by Leanna Ellis
Roc’s gaze shifted above to the ceiling, to the shelves with stacks of books, to the table in the middle of the room with a deep mahogany finish. “You have some criteria for deciding that?”
“I would tell you, but then I’d have to kill you.” Beaumont laughed, this time louder and longer, obviously amused with his pathetic joke. “Oh, yes, I almost forgot…that’s my plan.” The twinkle vanished from his dark eyes, and they turned a flat black, a sliver of white parenthesizing the blackness. “We never disclose our secrets, even to those about to die.”
“In case they get the upper hand?”
“As the college kids like to say, dream on.”
“And did you change Akiva?”
Beaumont tilted his head sideways and blinked slowly. “Is that why you are here? You’re looking for Akiva?”
“It’s one reason.”
“So you’re multi-tasking.” Beaumont laughed. “Well, you’re way off track.”
“We’re about to find out.” Roc jerked the Glock upward, aiming and pulling the trigger all in one motion. In a fraction of a second, Beaumont vanished.
Laughter surrounded Roc, embraced and confused him. He took a step back, tripped on something, then another step, looking behind and around and finally up. The curved edge of a wing stretched out along one outstretched limb of the chandelier. It wasn’t a fancy light fixture with crystals dangling or bulbs flickering like a flame. The solid black iron looked sturdy, as if forged by the resolute ideals during the Revolution. Eight arms branched outward off the main stem, arcing downward and ending with a cap of stained glass.
He didn’t wait for the laughter to die down or for the wing to move again. He aimed and fired six bullets right into the light fixture. Roc immediately covered his eyes with his forearm, as a wild array of pops and sparks ignited above him. Glass rained down, striking the table and floor and shooting outward. Tiny shards of glass pierced Roc’s skin. Then the wing transformed into an arm, and the rest of the body took shape as it fell from above, pulling the chandelier out of the ceiling and crashing onto the table. One leg split, tilted the tabletop, which slanted downward, pouring glass and iron to the floor.
Roc raced toward the body, which had three wounds: one each in the neck, shoulder, and leg. Wielding the stake, Roc opened a new one in the middle of the chest, driving the tip into the now scarred table. Before the professor could do anything other than flinch and convulse, Roc gripped Beaumont’s ankle and looped a leather strap around it and the table leg. By the time Roc rounded the table’s end, the vampire was sitting up and struggling with the stake centered in his chest. But Roc didn’t pause. He hooked another strap, which he’d pulled from his pocket, around Beaumont’s neck, jerked him back, looped the strap’s free end around another of the table’s legs, and knotted it tight.
Just as Roberto had taught him, the bound vampire was now powerless. So began the waiting game. Waiting for the vampire to bleed out. At first, Beaumont thrashed about on the table, snarling and growling, but the wound in his throat made a gurgling sound as air bubbled up into the hole the bullet had made.
“Saying your prayers?” Roc asked.
With the knife Roc now always carried strapped to his calf, he slit the arteries as Roberto had shown him, which would speed the process of dying. As the blood drained, so did the life of the vampire. His movements slowed until he lay completely still. Only then did Roc lean back against the wall, sweat pouring from him, as he stared at the demolished room, too exhausted to consider what to do.
Chapter Five
“Rachel did not come home yesterday from the Troyers’.”
Dumbfounded, Hannah Schmidt Fisher stared at her grandfather in the weak morning light. With his beard long and the lines in his face deep, Ephraim Hershberger stood tall and straight beside his daughter, Hannah’s mamm, who looked as if she was clinging to the porch railing for support.
Each morning since she had married Levi last December, Hannah and Levi left the little cottage on the Huffstetlers’ farm and drove their gray-topped buggy to her parent’s farm, where Levi worked with her father and Hannah helped her mother. Arriving this morning to the news that her pregnant sister was missing sent a chill down her spine. “B-but where could Rachel be? Did you talk with Mae and Ernest?”
