Dying for a Living (A Jesse Sullivan Novel)

by Shrum, Kory M.

  “You see these beams here?” Kyra pointed up. “Flying buttresses became popular in the—”

  I nudged her, cutting her off. “This is not art appreciation class.”

  She looked crestfallen. “Right. Sorry.”

  A priest came straight toward us, his black robe swishing about his ankles.

  Kyra was on it. Gracefully, she strode toward him, all smiles. In seconds she had him blushing as she made grand gestures toward the ceiling and smaller ones toward us. I held up my red-enveloped invitation just in case.

  Cindy scoped out the area then came close to whisper in my ear. “I don’t see the priest. You should duck out while he’s not watching.”

  “Come on.” Lane tugged my hand in agreement, trying to pull me from the allure of the ceiling and the little painted Christ-child in rich rosy hues.

  “Remember we’ll have to leave by nine,” Cindy said. “That’s when they lock the doors.”

  With Kyra blocking the priest’s view, and no one else in sight, Lane and I ducked under the velvet ropes barring a stone hallway. Immediately, we ducked left out of sight. Lane took the lead, turning a corner into an identical hallway.

  The walls and floor were the same stone as the outside of the church. A long, red rug ran the length of the hallway, giving it a rather gothic look. There were several doors on each side before the hallway ended at a T, splitting into separate directions.

  Lane pressed his ear to the first left door and then opened it, moving inside. I did the same to the right. There wasn’t much in my first room. No windows, so it reminded me of a cell. There was a desk with some papers on it, mostly receipts and thank you notes from various congregational members. Nothing that pointed me toward Ally or the black future we were trying to avoid.

  I had similar results behind the next three doors. Each held odd pieces of furniture, a chair or chest. Others held vases, pictures of Jesus, and bookcases with Bibles and devotional hymns. But still nothing I could use to determine Ally’s whereabouts. The last door was locked. I pointed this out to Lane after he’d checked all the doors on his side of the hallway.

  He wiggled the handle himself.

  “Are we going to break it down?” I whispered. I made a kicking motion in the air.

  He shook his head. At the end of our hallway, I leaned around the corners in each direction of the T, but I didn’t see any doors or people.

  “I don’t think anyone will hear if you knock softly,” I whispered.

  He shook his head again. Then put his lips right against my ear. “They wouldn’t keep her this close to the front, in case she screamed.”

  Good point.

  I followed him around the corner. I traced the entire length of the right hallway but found no doors except one at the very end. When I pushed it open, I found a staircase leading down into pitch black darkness.

  I shivered. No way in hell I was going down there by myself. Lane caught my attention by waving his arms and motioning me to follow him.

  Turns out, at his end of the T-passage there was a door just like the one on my end. But this one didn’t open to a staircase. It opened to a bedroom.

  A twin bed with rumpled white sheets and a down blanket sat tucked into the corner. It looked as though someone had just rolled out of it. The desk was neater than the one I’d seen in the other room. A small flower rested in the vase beside a lamp which was still on, giving the room a soft glow, but Lane didn’t bring me in here to see any of this. As I stared at this little living space, he was frantically jerking my sleeve and pointing at the bed. Ally’s red coat.

  I had a hard time dividing my attention between the coat and the painting on the wall.

  In a large frame, there was a picture of Mr. Reeves, the creepy guy from my mother’s funeral. He wore a nicely tailored suit much like the one I’d seen him in at my mother’s funeral, except this suit was navy blue with a red tie. I soaked the painting up, not sure what it meant. What was the creepy guy from my mother’s funeral doing here? Was he a church supporter? Was he a clergyman? Even so, why’d they hang a picture of him in a Nashville church?

  I filed the portrait in the back of my mind under “Shit To Sort Out Later.” I was a terribly simple girl when it came to problems and my plate was so full the vegetables were falling off.

