The Probing: Leviathan, The Mind Pirates, Hybrids, The Village Read online

  Brenda smirked. “The professor’s always odd.”

  “But he’s never asked for a group picture before. And there’s more—last night, before he went into his room, he kissed my forehead. It was . . . almost like he was saying good-bye.”

  Brenda’s brow creased, then she shrugged. “I’ll admit that he’s seemed really preoccupied the last couple of days. But he’d be lost without you, Andi, so I hardly think he’d take off without telling you where he was going. And where would he go? Unless—” Her frown deepened. “You . . . you don’t think he was thinkin’ of offin’ himself, do you?”

  “No—no, definitely not. He wouldn’t want a printed photo of our group if he was suicidal. He kept saying he wanted a pocket-sized copy of that image—”

  “Maybe he wanted the cops to know who to contact . . . in case his body was mangled in a car crash or something.”

  “A list of names and phone number would be more helpful than a photo. Still, something’s not right. I’m going to call the police.”

  Brenda sighed, then turned toward the hallway. “Honestly? The man’s too stubborn to kill himself. But if you call the police, you’re gonna feel really stupid when he comes in and yells at you for involving the cops.”

  “That’s okay.” I stood and moved toward the phone on the desk. “If I’m wrong, he can be as mad as he wants to be.”

  The police showed up within an hour of my call. Because I’d heard the cops tell Mr. Diaz that they couldn’t file a missing persons report until twenty-four hours had passed, I was careful not to say that we wanted to report a missing person. Instead I told them that we’d awakened this morning and suspected that something had happened to the professor—foul play, perhaps. So could they please investigate, especially since something had also happened to the woman who lived next door . . .

  My thoughts kept returning to the creepy kids. What if they had managed to get into the house? What if they’d met the professor?

  The young cop leading the investigation, Officer Chad Edwards, suddenly stopped writing on his notepad and looked at me. “Haven’t I seen you before?”

  I felt an unwelcome blush creep onto my cheeks. “At the hospital, I think. I was there to see Mrs. Diaz.”

  “Yours is an easy face to remember.” He smiled. “And what is your relationship to Dr. McKinney?”

  “I’m his assistant. And before you ask, our relationship is strictly professional.”

  “Noted.” His smile deepened as he made a note on his pad.

  From the sofa, Tank glowered at the cop. “Don’t you want to dust for fingerprints or something? If someone broke in and kidnapped him—”

  “No sign of forced entry,” Edwards said. “And there’s nothing missing or out of place, so an abduction is unlikely.”

  “Maybe,” Brenda said. “But we’re only guests here, so how would we know if something was missing?”

  Officer Edwards ignored Brenda and smiled at me again. “Why don’t you show me around and point out anything that seems odd to you?”

  Brenda sighed dramatically and Tank stood, pulling himself upright and thrusting his sizable chest forward. I’d studied enough zoology to recognize male dominance behavior when I saw it, so more than anything I wanted Tank to calm down and behave himself. But if the professor was with those black-eyed kids, he might be sick or dying or in serious trouble. . . .

  I led the way to the bedroom the professor had been using. Everything was just as I’d left it—the laptop and notebooks on the table, his watch and phone on the nightstand, his pajamas still folded on the bed.

  The cop’s gaze fell on the pajamas. “Do you think he slept here last night?”

  “Doesn’t look like it.”

  “So maybe he went out. Could he have gone to a bar, someplace that stays open late?”

  “No. I set the house alarm before I went to bed, which was right after the professor went into his room. Dr. McKinney didn’t know how to disarm the system. If he had opened a door or a window, the alarm would have gone off.”

  “Anyone else know how to disarm the security system?”

  “My grandparents, but they’re in New York. So I’m sure the professor didn’t go out last night or this morning.”

  Edwards flipped his notebook closed and narrowed his eyes as he looked around. “If everything you say is true, then your missing professor vanished into thin air. We’re missing something . . . because nobody ever vanishes without a trace.”

  I bit my lip, restraining the impulse to tell him about some of the things we had experienced as a group. “Sometimes they do,” I whispered.

