The Ruth Valley Missing (25 page)

“You’ll be great. Everyone loves you
almost nearly as much as I do.” I pointed to the little old lady from the
knitting circle. “I think she might even love you more.”

Jack’s entire face lit up and he
wrapped me in a hug, lifting me off the ground. His face buried in my hair, he
spoke in my ear. “I love you, too, James.”

Setting me down, he smiled at me
once more and took off for the bake-off area. I stood there, slightly stunned,
as I hadn’t realized what I said until Jack responded.

I stood in the crowd as Jack made
introductions to the judges, making jokes with the crowd, and charmed even the
sternest faces on the judges’ panel. Standing up there, he looked perfect;
broad-shouldered, blue-eyed, and absolutely adored.

I should have been ecstatic. True,
it seemed early in a relationship to be hearing those three words, but isn’t
that what every woman waits to hear? Why hearing ‘I love you’ from an obviously
amazing guy would make my stomach twist was a mystery.

Maybe the true culprit for my
knotted guts was all the guilt about lying to Jack.

I looked around the crowd, scanning
for familiar faces. Everyone from town was there. Even Emma’s mother, who
rarely left the house, was sitting in a yellow folding chair, holding Emma’s
hand.

Everyone was there. Well, almost
everyone.

I scanned the crowd again. Then a
third time.

There was no sign of Father Mike.

I looked up at the little stage we’d
erected for the bake-off then back at all the townspeople. I made my way closer
and closer to the fringes of the large crowd, then when it seemed no one was
paying attention, I took off towards the church.

Once inside, I called out for Mike,
getting no response. Had he been found out? My heart started to race, as I
pushed any thoughts of what could be and tried to focus on finding him. I was
standing at the front of the church when I looked over at the steps leading down
to the locked door I’d approached the first time I was alone in the empty
church.

I followed the steps down and tugged
on the heavy door. It was unlocked. I slipped inside, stumbling as my eyes
adjusted to the dark. With my hand on the wall to guide me, I quickly made my
way down the corridor, listening intently.

I paused by each doorway I passed,
finding them all locked, not a sound coming from behind them. As I crept up the
steps leading to the Sisters’ quarters, my path brightened, the outside light
creeping in through the windows.

I started pass the large wooden
doors, the room I’d once visited, then took a step back. The lock hung from the
door, open. I pushed the door slowly, enough for me to squeeze into the room.

Standing perfectly still, I
listened.

“James,” a voice whispered.

I spun around to see Father Mike
creep out from behind the door, a hand behind his back. “What are you doing in
here?!”

“You weren’t outside with everyone.
I got worried.”

“This is a very bad idea. What if
someone notices you’re missing?”

“I’ll say I had to pee.”

Mike shook his head. “I’m almost
done. Get out of here.”

“How did you get in here?”

He returned to searching the room,
waving a key in response.

“Did you find anything?”

“Maybe.”

“What?”

“Not now, James. Go.”

Mike grabbed the door and ushered me
out. “I’ll catch up with you at the bonfire.”

“Fine.”

I took off the way I came, moving
faster this time, even if I was fairly sure I still had a good amount of time
before the bake-off ended.

Outside, I snuck back into the
crowd, making my way next to Emma and her mom. The crowd was laughing at
something Jack said as I exhaled, calming myself.

“He is too cute, James,” Emma said,
grabbing my arm.

“You’re a very lucky woman,” Emma’s
mother added.

“The Sheriff is pretty lucky, too,
mama.”

I smiled at the compliment and
looked up at the stage. If Mike’s ‘maybe’ could put an end to all the drama,
particularly my need to lie all the time, then yes, we were both very lucky.

As the cheers ending the bake-off
subsided, the crowd thinned a bit, some choosing to go home as the sun
disappeared, others sticking around for the bonfire and barbecue.

I found my way to a quiet edge of
the fire, sat on the ground and waited for Jack to return with our plates of
food. I stared at the fire, the flames hypnotic after a long day.

“James.”

Father Mike squatted next to me,
staring at the fire. His face looked paler than I remembered, color only in the
apples of his cheeks.

“Are you alright?”

He nodded slowly, sucking his teeth.

“You think you can meet me at the
rectory later. Half past midnight?”

“Seriously?”

He nodded, still staring into the
fire.

“I guess. Are you sure you’re okay?”

He nodded as his eyes darted away
from the fire and towards Jack in the distance, making his way back with food.
Father Mike stood up, brushing off his dark jeans before looking down at me.
“Half past. Don’t be late.”

I nodded. He looked off in the
distance before adding, “Don’t eat the meat.”

I leaned against the wall by the
back door of the rectory, waiting for Mike to respond to my knocking. The
queasy feeling I had earlier in the evening never fully subsided, likely
amplified by stress and an extra helping of macaroni and cheese at the bonfire.

The door opened, a hand flying out and
pulling me inside, my legs barely keeping me vertical as I stumbled through the
doorway.

Father Mike shut the door behind me,
quickly locking the door, phone to his ear.

“You weren’t followed, right?”

I shook my head. “Of course not.”

He held a finger up as he spoke into
the phone. “Right…yes. One hundred percent. We’re good to go…Thanks, man.”

He hung up the phone and ran a hand
through his hair before looking up.

“What’s going on? You’re freaking me
out just a little bit here.”

“I talked to Doc Matthews. Man was
drunk and scared out of his mind when I showed him the documents. Turns out he
was paid to sign the death certificates, never actually examined any bodies. He
didn’t ask questions after the first few. He knew some of the men – deadbeats,
didn’t treat their wives or kids well – so he didn’t care to know where they
were.”

