Prey For Me Ch. 04

"Father, I have much of the information the police have. Now, if you want to help find Kathleen, tell me something new. Tell me something you didn't tell the police. Why do you think she disappeared?"

"I heard her confession. Which might seem very strange but that is just the way it was, right or wrong. We had a special relationship and had no secrets. Before I became a priest, we ... " Father Murray paused and looked pensive and embarrassed.

"Come on, Father," Jack encouraged. "Anything you might think could be important."

"Kathleen and I had an incestuous relationship for several years when she was a young teenager and before I became a priest. I tell you this only to emphasize our, our ..."

"OK, I get it Father. I don't judge and I've heard just about every story you can possible imagine. Now, what exactly did Kathleen confess?"

She was having a tempestuous fling with a new man in her life. Kathleen had been with him just a week before she disappeared and I could only describe it as total infatuation on her part. He was called Sariel, quite an unusual name but I have heard it somewhere before, he was very tall and according to her incredibly handsome. He rode a motorcycle. Kathleen has always had boyfriends and lovers, but it was obvious this was quite different. She talked about him as if he were some sort of god. Even read the bible to her. On the other hand, she said he also read erotic literature to her. I don't recall the names of the books offhand. Not something I am very familiar with."

"Was one of the titles The Perfumed Garden of Sheik Nefzaoui

published by Sir Francis Burton?"

"Yes, that's it! I remember that."

The priest paused momentarily as he contemplated about what he was going to say next. "One more thing I should tell you, Mr. Davis. I was indicted a few months back along with a small group of other priests located all over the world for distributing pornography over the internet. The Church has taken an 'innocent until proven guilty' position."

"Father, you have helped considerably just in this brief conversation. I'll call you if I think of anything else and you do likewise. I promise you I will let you know immediately if I find out anything about Kathleen's disappearance. I do believe this is related to several similar cases I am working on. There is absolutely no evidence that these women have been harmed so keep your hopes up."

The third seemingly related incident involving a missing woman that Jack had found on the Missing Person Index occurred in Albuquerque. He headed down Interstate 25. Best direction anyway because he figured whatever happened next was likely to occur in a southwestern state. It was getting a little chilly to be riding Harleys too far north. It would draw too much unwanted attention Jack surmised.

Rebecca Ziegler was a disc jockey at an alternative rock station in Albuquerque. She was also was the lead singer in a band called Rephaim. Her husband, Paul Ziegler, was Chief Executive Officer of a major ISP, internet service provider. He was also a prominent leader of the Promise Keepers group in the area. All this information was in the report on the MPI.

Jack decided to talk to the radio station manager first. Wally Williamson was an old hippie. Janis Joplin was his all-time favorite.

"Rebecca is a stone cold fox," Wally explained to Jack. "You know, like in the lyrics of the late great Jimi Hendrix, a 'Foxy Lady' in every way. Her husband didn't care much for her rock music career though. Her band was really into some heavy stuff. You ever hear of the band Fields of the Nephilim?"

"No," Jack replied, "But no doubt you are about to tell me all about them."

"Fields of the Nephilim were a German alternative rock band very popular 10-15 years ago. Then they broke up. Real wild and crazy material. I just happened to be in London in 1991 when they did their last gig at the Town and Country Club. "

"Wally, what significance do you attach to the name of the band, Nephilim?"

"Nephilim, fallen angels, what else. I got some of their stuff here, let me play something." Wally left the room to search through his archives and came back in a few minutes. "Here's one of my favorites, Watchmen."

"Innocence is hurting, a world speaks out of tune.
Promise calls, promise falls, what are we to do?
With a clouded view, you follow me through.

Sadly the tides are changing, my world slips out of you.
Your body falls, my body calls, what are we to do.
With a clouded view, you follow me through.

My life's turning pages, I see a promised day.
Watchmen never age here, they just sleep in vain.
Drowning people stare here, they don't care to call.
So I rebury the pages, Kthulhu calls ...

You'll see, you'll see her when she starts to form.
You'll see, you'll see her when she starts to call.

In the name of Jesus Christ won't you fear my name.
I've been around since Moses, your preacher never came.

You'll see, you'll see her when she starts to form.
You'll see, you'll see her when she starts to call.
Follow me ...

