Thr3e

by Ted Dekker

Besides, Slater’s never kidnapped anyone before. The thought brings a chill to his spine. The sensation of pleasure so intense that it runs up and down the spine is interesting. It is not boring like teenagers poking holes in their noses.

This is crap.

Perfect. Perfect, perfect, perfect.

Crap, crap, crap, crap.

The pleasure of his brilliance is so intense that Slater now begins to shiver a little.

Slater takes one deep breath, but very slowly.

Perfect.

Cut it out.

Kevin stood in his pinstriped boxer shorts.

“Shut up, Eugene. Please, just shut up and try to make some sense for once. Her name is Balinda. So Balinda left without telling you. I’m sure she’ll be back. You can live without her for a few hours, can’t you?”

So predictable.

They might as well get this over with. She would never know how much better he felt with her here.

Walking across the street and up the steps to the front door, Kevin made a firm decision. Under no circumstances would he blubber or show any more emotion in front of Jennifer. He was leaning on her too much already. The last thing she needed was a basket case. He would walk in, give Bob a hug, slug Eugene, do his I’m-looking-for-the-key-to-Slater routine, and leave without so much as batting an eye.

PLEASE DO SO.

“My, my, my, my. I don’t know what I’ll do without Princess,” Eugene said, heading off to the left.

Fess up, Puke.

The emotions came from his gut, unexpectedly and in a rush. He suddenly felt suffocated in the small, dark space. She was his mother, wasn’t she? And he was horrified by the fact that he even thought of her as a mother, because in reality he hated her more than he hated Slater. Unless they were one and the same and she had kidnapped herself. A confusing mixture of revulsion and sorrow overcame Kevin. He was falling apart. His eyes swam with tears and his face wrinkled. Kevin turned for the door. He could feel their stares on his back. Mommy. Fire burned through his throat; a tear spilled from his left eye. At least they couldn’t see. He would never allow anyone to see this. He hated Balinda and he was crying for her and he hated that he was crying for her. It was too much. He hurried for the door, crashed through with far more noise than he wanted, and let out a soft sob. He hoped Jennifer couldn’t hear; he didn’t want her to hear him acting this way. He was just a lost boy and he was crying like a lost boy and he really just wanted to be held by Mommy. By the one person who had never held him. “Kevin?” Jennifer was running after him. He only wanted to be held by Princess.

Sam pulled around the truck.

all of the riddles had to do with opposites;

A chill snaked down her arms.

The notion that Kevin might indeed be Slater refused to budge from her tired mind.

Very easy to solve.

Sam looked around the house. A two-by-four-foot travel poster of a bikini-clad native walking down a white beach said that New Zealand promised paradise. Dear Kevin, you want so much. I should have known how badly you were hurting, even when we were children. Why did you hide it from me? Why didn’t you tell me?

Sam briefly wondered if Jennifer had stayed with him until he fell asleep. Had she seen him like this? This sweet boy of hers? This stunning man who bore the weight of a hundred worlds on his shoulders? Her champion who’d slain the wicked boy on Baker Street?

What did Jennifer see when she looked at him? She sees the same as you do, Sam. She sees Kevin and she can’t help but to love him as you love him.

Sam reached out, tempted to brush his cheek. No, not as I love him. No one can love him as I love him. I would give my life for this man. She withdrew her hand. A tear broke down her right cheek. Oh, how I love you, dear Kevin. Seeing you these last three days has reminded me how desperately I love you. Please, please tell me that you will slay this dragon. We will, Kevin. Together we will slay this beast, my knight.

Dumb.

The childhood role-playing reference flooded her with warmth. She turned away and walked into his closet. She wasn’t sure what she was looking for. Something that Slater had left. Something that the FBI missed because they wouldn’t have guessed that it belonged to Slater.

Kevin had ordered his clothes neatly. Slacks and shirts hung in a row, jeans and cargo pants folded and stacked, shoes on a rack. Seminary dress to the right, casual dress to the left. She smiled and ran her fingers through the slacks. She smelled the shirts. His scent lingered. Amazing how she recognized it after so many years. He was still a boy. A man, Sam. A man.

I think Sam is more likely to be Slater than Kevin.

On the floor beside the desk she saw a small pile of paper, which she picked up. A paper he’d titled “The True Natures of Man.” He was a true man.

He is a baby.

Please, Sam, let’s cut the romantic drivel and do what you came to do.

He’s too intelligent.

Nope.

Slater breathed heavily.

We know that he breathes heavily. Get over it. All of the breathing in the world will not make this villain good.

me. In fact, you hate me, don’t you, Kevin? You should—I’ve destroyed your life.” “Stop it!” Kevin screamed.

This is just a book about four-year-olds and they haven't told us yet.

“Face me, you coward! Come out and face me!” Kevin shouted.

It would raise the bar for perfect crimes.

“A what?” “Seismic tuner. A device that alters voice patterns.”

She would know being in the FBI.

