“I can’t let it go,” he said.
“I know you can’t.” Lola gave him a long look. “What does your intuition tell you about the killer, Harry? I can sense that you feel something.”
Harry shook his head. “Very little, except that at times he feels very close. Sometimes it’s almost as though he’s standing right next to me. I’ve never felt that before.”
“Maybe it’s your past that’s standing next to you, Harry,” Lola said. “Think about that possibility, Harry. Think about it very seriously.”
The First Assembly of Jesus Christ the Lord was located on Keystone Road, close to the Pinellas-Hillsborough county line. That also placed it only a few miles from the Brooker Creek Preserve. The church was a sprawling complex that included the church itself, an elementary school, a gymnasium, and several smaller buildings, including one clearly marked as a teen center. All the buildings were connected by a covered outdoor walkway. There was also a sizable parking lot, attesting to a large congregation. As a young deputy Harry had occasionally been assigned to Sunday traffic control at various large churches throughout the county. The congestion created by those churches prior to and at the conclusion of services rivaled that of weekday rush hours. Harry called ahead but was told the Reverend John Waldo was in the sacristy “preparing” Sunday’s service. He decided to come early and catch the reverend when those preparations ended.
Harry climbed a wide cement stairway that led to a series of glass doors opening into a reception area. Across a twenty-foot expanse were another set of doors that opened into the church proper. Beyond those interior doors Harry found himself standing beneath an enormous arch that ran the entire length of the sacristy. But the focal point of the church was a vast stage that took up one entire end and faced out to rows of pews that would hold well over five hundred parishioners. There were lights suspended above the stage, and only the pews and the arched ceiling and a large golden cross that hung on the rear wall made him feel he had entered a church. Without them he would have felt he’d just walked into a large theater.
A man stood center stage his body fixed in a spotlight. Above him, to his right and left, his image was projected on two massive television screens, as the words he spoke ran in a scroll beneath. To his left, well off to the side, a group of musicians listened respectfully. Harry noted the instruments—organ, piano, three guitars, a drum set, a conga drum, two saxophones, two trumpets, and a flute. To the man’s right stood a choir of twelve men and women, each appearing equally intent on hearing every word the man spoke. At the front of the church, high above the pews, Harry could see a director’s booth hidden behind darkened glass. He assumed that the projection screens and all the stage lighting were run from there, an assumption that was confirmed when the man standing center stage interrupted his sermon at several points and spoke directly to the booth, asking that the cameras be brought in tight for close-ups at those specific points. As far as church services went, it was beyond anything Harry had ever envisioned, and he realized he was watching a rehearsal worthy of a professional theater.
The man at the crux of that rehearsal, who Harry assumed was Reverend Waldo, was railing against a gay pride parade that would be held in St. Petersburg the following Sunday, terming it a “celebration of sodomy” and urging his flock to join protestors throughout the county to speak out against “this public glorification of sin.”
Harry felt a hand on his shoulder, the pressure light but distinct. He turned and found a man, perhaps in his late twenties, standing behind him. He had blond hair of an unnatural color that fell almost to his shoulders. He was tall and slender, dressed in jeans and a T-shirt that bore the logo Jesus Now and Always. He had a square face and a flattened nose that looked as if it had been hit more than once; his eyes were cobalt-blue and despite a wide smile were clearly unfriendly.
“Can I help you?” he said, his tone holding no offer of help in it.
“I don’t know,” Harry said. “I’m looking for Reverend John Waldo. Are you him?”
The smile faded. “Who are you?”
Harry took out his credential case and held it up.
“A cop,” the man said.
“Good reading,” Harry responded. “Now who are you?”
“Bobby Joe Waldo,” the man said with a smirk. “I’m Reverend Waldo’s son and one of the associate ministers here. Reverend Waldo’s the man up on the stage.”
“How long before Reverend Waldo will be finished with his rehearsal?” Harry asked.
“We don’t call it a rehearsal.”
“What do you call it?”
“We call it preparing the way.”
