by Logan Fox
“Then he’d have taken her somewhere we couldn’t find them in the first place.”
Back then, when Zach was lying in that hospital bed with tubes sticking out of him, I was sure I’d lose it. So instead of fixating on how likely he was to die, I tried to put together the pieces of this fucked up jigsaw puzzle.
But too much of it didn’t make sense.
Gabriel had evaded us for close to a decade. Then all of a sudden he pops up on our radar. All right, not him, per se, but a bread crumb. The first of many. An article anyone but us would have missed.
A missing child turned up five years after he’d been kidnapped walking home from school one day. Told reporters he’d been abducted by a priest. Turns out the guy was a bank manager, and little Stuart only thought he was a priest because he wore a crucifix and spoke about God a lot.
The kid’s abductor made a run for it, and was never found, but that article sure as hell got our attention.
We visited the abandoned house where the kid had been kept. Then we broke in one night and took a look inside. Tried to figure out where Stuart had been held.
No surprise: it was the basement.
There were too many similarities in how it had been set up for it to have been a coincidence.
Mattresses, covered in dirty sheets, lying on the floor. Hooks dangling from the ceiling. Metal dog bowls for water and food. Metal sheets riveted in place over whatever windows there were.
And then there was the cold.
And the damp.
And rats.
That article, that house, eventually led to Father Gabriel. But before we could track him down, he came to us.
ORPHANAGE UNDER NEW ADMINISTRATION
A short piece. Barely news-worthy. But it made it into the paper, and it had his name in it, and that’s how we located him.
We’d found the Guardian.
A man who moved around the country and set up basements like the one we were kept in. Like the one little Stuart had been found in.
A man who kept his record clean. A man no one would suspect.
A priest.
And because we knew so many of our Ghosts were men of the cloth, there was no doubt in our minds that we’d found the orchestrator of the biggest child sex-trafficking ring of this century.
But how could a man who was so cunning, so fucking intelligent and well connected, be so stupid?
He could have taken Trinity anywhere, and we’d have lost them.
But he brought her here.
To her old house.
A house that was in his name.
That same day, Apollo told us everything Gabriel had said to him in the storm drain. But it had taken weeks of cajoling before Trinity told us her side of the story.
She believed Gabriel was lying. He’d become unstable, not sure if he wanted her as a daughter or a lover or a friend. And she decided she couldn’t trust anything that came out of his mouth.
But what if Trinity was right? Maybe Gabriel had become unhinged. He’d realized he’d made a mistake taking her home. So he decided to try again. And this time, he would make her vanish without a trace.
“…think? Hey, Rube? Are you listening?”
I come back to the present with a big inhale, and then shake my head. “What?”
Apollo’s eyes dim a little. “I said we should find an Internet cafe or something. I can download some of my code off the cloud and do some digging around. I mean, we’ve got the van.”
I take a last pull of the cigarette before crushing it out under my foot. Then I head back to the SUV without answering him.
Cass and Zach are already inside. Zach is in the driver’s seat now, and Cass is working his way through a ginger beer after deciding he’d rather sit in my seat than Zach’s. I move around to the other side of the car and climb in, kicking shit over to his footwell to make room for my feet.
One of those things catches my eye.
Trinity’s purse.
Cass and I both see it at the same time, but he gets to it first. Grabs it. Flicks it open.
His hand is shaking when he takes out the envelope, and I’m about to snatch it from him and tear it open how he’s struggling to get the paper.
“It’s a letter from Gabriel,” he says.
His pupils shift left to right as he scans the page.
“Fuck.” He looks up and locks eyes with me. “Guys…fuck.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Trinity
I’m about halfway through my search of the basement when my foot hits something in the dark. With a metallic gong I’m sure could be heard a mile away, a dog bowl flies away with a clang, clang, clang before finally coming to rest.
My foot’s wet.
I think there was water or something in there.
Now the smell’s stronger. I gag and shake my leg, trying to get the water off.
Hell, I hope it’s water. I’m not so sure anymore.
I hold my breath for a moment, wondering if anyone upstairs heard the ruckus. Then I start moving forward again, trying to remember which direction I was headed.
The smell is so much stronger now.
Stagnant water, is all.
My foot touches another mattress. Unless my imagined dimensions of this place are wrong, I’m close to another wall. I’m guessing this mattress is pushed up against it.
I lean forward, but I don’t feel a wall where I should. So step onto the mattress and stretch—
Something bumps my foot.
If I hadn’t clapped my hands over my mouth, I would have screamed. In fact, I do still scream, but the sound is muffled.
I jump back, my heart clanging in my chest almost as loud as that dog bowl.
What the hell was that?
I wait for something to happen. A sound that indicates movement, perhaps. More rat claws maybe.
But there’s nothing.
So I crouch down and grope in the dark until I touch the edge of the mattress.
My fingers brush the surface as I move them reluctantly forward.
