Saint's Gate

by Carla Neggers

  Colin frowned. “How does that make Sunniva a saint?”

  The priest raised his midnight eyes to him. “Forty years later, Olaf Tryggveson, the Christian king of Norway, ventured to the island to look into reports of a strange light coming from the cave. He unblocked the entrance and found skeletal remains and the incorrupt body of a beautiful woman.”

  “Sunniva, the Irish princess,” Colin said, sitting back with whiskey in hand. “What’s ‘incorrupt’?”

  Emma swirled the amber contents of her glass. “An incorrupt body is one that doesn’t decompose in the natural process. Long after death, the person continues to appear as if he or she has simply fallen asleep.”

  “Incorruptibility isn’t a requirement or a guarantee of sainthood, and it’s no longer considered a miracle by the church,” Bracken said.

  Colin sat forward. “Sunniva and company probably should have been more specific about what they were praying for. They got their wish, but they also ended up trapped in a cave.” He set down his glass. “I suppose dying in a cave is better than getting burned at the stake.”

  Bracken shrugged. “It’s unlikely the Vikings would have burned Sunniva and her companions at the stake. More likely they’d have carried them off into slavery or hacked them to death.”

  “Easier to be an incorruptible if you die of natural causes in a cave,” Colin said, not letting it go. “Did many saints live to a ripe old age?”

  The priest traced a fingertip along the edge of the Bracken Distillers label. “Some.”

  “Saint Augustine lived into his seventies. He’s a classical theologian, one of the most important figures in the ancient church.” Emma spoke quietly, staring into her whiskey as if she were transfixed. “He was from North Africa. He didn’t convert to Christianity until his thirties.”

  Bracken watched her a moment, then said, “We must remember that each recognized saint was a flesh-and-blood human being. Saints aren’t gods. In fact, that’s the whole point. We pray to them not as gods, not to perform miracles, but to intercede with Christ on our behalf.” He kept his gaze on the woman across from him. “Their example shows us what is within our grasp as human beings and moves us toward lives of faith, hope and charity, a deeper understanding of what is truly holy.”

  “Except the saints that were made up,” Colin said.

  Bracken sighed. “Some saints are certainly the product of a reinterpretation of local legends or the mingling of fact and legend. Saint Sunniva is a patron saint of Norway. A Benedictine monastery was built on the site of her cave on Selje. That’s powerful imagery, but her story is likely more legend than fact. Nonetheless, she is still venerated as a model of faith.”

  Emma seemed to tune back into the conversation. “Sunniva became a saint before the church centralized and formalized its canonization process.”

  “That’s right,” Bracken said. “In the early days, saints were often declared by popular acclaim, or by the local bishop, for local reasons. The pope was rarely involved until several hundred years after King Olaf discovered Sunniva’s intact remains.”

  Colin pushed back his chair and stretched out his legs. The sky was dark over the harbor, and the diners were beginning to thin out. A priest and an art expert discussing saints was interesting, but did it get them closer to discovering Sister Joan’s killer? He glanced at Emma, her green eyes picking up some of the amber color of the whiskey as she took another swallow. Did the talk of saints get him closer to understanding her? Did he want to know if it did?

  He twitched in his chair, restless. “You should eat something,” he told her.

  She shook her head. “I’m not hungry.”

  “You had one bite of that muffin today. Fin—”

  “I recommend soup,” he said. “I’ve grown fond of Hurley’s clam chowder.”

  Colin grinned. “Best in New England.”

  Plump Jamie Hurley herself brought cups of chowder and little packets of round oyster crackers. Emma picked up her spoon without protest.

  “Jack d’Auberville had an interest in Vikings,” Colin said. “He painted a room that includes possible Viking artifacts and is dominated by a painting of a Viking warship coming after Saint Sunniva. He kept the painting, stuffing it in his studio for his daughter to find thirty years later.”

  “What was his relationship with the Sharpe family?” Bracken asked.