“I’ve been at Kevin’s house digging through his writings, papers, books, anything where he might have made reference to his past, a clue to a place that’s dark. I knew Kevin was intelligent, but I never expected quite this—mind blowing. No obvious references at all to Slater or anything that even hints at multiple personalities.”

He was the boy, but Kevin already knew that. “But . . . how do you know about Balinda? What are you doing?”

“Sam believes it.” Slater walked over to the desk and touched a black box that looked like an answering machine. He’d lowered the pistol to his side, and Kevin wondered if he could rush him before he had a chance to lift it and shoot. “She found the cell phone I used in your pocket—that alone’s enough for most juries. But they’ll find more. The recordings, for instance. They’ll show that my voice is really your voice, manipulated to sound like a terrible killer named Slater.” Slater feigned horror and shivered. “Oooo . . . chilling, don’t you think?” “There are a thousand holes! You’ll never get away with it.” “There are no holes!” Slater snapped. Then he grinned again. “And I already am getting away with it.” He picked up a picture. It was a photograph of Sam, taken at a distance with a telephoto lens. “She’s really quite beautiful,” he said, lost in the image for a moment. He reached up and ripped down a large black sheet that hung on the wall. Behind it, fifty or sixty pictures had been affixed to the concrete. They were all of Samantha.

Slater’s lips began to quiver and his breathing came in short quick drags. “Well, now I am going to kill her. And I’m going to show the world who you really are, because you’re no better than I am. You’re the pretty boy down the street she loves to play with. But does that make you better? No!” He screamed the last word and Kevin jumped.

“Hang out with me for a while and we’ll see how sweet you are.” He leaned forward and tapped Kevin’s chest with the gun barrel. “Deep down inside you’re no different than I am. If you’d met me before you met Samantha, we’d both have been at her window, licking the glass. I know that, because I was just like you once.”

Impulsively he sticks out his tongue and presses it firmly against Kevin’s jaw. He draws it all the way up his cheek to his temple, as if he’s licking an ice-cream cone. Salty. Bitter. Sick, sick, sick.

Slater shoves Kevin and steps back. “Know what I taste? I taste Slater. I’m going to kill her, Kevin. I’m going to kill both of them. But that’s not what the world will think. They’re going to think that you did it.”

Kevin straightens and glares at him. The man has more spunk than Slater estimated. Enough to come here, he’d guessed as much. But he can’t forget that this man also locked him in that cellar once, when he was still ...

“Let’s face it, Kevin. You came here with one thing on your mind. You wanted to kill. Kill, kill, kill. That’s another way you and I are alike.” Slater shrugs. “True, the object of your blood lust is me, but when you cut away all the face-saving, it’s the same instinct. Most humans are truly murderers, but I didn’t bring you here to lecture. I brought you here to kill. I’m going to give you your wish. You came to kill me, but that doesn’t suit my tastes, so I’ve chosen to flip things a bit.”

Slater looks at the wall, the collage of pictures. It’s in part her beauty that he hates so much. It’s why he keeps the photographs covered. By nine o’clock she will be dead.

“Kill me,” Kevin says. “I hate you.” He speaks the last words with such contempt that Slater feels a sliver of shock.

But Slater doesn’t show shock. He shows anger and hatred, but not shock, bec...

“So courageous. So noble. How can I refuse such a sincere request? Consider yourself dead already. We all die; yours will be a living death until you finally do kick the bucket. In the meantime, we must lure in our second victim. She will fly to your rescue. Her knight is in peril.” “I ...

Kevin shakes his head and is about to speak, but Slater doesn’t want to hear it. He steps forward and slams the gun against the side of Kevin’s head. “I’ll kill her, you perverted little brat!” Blood oozes down Kevin’s face. This excites Slater. Kevin’s face wrinkles and he begins to cry. Better, much better. He sinks

slowly to his knees and for the first time since his nemesis entered the room, Slater knows he will win.

and thoroughly intelligent.

He was a thinker, among the best, and he seemed to like playing detective. So did most people. His questions were insightful. How do you know that Kevin was inside his house when the second phone call was made? Is there a way to intercept a laser signal? All the questions lent themselves to whether Kevin could logically be Slater.

“Yes. But either way, we’ve pieced together his framework. At least the logic of it.” Dr. Francis sat and faced her with his fingers touching each other in a

tepee. “My goodness. You came here to find out who Kevin really is. I think I’ve just stumbled on it, my dear.” “Tell me, who is Kevin?” “Kevin is every man. And woman. He is you; he is me; he is the woman who wears a yellow hat and sits on the third pew every Sunday. Kevin is the natures of humanity personified.” “Please, you can’t mean that everyone’s a Slater.” “No, only those who do as Slater does. Only those who hate. Do you hate, Jennifer? Do you gossip?”

The window. Her window! The boy Slater had watched her from the window and seen what he desperately wanted but could not have. And he hated her. The answer to the riddle was her window!

So. Incredibly. Dumb.