I’m almost sure I can make out the incredibly vague, pale outline of the mattress. But if so, then there must be a big stain in the center, because that area is dark.
God, I wish there was more light down here.
I swipe my fingers left to right over the mattress, with no idea where I’d felt the thing on my foot.
But there’s nothing there.
Probably because I chased it away.
And I have no idea if I’m relieved or grossed out by the thought that I touched a live rat with my foot.
I’m just about to stand when my fingers snag something.
I freeze.
It takes me a few seconds to figure out what I’m touching.
Hair.
I leap back.
My scream echoes back to me, but I couldn’t give a fuck if everyone above me heard. I scramble away, tripping on the edge of another mattress and falling hard on my ass. Then I’m on hands and knees, crawling. I hit another dog bowl but this one’s dry and doesn’t splash me.
I’m half-sobbing, half-choking by the time I get close to the other side of the basement—arms outstretched as I search out the wall I know is getting closer.
But instead of hitting the wall, something slams into my stomach. I fold in half, gasping in pain, sobbing with shock, and grab for something to hold onto.
I ran into a bar of steel.
A railing.
Stairs.
I’m up them a second later. Now my sobs are tearing me apart. Bile vaults up my throat, but I choke it down with a ragged gasp.
My hands bang against something.
A door.
I slam my fists onto it.
“Let me out! Please, please!” My throat burns as I shriek out a string of desperate pleas. “Let me out!”
As if someone on the other side of the door hears my prayers, it swings open.
I fall forward, stumble, catch myself, and go hurtling into the light. I
can’t see a thing—it’s just white, and there’s shouting and movement.
I run into someone.
They grab me.
Is it Hoody? The man with the polo shirt under his sweater? Or the woman with the gun?
I don’t care.
I don’t care.
I swipe my hands over my face, push hair out of my eyes.
The man in front of me, the one I ran into, he spreads his arms.
Smiles.
I recognize that smile.
But I don’t know how.
Because the man staring at me is a stranger.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Apollo
“Trinity’s dad faked his own death?” I murmur.
I’m still staring at the letter Cass passed me. He read it out, but I’m reading it again. I was hoping I could get something—anything—by the font or type of paper he used.
But it’s a standard font in Word printed on ordinary, cheap, letter-sized paper.
Even the signature just reads ‘Gabriel’ with an indecipherable flourish that could be anything.
Cass blows a plume of cigarette smoke out of the car window. “It would appear so.”
We moved the car to the far side of the parking lot a few minutes ago. We should have started driving already, but we don’t know where to go. Which means we could be heading in the wrong direction, moving further away from Trinity.
“What if he’s lying?” Zach asks, twisting in his seat to scan our faces.
“Gabriel? Why would he?” Rube sits forward a little in his seat. “He’s dead.”
According to Gabriel’s letter, Trinity’s father—Keith Malone—is still alive. And although he states it as a fact, he doesn’t back it up with evidence.
“Then what about her mom? Is she alive too?”
“It doesn’t say,” Cass reminds me.
“Yeah…but…”
“Look, this isn’t getting us any closer to finding them,” Cass says. He flicks the butt of the cigarette out of the window.
“What will?” Rube asks.
Quiet settles down. I’ve been trying to figure that out the past ten minutes, and I’m sure everyone else has too. But we don’t have any leads.
“We’re assuming Gabriel took her, but what if it wasn’t him?” Zach says quietly. And then puts his hand over Cass’s so he’ll stop tapping his nail. “He could have had someone else do it.”
“But how would he know—” Rube begins, sighing as he speaks.
“The lawyer.” Cass snatches his hand out from under Zach’s and clicks his fingers. “She obviously called him when Trinity picked up the key.”
“So? We weren’t followed here,” Rube says. “How would he know exactly when—”
Rube stops talking when Zach lifts a hand and points out his window.
We all turn to look.
“What?” I ask, peering at the house. The garden. The roof.
“There,” Zach says.
And then I see it.
A For Sale sign.
But I don’t get it.
“He’s watching the house,” Zach says. “Trinity’s old babysitter said a young couple moved in across the road. No kids, but the house is big enough for a family of five.”
“So they watch the house. Someone lets him know Trinity’s arrived. He comes and snatches her? And then what? Where does he go? And why?” Cass shakes his head. “What does he—”
“We have to go back,” I say. “Back to her house.”
Zach opens his mouth as if to argue, but then closes it again. Cass and Rube look at him, then at each other. Like there’s a telepathic conversation going on.
It’s fine, I’ll wait them out.
“He’s right,” Cass murmurs. “Everything leads back to that house.”
“But the safe is gone,” Rube says. “What else could there be?”
There’s a beat of silence. Then Zach says, “It’s not much…”
I grin at him. “But it’s a start.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Rube
My first and only foster family had a study in their house. One wall was lined with bookshelves and old, musty books.