  Emma sprinkled the oyster crackers on her chowder. “I don’t know of one.”

  Colin wasn’t hungry and really didn’t want chowder but dug in anyway. “What’s the story with Ainsley and your brother?”

  “They saw each other for a short time last summer. Obviously whatever was between them is over, since she’s engaged to Gabe Campbell.”

  “Who broke things off?” Colin asked.

  Emma dipped her spoon into her chowder and crackers. She clearly didn’t like being the one answering questions. “I always thought it was mutual, with no drama. They were never that serious. Ainsley had finally zeroed in on what she wanted to do as a painter.”

  “Would Lucas have told you if they had been serious?”

  “Either he’d have told me, or I’d have figured it out.” She tried the chowder, not looking at either Colin or Bracken. “We’re a tight-knit family. We get together here in Maine regularly, even before I was assigned to Boston.”

  Colin gave up on his chowder. “Is your brother an expert in Vikings and saint art?”

  “No,” she said. “He’s an expert in art crime.”

  She was cool, logical, not easily ruffled. She was also, Colin thought, still holding back.

  He tore open his packet of crackers but didn’t eat any. “Why didn’t you stick with the family business?”

  “Because I joined the FBI.”

  “Ainsley didn’t go to you with her father’s painting. She went to Sister Joan.”

  “Ainsley wanted the painting cleaned. There was no reason to involve me.”

  “Sister Joan thought there was. That’s why she called you.” Colin saw color return to Emma’s cheeks, but he didn’t know if it was him, the whiskey or the steam from the chowder. “Ainsley’s a spoiled rich girl?”

  Emma set aside her chowder. “It’s easy to reduce her to that, I suppose. She gets absorbed in whatever has her attention.”

  Bracken shifted in his chair. He’d gone quiet, observing the exchange between the two FBI agents. “She’s trusting, and I suspect somewhat naive. Would you care for more whiskey, Agent Sharpe?”

  “Please, Father, call me Emma, and no, thanks. I’ve had enough whiskey.” She rose, looking a little rocky on her feet. “Thank you for your help identifying Saint Sunniva.”

  “Anytime,” the priest said.

  Emma’s eyes seemed a darker, deeper green as she turned to Colin. “Good lobstering, Agent Donovan. I’ll see myself home.”

  Colin noticed a faint spray of freckles across her nose as she turned in the light. He didn’t know how he’d missed them until now. She wasn’t so contained and logical all of a sudden. He was asking questions, getting close to something she didn’t want to tell him. The danger she’d experienced in the past two days and the murder of Sister Joan were sinking in, rattling her to the core.

  Bracken turned to him. “Should she go home alone?”

  Emma smiled down at the priest. “Yes, she should. Thank you for your concern, Father. I’m an FBI agent. I don’t need a protector.”

  She pushed off across the restaurant. Bracken watched her, then frowned at Colin. “She just found a bomb in her attic. It could have gone off in her sleep. She could have burned to death.”

  “She’d have gotten out of there first. Her bedroom’s on the first floor.”

  “I don’t care, and I don’t care if she sleeps with a dozen guns under her pillow. You can’t just let her go.”

  “She’s not going anywhere,” Colin said, rising. “She came by boat. She doesn’t have a way back to Heron’s Cove unless she hitches a ride.”

 
Bracken wasn’t chastened. “You can drive. You’ve only had a few sips of whiskey. I’ll take care of the tab for the chowder.”

  Colin didn’t argue and, grabbing his jacket off the back of Emma’s abandoned chair, left his priest friend alone at the table. He caught up with Emma outside in the parking lot. “You might not need a protector, but you need a ride home.”

  She shivered but he figured offering his jacket again would be the last straw. “All right. You can give me a ride back. How much whiskey have you had?”

  “Not enough.”

  He led her to his truck, and she climbed in next to him. She was cool again, under control. He realized he wanted to kiss her. Once wasn’t nearly enough, and he had whiskey on top of adrenaline going for him now.

