Unholy Order
Page 28
Charles was blinking again, apparently confused by the question.
Devlin made his voice even softer and asked again, “Why do they have to die, Charles?”
Charles continued to blink, then suddenly focused on Devlin’s face. “They’re homosexuals,” he said. “They defile their priesthood with their sins, with their very being.” As he spoke, his mouth twisted with hatred.
Sharon was only five feet away from him now. “Do I defile my job, Charles?” she asked. “Does my very being offend you?”
Charles’s eyes snapped to the sound of her voice. “Yes, it does,” he hissed.
Sharon gave him a cold smile. “Is that why you sent Emilio Valdez to kill me?” she asked.
It had gone too far now. Devlin turned to Ollie. “Read him his rights,” he snapped.
Ollie did so. Charles remained fixed on Sharon.
“Do you understand your rights?” Devlin asked.
Charles looked at him briefly, then turned his gaze back on Sharon. The dagger, still held above his head in both hands, had dropped slightly but was still poised to strike. “I understand,” he said. “I understand everything.” He smiled at Sharon. “Yes,” he said. “That’s why I sent him.”
His voice held an arrogance that made Sharon blink. “What about you, Charles?” she asked. “What about your sexuality? What part did that play?”
Charles glared at her. “I am a priest of God,” he hissed.
“So is Father Janis. So were the four men you had killed.”
Again, Charles’s face twisted with hatred. “No … they … were … not.” His voice was sharp, each word spat out, each standing alone like an individual truth.
“We spoke to Ginger, Charles,” Sharon said. “She told us what you like.”
The hands holding the dagger began to tremble. “Shut up!” Charles shouted. “Shut up, shut up, shut up!”
Devlin saw Ollie inching closer and realized what Sharon was doing. She was drawing Charles’s attention, forcing him to concentrate on her, so Ollie could slip from his peripheral vision and move up behind him. If Ollie could get his big hands on Meyerson’s wrists it would be over.
Devlin moved to his right, until he was beside Sharon. “It confuses me, Charles,” Devlin said. “Hiring a prostitute to do those things to you.”
Charles’s eyes blazed with rage. “She kept me pure,” he snapped. “She kept me from temptation.” The trembling in his hands increased, causing the dagger above his head to wave back and forth.
Sharon stepped in closer, forcing his eyes to her. “Is that why you had her use a strap-on dildo, Charles? So she could do the same thing to you that someone did to Father Donovan … Father Falco … Father Hall … Father Halloran?” She snapped out the names of the murdered priests, watching as each one caused Charles’s head to jerk back as though he’d been slapped, Sharon’s eyes hardened. “Did you think if a woman fucked you in the ass you wouldn’t be a homosexual yourself?”
“Is that what you thought, Charles?” Devlin asked. “Is that how Ginger kept you pure, how she saved you from temptation?”
Charles staggered back, one step, then another. The movement brought Ollie into view, closer now than he had expected. Charles spun to face him, then quickly lowered the dagger, bringing the blade against his own throat.
Devlin watched him press the blade against the skin, just above the carotid artery. A trickle of blood ran along his neck. “Don’t do it, Charles. Suicide is a mortal sin.”
His hand shook, causing the dagger to cut deeper. “God will forgive me,” Charles said.
Devlin knew he should step back; knew he should move Sharon and Ollie back as well. If Charles cut through the artery it would send out a spray of blood that would hit all of them. Hit their faces, their eyes. If he, too, had AIDS, they could all be infected. But he couldn’t move, couldn’t step away. Sharon and Ollie also remained in place.
“No, he won’t. God won’t be able to forgive you.” Devlin kept his voice soft, calm. “Think back to your catechism, Charles. Suicide is the product of despair, a loss of all hope. It denies the sinner a chance to seek forgiveness. If you do this, God will be helpless, Charles. You’ll be condemned to hell.”
“No one has to know, Charles,” Sharon said. “You won’t go to prison. You’ll go to a hospital. You can be a priest there, Charles. There are people there who need priests.”
“It’ll hurt, Charlie,” Ollie said. “It’ll hurt real bad. Then you’ll lie there and drown in your own blood, and everybody will know why you did it. We’ll have to tell them why, if you kill yourself.”
Charles blinked repeatedly. He looked at Ollie. “You won’t tell them?” His voice sounded like a small child.
