When Erik returned to the living room, Thralls, Mark, and Vickie were sitting in a circle with their heads down. A Rhode Island State Trooper stood by the door.
“They’ve found Collins,” Thralls said.
“Where…where was he?”
“In Dovecrest’s cabin. He’d been shot nine times with his own gun. And his throat was slit for good measure.”
“In the cabin…how’d he get there?”
Thralls shrugged. “Look, I’m not buying your demon story. But I do believe there’s a cult running loose in the western part of the state. We’ve tracked them from California and recently lost them. We’d assumed they went north, to Maine or Vermont.”
“You must know Steve Harvey. The radio talk show host.”
“Yeah. Good friend of mine.”
“I was on his show about a week ago. He told me about these nuts. I bet this guy is the same one who was on his talk show.”
Thralls nodded. “The body of the man found with the missing girl was one of them. And I still think Dovecrest is involved somehow.”
“He is,” Erik said. “He caught them in the middle of their little ritual.”
“That may or may not be true. But our job now is to find and stop these nutcases before they kill anyone else.”
“That’s the first thing anyone’s said that makes any sense whatsoever,” Vickie said.
“Ok,” Thralls said. “Erik, I’m going to ask you to do two things.”
“Whatever you need.”
“First, I need you to give me a detailed description of the guy you saw in the woods. We might have a sketch artist sit with you later.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“And, second, I want you to try and draw a map to where that altar stone was. If it does exist, the cult will be drawn back to it. We can stake it out and be waiting for them.”
“That’s going to be a little difficult,” Erik said. “Like I said, the thing moves.”
Thralls let out a deep sigh. “All right. Would you be able to take us there?”
Erik thought for a moment. Dovecrest said the thing could only be found if it wanted to be found. Yet Dovecrest had no trouble finding it. He guessed it could be found, once you knew how.
“I can’t promise anything,” he said. “But I’ll try.”
“Good. I’ll assemble a stakeout force. I won’t call in the sketch artist just yet. We’ll try the stakeout first. If we either can’t find the stone, or if they don’t show, then I’ll have this cult leader’s picture posted on every news channel in the world. I’ll have you look at some photos, too, and see if you can identify him.”
“I don’t know if this is going to work or not. You should speak with Dovecrest again.”
“You’re assuming this is supernatural, Mr. Hunter. I’m assuming it’s a group of killers that justify what they do by calling it a religion.”
“For all of our sakes,” Pastor Mark said. “I hope that you’re right.”