  My house phone rang just after I escorted the two police officers to the front door. My heart leapt in anticipation—maybe it was the professor—but caller ID identified the caller as Reuben Diaz, my neighbor.

  “Andi,” he said, after I greeted him, “I thought you should know that someone else has run into one of those kids. There’s a family at the hospital now; their little boy is upstairs in a coma. The wife saw a strange kid in her van and—”

  “I read the story in the paper,” I told him.

  “Not all the story,” Mr. Diaz said. “They didn’t report everything. I talked to the mother myself. The kid in her van had black eyes.”

  I turned to face the others, who had gathered in the living room. Brenda, Tank, and Daniel were all looking at me, doubtless alarmed by the expression on my face.

  “We’re coming,” I told him. “We’ll meet you outside your wife’s room.”

  After talking to Reuben Diaz, we found the Hanson family in the pediatric wing on the third floor. Jax Hanson lay in a hospital bed, his face still and pale as a heart monitor beeped and an IV line kept him hydrated.

  Mrs. Hanson sat in a chair behind her son’s bed, and Mr. Hanson was pacing in the narrow space between the end of the bed and the wall. A TV hung from the ceiling, but it was dark.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Hanson?” I asked, timidly stepping into the room. “My name is Andi Goldstein, and these are my friends Brenda, Tank, and Daniel.”

  The Hansons looked at us without reaction, but their gazes lingered on Daniel. “Is he—does he know Jax?” Mrs. Hanson asked. “Is he in Jax’s class at school?”

  I shook my head. “Daniel lives in California. We are here because . . . well, because the other day I had an encounter with two children with solid black eyes. I wondered if maybe we had . . . something in common.”

  Mrs. Hanson gasped and gripped the sheets on her son’s bed. Her husband looked from her to me, then his face went a shade paler. “I wasn’t sure . . . her story seemed so farfetched.”

  “It’s true,” I said, meeting his gaze. “I’ve seen those kids twice, and there’s something sinister about them. I can’t explain it, and I can understand why other people don’t believe it—”

  “The reporter didn’t believe me,” Mrs. Hanson said, her chin quivering. “I told her about that boy’s eyes and she looked at me like I was crazy. She wrote down what I said, but she didn’t put it in the paper. What good is a newspaper unless reporters are willing to tell the whole truth?”

  I didn’t have an answer to that, so I tried to change the subject. “Did the strange kid speak to you at all?”

  “Not a word,” she said. “He got out of the car when I told him to, though. Then he just disappeared. I glanced away only for a second, and he just vanished. I haven’t stopped shaking since.”She lifted her hand so we could all see the tremor that quavered her fingertips.

  “Has there been any change in your son?” Brenda asked, taking a step closer to the bed. She reached for Daniel’s hand and held it tight as she looked down on the unconscious boy.

  “None,” Mr. Hanson answered. “He just lies there, and the doctors don’t know why he won’t wake up. They’ve done all kinds of scans and blood tests, but it’s like something’s got ahold of him and won’t let go—”

  Without saying a word, Tank stepped between me and Brenda, his gaze fixed on the boy’s
face. “Would you mind,” he asked, not looking at either of the boy’s parents, “if I prayed for your son?”

  Mr. Hanson looked at his wife, but Mrs. Hanson kept her gaze focused on Tank. “I wish you would,” she said, her voice heavy with unshed tears. “I don’t know how to pray . . . for something like this.”

  I stepped back so Tank could move closer to the head of the bed, then we all watched as he placed his palm on the boy’s forehead. “Lord,” he prayed, “we know you are sovereign over all creation, over angels and demons, over all kinds of forces everywhere. We ask that you return this boy to his folks, binding whatever forces are keepin’ him from wakin’ up. Bring him back, Father, and wash his mind so that he don’t have any memories of anything bad or evil. I ask these things humbly, but in the mighty name of Jesus, who holds authority over everything on and above and under the earth.”

  Silence fell over the room. Tank remained motionless, his hand on the boy’s forehead, and no one spoke. Tears glistened on Mrs. Hanson’s cheeks, and Mr. Hanson stared at his son as though he could bring his son back by the sheer force of his will. Brenda had bowed her head, too, though she might have been trying to hide her skepticism.