“No,” Devlin said. “No one will tell. No one will ever know.”
Charles dropped his hands to his side, Ollie’s arm flashed out and his oversized fist wrapped around Charles’s wrist in a viselike grip. Devlin stepped forward and eased the dagger from his hand.
Charles looked down at the bejeweled dagger, then his eyes rose to Devlin’s face. “Did you know that dagger once belonged to Saint Thomas More?” he asked.
Epilogue
Devlin put down the Sunday Times and took a sip of strong Cuban coffee. It was the last of the beans they had smuggled into the States a year ago, when they had returned from Cuba, the last evidence of the federal crime he and Adrianna had committed by “trading with the enemy.”
Adrianna came up beside him and looked down over his shoulder at the front-page story that told of Charles Meyerson’s arrest.
“You think the mayor will be happy?” she asked.
“Should be,” Devlin said. “So far nothing has come out to make the archdiocese squeal.”
“You think it will stay that way?” she asked.
Devlin shrugged, looked up at her, and smiled. “You’re hoping it won’t, right? You’re hoping something will happen to get Howie in an uproar, and he’ll fire my sorry butt.”
“I didn’t say that.”
Devlin laughed. “You never say it. You only think it.”
“I just don’t like you putting yourself in danger all the time,” she said. “Kneeling there, all dressed up like a priest, while that madman came down the aisle with a knife in his hand.”
“It was a dagger,” Devlin said. “And it once belonged to Saint Thomas More.”
Adrianna exhaled heavily and rolled her eyes. “So what really happened will never come out?”
Devlin shook his head. “Not if the mayor and the DA have anything to say about it. And the archdiocese and Opus Christi sure aren’t talking.”
Adrianna smiled like a teacher who had caught a clever student cheating. “So Charles Meyerson was just a madman.”
“That part’s true enough,” Devlin said. “So’s the part about a powerful banker who got involved with a Colombian drug cartel—and used them to carry out his fantasies about killing Catholic priests.”
“And there won’t be anything about the priests being gay or having AIDS?”
“Not unless the archdiocese decides to acknowledge it.” He laughed. But there was no joy in it, Adrianna realized.
“I guess that’s one big snowball in hell,” she said. “What about the nun, Sister Manuela?”
“The wiser heads in the mayor’s and DA’s offices have decided she was coerced by Charles and the drug lords, that they needed her to front for them with the religious artifacts they used to get heroin into the country. That Charles picked her because she had worked for him, and he knew she was vulnerable; they could threaten her family in Bogotá.” He shrugged again. “That’s true enough too. According to what Charles told us, at least.”
“And the case will never go to trial?”
“Not a chance. Charles’s attorney has agreed to have him committed. And Estaves is being deported. We don’t have enough to try him.”
“What if Charles is found competent someday?” Adrianna asked.
“I hope
he is,” Devlin said. “But by that time I’ll be on some beach, using my walker to chase young women in thongs.”
Adrianna slapped his shoulder, then eased herself onto his lap. “You think I’d look good in a thong?” she asked.
Devlin let out a low grunt. “I’d sure like to find out,” he said.
Phillipa bounced up to the table, ending their game. It was the way she walked now. She bounced. It was as though she had springs in her toes, Devlin thought.
“Daddo,” she said. It was an ominous start—a name she used only when she wanted something.
Devlin eyed her suspiciously. “Yeees?” he said, drawing out the word.
Phillipa grinned at him. “Joslyn solved the Madison Square Garden problem,” she said.
“What problem was that?” he asked. “And who’s Joslyn?”
Phillipa rolled her eyes. “Daaad. Joslyn’s my friend. The one who had two tickets to the concert at Madison Square Garden. The one you said I couldn’t go to unless an adult came with us.”
“I seem to remember some other parts of that story,” Devlin said. “Something about taking tickets from a stranger. That’s just a minor detail, of course.”
Phillipa shifted from foot to foot. “Yeah, I guess I remember that part,” she said. Her face broke into a beatific grin. “But that’s history, right?”
Devlin narrowed his eyes. “Okay, it’s history. So?”
Phillipa’s face exploded into a grin. “So Joslyn’s mother got three tickets. She bought and paid for them herself.”