  She narrowed her eyes on him in the darkness. “Don’t even think about it.”

  “About what?”

  “Repeating what you did earlier.”

  “What I did? That kiss was mutual, sweetheart.”

  “I’ve known you for less than twenty-four hours. I know your type. Action-oriented, on the move. No roots.”

  He started the engine. “I have roots here in Maine. You just met two of my brothers.”

  “I mean…” She waved a hand. “Never mind what I mean.”

  “You mean women.”

  She looked uncomfortable and busied herself strapping on her seat belt.

  “What about you and men, Emma Sharpe? Is there a guy in your life?”

  “I’m still getting settled in Boston.”

  “So no, there isn’t. Did you like me better when you thought I was a lobsterman?”

  She didn’t answer and rode in silence back to Heron’s Cove. He parked just down the street from the gray-shingled house where her grandfather had started Sharpe Fine Art Recovery. Law enforcement vehicles—local, state, federal—were still lined up out front.

  Emma cracked open her door. “I should have stayed here. I shouldn’t have gone off to Rock Point with you.”

  “Nothing more you could have done, and Kevin and I drank your cider.”

  Colin got out of the truck and met her on the sidewalk. She nodded toward the restaurant across the street. “You’d think someone would have seen something.”

  “If it’d been me, no one would have seen a thing.”

  “That good, are you?”

  “I’m just saying that someone who knows what he’s doing could break your storm door and let himself in with thirty people eating lobster rolls across the street not noticing.”

  “I left Lucas several messages. I’m sure he’ll stop by. I’m going back to Boston.”

  “Where is he?”

  “I don’t know. He has a busy schedule.”

  “Your grandfather created an internationally respected business, with a solid livelihood for his family. Why didn’t you want it?”

  “I didn’t reject him or the business. I love my family. I love the work they do. I embraced something else. Did you reject lobstering?”

  “As a matter of fact, yes. It’s tough work.”

  She didn’t smile at his humor. “Did you always want to be an FBI agent?”

  “Nope. I wanted to be a lobsterman. Then marine patrol. Wanting to join the FBI came later. I thought it was a good way to get a taste of life outside of Maine. I’m not complicated.” They ducked under the yellow police tape in front of her house. “You’re complicated. A Sharpe art detective, an art historian, an FBI agent. Now you’re a member of Yank’s elite team. I figure you must be good at what you do.”

  “I appreciate the vote of confidence.” She angled a look at him. “Thank you for the ride, and for your help with the bomb.”

  “You’d have found it when you went upstairs to look for the Sunniva painting.”

  She stopped abruptly, kicking up a small stone on the sidewalk. “You mean the painting Sister Cecilia described—”

  “That’s the one.” He pointed up at the house. “Sunniva was here, wasn’t she? In the attic?”

  Emma turned to him with a deceptive calm. “She might have been. She’s not there now.”

  “Who would know? Your brother, your parents, your grandfather?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “When did you last see the painting?”

  “I don’t remember. I’ve been thinking about it since Sister Cecilia described it. At first I thought I might be creating a false memory.”

  “You’re not.”

  She took a breath. “No, I’m not. It was a canvas. It wasn’t framed. I saw it in the attic when I was a child. It wasn’t valuable or it would have been under lock and key and properly stored, and it wasn’t.”

  “You didn’t know it was Saint Sunniva?”

  “No.”

  “That’s how you knew there were skeletal remains in the cave. Sister Cecilia didn’t mention them. You’d seen them yourself. You suspected the painting was of a saint. That’s why you wanted to talk to Father Bracken.”

  She looked up at the attic window. Lights were on. The police were still up there. “I’m going to find out what’s going on.” She shifted back to Colin. “I don’t care if I have to take a leave of absence. I’ll quit if I need to.”

  “Get fired?”

  “Whatever it has to be.” She seemed not to notice the stiff, cold night breeze that blew up off the water. “How well do you know Father Bracken? An Irish priest with a BMW and expensive whiskey—”

  “Don’t go off on tangents. Follow the evidence.”

