Deliver Us From Evil Part 14

"I told the sheriff that Mr. Cooper and I were not on very good terms, Mr. Zaccardi."

"Why is that?"

"He's a difficult man."

"He can be." Rafe was stubborn-sometimes to a fault-but he was intensely loyal.

"The tabernacle isn't missing," Bishop Carlin said. "I gave the mission a replacement."

Anthony couldn't keep the surprise off his face. "You have the original tabernacle? Why?"

"It's very old, as I'm sure you know. Several of the stones had fallen off and needed to be replaced. Father Hatch brought it to me nearly two weeks ago."

"Father Hatch?" Anthony didn't know him.

"He arrived at the mission a year ago. He's one of the few who leave the property. I'm sure you know that the mission had, frankly, become an asylum of sorts. The men are mentally ill."

Anthony's jaw clenched. "They witnessed evil, Bishop."

"We've all witnessed evil."

"Have we?" Anthony countered.

"Look around you, young man."

"I have faced demons. I have freed souls."

"You are not a priest."

"I am not."

"I know exactly who you are, Mr. Zaccardi. And you are given a lot of lat.i.tude because of your friends in the Vatican."

"I am given lat.i.tude because I can see demons. Where is the tabernacle now?"

"In storage awaiting shipment to Rome. Perhaps you'd like to take it back with you?"

Anthony bit back his first, angry remark.

"Perhaps I would," he said.

"I will ready it for you immediately."

The demon looked at his minions through his new human eyes, relishing with hubris the worship in their expressions. He craved adoration.

"Is it done?" he asked.

"Yes. We have the records."

"Have? Why didn't you destroy them?"

"We thought the information would be valuable," the older woman said. "The doctor was very detailed in his comments. There are prayers and protections that may help us grow stronger."

She was right. He'd been in a destructive mood ever since the journal disintegrated and Zaccardi saved Skye McPherson. That soul should have been his!

"You-" He pointed to the older woman. "Drive." He stared at the younger woman. "You, in back with me."

"I-"

His eyes glowed. "I have l.u.s.ted for nine hundred years since I last possessed a human body. You will serve me."

She nodded, fear and excitement in her eyes, unable and unwilling to deny his l.u.s.t.

He roared his satisfaction and ripped off her clothes.

Anthony sat in the Santa Louisa Public Library, his knees. .h.i.tting the low table, hunched over a computer. He typed into the Google search engine: "Jeremiah Hatch"

He'd already woken Father Philip in Italy who was covertly looking into the mission records. The mentally disturbed priests were given necessary compa.s.sion by the church and cared for, but no one wanted to admit to the public that the presence of evil could break the strongest of the faithful. What hope could there be for regular people if devout priests crumbled within Satan's grasp?

There were far too many hits on the name, so Anthony narrowed the search to "Jeremiah Hatch + priest."

Fewer than a hundred sites came up and Anthony began clicking through.

He found an article published four years ago in a national newspaper about a group of missionaries, led by Monsignor Jeremiah Hatch, gone missing in Guatemala. When representatives from the Teach the Poor project had visited the site, they found it completely empty. Six missionaries gone, as if vanishing into thin air. The local villagers refused to talk, but by all accounts they knew what had happened. They'd been scared silent.

There was a bio on each missionary, including Hatch.

Monsignor Jeremiah Hatch, 43, was born in Denver, Colorado. Orphaned at the age of twelve, he was taken in by the Sisters of Mercy. A graduate of Notre Dame University, he entered St. John's Seminary in California at the age of twenty-seven. Ordained three years later, he served as a priest in the Los Angeles Diocese, the Portland Diocese, and most recently in the Washington, DC Diocese. He'd been an advisor to Teach the Poor for the past ten years.

Anthony wondered what Hatch had done between the time he graduated college and joined the seminary. Was it just a coincidence that he'd attended the same seminary where Rafe was studying?

Another article published just a year ago mentioned Hatch again.

Three years after he went missing and was presumed dead while a missionary in Guatemala, Monsignor Jeremiah Hatch walked into a hospital in Belize. Though physically healthy, he had no recollection of the last three years.

Representatives from the United States Bishops came to bring Msgr. Hatch back to the States, but one unidentified nurse said, "He kept repeating, 'They're dead. They're all dead.'"

That would explain why he was sent to the Santa Louisa Mission, Anthony surmised.

Curious about Hatch's childhood, Anthony tried other search terms, focusing on Denver.

Nothing. The bad thing about the Internet was that while information over the last decade was easily searchable, the further back you went the harder it was to find anything. Archives often didn't make it online.

Why would Monsignor Hatch bring the tabernacle to the bishop? Anthony had inspected the damage, and it was minimal-a few missing stones, a few more loose. The stones themselves were replaceable.

The importance of the tabernacle was that it protected the priests against evil. Its removal put them all in jeopardy. If Davies was responsible for summoning the demon, she may have been poisoning the priests to make it easier for the demon to gain a foothold. And if Hatch was one of the three humans needed to extract Ianax from h.e.l.l, he would know to remove the tabernacle.

It didn't make sense unless Hatch knew of the protective qualities of the tabernacle. And wanted it gone.

And the only reason he'd want it gone would be because he knew what was coming. Who was coming.

