Chapter 4
four
The Salvation
A knock sounds on the rectory door. It’s the seventh night since my lamb has been gone, and I feel her absence in every breath I take, every heartbeat.
I expect her around every corner, so when the tapping comes, echoing on the old wooden surface, I jump up so fast I wake my guest. He lifts his arm and peers at me from under his elbow.
“Expecting company?” he asks, his eyes bleary with sleep.
“I’m always available for my flock,” I say, halfway to the door when it swings open.
The wrong Soule is standing in the doorway, though. My entire frame sags with defeat, and I think I’ll sink to the floor in exhaustion and simply sleep until I wake to find it all undone, a nightmare of losing the one I’ve waited for all this time, until I thought she wasn’t coming.
And tonight, she’s not.
Her brother frowns, holding the grey cat in his arms closer and glancing from me to the form buried under a blanket on the sofa. “You have guests?” he asks.
“It’s just a seminary student,” I assure him.
“I told the others to meet me here,” Saint says, lowering his voice so he won’t be overheard. “Should we go somewhere else? My room, maybe?”
“There’s no need,” I say, matching his tone. “He won’t be involved. He was having some troubles, so he’s staying here while he takes a break from school and reassesses his path.”
Already, he’s turned his back to the room and pulled the blanket up over his head, blocking out the light.
Seeming satisfied, Saint sets down the cat and heads for the small, round table in my kitchen without an invitation. He pulls up a chair, sits, and pulls out his phone. “Nate’s on his way,” he reports. “I sent Angel a message too, but I don’t know if he’s talking to me right now.”
“He will,” I assure him. “He’s as scared as we all are right now, but he’s still your brother.”
Saint drops his head, pinching the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. “It’s my fault, Father,” he says, his voice cracking. “I let her go.”
“You had no way of knowing what would happen,” I tell him, resting a hand on his shoulder. It shakes under my grip, but he gets himself together after a minute.
“I knew she was upset, though,” he says quietly. “I hurt her on purpose, pushed her away, because of my own shit.”
“She carries the same burden of shame that you do,” I say. “She understands.”
A minute later, another knock sounds at the front door, and even though I know who is coming, an instinctual surge of hope flashes through me.
The grey cat perches on the back of the sofa, staring at the door with saucer eyes.
I open the door for Nathaniel, and Walker looks up again.
“What is this, a halfway house for freaks?” he mutters before flopping back down on his pillow and folding it around his head.
“Considering you’re here, that makes you one of the freaks,” Nathaniel points out, but his cousin doesn’t hear him through the pillow.
“Come in,” I say, gesturing toward the kitchen. “Saint’s already here.”
The cat hisses loudly, but Nathaniel ignores it and follows me in, swinging his satchel strap over his head. “Just because you’re a professor, that doesn’t mean this is free,” he warns, setting his stuff on the table.
“You’re such a cheapskate,” Saint says. “You don’t even need it. Your parents are doctors and lawyers.”
“That’s their money,” Nathaniel says, not looking up from where he’s booting up two laptops at once. “And who said anything about cash?”
“Fine,” I say, hoping I’m not getting myself deeper into something I can’t get out of, the kind of life I tried to leave behind when I moved here.
I wanted a fresh start, and I got one. The last thing I want to do is compromise it all now.
But it would be worth it to know Mercy’s safe and happy, even if I can’t be part of her life the way I want to.
If this is the condition of finding her, so be it.
“I had the tracker put in her like you told me,” Saint says. “I’ve been watching her location since, so I know it works. Until a few days ago.”
Nathaniel pulls out a packet of Twizzlers and sets it beside his stuff before sitting down in one of the kitchen chairs. “Of course,” he says. “If it’s anyone who knows anything, they’d deactivate a regular tracker as soon as they ditched her phone.”
“That seems a little presumptuous,” I murmur. “She’s not a dog. Why would anyone assume a human has a tracking chip?”
“Mercy’s not just any human, is she?” Nathaniel asks, tapping away at his wireless keyboard. “She’s Angel North’s girlfriend.”
His words settle between us like a weight, the seriousness of the situation increasing with each new revelation, each new realization. No one speaks until the front door swings open, and then we all jump. Angel steps through, the cat darts under the couch, and Walker sighs heavily.
“If I’d known I’d be sleeping in the parade route, I would have crashed on someone else’s couch,” he mutters.
“Who the fuck is that?” Angel demands.
“It’s a seminary student,” I tell him. “He won’t bother us.”
