Read Online Through the Flames by Tim Lahaye, Jerry B. Jenkins - Free Book Online Page A

the younger of them, who had seen the light?
    André turned the light on and sat down, as if expecting a lecture. But a lecture was not what Lionel had in mind. He had a lot of questions, and he wanted answers.
    “When you called my house, drinking and crying and slobbering and talking about killing yourself, were you serious or were you put up to that?”
    “Both.”
    “What do you mean? Part of that was just acting?”
    “Part of it,” André said, staring at the floor.
    “I was worried to death about you. I didn’t want you to go to hell. Anyway, we’re family, man. We’re all we’ve got left. We’ve got to watch out for each other.”
    “Listen, Lionel, I’m going to hell whether you want me to or not.”
    “You want to?”
    “’Course not! But that’s where people like me go!”
    “I’m not going there!” Lionel said. “And I used to be like you.”
    “You were just a kid. I was afraid I was the one who made you what you were. I’m so glad you’re a Christian now.”
    “Then why aren’t you?”
    “It’s too late for me.”
    “You know better than that! You know the truth. You just have to act on it now, André.”
    “You have no idea.”
    “Then tell me! What’s going on? I want to know!”
    André stood, paced, then sat again. He let out a huge sigh. “All right,” he said finally. “That guy found in my apartment was one of the guys I owed money to.”
    “Really? He wasn’t one of the two I met that one time, was he? He sure didn’t look like them. They were both a lot bigger.”
    “Those two just worked for him. They were his collection guys. When they couldn’t get any money out of me, he came lookin’ for me. It was pay up or be killed. I had held out on him way too long. Well, I had no money, and LeRoy wasn’t about to advance me any, so it came down to kill or be killed. That’s when I called you. I didn’t want to die. If I was going to go, I was going to go on my own terms. I’d rather kill myself than die that way.”
    “So you were serious.”
    “Well, mostly. LeRoy had come up with a plan. He knew this guy I owed the money to, see, and he was the one who reminded me that the guy was my size. It was LeRoy’s idea to get him to come to my place for the money. He told me to leave some message somewhere that would make it look like I killed myself. I called your machine, left that message, talked about how guilty I felt about you and all that, and then even wrote a suicide note.
    “After the guy showed up, LeRoy’s friends had his people outnumbered and ran them off. While the guy thinks he’s got his bodyguards protecting him from the hallway, LeRoy pops out of the closet and gets the drop on the guy. He makes him put on my clothes and put my wallet and stuff in his pocket. He put on my rings and watch and everything. Then LeRoy told me to off him.”
    “Kill him?”
    “Yeah. But I couldn’t do it. I had the blade and everything to make it look like a suicide. I was afraid the guy would fight and make it look obvious that someone had done it to him, but LeRoy had thought of that too. He tells the guy he’s going to die anyway and gets the guy crying and begging and starts loading him up with whiskey. This is real strong stuff now, the good stuff, not like I’m used to drinking. He gets the guy so mellow and out of it that he didn’t even struggle. I was supposed to cut him, but I couldn’t even do that.”
    “Of course you couldn’t kill someone, André. You know better than that.”
    “Oh, don’t be makin’ me out as some kind of saint now, Lionel. Fact is, I wish I could have done it. LeRoy was setting me up, don’t you see? I had told him all about your house and how I knew you would let us stay there and everything. But once he set up this fake suicide and murdered the guy, he made sure he had something on me.”
    “What does he have on you? You owe him money too?”
    “No! Think, boy! We never expected you to go identify the body. We figured