. “No, he's alive. He took most of it in the shoulder.”
    “Cam, if he hadn't jumped over me …”
    “He's going to be all right. Bud, let's get these bastards tied up.”
    “One of them's Mick,” he murmured, shamed that he was fighting tears.
    “Yeah. I know.” He tossed over the rope that had been used on Clare. “Let's get it done, then you take Clare back and call the state boys. Bring them here.”
    “I want to stay with you.” She closed a hand around his arm. “I need to stay with you. Please.”
    “Okay. Just go sit down.”
    “Not here.” She looked away from the altar. “There's more rope over there.” Where they had stripped her. “I'll help you tie them.” Her eyes lifted, glittered. “I want to.”
    * * *
    Unmasked, bound, they looked pitiful. That was all Clare could think as she knelt beside Ernie, holding his hand and waiting for Bud to get back with the state police and an ambulance.
    “I can't believe Annie brought you here.”
    “She was terrific. She'll be getting quite a charge from riding with Bud with the siren going.” He glanced down at Ernie. “How's he doing?”
    “I think I stopped the bleeding. He's going to need help, but he's going to be okay. I mean really okay.”
    “I hope you're right.” He reached down to brush his fingers over her hair. Just to touch. “Clare, I have to check the other one.”
    She nodded. “It's Atherton,” she said flatly. “He started it all.”
    “Tonight, it's finished.” He walked around the altar. Atherton lay facedown. Without pity, Cam turned him over. The chest wound was mortal; he didn't doubt it. But breath still hissed out of the opening of the mask. When he heard Clare behind him, he rose quickly and turned to shield her from the body.
    “Don't protect me, Cam.”
    “You're not as strong as you think you are.” He lifted one of her hands and touched the bandaged wrist. “They hurt you.”
    “Yes.” She thought of what she had learned, of how his father had died. “They hurt us all. Not anymore.”
    “Do you think it's over?” The question rasped obscenely through the mask of the Goat of Mendes. “You've done nothing. You've stopped nothing. If not you, your children. If not them, their children. You didn't get the head. You never will.” Fingers curled like claws, he made agrab for Clare, then fell back with a rattling laugh and died.
    “He was evil,” Clare whispered. “Not crazy, not ill, just evil. I didn't know that could be.”
    “He can't touch us.” He drew her back, then closed her tightly in his arms.
    “No, he can't.” She heard the sirens echo in the distance. “Bud was quick.”
    Cam pulled her back just to look at her face. “There's so much I have to tell you. So much I have to say. Once I start I don't know if I'll be able to stop. It's going to have to wait until we're done with this.”
    She closed her hand over his. Behind them, the fire was going out. “We've got plenty of time.”
    Two weeks later, wearing mourning black, Min Atherton boarded a train going west. No one came to see her off, and she was glad of it. They thought she was slinking out of town, shamed by her husband, shocked by his actions.
    She would never be shamed or shocked by her James.
    As she maneuvered herself and her one huge bag back to her compartment, she blinked away tears. Her dear, dear James. Someday, somehow, she would find a way to avenge him.
    She settled on the wide seat, thumping