“Bullshit,” Angel says, wrenching the blankets off the couch. “This is Hellhound business.”
Walker sits up with a sound of exasperation, but Angel’s gone stock still.
“A Sincero?” he roars, grabbing Walker by the throat. “I just did the world a favor and got rid of one of you sons of bitches. Give me one good reason I shouldn’t take out another?”
“I’m a Delacroix,” Walker says, looking Angel straight in the eye without flinching.
If anything, he swells a little, as if just saying his name makes his spine a little straighter and his shoulders squarer.
That kind of family pride fascinates me.
It’s hard for me to even imagine that being a point of pride to someone.
I’ve only known loathing for my own family.
“What?” Angel grits out between his teeth, clearly incensed that someone contradicted him.
“I’m not a Sincero,” Walker says cooly. “I’m a Delacroix.”
“You took her,” Angel roars, shaking the other man like a ragdoll. “You rat bastards fucking took my girl!”
“He didn’t take her,” I say, laying a hand on Angel’s shoulder.
After a second, he relents, though he’s trembling with rage, his muscles coiled and ready to strike.
Power wells inside me, the awe I always feel when someone powerful obeys me sweeping over my limbs, filling my chest with the kind of exultation that my father only found in violence.
I tell myself there’s a difference, but I don’t really believe it.
“Get him out of here,” Angel says, his voice shaking with barely suppressed fury.
“Why don’t you take a walk,” I suggest to Walker.
“Gladly,” he mutters. He stands and grabs a sweatshirt off the rack near the door, disappearing through it into the night without even bothering to dress properly. The cat darts out behind him, but the boys at the table don’t notice, so I assume he’ll come back.
“Why the fuck do you have a Sincero in your house?” Angel asks, wheeling on me, his green eyes dark with fury.
“My job is to be there for anyone in need,” I point out. “Not just you.”
Angel’s jaw clenches, and he tips his head back, giving me that hard, blank look. “Then we can’t trust you.”
“You can trust me,” I grit out, glaring back at him. “You think I don’t want to get her back as much as you do? She’s—”
She’s my perfect little lamb, sweet yet spicy, innocent yet depraved; wanton in her eagerness and alluring in her innocence.
“She’s special,” I finish lamely.
“You pay even if they kick you off the project,” Nathaniel calls, not looking up from his computer. He chews absently at one of his red licorice sticks as he works.
“We’re not kicking him off,” Saint says firmly. He frowns at Angel. “Get it together, man.”
Angel scowls, but he doesn’t accuse me of working with a rival gang again, so we’re making progress.
“So,” Nathaniel says. “An ordinary tracker will ping off a cell tower, but the problem is, they’re too easily detectible and too easily tampered with.
I use something more secure. The downside is, it can be traced back to you easily, as it’s more like pairing your device, but it works at a much longer range than a photo drop or something along those lines. ”
“But they deactivated it,” Saint says.
“Not quite,” Nathaniel says. “It looks like the signal has been blocked, but it’s still active.
I’ll see if I can work around it, but it might take a while, so settle in.
By the way, my overnight rate is double.
” He beams at Saint, like he’s trying to piss him off for his earlier comment about not needing payment.
“We talked to a guy earlier,” Angel says. “One of the guys from the video. He said it was the Disciples.”
“Why didn’t you bring him?” Saint demands.
“He’s dead,” Angel says flatly.
“You dumbass,” Saint snaps. “We could have gotten information out of him.”
“I did,” Angel says. “Before he had a tragic and sudden accident.”
“What if he remembered something else?” Saint grits out.
“He wouldn’t,” Angel says. “But there were two other guys there. We can get information out of them.”
“Yeah?” Saint asks. “Then where the fuck are they? Because the only Disciple I’ve seen around was Salem Sincero.”
“You saw Salem?” I ask. “What did she say?”
“Nothing much,” Saint says, shrugging. “She was at Sinner’s Tower. Just being weird and refusing to answer my questions.”
“What exactly did she say?” Nathaniel asks, looking up, his fingers going still for once.
“I told you,” Saint says. “Nothing.”
I glance at Nathaniel, frowning. I’m not sure how well he knows the Sinceros, but his reaction indicates he knows at least a bit.
“Sinner’s Tower is closed,” I say. “And Salem doesn’t say ‘nothing.’ She might be cryptic or elusive, but she doesn’t talk for the sake of it.”
“Agreed,” Nathaniel says. “Tell us exactly what she said. There might be a clue there.”