The Left Behind Collection: All 12 Books by Tim Lahaye, Jerry B. Jenkins Page B

something to do with her church. She doesn’t go with us anymore, you know. Story is, she never got there. Car flipped over. No trace of her, ’cept her clothes, and you know what that means.”
    “She’s gone?”
    “Looks that way. Jeff can’t accept it. He’s takin’ it hard. Wants to see for himself. Trouble is, the kids are gone, too, all of ’em. All their friends, everybody at that retreat thing in the mountains. State police found all the kids’ clothes, about a hundred sets of them, and some kind of a late-night snack burning on the stove.”
    “Whew, boy! Tell Jeff I’m thinking of him. If he wants to talk, I’m here.”
    “I can’t imagine he’ll want to talk, Cameron, unless you have some answers.”
    “That’s one thing I haven’t got, Dad. I don’t know who does. I have this feeling that whoever had the answers is gone.”
    “This is awful, Cam. I wish you were out here with us.”
    “Yeah, I’ll bet.”
    “You bein’ sarcastic?”
    “Just expressing the truth, Dad. If you wanted me out there, it’d be the first time.”
    “Well, this is the kind of time when maybe we change our minds.”
    “About me? I doubt it.”
    “Cameron, let’s not get into this, huh? For once, think of somebody other than yourself. You lost a sister-in-law and a niece and a nephew yesterday, and your brother’ll probably never get over it.”
    Buck bit his tongue. Why did he always have to do this, and especially right now? His dad was right. If only Buck could admit that, maybe they could move on. He had been resented by the family ever since he’d gone on to college, following his academic prowess to the Ivy League. Where he came from, the kids were supposed to follow their parents into the business. His dad’s was trucking fuel into the state, mostly from Oklahoma and Texas. It was a tough business with local people thinking the resources ought to all come from their own state. Jeff had worked his way up in the little business, starting in the office, then driving a truck, now running the day-to-day operations.
    There had been a lot of bad blood, especially since Cameron was away at school when his mother fell ill. She had insisted he stay in school, but when he missed coming home for Christmas due to money problems, his dad and brother never really forgave him. His mother died while he was away, and he got the cold shoulder even at her funeral.
    Some healing had occurred over the years, mostly because his family loved to claim him and brag about him once he became known as a journalistic prodigy. He had let bygones be bygones but resented that he was now welcome because he was somebody. And so he rarely went home. There was too much baggage to reconcile completely, but he was still angry with himself for opening old wounds when his family was suffering.
    “If there’s some kind of memorial service or something, I’ll try to make it, Dad. All right?”
    “You’ll try ?”
    “That’s all I can promise. You can imagine how busy things are at Global right now. Needless to say, this is the story of the century.”
    “Will you be writing the cover story?”
    “I’ll have a lot to do with the coverage, yeah.”
    “But the cover?”
    Buck sighed, suddenly tired. It was no wonder. He’d been awake nearly twenty-four hours. “I don’t know, Dad. I’ve already filed a lot of stuff. My guess is this next issue will be a huge special with lots of stuff from all over. It’s unlikely my piece would be the sole cover article. It looks like I do have the assignment for a pretty major treatment two weeks from now.”
    He hoped that would satisfy his dad. He wanted to get off and get some sleep. But it didn’t.
    “What’s that mean? What’s the story?”
    “Oh, I’ll be pulling together several writers’ pieces on the theories behind what’s happened.”
    “That’ll be a big job. Everybody I talk to has a different idea. You know your brother is afraid it was like the last judgment of God or