“Your dat did last evening.” Mamm looked pale, as well, as if she hadn’t slept. “It is mighty strange for Rachel to behave so. Your dat…Daniel is beside himself. He’s thinking he should drive to town and check at the hospital in case she had more problems with the baby. But I can’t imagine her not telling nobody, ja? Just going off for help that way. Without her mamm knowing.”
Ephraim patted his daughter’s arm. “The good Lord is watching over her.”
Hannah trembled all over, shaken by the news, frightened by what it could mean. “Does Levi know?”
“I expect your dat is telling him now,” her grandfather said, his voice somber and calm, the direct opposite of how Hannah now felt.
She glanced over her shoulder at the path she had taken from the barn. The fields beyond were green, the corn stalks rippling in the breeze, and her gaze slid toward the springhouse. It held so many memories from the past year, when she had housed Akiva until she’d realized his deception. The memory burrowed deep inside her now and made her heart pulse with uncertainty.
Could Akiva have returned? Could he have taken Rachel? Or…could he have done something similar to what he’d done to Josef? Those eyes had looked on her with vile hatred and burned in her memory. Her heart stopped as she imagined her sister…her dear sister. She’d hoped and prayed Akiva had gone away for good, but the truth was she’d always worried he’d return. But if so, why now? Why Rachel?
It didn’t make any sense, and so she pushed the disconcerting thoughts aside. Most likely Rachel was having some difficulty with her pregnancy. She’d probably taken the buggy to town to see the doctor, who those in her district often sought when something besides home remedies were needed. Because of the problems Rachel had experienced early on the night her husband had died, she probably hadn’t taken any chances. She wouldn’t have wanted to worry Mamm either. But maybe the doctor had seen fit to place Rachel in the hospital. Maybe there hadn’t been time to drive all the way out to the farm and tell the family.
Hannah took a deep breath and walked up the porch steps, clinging to the railing to steady herself, and offered her mother a comforting hug. Levi would know what to do. His calm demeanor would soothe all of them. “It will be all right, I reckon, Mamm. We should pray Rachel is feeling better and not experiencing…”
But her voice trailed off at the thunk of the barn door. Levi rushed through the doorway, Toby trotting alongside him, barking and leaping. Levi pointed toward the barn and ordered the yellow lab back inside, his tone stern. Then his gaze sought hers, and an electrical spark shot through Hannah. She often experienced a similar feeling at her husband’s glance, but this time it was different. Her breath caught in her chest. Something was wrong. Very wrong.
Levi, his movements strong and sure, his head bent with determination, rushed through the chore of hitching the horse, and Pete seemed to sense the urgency and stamped his hoof. Then Levi climbed onto the bench and grabbed the reins, turning the buggy around and driving straight toward the house.
He pulled back on the reins as he approached the porch. Morning sunlight glinted on his burnished blond hair, but his blue eyes pierced her. She’d seen the many different shades of his eyes, the pale tenderness when he held her, the darkening of passion as he leaned in to kiss her, the light of humor as his mouth curved with a smile. Now, the flat planes of his cheeks compressed, and his lips thinned with tension. “I’m heading over to the Troyers’. Will you join me, Hannah?”
She glanced at her mother, not wanting her to be alone. But then, her youngest sister, Katie, came through the back door and stood on
the other side of Mamm. Answering her husband, Hannah said, “Of course, Levi.” She gave her mother another hug then motioned for Katie to stay near their mother’s side. “I’ll be back soon, Mamm. Levi will know what to do.”
***
Levi walked toward her, Eli Troyer at his side. Levi’s manly shape only emphasized Eli’s teenage gawkiness. The boy’s long, gangly legs and arms had outgrown his pants and coat by a couple of inches. He had a thatch of blond hair cut in the traditional bowl style, but his hair was a shade or two darker than Levi’s. He was almost as tall, but his shoulders weren’t yet as broad. In the Amish way, Eli, at age fourteen, had finished the last year of his schooling and would be helping out on the farm from now on or finding his own trade for when he married and had a family of his own. Of course, the teen’s face was smooth where Levi already had a beard, indicating he was married, which caused her heart to swell.
