Not of This Fold

by Mette Ivie Harrison

  I sagged in relief.

  Unless—was Kurt lying?

  “You bastard,” Hope cursed.

  I couldn’t bear it anymore. I wasn’t waiting to hear Hope strangle my husband, as well. I rushed inside the room, flung myself at Kurt to protect him, and kicked at Greg Hope’s legs on the way. I might not be an athlete like he was, but I knew enough to make him drop to his knees.

  “Linda, what the—?” Kurt started to say.

  He was cut off by the sound of uniformed officers streaming in through the front doors, past reception, and into Kurt’s office wide open. They pulled Hope’s arms behind his back and cuffed him, then read him his rights. And finally, Detective Gore came striding in.

  She saw me and said, “Linda, I should have known you would somehow figure this whole thing out and make sure you were here for the climactic moment.”

  I didn’t know what to say. I’d been here purely by accident. I wished I believed that God had led me here, but I didn’t. I hadn’t felt any sense of divine protection. “Thank God you’re here,” I said, still a little winded from my run.

  Gore shook her head and extended her hand toward Kurt. He met the gesture with a firm shake. “Thank you so much for your help,” Gore said. “This will all be very helpful at the trial. I assume that you’ll be willing to testify there, as well?”

  “I will,” Kurt said. He reached for my hand and pulled me close. I could feel his heart beating so quickly, it was a wonder he hadn’t had a heart attack. He should really leave these kinds of things to me, the expert at this kind of craziness.

  “We already had the books, but you got him to confess on tape to his presence at the murder scene, as well as his collusion in the robberies. That, along with Carlos Santos’s testimony against him, should be enough to get a conviction at trial. We can thank your wife for her help in this, too,” Gore said, nodding to me.

  It felt good to get some credit, though I felt like the lion’s share of it really should have gone to Gwen, who had been so dogged about investigating Bishop Hope and proving Carlos Santos’s innocence.

  As the police officers dragged Hope out of the office threatening everyone with church discipline and eternal consequences, I kissed Kurt’s cheek, almost as I would have done with one of the boys.

  “Let’s go home,” I said to him.

  “Good idea.” He steered me through the office and into the parking lot, where the police car was just heading off with Bishop Hope in its backseat. I could see him glaring menacingly at us through the rear window.

  “His poor wife and sons,” I said. I felt for Maria, who had seemed genuinely like a good mother. What would happen to her and her boys?

  “Are you really saying that, after you and Gwen did everything you could to make sure he went to prison for his crimes?” Kurt said.

  Yes, I was. “Of course. I can still worry about them,” I said. “They’re innocent in all this.” Wasn’t that what Mormonism was about? Taking care of the people in your community? Making sure families had the best chance they could?

  He sighed. “Yes, I guess you’re right. We’ll make sure they’re okay, Linda. You know the church takes care of its own.”

  And what about Gabriela’s children? Did the church take care of them, too? Or didn’t they matter? I vowed to myself that I would do something for them somehow.

  At home, I called Gwen to tell her about our crazy morning.

  “I was right all along, then.” I could hear the happy gloating in her voice.

  Well, I wasn’t sure if she’d been right every step of the way, but we’d gotten to the truth first. “You’re going to be one hell of a detective,” I said.

  “I hope so,” she said. “Thank you, Linda.”

  “Anytime,” I said. “I’m always here for you. And not just for murders.” I was trying to re-establish our friendship outside of this case, but it didn’t quite come out that way.

  “We’ll see,” Gwen said, and hung up.

  After that, Kurt and I slouched on the couch together, not even bothering to turn on the television. We were too wrung out.

  “Seeing Hope led off in handcuffs has given me a new appreciation for you,” I said, snuggling closer to him.

  “Well, that’s good,” he said. “Maybe we’ll have to do more murder investigations together.” He looked at me and winked.

  Was that what we had done?

  The next day, I called DCFS and asked about Gabriela’s children, but they absolutely refused to tell me a thing. They wouldn’t even let me send money to them, which made me cry and bang my phone against the table. But I told myself that I would try again through other channels, and that this didn’t mean I couldn’t help anyone. I remembered that most members of the Spanish ward would likely be out of a job soon. And the attention of Hope’s trial could scare them enough to simply leave the ward in order to avoid attention from ICE.

  I went back online to MWEG. I posted about the Spanish ward and asked for advice. The post was flooded with suggestions of things I could do, but more than that, people were volunteering. There were contacts for lawyers to help, volunteers to do a rally to raise money for those who were losing their jobs, and the idea of starting a job fair to help connect those who needed jobs with employers who wanted someone with their skills. Gwen was joining the Police Academy, and I knew I couldn’t join her, but I could do this. I could take part in making a better future.

  Afterword

  Mormon Women for Ethical Government (MWEG) was formed in November 2016 by Sharlee Glenn, Linda Hoffman Kimball, Melissa Dalton-Bradford (old, dear friends of mine) and Michelle Lehnhardt, Jacquie White, and Diana Bate Hardy (new, dear friends of mine) and now has nearly 6,000 members. These non-partisan women have joined together to protest unethical government in a variety of contexts, from immigration issues to health care reform and even connections between Trump and Russia. They’ve worked hard on letter-writing campaigns to help reconsider repeal of the ACA, to stop the new tax bill with its deficits and tax breaks for mega-corporations, and have also worked hard to send a statue of Martha Cannon, the first Mormon woman to serve as a senator (and first woman in any state to do so—after she won the election against her own husband!) to the Capitol. You can find out more about them at www.mweg.org.

  Acknowledgments

  Thanks are owed to many people on this book. First, Juliet Grames, who encouraged me to actually outline a book for the first time, and then guided me through the tricky process of first tying it to a current year’s timeline, and then separating it from it. Thanks also to Amara Hoshijo, who walked me through several content and line edits. And to Jennifer Lyford, who went above and beyond a copy-editor’s job. Thanks also to Kerina Espinoza for answering a series of questions about Spanish wards. As always, the mistakes are all my own. Thanks to everyone at Soho, the best publishing company on the planet. And to the friends I keep finding within Mormonism and without, who understand the work I’m doing, who are kind about the mistakes I make, and who allow me to cameo them when I have the chance.