Harry nodded, as if digesting a heavy bit of information. “Well, when do you suppose he’ll be through preparing the way?” Now it was his turn to smirk.
The younger Waldo glanced at his watch. Harry’s tone had turned his face into a sneer. “About ten minutes. Right now I have some stuff to do up on the stage. If you want, you can stay here and I’ll let him know you’re waiting on him. But don’t start wandering around. It distracts him, and he doesn’t like it when that happens.” He hesitated, offering as hard a look as he could muster. A bit of face saving, Harry thought. “He’ll wanna know what it’s about,” the man added for effect.
Harry smiled up at him, thinking how pleased Pete Rourke would be. “Just tell him it’s police business,” he said in an unmistakable fuck you tone. Maybe Rourke wouldn’t be pleased.
“I’ll be sure to give him that message,” the young minister snapped back.
Harry watched him as he headed toward the stage, trying to keep a bit of swagger in his walk. He made a note to check Bobby Joe Waldo for a rap sheet. Instinct told him he’d find something.
Ten minutes later, as predicted, Reverend Waldo wrapped up his preparation, and Harry watched his son walk up to him and whisper in his ear. The older minister nodded and looked out to where Harry was seated. After giving some final instructions to the director’s booth and the people on the stage, he started toward Harry. Almost immediately the choir began its preparation of “Amazing Grace.”
Waldo wore a broad salesman’s smile when he reached Harry. But the smile never carried to his eyes which were narrowed and wary. He was a short, rotund man, no more than five-seven, Harry guessed, and he was pushing two hundred pounds hard. His son obviously got his height, slender frame, and sneer from a different member of the family. Waldo was easily in his mid- to late-fifties but there was no visible gray in his full head of hair. He was wearing a vibrant Tommy Bahama floral print shirt and sharply creased tan linen trousers that broke over gleaming, glove-soft Italian loafers, and there was a gold Tag Heuer watch on his wrist. It was high-end casual and Harry estimated that Waldo was wearing more money on his back than Harry spent on clothing in an entire year, maybe two.
“Well,” the minister began, “deputy is it?”
“Detective,” Harry said, opening his credential case. “The name’s Harry Doyle.”
“Well, Detective Doyle, my son tells me you need to speak to me on police business.”
“That’s right, reverend. It’s about Billy Hall. I believe the boy was once a member of your church.”
“Still is, far as I know.” A sudden edge came into the minister’s voice and he quickly masked it with another faux smile.
Harry took out his notebook and wrote the time, the date, and the minister’s name. When he looked up Waldo was shifting impatiently from one foot to the other. “If this is going to take some time, why don’t we adjourn to my office where we’ll both be more comfortable? The church secretary brews a good cup of coffee and I can always use one after a long session of preparing the way.”
Waldo’s office was like the man himself, oversized and expensively furnished. After passing through an outer office that housed a secretary and two assistants, they entered a twenty-by-twenty-foot room. With his first step Harry sank into a full inch of thick Berber carpet and his nostrils were filled with the scent of
expensive leather and recently applied furniture polish. The room was dominated by a massive desk that was easily eight feet across, the surface empty except for a leather blotter and a gold pen set. Behind the desk was an equally large credenza that held a telephone console, a flat-screen computer monitor and keyboard, a photograph of a middle-aged woman who Harry assumed was the minister’s wife, and a solitary, well-worn Bible. Above the credenza a large picture window looked out on a pond that had been meticulously designed. There were bulrushes at one end and flowering lily pads at another. One bank held a large royal poinciana tree, its wide branches and flaming red flowers reflecting in the pond’s surface; another offered a white crape myrtle and a golden rain tree, while a third held a towering jacaranda, heavily laden with purple bell-shaped flowers and rich fernlike leaves. If the landscape architect was shooting for serenity, Harry decided he had hit the mark squarely.