The last six months had been filled with a peace and contentment Hannah had never known. Levi’s heart was deep and full of a selfless love. The joy she had felt in the safety and comfort of his arms at night faded when she had spent time with Rachel. For her sister had been in mourning for her husband, and Josef’s death was most probably Hannah’s fault. If she hadn’t invited Akiva into her mind and heart and welcomed him into her home, then none of those events would have happened. Guilt, at first a heavy stone in her heart, had accumulated into a wall between her and Rachel. But she couldn’t confess what she knew and had done to Rachel. How could she tell her sister how horribly Josef had died? It would have been too painful and disturbing and might have risked the life of the child Rachel carried. But now, was Rachel’s disappearance another stone of guilt?
The seriousness of the situation kept her feet firmly planted in the summer grass as she waited impatiently for her husband and Eli to approach the buggy. She stood beside Pete as the horse dipped his head and nibbled the grass. She couldn’t read Levi’s or Eli’s expressions shaded beneath the flat bills of their straw hats.
When they had arrived, Levi had first spoken to Ernest Troyer, Eli’s older brother, the one now considered the head of the family and farm. He had not been here when Rachel was working in the strawberry field yesterday morning, but his wife, Mae, had been. She last saw Rachel when she’d taken their toddler inside for a nap, leaving Rachel alone. When Mae returned a couple of hours later, Rachel had been gone. Mae had assumed she’d gone home as usual.
It was one of the other Troyer brothers, Ezekiel, who had suggested the youngest, Eli, might have seen something. He was the only one left on the farm that morning. So, Levi had walked out to the field where Eli was plowing, bringing him back to Hannah now. But did the teenager know anything?
“Eli was in the barn yesterday,” Levi said as they reached her.
She pinched her hands together in an effort to quiet her galloping heart and looked at the younger man’s face. “Did you see Rachel then?”
Eli shook his head, and his gaze shifted sideways, avoiding hers.
“Are you sure, Eli? You didn’t see Rachel?”
“I told you.” He gave a nod to Levi and left them alone.
Hannah stared at her husband. Her throat tightened on a sob. What would they do now? Where would they go? How could they find help?
Levi stepped toward the buggy and held out a hand for Hannah.
“Levi, she couldn’t just disappear.”
“Maybe she is at the hospital.”
“You know as well as I do that is not the case.” She covered her heart with a hand. “I can feel it. I know.”
He didn’t deny or refute it. His lips flattened, pinching the corners of his mouth in a grim line. Glancing back at Eli’s retreating back, he shook his head.
“You think he’s not telling the truth?”
“I didn’t say that.”
But he didn’t have to. She sensed it too. “But what if he knows something? What if he saw something?”
“I cannot make him talk. And I don’t know, maybe he doesn’t know anything.”
Her throat convulsed, desperation rising up inside of her. “What are we going to do? We have to help Rachel. What if—?”
Levi wrapped an arm around her shoulders and tucked her close to his side. “There’s only one thing for us to do.”
Chapter Six
Dark clouds leached the light out of the morning sky, which spilled over the church, casting it in a ghostly luminescence. The gray and mist made it feel as if time had stopped, hovered between night and day, hope and despair. Nothing stirred, not even in the shadows.
Roc watched from the confines of his Mustang for long minutes, making sure no one had followed him. He knew the real reason he delayed, but time was ticking away, and precious minutes were escaping.
He yanked the rubber band out of his hair, pulling strands out with it, and tossed the rubbery circle on the dash beside the attached GPS system. He shook his head in an effort to clear away the images, which jumbled his thoughts together. In an attempt to rid himself of the memory, he wrenched the keys from the ignition and jerked open the door, surprised at his own sudden action. It was time to fully face his mistake, his guilt. It would never be clearer or more painful than when he looked into Roberto Hellman’s crystal-blue eyes and confessed he’d killed Ferris. It was his fault he’d believed the young man was ready and put him in harm’s way, and he’d wear the stain of Ferris’s blood forever.