  Daniel, on the other hand, was looking at the ceiling, his gaze traveling the width and breadth of the room as if he were watching creatures from other dimensions, forces who might be trying to steal this boy’s soul . . . or return it.

  I lowered my eyes as someone took a sharp breath. Jax Hanson’s eyelids fluttered and color returned to his cheeks. His lower lip trembled, then his tongue darted over his lips and his eyes opened. “Mama? Dad?”

  Tank lifted his hand and stepped back as a flush reddened his face and neck.

  “Jax?” Mrs. Hanson rose and hovered over her son, her hands feeling his forehead, his cheeks. “Are you okay?”

  “Where—what am I doing here?”

  Jax attempted to sit up, but his father, who had rushed to his wife’s side, held him back with a restraining hand. “Easy, son, you don’t want to rush it.”

  “I feel fine. What’s going on?”

  Pssst.

  I turned to see Tank in the doorway, already slinking away. Brenda stood behind him with Daniel, and they were waiting for me.

  Leaving the Hansons alone with their son, I followed my friends down the hallway. “Wow,” I said, completely at a loss for words. “Tank, what you did—”

  “I didn’t do anything,” he said, gesturing toward the elevators. “Come on, we should get going.”

  “If you didn’t do it,” Brenda countered, “then how in the heck did that kid get better?”

  Tank didn’t answer, but smiled as he pressed the elevator call button.

  CHAPTER

  9

  My thoughts raced as I drove out of the hospital parking lot. I wasn’t exactly sure what had happened in that hospital room, but I knew two things for certain: one, strong forces of evil were afoot in my neighborhood, and they seemed to emanate from two weird, smelly kids with black eyes; and two, forces of good were also at work, and they were even stronger, especially when wielded by men like Tank.

  “I don’t get it,” Brenda mumbled in the back seat. “If those kids are stealing babies from pregnant women, what did they want with the Hanson kid? Are the two situations even connected? And what does any of this have to do with the professor?”

  I shook my head and slowed for a red light. “I don’t know.”

  “The situations don’t have to be connected,” Tank said, rubbing his temple as if he felt the approach of a headache. “Evil goes after innocence. Why would evil beings mess around with people who are already on a road to ruin? Evil wants to destroy the innocent—animals, babies, children. It takes little pleasure in bringing down someone whose life is already ruined.”

  In the rearview mirror, I saw Brenda glare at Tank. “Feeling a little judgmental, aren’t we? Who are you talking about?”

  Tank shrugged. “I think you know what I mean. God wants to lift people up, bring them out of addiction, crime, dangerous lifestyles. The forces that oppose God want to bring people down—keep them addicted, drunk, and sick. Most of all, evil wants to keep people ignorant. They think they’re partying and having fun, but all they’re doing is setting themselves up for disaster. Evil demands a high price. It destroys people.”

  Brenda crossed her arms and looked out the window, and when I glimpsed the pained look on her face I wondered if Tank’s words had awakened some painful memory from her past. We knew each other pretty well, but Brenda had kept a tight grip on some chapters of her history.

  “I get what you’re saying,” I told Tank, “but right now all I can think about is the professor. If he’s not there when we get back—”

  My mouth went dry when my gaze focused on the path beside the road. Walking along the edge of the sidewalk, dangerously close to cars whizzing by, were the two creepy kids. I recognized them instantly, even from the back, because something was obviously wrong about them. They walked together, their arms hanging straight down, their heads facing the road ahead, moving like two small automatons with no sense of life about them.

  “Hey,” Brenda said. “Isn’t that—”

  “Yes,” I answered, stepping on the gas. I sped up and passed the kids, then pulled onto the side of the road and shoved the gearshift into park. Without thinking I opened the door, stepped out, and crossed in front of the vehicle. Upon seeing me the kids stopped and stared. But when Tank stepped out of the car, the kids made a sharp right turn and hurried into an empty lot where weeds grew knee-high and broken bottles glimmered among the wild grasses.

  I bent and caught Brenda’s gaze through the car window. “Keep an eye on Daniel,” I warned. Tank’s warning about evil and innocence had given me the feeling that Daniel might be in more danger than any of us.