  Lane insisted we go back and investigate the dark staircase, since it was the only place left to look. We checked every inch of the basement, but no Ally. It was terrifying to be in the basement, because it looked the most like the room in the drawings. Pretty sure Ally was no longer in the church, we crept out. Kyra and Cindy were waiting in the parking lot, catty-corner to the cemetery.

  “We only found her coat,” I said. “You?”

  “No,” Kyra said.

  “Wait. There it is again.” Cindy’s hands shot up.

  “I—” Lane started but Cindy stopped him.

  “Shhh.” Cindy did a sort of twitch, side step. “There!”

  We strained to hear whatever it was Cindy was talking about. A phone suddenly vibrated and we all jumped. Lane pulled out his phone and saw Gloria’s name on the display. He flipped it open. After listening for just a moment, he handed it to me.

  “Bobkins is here to serve your warrant,” Gloria said. “Tell him where you are. You don’t want more trouble.”

  She seemed to mean something by more. I tried to play along. “Put him on the phone.”

  “Bobkins,” he said.

  “So what are my charges?” I asked.

  “Murder,” he said.

  Of course. “And who did I kill?”

  “Eddie Phelps and Nessa Hildebrand. Eve Hildebrand gave a full confession today, saying that you killed her daughter and she was taking revenge.”

  My heart stopped. “Did you find Nessa’s body?”

  “It’s only a matter of time.”

  I sighed, relieved. Maybe the little girl was still alive. Bobkins was an idiot and hopefully a misinformed one. Eve must’ve folded under the pressure.

  “You can either turn yourself in or I can pick you up,” he pressed.

  “How thoughtful.” My heart pounded like a jackhammer busting up concrete. Prison! “Why don’t I just leave the line open so you can trace my call?”

  “Or you can tell me where you are?” he retorted.

  What was a “resisting arrest” charge compared to murder? I couldn’t cater to Bobkins anyway because I only had so much time to find Ally before they hauled me away. “Come and get me.”

  I put the phone in my pocket and left the call connected. If Gloria was right about this tracing business, they’d be able to find me. I wasn’t sure why Gloria wanted the cops to come to the church, but if she thought it might help us, I was willing to go on a little faith. Faith was about all I had left to work with.

  Lane, Kyra and Cindy were making funny gestures and debating something amongst themselves.

  “What’s going on now?” I asked. The reality of a confining cell in my immediate feature seriously dampened my mood.

  Lane held up his hand. “I heard it.”

  I listened until I heard it, a muffled banging noise. I had no idea where it was coming from.

  “Is that what you’re flipping out about? So what? Some squirrels are getting frisky in their nest.”

  “Big squirrels,” Cindy muttered, her ears still turned, straining.

  Kyra’s face lit up. “Oh my god, what if they put her in one of these trunks?”

  Their eyes scanned the parking lot and the dozen cars filling random spaces.

  “If Ally is in the trunk, we have to be quick,” I said. “The cops are coming to arrest me.”

  “What?” Kyra and Cindy cried simultaneously. Oh, now they heard me. Lane pulled me closer, like holding me was going to keep me from going to prison.

  I tried to make a joke. “I’ve always wanted to sit in a cell and sing, Nobody knows the troubles I’ve seen…Can one of you loan me a tin cup that I can use to rake the bars?”

&n
bsp; “How much time do we have?” Cindy was already lowering her ear to the nearest trunk and knocking. No one appreciated my humor.

  “Minutes,” I said.

  “We should run,” Lane said. “I can hide you.”

  I pulled away from him. “I’m not leaving until we find her. Let’s just search the trunks.”

  Everyone took a car, doing a tap and listen sort of system. I knocked on three cars before Cindy yelled my name. We abandoned our cars and trotted over to the tan sedan furthest from the church’s back door. It was parked conspicuously under a large tree, which rained dying leaves with each windy burst.

  Cindy raised her hand from the trunk. “Well something’s in here.”

  Kyra knocked on the trunk and a barrage of noise reverberated back. The noise was somewhere between muffled screams and shuffling noises.

