The Ruth Valley Missing (21 page)

Not again, I thought.

~~~

I opened my eyes, lids heavy, seeing
nothing but the backside of a blindfold. My mouth was taped shut and my arms
and legs bound.

Again.

Nails scraped my face as a hand
yanked down my blindfold. I didn’t have to look to know it was Sister Marjorie,
the pungent smell of lavender oil surrounding her.

“People think city-folks are smarter
than folks from little towns like this. If you’re any indication, they’re
sorely mistaken.”

I stayed silent, looking at the
concrete floor around me. We weren’t in the house in the woods.

“I mean, I think we were pretty
clear about how we felt about your actions during our last meeting, weren’t
we?”

Sister Marjorie punctuated the end
of her question with a kick to my side, right where I’d been slashed during what
she confirmed was my last visit with her. I fell over, the pain knocking the
wind out of me.

“Get up. I barely tapped you. People
are so weak nowadays.”

I inched my way back into a sitting
position and winced as Sister Marjorie ripped the tape from my mouth. I exhaled
a question while I still had the breath to do so. “What do you want?”

“See, now you would think that’s a
good question. But really, the answer lies in what you want.”

I shook my head. “I don’t follow.”

“That’s right. You need things spelled
out.” Sister Marjorie held the cross around her neck between two fingers,
spinning it as she spoke. “That Sheriff of yours, it’s apparent to everyone how
much you like him, and for whatever reason, he seems to have taken a shine to
you as well. So, you have a choice. You leave us to our affairs, and we will
leave you to yours.”

“Come again?”

She leaned in, her breath sour and
warm. “You’ve experienced a small bit of what we’re capable of. Unless you want
your boyfriend to be subject to what we can do – and let me assure you, there
is so much we can do - then you back off.”

“So, I leave town, forget anything
I’ve…” I paused, choosing my words carefully, “anything I think I might know,
and you leave Jack alone?”

“I didn’t say anything about leaving.
Quite the opposite. You stay in this town with your Sheriff, where we can keep
an eye on you. You behave and we keep our deal.”

“You can’t keep getting away with—“

“Now you’re just boring me.” The nun
straightened her habit and turned away. “Think about it. I’ll be back.
Eventually.”

I pulled against the tape around my
limbs, calling after Sister Marjorie.

“Wait!” I watched the nun’s skirts
swirl as she turned to face me. “How do I know you haven’t already hurt Jack? I
need to know he’s okay before I agree to anything.”

“Fine,” she sighed walking over and
pulling a knife out from under her habit. With one quick motion, she tore
through the tape holding my feet together, then pointed the knife at my chest.
“If you get creative, I get creative, got it?”

I nodded reluctantly, stood up and
followed her to the door leading us out to a long, smooth hallway. There were
steps going up at one end, and a few more doors like the one we came from all
along the lengthy corridor.

Before I could look any longer, she
pulled the blindfold back over my eyes and grabbed my arm, jerking me to
follow.

Finally we stopped. I listened to
her unlock something, and stumbled as she pushed me forward. She yanked the
blindfold down again to reveal the room in the convent I had been in before.

There on a table in the center of
the room laid Jack, unconscious.

“What did you do to him?”

“I can assure you he is perfectly
fine.” Sister Marjorie looked up and added, “Well, he’ll have a headache in the
morning and think he had too much whiskey for some reason, but otherwise, he’s
fine.”

I took a step in his direction but
was stopped by Sister Marjorie’s outstretched arm and very sharp knife.

“No, no. Plenty of time for that
when he’s back home and awake. Do we have a deal?”

I nodded.

“Excellent. And now…”

A sudden flash of pain to the back
of my head and I was out again.

It was still early when I stepped
out of the house. I ached everywhere, and the knot on the back of my head was
tender, but I couldn’t stay in bed. There was too much to do.

I ran to Jack’s house, letting
myself in, quietly making my way through the kitchen into the living room.
There he was, asleep on the couch, hugging an empty bottle of whiskey. I leaned
close to check on him. His breath reeked of alcohol, but at least there was
breath there to reek.

I grabbed a box of pastries from the
kitchen and snuck back out of the house, leaving him to sleep off whatever was
in his system.

Not wanting to be noticed, I opted for
a shortcut through the woods on foot, rather than a drive on the small town’s
roads, where my car was far from inconspicuous.

As I broke through the final bit of
trees, I found myself standing behind the small brick building across from the
church. The rectory.

I knocked on the back door, softly
at first. No answer. I looked around, still knocking softly, but without
stopping. Finally, the door opened.

Father Mike stood sleepy-eyed in
sweatpants and t-shirt, hair standing in all directions. He leaned out of the
door, looking around before he grabbed my arm. “Well, get in here. Quick.”

I stepped inside, Father Mike
pulling the door shut behind me and locking it.

“Hold on a sec,” he said, putting a
finger up as he walked around the house checking windows. He pulled one open
curtain shut.

I looked around at the peeling
linoleum floor of the kitchen, the chipped countertop, and ancient beige
appliances. The living room ahead was no better; brown carpet with a swirled
pattern that disguised years of dirt and stains, a plaid couch that sagged in
the middle, and an amber-colored lamp on a TV tray.

“Nice place.”

“Don’t lie. This is an extension of
the house of God, you know. And I’m pretty sure even he’d say it’s a dump.”

He rubbed the sleep from his eyes
and stared at me.

“I brought pastries.” I held up the
box and placed it on the counter. “And I can make some coffee.”

