Читать книгу The Soul Catcher - Alex Kava, Alex Kava - Страница 14

Ben Garrison knew a thing or two about causing pain. The kid was younger and taller, but Ben knew he was stronger and definitely wiser. This hothead would last about five seconds if Ben shot a hand to his throat and squeezed in just the right place.

“No fucking reporters, Garrison. How many times do we have to tell you that?” the kid screamed at him.

He grabbed at Ben’s Leica, managing to yank the strap wrapped around Ben’s neck. The 35 mm camera was almost as old as Ben and probably tougher. Hell, it had survived a stampede of caribou in Manitoba and getting dropped in an Egyptian sand dune. It could certainly survive some pissed off religious freak.

“Why no reporters? What is your precious leader afraid of? Huh?” Ben egged him on. He knew this kid from the short visit he had paid to their camp at the foot of the Appalachian Mountains. Hell, he even kind of liked the kid. From what he had seen in the past, this kid, this Brandon, had a lot of passion, a lot of fire in his belly, but he didn’t have a clue as to what to do with it.

Brandon swiped at the camera again, and this time Ben gave him a shove that sent him onto his backside. Now the kid’s red face almost matched his red, goop-backed hair. He looked up at Ben like a bull, revving up and getting ready to charge. Ben could see his nostrils flaring and his hands balling into fists.

“Give it up, kid.” Ben laughed at him and snapped a couple of shots to prove the kid couldn’t rattle him. “Reverend Everett may have tossed me out of his hideout, but he isn’t gonna get rid of me that easy. Why doesn’t he send a real man to do a real man’s job?”

Brandon was back on his feet, his jaw and teeth clenched, his hands ready at his sides. Ben imagined little clouds of steam coming out of his ears like in the comic strips. The kid would need more than those accompanying bubbles of “Pow” and “Wham” to scare off Ben Garrison. Hell, he had survived an Aborigine’s blow dart and a Tutsi’s swipe of a machete. Like the Leica, he had seen a few death battles before, and this wasn’t one of them. Not even close. Poor kid. And with all his precious little friends watching. But there was no Reverend Everett to swoop in and save the souls of his little lost fools.

A crowd had gathered, hiking up the Jefferson Memorial steps to get a better look, but they kept their distance. Even the gang of young men, the redhead’s gang, circled like dogs in heat, but yellow-bellied dogs that stayed out of the way. Ben scratched his bristled jaw, bored with the whole thing. He had spent the afternoon getting some lame shots of tight-assed, hipless nymphettes. A few he had recognized. One he had even followed for a while, hoping for a risqué Enquirer shot, to embarrass her big-shot daddy. He’d stay and get a few of the prayer rally, with the precious, fucking Reverend Joseph Everett in action. This poor excuse of a rebel without a cause wouldn’t stop him. They couldn’t stop him, especially if they insisted on using public property.

He walked up several steps, leaving the hothead to snort and stomp and pretend to be choosing the godly thing of turning the other cheek. In the distance, Ben could see people starting to flock to the FDR Memorial.

It surprised him that Everett had chosen this spot for his rally in the District, especially over the Jefferson Memorial. Jefferson seemed more in tune with Everett’s philosophy of individual freedoms and limited government. Hell, hadn’t FDR put into place some of the very government programs Everett abhorred? The good reverend was a complicated piece of shit. But Ben was determined to expose the bastard for what he really was. And it would take more than this hotheaded punk to stop him.