  “How do we get it open?” I asked, hesitating. What if it wasn’t Ally? I’d heard stories about raccoons mauling people. Of course, I wasn’t sure why someone would have a raccoon in their trunk but I had theories. I always had theories.

  Lane lifted a huge rock from beneath the tree and shoved it through the driver side window. The glass shattered, hitting the dark pavement in a shower of glitter. In the overhead street light, it looked gold.

  “That works,” Kyra said. The alarm went off screeching like crazy as Kyra opened the door and pushed the trunk release button tucked somewhere up under the dash. The trunk popped open as the four of us crowded around to see what was inside.

  Ally. She was bound and gagged with her hands behind her back. I pulled the gag out of her mouth as Lane lifted her from the trunk.

  “I never thought I’d see you like this,” I said. I held her coat open so she could slip her arms inside the sleeves once she was free.

  “I never thought I’d see you again,” she said as Lane put her on her feet.

  Lane worked on loosening the ropes completely. Ally didn’t look away from me once, tears rolling down her face as he worked. Her mouth was red, irritated from where the cloth had worked against the skin. As soon as the rope snapped she threw herself against me and kissed me full on the mouth.

  And I mean kissed me, wet cheeks and all. Was that her tongue? When she pulled back her arms went around my neck, crushing the coat between us.

  “I have so much to tell you,” she said.

  “Obviously.” Kyra tilted her head with a naughty smile.

  Lane was not smiling. I did my best to ignore the attention and the warm tingles in my body. I looked down to hide my blush. If Lane was mad about this kiss and what doubts it must cast on my monogamy pledge, I was sure I’d hear about it later.

  “Here’s your coat,” I said, offering the coat again. “You’ll have to save whatever you want to tell me for visiting hours. The police are on their way to arrest me.”

  “That’s perfect,” Ally said. She grabbed me and pulled me toward the church. “Come on.”

  “No,” I said. “We just came out of there. We can’t go back in.”

  “We’ve got to get Nessa,” she said. “I promised.”

  “Nessa is in there? But we searched everywhere.” That’d be great. A living Nessa would exonerate me of at least one crime and throw doubt on Eve’s confession. I hadn’t worked out a plan for the whole killing Eddie thing though. But maybe I’d get something less than a life sentence or the death penalty if I could prove it was self-defense.

  “Jesse can’t go back into the church,” Lane said. “It isn’t safe.”

  “If the agent is on his way, he’ll be able to help,” Ally said.

  Ally dragged me to the back door, yanking it open. Lane grabbed a hold of my other hand. “No, you don’t understand,” he said. “There are these pictures that Gloria drew.”

  “Don’t tug on me.” I yanked my hands away from both of them and pulled my keys free from my pocket. “First of all, Kyra and Cindy need to get out of here. You’ll be safer at the office with Gloria or at home.”

  “We can’t just leave you,” Kyra said.

  “You’d better,” I said. “It’s two less people for me to worry about.”

  “I thought you wanted help?” Cindy asked.

  “I want nothing more than to ask for your help.” With Cindy’s help I might be able to save at least two people if that horrible picture comes true. “But I can’t ask you to risk your life. If they want me dead for being a Necronite, then you aren’t safe either.”

  Cindy hesitated but I could see the relief in her face. She would have stayed if she had to, but she couldn’t be happier that I’d given her a way out. “But what about you?”

  “I’ve got these guys to help me,” I said, smiling at Ally and Lane. “I’ll be okay.”

  When Cindy led a reluctant Kyra toward the office, I turned to find Ally all grins.

  “What are you so happy about?” I asked her. “I’m going to prison.”

  “I’m so happy to see you,” she said. She bit her lip. “I’m so happy. I just knew they were going to shoot me and bury me in a ditch.”

  Lane huffed. “So did Jesse get a chance to tell you that we’re—”

  I cut him off. Ally was just rescued from a near death. She didn’t need to hear that I was dating someone else right now.

  “I’m glad you’re okay too. I wanted to apologize for—hey!”