The office interior offered its own sense of design, this time aimed at the minister’s image. To the left of the desk photographs of Reverend Waldo with various politicians and civic leaders filled an entire wall, including one that showed Waldo shaking hands with Harry’s ultimate boss, the Pinellas County sheriff. A second wall was filled with awards and plaques citing the minister for various meritorious acts. The final wall held a large portrait of Jesus Christ. Oddly, it was the only item that seemed out of place, and Harry immediately thought of the Bible quote that spoke of a camel and the eye of a needle.
Waldo settled himself into a high-backed leather desk chair that let out a discernable creak under his weight. He gestured toward one of two visitors’ chairs and Harry found himself sinking into soft leather. Almost immediately the office door opened and the secretary entered carrying a tray of coffee. Waldo thanked her, using the name Emily, but withheld any introduction to Harry, who jotted the woman’s name in his notebook. When the woman left, Waldo sipped his coffee, then sat back and brought his hands together like a man preparing to pray. “Now, what can I tell you about Billy Hall?” He offered Harry another smile.
Harry leaned forward and held the minister’s eyes. “Billy’s mother told us the boy was under a great deal of pressure to ‘repent his sins.’”
Waldo nodded. “Indeed he was.”
“She also said the congregation was encouraged to ‘seek justice’ for Darlene Beckett.”
Again, Waldo nodded. “Equally true.”
“Was there anyone in your congregation who showed a particular interest in doing so?”
Waldo let out a soft chuckle. “If you mean, did anyone try to get together a group to light torches and march on the courthouse, the answer would be no. I’m afraid I’m not that powerful a preacher. If you’re asking if anyone wrote letters to the court, or the state’s attorney, or even to Ms. Beckett herself, I would have to say I’m sure some might have, although I have no personal knowledge of any such letters. But I do know that we have a very committed congregation. Committed to the repentance of sin, committed to the punishment of sin, and also committed to the forgiveness of sin, I might add.”
“Was Billy Hall forgiven his sin?” Harry asked.
Now it was the minister’s turn to lean forward, his eyes harder. “Billy Hall would have been forgiven had he repented. But you must have one to have the other. Billy Hall did not repent his sins. He did not testify against that woman, as he should have. And his parents yielded to his refusal to do so. Because of that, a truly evil woman escaped justice.”
“I notice that you use the word evil.” Harry watched the man’s eyes.
“It’s clearly what she was,” he said. “Not that she, too, couldn’t have repented, forsaken her evil ways and received the Lord’s forgiveness.”
Harry stared at the minister for several moments. “Did you or anyone on your staff have any contact with Ms. Beckett?”
“Certainly not,” Waldo snapped.
“You’re sure you can speak for your entire staff on that?”
“I don’t directly supervise the staff. My son Bobby Joe, who is an associate minister here, does that. I’m sure he would have told me if that had been the case. But why leave it open to speculation? Let’s have him in so he can tell us directly.”
Harry waited while Waldo got on the office intercom and asked his secretary to locate his son. When he finished, Harry opened a fresh page in his notebook. “Exactly what denomination is your church?”
“We’re not part of any particular denomination. We’re an independent evangelical church,” Waldo answered.
“So your ministers aren’t ordained?”
“I ordain our ministers myself … after a suitable course of study and work within the church, of course. I, myself, was ordained the same way by my predecessor.”
Their conversation was interrupted as Bobby Joe Waldo entered the office. Harry noticed the smirk he had been treated to earlier was now missing and he wondered if Bobby Joe knew better than to cop that kind of attitude in front of his father.
“The detective here just hit me with a question I couldn’t rightly answer,” Waldo began. “He wants to know if anyone on our staff ever had any contact with that woman who molested young Billy Hall.”
Bobby Joe thought for a moment, then shrugged his shoulders. “Why would they?” There was a slight movement of his eyes to the left when he answered, which Harry picked up on. It was a classic tell. It didn’t mean the young minister was lying, but it did indicate that he was not answering the question in a completely truthful manner.
Apparently his father picked up on it as well. He leaned forward in his chair again. “Just tell us if you know of anyone who had contact with that woman.”