Which meant he had betrayed everyone at Santa Louisa de Los Padres Mission. Just like Charles Wicker said.

But Hatch was dead. Had someone betrayed him? Or . . .

Anthony ran from the library. He opened the trunk of his rental-he'd taken a taxi to retrieve his car after leaving Skye-and inspected the tabernacle more closely.

He crossed himself. "Please forgive me, Father."

On the bottom panel an ancient Hebrew incantation was stamped in the metal. Anthony had to take apart the tabernacle to remove the inscribed prayer. This would help him break the spell surrounding the evil house on the coast. Skye would return, and if he couldn't get past the invisible barrier, she would most certainly die.

He slid into the driver's seat and picked up his cell phone. He had to get Rod Fielding to talk to him. Then he would know for sure whether Monsignor Hatch had worshipped demons.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

FEELING ALONE WASN'T UNUSUAL, but when Skye watched Anthony walk away that morning, she felt lost. Almost as lost as when her mother deserted the family. When her father died.

She shook her head. Ridiculous. It was the remnants of the drugs, the long day and lack of sleep. That's why her mother and father were in her thoughts. That's why she couldn't get Anthony out of her mind. She wanted to trust him, but how could she?

He walked through fire.

The arson investigator told her over the phone it might have appeared as if he walked in the fire, but no one could survive unscathed. He explained the concept of backdraft, and how fire seemed to disappear, then could return more powerful and destructive, consuming everything in its path.

Skye suppressed what had happened at the mission. Her mind must have tricked her eyes, just like when she thought she saw her father on the cliffs.

She was a cop in the U.S.A. Anthony Zaccardi worked for the Vatican. A religious cult, as far as she was concerned. It wasn't as if he would stick around once the killers were in custody. He'd go back to Italy-Rome, Florence, Sicily, wherever-and that would be that.

She rubbed her face, missing him. What had gotten into her? She wanted to place her trust in a man she'd just met, a man who had an illogical but quick answer to every one of her problems? The fact that she missed him proved her judgment was damaged, as least as far as Anthony Zaccardi was concerned.

After checking with Rod and learning it would be another day before the autopsies were complete, she checked in with dispatch. No word yet on Juan Martinez. Guilt twisted her heart. She should know where her people were at all times. Instead, when Juan went missing, she was s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g a European hottie on the cliffs.

She rubbed her face. In her heart she knew it wasn't like that, but in the end she was responsible for the destruction of Rafe Cooper's journal, for Juan's disappearance, for sending Anthony away.

She went by the hospital, ostensibly to check on the status of her main suspect, but in her heart she knew it was to see Anthony. He wasn't there, nor had he been.

She drove by the inn. He wasn't there, either. She called dispatch and he hadn't picked up his pa.s.sport.

Her instincts overrode her personal wishes. What was he up to?

She'd already put a BOLO on Corinne Davies and her daughter, Lisa. If anyone saw them, they were to call her. She wanted to talk to them, not scare them or send them into hiding.

Running through her mental checklist, she called Brian Adamson, the delivery driver whom Juan had spoken to the morning of the murders, asking if Juan had spoken with him since yesterday morning. He hadn't.

What Skye didn't understand was if Ms. Davies was poisoning the priests, why would the grocery records matter to Rafe Cooper? Why couldn't she have brought her own poison to the mission? Using the grocery would only heighten suspicion and leave a trail. She could easily have brought hemlock or whatever from her own garden. Unless, maybe, he first suspected the produce from the grocery was tainted.

And why had the killer removed the weapons? Perhaps to make it appear that something supernatural had happened when it was simply another example of human violence? The weapons probably didn't belong in the mission. Someone had brought them there. Skye's head hurt as she contemplated that someone had drugged twelve men, put weapons in proximity, and watched the brutal show. The weapons themselves must hold significance to the killers, or be traceable, otherwise why would they need to reclaim them?

She wanted to ask Anthony. He obviously understood religious nutcases.

That's not fair.

Skye ran a hand through her hair, messing with the ponytail, and she undid it, shaking her head.

Someone must have drugged the men after Davies left. If, in fact, Davies was involved at all. Perhaps she had been a scapegoat? Maybe the men had been drugged by someone inside, and Rafe Cooper arrived and pointed a finger at Corinne Davies. Maybe she was truly an innocent, but knew something. Could she, too, be in danger?

She'd gone off to a spa and her daughter was alone. Had her daughter reached her? Where were they now? Could they also be victims, and in Skye's exuberance to find a suspect and close this case she had put potential victims in the suspect column?

She called Rod. She had one more question for him.

"How were the drugs administered to the men the night they died?"

"All I can tell you is that they ate stew the night they died."

"Stew?"

"You know, beef, potatoes, carrots, onions, gravy. Stew."

"What about additions? Were the drugs in the stew?"

"The drugs had to have been in the stew. All but one of the men ate it. The richness of the food would have disguised the bitterness. I don't have the lab reports back yet to confirm."

Just like the sugar she added to her coffee disguised the bitterness.

"Who didn't eat the stew?"

She heard him flipping through papers. "Jeremiah Hatch. He had lettuce, carrots, onions, and bread, no stew."

"Why wasn't Rafe Cooper affected?"

"He wasn't dead. I couldn't examine his stomach contents," he said sarcastically.