  “I am following the evidence. It’s standing right in front of me.”

  “You’re looking for distractions. I don’t plan on being one of them.” Colin waited, watching her, but she didn’t meet his eye. “I’ll see you around.”

  As he headed back through the tape to his truck, Emma said behind him, “You’re leaving because you have something you want to do.”

  He didn’t respond, but she was right.

  He was having another glass of whiskey with Finian Bracken and a little chat about Special Agent Emma Sharpe.

  16

  FATHER BRACKEN KNEW.

  Emma had seen it in his eyes. He wouldn’t say anything to his friend the FBI agent until he figured it out for himself. Colin would see that Bracken was holding back something—he probably already had—and get it out of him.

  Then Colin would know.

  Everything would change the second he realized the woman he’d kissed after disabling a bomb in her attic had been a nun.

  So be it, she thought as she avoided the law enforcement personnel still at work and went into the first-floor bedroom. She gathered up the few things she’d brought with her from Boston and threw them into her overnight bag. As she zipped it shut, she tried Lucas once more, again getting his voice mail. She’d already left him a message and didn’t bother leaving him another one.

  On her way out, she spoke to Tony Renkow, the lead detective and one of Colin’s many friends among the Maine police, and explained where she’d be. She wasn’t holding back information from CID. They knew what she knew about the painting now no longer in her grandfather’s attic.

  “We checked your car,” Renkow said. “It’s clean. No bombs. Your people had a unit go through your apartment in Boston.”

  “Thank you for letting me know,” she said, keeping any emotion out of her tone.

  The detective studied her a moment. The events of the past two days had clearly put a strain on him, but he was focused, professional. “Are you sure you want to drive to Boston alone?”

  “I’ll be fine, Detective. Thank you again.”

  “What about Colin Donovan?”

  “He’s gone back to Rock Point,” Emma said evenly.

  Renkow pointed a thick finger at her. “You two—”

  “We met this morning for the first time.”

  “Handy having him here to defuse the bomb.”

  “Yes, it was.”

  “You FBI agents, huh? Even the ones who sit at a desk all day know
just which wires to cut to keep from blowing themselves up.”

  Emma wasn’t about to share her own suspicions about the true nature of Colin’s work with Renkow. “Good night, Detective.”

  “Yeah. Stay safe.”

  When she started her car, Emma was glad that Renkow had told her it’d been checked for bombs. She’d have wondered. On her way through the village, she drove past her brother’s house, but it was dark and his car wasn’t out front. She continued to their parents’ house, a little Victorian that served as the temporary offices of Sharpe Fine Art Recovery. It, too, was dark, with no cars out front.

  Yank called her. “Where are you?”

  “Heron’s Cove. I’m heading to Boston.”

  “Stop by the office. We’re here. We’re working on this thing.”

  “It’s a two-hour drive, Yank.”

  “I’m not going anywhere. A bomb, Emma. Hell.”

  “You know that Colin Donovan was there?”

  “Yeah. I know. Drive safely.”

  “You’re not going to talk about him, are you?”

  But Yank had already disconnected. Emma slid her phone back in her jacket pocket. Her head ached, and her eyelids felt heavy, although she was wide-awake. She hadn’t seen any of her HIT colleagues—except for Matt Yankowski—since Sister Joan’s death. By now they all would know that she’d been a novice with the Sisters of the Joyful Heart. They worked side by side with her. She tried to imagine herself in their position and wondered if it would matter to her that one of them had been a priest, a minister, a nun.

  No, she thought. It would matter that one of them had kept that information from her and now it had put them into the middle of a murder investigation that could expose their team to unwanted publicity and distract them from their work.

  That could expose a valuable undercover agent and distract him from his work.

  She sighed as she reached the interstate. Her past had put Yank’s team at risk. For all she knew, the FBI director could be reaching for his phone to call Yank and shut him down right now.

  Emma got out her phone and dialed his number. “I can resign,” she said.