You sleep, you sleep, follow me.

It's just another day, remember I am calling you.
Just another day, remember she's calling for you.
Just another day, Kthulhu I am calling for you.
Just another day, an empire has fallen from view.

You sleep, you sleep.
Follow me.
You sleep, you sleep.
You cannot follow me"

Willie flipped off the sound. "Some would call this music part of the Goth genre, but it was much more than that. Quite biblical in fact. The name, Rephraim, which Rebecca gave her band is of course related to the Nephilim.

Rebecca's husband hated what she was doing with the band but he worshipped her. I saw him a week after she disappeared and he sure looked like one lost soul."

"Wally," Jack interrupted, "who was Rebecca seen with in the days before she vanished? Anybody unusual?"

"You got that right, Jack. A big dude named Baraqijal. An astrologist or some such thing so he said. Rode a big bad Harley. I caught them banging away in the back storage room when she was supposed to be spinning discs."

"Thanks, Wally. That's enough for now. Maybe I'll talk to the members of the band, the husband and the police. I dunno. I doubt they could add much of importance. I might want to talk to you again, though. You seem to be pretty up on this Nephilim business. By the way, did you ever hear the names Danel, Ezequeel or Sariel?"

"Nephilim. Fallen angels. Just like Baraqijal."

Jack got in his car and drove into the Sandia mountains on I-40 and turned north on State 14, and took the crest road at San Antonito, drove another 20 miles and pulled off into a picnic area. He just sat in his car with the top and watched a breathtaking sunset. Over and over he sifted through the latest developments. He thought, we have several members of some sort of motorcycle gang who are seducing and causing the disappearance of beautiful women. Beautiful women who are the loved ones of men involved in religious endeavors. At the same time, we have a beautiful woman who goes by the name Lilith, sometime vampire and sometime witch, who is executing men. Men who seem to have some information she either wants or wants to keep hidden.

"I need somebody smarter than me to make sense out of this," Jack said out loud but only to himself. He was exhausted and decided to check into a motel. He called Brett who was not in and left a message on his answering machine. "We need to meet, Brett. Be in Las Vegas by Saturday." Jack had done some research on Dr. Caitlin Cornplanter, the name Nathaniel mentioned. She was the one he wanted. "And find me Dr. Caitlin Cornplanter, late of the Harvard Divinity School, and bring her with you. I don't care what it takes. Money, whatever. Have Tommy Boy call her personally if necessary." Brett, of course, would know to whom he referred. His good friend the governor.

Next Jack plugged in his notebook computer to check his e-mail. He had a message from Sam Hanson. There may have been another Lilith murder in Vegas. The body had not yet been found but the circumstances were very suspicious. Jack was quite sure from just the minimal information in a message that she had struck again. Well, he was headed back to Las Vegas in the morning anyway.

Jack decided to call Father Murray. "Hey, Father, what is the Catholic doctrine regarding fallen angels, the Nephilim? No, forget Catholic doctrine, I don't care what the Pope says, what do you say?'

"Well, Jack, first this is something that the Catholic bureaucracy would just as soon ignore. But let me quote from the bible I teach from, THE CATHOLIC LIVING BIBLE. Genesis 6: 1 & 2, 'Now a population explosion took place upon the earth. It was at this time that beings from the spirit world looked upon the beautiful earth women and took any they desired to be their wives.' And verse 4, 'In those days, and even afterwards, when the evil beings from the spirit world were sexually involved with human women, their children became giants, of whom so many legends are told.' I guess that says it all, doesn't it?"

"Father, that name Sariel, the man seen with your sister Kathleen before she disappeared. Someone told me Sariel is the name of one of the Nephilim. Other women who disappeared under circumstances similar to Kathleen were seen in the company of men named Danel, Ezequeel and Bariqijal. Also the names of Nephilim according to my source."

"Of course!" Father Murray cried. "The Book of Enoch, that's where those names are."

"Well, Father, I don't know what it all means, but you think about it and let me know if you come up with anything that can shed some light on these mysteries."

Jack spent all night researching information on the internet. He was drawing blanks and was looking forward to his friend Brett and this Dr. Cornplanter helping him make sense of all this. When the sun rose the next morning he got in his Mercedes and drove toward Las Vegas.

To Be Continued...