Sweat poured out of Roc as he walked the lonely path he’d taken so many times over the past six months. It was too early for the pink-dressed nuns or even the most determined and dedicated churchgoers. The grounds remained deserted and quiet. Even the surrounding neighborhood, which housed the occasional bar, was hushed as if in reverence for the loss of Ferris. He reached the stone cathedral, its domes and arches pointing heavenward, its spires indicating the way. He passed stained-glass windows with fierce angels soaring through the air or standing as if on guard to protect the sanctity of the church.
He remembered then to make the call. Using his cell phone, he dialed the number once then disconnected after one ring. By the time he’d walked the length of the building and rounded the corner, he dialed again, allowing it to ring three full times; then again he severed the call. Twenty more paces to the rectory. He passed the main entrance and went around to its side door, which was set in deep shadows. He couldn’t actually see the wooden door and its ancient lock until he stepped onto the landing and his knuckle met wood with four succinct raps.
He waited, his breathing harsh in his own ears. He turned away to stare at the solitary path he had come, a path also leading to the garden the priest tended as faithfully as he tended his flock. Of their own accord, his feet took to the path, as if he no longer had a will, and he walked in the silence past the rectory and school to the alcove. The burbling of the fountain in its center had a calming effect and washed over Roc. He walked to the round stone edifice and placed a booted foot on it, just inches from the water line. He’d never really paid attention to the statue before, never cared. The rain clouds gave the white marble a soft glow, as if it was lit from its very soul. The Virgin Mary bathed the baby Jesus upon her lap, and just beyond her right shoulder stood a powerful angel, its face stern, its wings massive, its sword pointing downward as it stood guard over the young mother and her child.
For Roc, the Virgin Mother had always seemed full of accusation, but this rendition of Mary’s face was soft and delicate as she tended her baby, and he wondered if his own soul could ever be cleansed of his sins.
Then a hand pressed against his shoulder. Roc dodged sideways and swung around while pulling his Glock free of its shoulder holster.
“It is all right, Roc.” Father Hellman spoke calmly, saying Roc’s name with the guttural articulation at the end, the way St. Roch was often pronounced. “If I wanted to hurt you, you’d already be a goner.”<
br />
Roc had let down his guard. One lapse of judgment was all it had taken. In a way, Roc wished for that sort of release. Yet, he drew a steadying breath and replaced the Glock in the leather holster again. “That’s comforting.”
The priest wore a button-down blue chambray shirt with his priestly collar beneath, as well as a pair of worn jeans. He didn’t appear to have been awakened by Roc’s phone calls or knock. “You seemed far away just now. Are you all right?” His gaze dropped to Roc’s chest and Roc glanced downward. Even though his T-shirt was black, it was stained, some places wet, others dry. The coppery scent made it clear it was blood. “You were in a fight?”
Roc nodded.
“Are you hurt?”
“It’s not my blood.”
Roberto motioned for him to follow. “Come. You can clean up and tell me about your adventure. And—”
“Do you have a drink?” A tremor rippled through Roc’s hand.
Roberto eyed him carefully. “We will see.”
They walked the few steps back to the rectory in silence. Roc waited, glancing over his shoulder, while Roberto unlocked the wooden side door and led the way down the steep, narrow stairwell to the tiny room he occupied. It held only a small wooden desk, rickety chair, and cot where Roberto slept and studied. A musty smell filled the space, but Roc wasn’t sure if it was from the man, the room, or the many books filling the bookshelves. Even more books were piled on the desk.
Roc sat on the rickety chair, a place he’d occupied many times in the past months. From underneath the cot peeked a forty-pound barbell Roc had used in his effort to get battle ready. Effort he now considered wasted. Often this tiny room had been a place where he had learned about a world he’d never wanted to discover, but tonight it was his confessional.