“Pot on the stove to boil some
water. Sanka’s in the cabinet.”

“Sanka? I didn’t even know that
stuff still existed.”

“It does here.”

I wrinkled my nose at the jar of
coffee crystals and filled the pot with water.

Father Mike sat on one of the
mismatched rusty stools at the counter. “Did I miss something? I thought I said
confession in the morning. Not ‘come make me breakfast at the crack of dawn’.”

“It’s not that early. And this is
not making you breakfast. I make amazing breakfast, and this is most definitely
not it.”

“Yeah?” He raised an eyebrow and
grinned.

“See that? With the eyebrow? Creepy
priest.”

“Haven’t had my coffee crystals and
day old pastry yet. Give me a break.”

I grabbed the only two mugs from the
cabinet and gave them a rinse before dumping my usual load of sugar in one cup.
I turned towards Father Mike. “How do you take it?”

“Black, lots of sugar.”

I nodded and gave the second mug the
same treatment as the first.

“This is all very nice, but are you
planning on getting to why you’re here? Not that I mind.”

I paused, coffee mugs in hand.

“What? Still creepy?”

I nodded as I flipped open the box of
pastries and pulled a piece off a cheese Danish.

“Well, maybe you could start talking
so I can stop putting my foot in my mouth.”

I waited, searching his face for any
sign that he already knew what happened. I mostly believed that he wasn’t involved,
but I couldn’t help but still wonder. Taking a breath, I went ahead. “The nuns
gave me an ultimatum last night. Well, specifically, Sister Marjorie did.”

Mike’s sleepy-eyed look disappeared,
his eyes wide. “When was this? Where?”

“They knocked me out with something
at Jack’s house. When I came to I was in a room connected to the church. You
know those doors at the bottom of the steps that lead off to the convent?”

He nodded.

“I was down there. I’m sure of it.
There are rooms off that corridor and I was in one.”

“You’re positive?”

“When she took me out of the room I
had a second to look around. There were steps going up in one direction – I’m
pretty sure those lead into the church – and then she led me the other way and
we ended up in the room I discovered when I broke into the convent. That’s
where they were holding Jack.”

Father Mike rubbed his forehead,
closing his eyes. “Wait, they were holding Jack?”

“He was unconscious the whole time,
far as I can tell. But he’s okay. He was passed out on the couch when I left.”

Mike leaned back a bit, crossing his
arms. “What did they have him for?”

“Leverage. They know I know
something. Sister Marjorie said that they would leave Jack alone if I back off.
I have to stay in town and pretend I don’t know a thing.”

“And you agreed?”

“In word, yeah. But obviously I
can’t let this go. I just need to be extra careful now.”

“And that’s why you came here rather
than visiting me in confession?”

“It seemed like a better option than
going to the church.”

“To visit me, alone.” He paused,
blinking. “Here.”

“Well, when you say it like that it
doesn’t sound so good. I thought parishioners came to see priests in the
rectory?”

“There are office hours for that, in
theory, but as you can see, they haven’t exactly set this place up to make that
an appealing option.” I frowned. Maybe I wasn’t as smart as I thought. “Hey,
it’s okay. Meeting in the church probably wouldn’t have been the best idea, at
least not for today. But we need to be able to talk somewhere less suspicious,
so we gotta come up with a suitable cover moving forward.”

I walked over to the boiling water
and filled the coffee mugs, bringing them to the counter. “Any ideas?”

Father Mike poked at a pastry in
front of him and grinned. “Bake sale.”

I rolled my eyes. “Very funny.”

“No, seriously. The church has a
charity bake sale coming up. Joan was signed up to organize, but she’s gone.”
He held his arms out in my direction. “Welcome, ‘Widows and Orphans Bake Sale’
Coordinator.”

“Just like that?”

“Just like that. It’s perfect. Gives
you the freedom to roam town, gathering volunteers and such, and you can chat
with me anytime. Officially, about baked goods, unofficially, about the
nefarious and possibly homicidal deeds of some very scary nuns.”

“Amazing. You can say all that and
sound so chipper.”

Father Mike took a sip of his coffee
and winked. “You gotta love your work.”

“Winking?”

“Sorry, sorry.” He pushed away from
the counter. “I’m going to go get my priestly duds on. You better get the way
you came. Breakfast at the diner, tomorrow?”

“Bright and early.” I looked out the
window before opening the door. “Hey, Mike?”

He paused and turned my way.

“Be careful. If they’re watching me,
they may be watching you, too.”

“I’m always careful.”

I shook my head, stepped outside, and
took off for the woods.

When I came home, I found Jack on
the back porch, cleaning one of his rifles. “Hey, you. How are you feeling?”

“My head is killing me.”

I nodded, expecting that answer.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbled.

“For?”

“I obviously had one too many. Or,
ten too many from the looks of the bottle inside. I can’t remember a thing.”

“Oh, don’t worry. You were too drunk
to do or say anything too offensive.”

It was partly true. He didn’t do
anything offensive.

“Still. I don’t want you thinking
I’d make a habit of that sort of thing.”

I forced a smile, playing along. I
didn’t think telling him what really happened was going to help. If he believed
me, he might try to go after the nuns, and I really didn’t know what they were
capable of at this point. And if he didn’t believe me, well, relationships with
crazy people tend to die a quick death, and I was hoping to keep this
relationship alive.

“Of course not. Consider it
forgotten. What are you up to out here?”

“One of the farmers said he saw a
bear on his way into town the other day. Keeping the hunting rifle ready in
case.”