One day when my sisters were all at cheerleading practice and I’d been left alone for the first time in my new home, I was climbing up the walls from boredom. I tried watching television, but it didn’t hold my interest.
So I explored the house, peeking into rooms I’d only caught a glimpse of before.
The study fascinated me. It felt stale and unused—when I opened the door, dust motes shifted through stray beams of light shining in from the window. I felt like I was walking into a crypt.
I went over to the bookshelf and worked my way through the titles. Some of the books stuck together when I tried pulling them out.
Those I left alone, scared I’d damage them and get crapped out.
But some came out a little easier. Titles I’d later learn to recognize, but which were alien to me back then.
Alice in Wonderland.
A Tale of Two Cities.
Casino Royale.
Great Expectations.
I’ll never forget the smell of those books. Or how, when I turned the first page of Alice in Wonderland, I wondered why on earth an adult man would own a book like that.
Since then, I’ve always been drawn to books. My interest moved to bibles when I decided to play the part of a pious kid on his way to becoming a priest as a way to get closer to Father Gabriel without rousing suspicion.
Very little of that interest was feigned.
I found solace in the pages of any bible I read.
Cass is right—there’s no safe in this room anymore. But there is a treasure.
Seems Trinity’s parents collected bibles. Mostly King James, but there’s a Geneva here too. I crack them open, hoping to find a clue, but they’re as barren as the big white one Trinity came to Saint Amos with.
It makes sense—you’d destroy the value of the book by marking it—but a cheap mass-produced King James is just as empty.
I guess the church was just a front for Trinity’s parents.
We split up to search the house. Apollo found a door we assume leads to the basement, but it has a keypad. That combination should be the same one for the safe we can’t find. But Trinity never gave us the code. Apollo’s gone to look around the house and see if there’s another way inside the basement—maybe through a hurricane door or something. Cass and Zach went upstairs.
I said I’d search the study. But there’s nothing in here. I crack open one more bible, but it hits the floor a second later when I hear a rip from upstairs.
Apollo must have just come back inside already—he and Cass are in the main bedroom when I arrive.
We watch, silent, as Zach digs his fingers into the edge of the carpet and yanks up another strip, baring the hardwood floor beneath.
“Hey, Zach?” Cass asks quietly. “Whatcha doing over there, buddy?”
Zach spins around in a crouch, staring at us with a lowered head. Eyes bright, wide. “You don’t smell that?” he spits out. He waves a hand. “It’s all over this fucking place.”
I step forward, sweeping out and arm and using it to herd Cass and Apollo behind me, out of the way. “Smell what?” I ask.
Zach rushes to his feet. He charges toward me, and I almost back up when I see the ferocity on his face. But then he goes right past us, shoves a hand into a closet that’s standing open, and drags out a sweater.
He brings it to me, shoves it under my nose. “This,” he hisses.
I turn my head away, but he follows with the sweater until I take a reluctant sniff at the fabric.
When I snatch it from him and take another whiff, his shoulders sag. “It’s him.”
Zach’s eyes slide past me, fix on Apollo, then Cass. “Our Ghost lives here.”
The sound of ripping carpet fills the room. Cass joined Zach on the floor, and they’ve almost torn up everything. Apollo is by the c
loset, dragging everything out into a pile on the floor.
Zach has them believing they’ll find another safe or something in here.
I’m sure someone with as many secrets as Keith Malone had tons of hidey holes…but even if they do find another secret place, I’m sure it will be empty.
I go through the nightstands. There’s nothing of interest in there—bible, tissues, lip balm, lotion. A half-eaten candy bar still in its wrapper on what I assume is Monica’s side, judging from the feminine scented lotions and creams, but it’s turned white from age.
I almost don’t pick up her bible. None of the ones I’ve found have proved useful yet—why would anything be different up here?
But just like some people can’t walk past a rose bush without smelling the blooms…
The instant I lift Monica’s bible out of the drawer, I know it’s not like the others. For one, it’s been read before. There are faint fingerprints on the cover, as if she handled it after putting on lotion or cuticle oil. When I turn the bible so the spine rests in my palm and focus on the gold-trimmed pages, there’s a narrow section that’s been rubbed off from use.
Behind me, Zach and Cass start discussing which side of the room they’ll start tearing up the floorboards on.
I open the front cover. There’s a short message in an elegant script.
The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
John 1:5
Dear Monica,
Let this book be your light.
Love,
Gabe.
I let the bible fall open in my hands, hoping it will land where the spine was most often opened.
New Testament. The book of Mark.
No notes, no dog ears.
I start paging.
I reach the end of Mark. The faster I thumb through those near-transparent pages, the tighter my chest grows.
Then I skim ahead.
Luke.
The forty-second book of the bible.
I page furiously until I reach chapter eleven.
It starts a quarter of the way down the left page, in the first column.