  I fell to the ground as Lane shoved me out of the way and took the full force of the shovel to his own skull. I didn’t even have time to process his body collapsing to the ground beside me before I saw a steel plate whishing toward my face.

  Chapter 24

  When I woke up, my head was killing me. Not literally, but I wished I was dead just so I didn’t have to feel the massive lump throbbing on the side of my skull. My face was sticky with blood, but I reminded myself that face cuts always bleed profusely, so no need to panic yet. Again, I wasn’t afraid of dying, but I was worried about blacking out before I discovered what was going on.

  And I was worried about my face. Ok, maybe I’m a little vain.

  As my vision blurred into focus I saw the bed first. A twin-sized mattress like we saw in a room upstairs, sat just to my right against the wall. Ally and Lane were tied up to chairs across from me with a dark door to the left. I jumped up and ran toward them only to be yanked back.

  Something had me by the ankle—a little shackle equipped with a bell that jingled.

  The door opened and a man entered as if I’d summoned him purposely.

  “Hello, again,” he said. He was dressed as Cindy had described him, black robe and white collar. I tried not to think of him with his penis in his hand, standing behind Eve.

  “Brad,” I said. “I was wondering when the hell you’d turn up.”

  “My name is Martin,” he said.

  “Brad suits you better than Martin,” I said. “Martin seems too goody-goody for you.”

  I didn’t let on that I knew he wasn’t Brad, or even that I knew he probably wasn’t a priest but an FBRD agent. After all, what else would guarantee a bullet to the brain better than proving I already knew too much?

  He smiled. “Did you enjoy watching us? I bet you did, you sick little bitch.”

  “Wow, such language for a priest,” I said. “And actually, I was thinking if they offered sex-education in seminaries, maybe your performance would’ve been better. Five minutes? Come on.”

  His face burned crimson despite the poor lighting of this cramped room. Martin had an ego. Good to know. Maybe it would get the best of him like mine did me. I was sure going to try.

  “I thought priests took a vow of celibacy,” I said. “Do your church patrons know how you and Eve tricked me into dying?”

  His face changed into something resembling pain.

  “I’ll take that as a no,” I said. “So this is the part where I call you a kettle, because I think you’re the one who enjoyed it. Oh, Martin, don’t tell me. Was it your first time? Well, that explains some things.”

  “Shut up!” he
barked.

  Then it hit me. I realized where the hell I was.

  The room spun and I grabbed my head to steady myself, failing to hold back the horror of where we were: stone walls, lamps casting playful shadows. Rachel and Gloria had seen this and if I didn’t do something differently, I knew where this was going.

  We would die down here.

  All of us.

  “Don’t shout, Martin,” I said, and tried to keep breathing. “That shovel gave me a headache, man.”

  “Shut up.”

  “Not much of a vocabulary. I thought seminary-types were well-educated.” I wanted to keep him talking. To keep him talking meant time. Time meant possible rescue. Bobkins had to be on his way, right? But where was Lane’s phone? It wasn’t on me anymore.

  Lane craned his neck to one side then the other. He was gagged, just like Ally. One of his eyes was swollen shut and purple. The other opened wide and the fire in it told me he was going to annihilate Martin first chance he got. I was quite happy to untie him and let him do it, except my little ankle bracelet only let me go so far.

  When he saw where I was looking, Martin turned back. His eyes fixed on Ally who had just woken up too. “Good.”

  The more of Martin’s teeth that I saw, the more nervous I got.

  “Why didn’t you cut off my head as soon as you knocked me out?” I asked, hoping he’d turn his attention on me. “That eager to tie me to a bed? Did you learn a few things from Eve?”

  It worked and his eyes flicked to mine. “I know all about your kind. It’s easier to kill you permanently if you’re dead. Decapitation, of course. It’s a small but effective window.”

  “Right, I forgot you’ve got plenty of practice by now. You should know how to do it right.” My eyes wouldn’t stay open. I must’ve had a concussion from getting hit in the head with that damn shovel. I hoped my brain was okay. I couldn’t save anyone without my brains.