  Then I took off after those kids.

  With Tank beside me, we tore through the empty field, picking up sandspurs and narrowly avoiding a couple of red ant hills and areas sprinkled with broken glass and rusty debris. I could see the horizontal strip of blue water on the horizon and beneath it, the swaying sprays of the sea oats. The sinister siblings—if that’s what they were—were nowhere in sight, but surely they had to be just past the dune that served as a windbreak between the beach and the waterfront houses on this road.

  Tank and I reached a narrow walkway through the dunes and followed it, reaching the beach at the same time. Breathless, we looked north and south . . . no black-eyed kids in sight.

  Lots of people were on the beach—older people, tanned as leather, reclining on beach towels or reading books beneath umbrellas. Young mothers with their little ones, playing in the wave wash and looking for seashells. Lots of children, lots of innocents—only the active, loud, normal variety.

  The BEKs had disappeared again.

  I heaved a sigh and crossed my arms. Tank gave me a sympathetic look, then gestured toward the beach. “If you want, I’ll walk south a little way to see if I can spot them—”

  “They’re gone,” I said. “They have a way of disappearing when they don’t want to be found.”

  I turned, my heart feeling like lead in my chest, and followed the path we’d created in the tall weeds. “What is this stuff?” Tank asked. “Wheat?”

  I gave him a smile, but only because I knew he was trying to lighten my mood. “It’s just weeds,” I said, “but I’d admit it does look a little like wheat—”

  I stopped. “Hold up. Look how we flattened these weeds when we ran through here. Why didn’t the kids leave any kind of trail?”

  Tank scratched his head and looked around. The weedy stalks around us stood straight and unbroken, stirring slightly in the wind. I couldn’t see any other places where they’d been stomped or broken, except for one small area about twenty feet away.

  I walked toward that spot, wondering if the kids could be hiding in the weeds. That’d be a good trick, hiding right in front of us.

  I caught my breath a
s we drew closer. The flattened area was circular in shape, reminding me of . . .

  “A crop circle,” Tank said, staring at the field with wide eyes. “Just like Brenda’s picture.”

  I quickened my step. Brenda hadn’t drawn just a crop circle, she’d shown me holding something inside that circle—

  I froze when I heard an unexpected sound among the snap and crackle of weeds beneath our footsteps. “Shh,” I said, holding up my hand. “Listen.”

  I heard it again, a soft mewing sound, almost like a kitten. I rose on tiptoe, trying to see above the line of stalks along the edge of the circle, and what I saw turned my blood cold.

  A baby. A pale, motionless infant, still shiny and wet with fluid and a smear of blood.

  “Tank, call 9-1-1,” I told him, my heart rising to my throat. I didn’t dare voice my next thought: We might have found Mrs. Diaz’s missing baby.

  CHAPTER

  10

  We followed the ambulance to the hospital, of course, and waited in a lobby while doctors checked the baby to be sure it was healthy and unharmed. I knew they’d also take blood and try to determine whether or not the child belonged to Mrs. Diaz. DNA tests took time, so we wouldn’t know anything for certain today, but with every passing moment I felt more certain that we’d found the missing child.

  “Yay for us,” I murmured under my breath as Tank bought a candy bar from the vending machine. “We might have found the baby, but I don’t have any idea why or how.”

  Tank grinned and offered me the candy bar. “Sure I can’t tempt you?”

  “Not right now.” I shook my head. “I can’t focus on food when I’m upset.”

  “That’s when I find myself craving sweets.” Tank fed another handful of quarters into the machine. “I think sugar fuels my brain cells.”

  I sank into a plastic chair and closed my eyes, forcing myself to think. Where was the professor when we needed him? If he were here, he’d point out some connection I’d missed, something that tied the baby to the kids and that spot on the beach. If those kids had been responsible for taking the baby—somehow—then why had they brought him back? Had they been walking on that road to bait me? Had they purposefully lured me to that beach so I’d find that baby? Unexpectedly decent of them, if that was their intention—at least the infant wouldn’t die of dehydration or exposure.