Devlin groaned inwardly. He was trapped. He could feel Adrianna’s body quiver with silent laughter as she sat on his lap. He thought about pinching her but decided against it.
“So Joslyn’s mother is going to take you,” he said. It wasn’t a question, but a statement spoken as a deeply regretted fact.
“Uh-uh,” Phillipa said.
Devlin felt a moment of reprieve. “I’m sorry, honey, but three kids going together is the same as two, as far as I’m concerned.” He looked up at Adrianna for support. “Don’t you agree?” he asked.
“Oh, yes,” she said. There was a clearly false tone in her voice. She knew something he did not. It was a plot, the two of them were suckering him. They had done it before, too many times.
“If Joslyn’s mother isn’t going with you, what’s the deal?”
Phillipa gave him a look intended to melt the strongest father’s heart. He immediately steeled himself against it.
“Tell me,” he snapped.
Phillipa maintained the look, her eyes large and round and very innocent. “Joslyn’s mom said she’ll give the ticket to you. She said she’d feel really good if you’d go with us. She said what could be safer than having a police inspector right there with her twelve-year-old daughter?”
Devlin closed his eyes and groaned.
“You will, won’t you?” Phillipa asked. The tone of her voice now was something on the brink of devastating disappointment. Devlin wondered where she had learned how to do that.
Adrianna kissed his forehead. “It will probably be fun,” she said.
Devlin gave his daughter a cold, malicious smile. “Who’s the group?” he asked.
Phillipa glanced at Adrianna, then back at her father. “The Rat’s Nest Girls,” she whispered. “They’re new, and they’re really, really cool. I think you’ll really, really like them.”
“The Rat’s Nest Girls,” Devlin repeated. He looked into his daughter’s beautiful face. “Hip-hop?” he asked.
Phillipa nodded. “But really, really cool,” she said, her eyes still wide and pleading.
Adrianna’s body was shaking uncontrollably now. This time Devlin did pinch her.
Author’s Note
Opus Christi, the religious order depicted in this novel, is purely fictitious. There is, however, within the Catholic church today, a religious group called Opus Dei, whose history, practices, and beliefs closely resemble those fictionalized within these pages. It is a controversial religious order that many within the church have questioned and condemned in a manner not unlike what is written here.
To the author’s knowledge, neither Opus Dei, nor any of its members, has ever been accused of a criminal act, either as a group or individually. This is purely the author’s imagination at work.
This is a novel about religious fanaticism, its dangers to the people caught up in it, and what could occur when it is allowed to exist unquestioned and unchallenged. It is intended as nothing more.
About the Author
WILLIAM HEFFERNAN won the 1996 Edgar Award for his novel Tarnished Blue. He is the author of fifteen novels, including his previous Paul Devlin novel, Red Angel, and the international bestsellers The Corsican, Ritual, Blood Rose, and Corsican Honor. A former reporter for the New York Daily News, he lives in Vermont with his wife and three sons.
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ALSO BY WILLIAM HEFFERNAN
BEULAH HILL
RED ANGEL
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THE DINOSAUR CLUB
WINTER’S GOLD
TARNISHED BLUE
SCARRED
CORSICAN HONOR
BLOOD ROSE
RITUAL
ACTS OF CONTRITION
THE CORSICAN
CAGING THE RAVEN
BRODERICK
Praise for Edgar Award-winner
WILLIAM HEFFERNAN
and
UNHOLY ORDER
“Heffernan can write a mean page and create a living character in a few words.”
Stuart M. Kaminsky
“[A] great tale … The plot … is wonderful.”
Providence Journal-Bulletin
“Creepy … Heffernan does a good job of showing that fanaticism in any guise can be a destructive, evil force.”
Orlando Sentinel
“The plot twists tighter and tighter.”
Salt Lake City Deseret News
“Heffernan knows how to create characters through sharp and distinctive dialogue; his pacing is fast and fluid, and his plotting is superb.”
Nelson DeMille
“Fascinating … There’s plenty for thriller fans to enjoy.”
Library Journal
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2002 by Daisychain Productions, Inc.
ISBN: 978-0-062-02907-2
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EPub Edition © OCTOBER 2010 ISBN: 978-0-062-02907-2
First Avon Books paperback printing: December 2002
First William Morrow hardcover printing: February 2002
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