Bobby Joe shifted the position of his feet—another tell—and shook his head. “I don’t know anyone who had any contact with her,” he said.
“How many ministers and staff do you have working here?” Harry asked before either man could say any more.
“That depends what you mean by staff,” the minister said. “My first associate minister, a man named Justin Clearby, and Bobby Joe here are the only ordained ministers. We have several lay ministers, who have regular jobs outside the church. Our music director, for example, is considered a lay minister even though he’s not ordained. And we have several folks who work with the children’s programs who we refer to as assistant lay ministers. As far as full-time paid staff goes, we have our regular ministers, my secretary and one assistant—the other is a part-time volunteer—the director of our school and three teachers, and a custodian. The folks who run the lighting and sound for our services are paid part-time employees.”
“I’d like to speak with any staff people who are here now,” Harry said. “And I’d like a list of both paid and unpaid staff with their home addresses and phone numbers.”
“Is all that really necessary?” Bobby Joe chimed in. “I already told you that nobody from here had any contact with that woman.”
Harry stared at the young man, but before he could say anything else, Reverend Waldo gave his son a clear and direct order: “You do what the man asked, Bobby Joe. It’s our job to help if we can. You have Emily put together a list and you see to it that Detective Doyle gets it.”
Bobby Joe seemed to shrink in size as he nodded his head. “I’ll do it right now,” he said, and headed back to the outer office.
Waldo rose from behind his desk, a smile fixed on his face again. “Come with me and I’ll introduce you to the people who are here,” he said.
They passed through the outer office and out onto the covered walkway that led back to the church and the other buildings. They had only gone a half dozen steps when the minister stopped. “Just a minute, I forgot to tell my secretary something that’s a bit pressing. I’ll be right back.”
Before Harry could say anything he had spun around and reentered the office.
Back inside, Waldo led Bobby Joe away from the secretary’s desk, then leaned in close so he could speak without being overheard.
“Now you listen to me,
son. You sure this detective isn’t gonna find anything out that’s gonna come back and embarrass this church?”
“I’m sure, Daddy.”
“I’m countin’ on you to make sure it stays that way, hear? And you also better check that list Emily’s putting together and keep anybody off it who might be a problem.”
“I’ll see to it, Daddy.”
“Make sure that you do. You also make sure everybody else knows that’s how I want it to be.”
“I will.”
Waldo caught his son’s eyes moving toward the exterior door of the office, and he turned and saw Harry standing there.
“Hot out there,” Harry said. “Thought I’d come back to the airconditioning while I waited.”
The ready-made smile returned to Waldo’s face. “Good thinking,” he said. “But I’m afraid we’re going to have to head right back out into it.”
CHAPTER NINE
Lola Morofsky sat in one of her oversized office chairs, her feet dangling well above the floor, her five-foot, hundred-pound body making her look like a small child who had stumbled into a giant’s living room. Lola adjusted her half-glasses on her long nose as she read the rap sheet Harry had just given her.
“Nasty fellow,” she said. She turned a page and raised disapproving eyes to Harry. “You realize, of course, that you have juvenile records here, as well as adult records—juvenile records that you are not supposed to have.”
Harry feigned surprise, without any attempt to be convincing. “Must have been a computer glitch.”
Lola looked at him over the half-glasses, her soft brown eyes incapable of anything more than a mild reproach. “Yes, I’m certain it was,” she said, her Brooklyn accent weighty with sarcasm. “What does your person of interest do for a living?”
“He’s come home to Jesus,” Harry said.
“What does that mean?”
“He’s a minister … ordained by his minister father. He works in Daddy’s evangelical church.”
“Quite a change for him,” Lola said as she went back to the rap sheet. “Let’s see, we had three instances of possession, along with several burglaries as a juvenile, which are charges that often go together. It seems that all were treated with in-house arrest and probation, except for one stint in a boot camp. Then, as an adult—he didn’t seem to learn anything in boot camp, which is often the case—we have several bad check charges, all dismissed after restitution was made.”
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