Strong Cold Dead (Caitlin Strong, #8)(91)
Its powerfully sour scent almost made him retch, and it was all Dylan could do to steady his stomach. He recalled the same scent emanating from the patch of fungus on the mold-riddled ear of corn that he’d made himself eat after Ela had called it a delicacy.
It’s a secret my people have kept for centuries, our greatest secret.
Dylan moved deeper into the chamber, into the shaft of light illuminating almost all of it.
And that’s when he saw the bodies.
87
DALLAS, TEXAS
“A blessed target,” Hatim Abd al-Aziz proclaimed, seated at the picnic table across from Razin Saflin, Ghazi Zurif, and Daniel Cross in Klyde Warren Park. “How many do you think are here now who could be dead tomorrow by the grace of God?”
Al-Aziz said that in a way that sent a chill up Cross’s spine, reminding him of how close he’d come to a moment like this a decade ago, of the lives he had wanted to take in his crowded school cafeteria. And that made him wonder whether Caitlin Strong had noticed him the other day outside the Comanche reservation. A decade ago, she’d done her best to convince him he was worth something, but the feeling had only lasted until the other kids started up on him again. Caitlin Strong might have talked him out of pulling a Columbine, but he knew his day was going to come. Now that it finally had, he found himself fearing her disapproval.
Why’d she have to be at that damn reservation?
“I only wish I could be here to see it,” al-Aziz continued, smiling so placidly at the prospect that it utterly unnerved Daniel Cross.
Klyde Warren Park was a pristine, tree-lined, eco-friendly stretch of land erected on a mothballed overpass of the eight-lane Woodall Rodgers Freeway. A public and private partnership initiative to combat urban sprawl and create a sprawling green space on the site of a former crumbling concrete blight between Pearl and St. Paul streets, where uptown and downtown Dallas meet. An urban oasis set in the shadows cast by skyscrapers lining the site’s east and west peripheries.
The park was normally dominated by a large, open grassy stretch lined with lawn chairs, food vendors, and ice cream trucks, adjoining a botanical garden, walking trails, and an assortment of pavilions. But an old-fashioned traveling carnival had set up shop on the grounds in recent days. The bulk of the rides and attractions—including the House of Horrors, the Buggy Whip, the mini Flume, various kiddie rides, and a family-friendly roller coaster that swept over the expanse of the entire carnival, erected from Pearl Street, across the great lawn crossing Hart Boulevard. Food booths and game attractions forming a makeshift midway rimmed the perimeter on the eastbound side of Woodall Rodgers Freeway, across from the Dallas Museum of Art.
Al-Aziz sat alone on one side of the shaded picnic table, amid the smells of grilled hamburgers, falafel, and various Mexican-style offerings. Saflin, Zurif, and Daniel Cross sat across from him, with a clear view of the botanical garden and the section of the park devoted to children’s activities, which today had been usurped by a pair of bounce houses, where lines had begun to form. The carnival was just starting to fill up, locals streaming in to loiter away a few hours during spring break for Texas schools. A local radio station was doing a live remote, and both the Nancy Collins Fisher and Muse Family Performance pavilions offered live performances featuring clowns, mimes, and jugglers.
Cross looked around at the rapidly growing crowd of happy people who had no clue about the fate that ultimately awaited them. Thanks to him.
“I just want to see the world burn,” Cross said, to no one in particular. “I want to be the one lighting the match.”
Cross glanced back at al-Aziz, who was lowering a cell phone from his ear, grinning anew above his trimmed beard. “This place will be our second target. Houston will be the first.”
“Houston?” Cross asked, feeling something quiver in his stomach.
“Inshallah,” al-Aziz said, bowing his head slightly.
88
BALCONES CANYONLANDS, TEXAS
Dylan recognized the Lost Boys immediately, the same ones who’d tied him to a tree and left him for dead the night before. He counted seven of them. Their blood was everywhere, whether from bullet or knife wounds, he couldn’t be sure.
He tried to make sense of what he was seeing, to put everything together.
Our greatest secret …
That greatest secret of the Comanche had been stockpiled down here atop trays sealed in airtight plastic wrapping. Hundreds of pounds of the mold, fungus, or whatever it was, divided into six stacks, squeezed tightly against the walls. Hidden in this secret chamber for who knew how long to do who knew what. Dylan whipped the phone out of his pocket to call his father and started to back out of the chamber.
He turned to find Ela Nocona standing before him, and she collapsed in his arms.
Dylan crumpled under her weight, cushioning Ela the whole way.
“Take it easy,” he tried to sooth her.
He was cradling her waist and her head at the same time, the hand nearer her torso feeling warm, wet, and sticky.
With blood.
“They thought I was dead,” she managed to say, after swallowing hard.
“Who?”
She shook her head, eyes gaping in fear at the rekindled memory. “I don’t know. They spoke…”
“What?”
Ela swallowed hard again. “Arabic, I think. I’m sorry…”