“Bodies? The first few? That doesn’t
sound good.”

“It’s not.”

I sat on one of the rusty stools,
nodding for him to continue.

“He said as time passed, he was
signing more and more death certificates. He was starting to worry. He’d have
someone come in with an odd injury—“

“Like Andy’s?”

“Yeah, like that. But then months
later he’d be asked to sign a death certificate for that same person. That’s
when he started drinking.”

“To deal with the guilt.”

Mike nodded. “One would assume, and
thank goodness for that. I don’t think he would have told me what he did if he
hadn’t been three sheets to the wind already.”

I took a deep breath, my voice
cracking, “Did he ever sign one for Andy?”

“I didn’t ask.”

My face fell. Mike quickly added, “I
doubt Andy had a policy, James. I’m sure he’s okay.”

I nodded, wishing I felt so
confident. “No wonder he’s drunk all the time. Horrible man. What did you find
in the convent?”

Mike took a deep breath. “The room
with the freezers that you’d been in, something about it didn’t set right with
me. Surgical tools, the drain; I knew there had to be more there. As you know,
I checked it out.”

He scratched his head with both
hands before continuing.

“They were storing containers of
hydrochloric acid in that room. You know what you can do with that?”

I shook my head, although I
suspected I knew the answer.

“You can dissolve bones. My guess is
they discovered burying remains was hard work, not to mention risky, so they
moved on to a new disposal methods.”

I shook my head. I believed every
word, but it didn’t make it any less awful.

“It gets worse. I checked the
freezers and that meat? Let me assure you, there were no cows harmed in filling
up those chests.”

“What?”

“I opened a couple of packages. I’m
certain those were not cuts the butcher carries. At first, I thought they were
storing body parts there, pacing out their disposal. Those chemicals are pretty
caustic, so maybe they wanted to do a little at a time? But on a hunch I
checked the kitchen. The only meat in every freezer and fridge in that convent
is the same meat that’s in those freezers.”

I grimaced, swallowing the sting of
bile threatening its way up my throat, repeating slowly. “Don’t eat the meat.”

He nodded. “I can’t know for
certain, but I suspect this town has unwittingly been feeding on its own.”

I held my head down, taking slow
breaths through the mouth.

“Are you gonna be sick?”

Mike jumped up and grabbed an empty
trash can and held in front of me, pulling my hair away from my face. I waved
the can away.

“I’m okay. I mean, I’m not even
close to ‘okay’, I just don’t think I’m going to throw up.” He moved the can
away and let go of my hair. I looked up at him and shook my hands in front of
me, as if my hands were covered in the towns’ carcasses, moaning, “We ate
people!”

“It looks that way. On the positive
side, you didn’t eat anyone last night, did you?”

“Somehow, that’s not helping.”

“The important part is that it means
evidence. Whatever sick reason they had for using the ‘meat’ rather than
disposing of it, the chemicals, the documents, it’s all enough for a real
investigation.”

I heaved a sigh. The news should
have eased my nausea, but knowing I may have ingested someone’s Uncle Bob was
still having its effects.

“I guess it’s all good news, big
picture-wise.” I hopped off the stool, shaking my head. “I should get back. I’m
not going to be able to sleep tonight. Or eat, ever.”

Father Mike grimaced. “Let me walk
you.”

I rolled my eyes. “I got here with
no problem, didn’t I?”

“I know, I just, I don’t know. I’d
feel better if I see you through the woods at least.” The corner of his mouth
turned up slightly. “I don’t want to end up finding you on someone’s plate.”

“Fine. Get a coat. It’s freezing out
there.”

He obeyed, grabbing a coat and
following me out the door. We both took a quick look around. It was silent
outside, the night sky perfectly clear, the moon nearly full. We made a quick
dash for the cover of the woods, staying quiet as we made our way through the
shortcut. When we got close to the opening leading to my place, I turned to
Father Mike.

“I’m good from here. You should go.”

I jumped at the sound of a twig
snapping and leaves crunching. Father Mike grabbed my hand and pulled me next
to him.

The crunching stopped, followed by a
heart-stopping click.

“Hello, Father. James.”

I looked at Mike as he let go of my
hand and slowly raised his over his head before turning towards the sound. I
did the same.

Jack paced in front of us, gripping
his rifle, as we kneeled on the floor of the church. When he found Mike and me,
he forced us back through the woods, ordering silence the whole way.

I looked at Mike, kneeling beside
me, his hands behind his head like mine. He was watching Jack walk back and
forth, then looked over at me when Jack’s back was to us. He mouthed the words
‘stay calm’ before returning his gaze to Jack’s pacing.

“I don’t understand why you would do
this, James. I thought you cared about me. I thought you would be the one.”

“I do care about you Jack.” Or at
least I did. This crazy display of what I could only assume was unnecessary
jealousy was killing the perfect boyfriend image. “This is all just a big
misunderstanding.”

Jack shook his head. “You could have
stayed out of it. You should have done what you were told.”

My forehead wrinkled, disbelieving.
“Stayed out of what? Told by whom, Jack?”

“Who do you think? They warned you
to stay out of their business. That’s all you had to do. I told them you’d do
it for me.” He paused before adding, “I really believed you would.”

“You knew?” I held my breath,
knowing the answer couldn’t be good.

“Of course I knew. Do you think I’m
an idiot?”