The Bishop's Legacy (World of Shadows Book 3) Page 4

  “Could you maybe give us a tour?”

  The question came from Desiree, and it jolted him back out of his memories. He realized that a long while must have passed in his reverie, and he shook his head to clear the thoughts away.

  He tried to focus on something else, willing forth good memories of his life spent here. It wasn’t all bad, he knew, and it wouldn’t be fair to let the bad outweigh the good. He’d been raised here, played with his brother in the fields, worked with his father in the barn.

  When his parents had died they’d still been just teenagers. Without a will, the house had been left to both of them to share. Neither of them knew what to do about that; Mitchell had eventually forfeited his claim to Arthur years later as a wedding present when he’d just turned twenty.

  He did it, he said, so that Arthur could raise his family here, and it had been the happiest day of his life. This home was full of good memories.

  But it was also full of death.

  “Sure. A tour sounds like a great idea. Let’s start with the barn,” he said finally.

  He brushed angrily at his wet cheeks and opened the car door. They all stepped out into the sunshine. The air felt good on his skin and it was nice being able to stretch his legs.

  The other two followed him as he walked across the gravel driveway to the old red barn. He’d spent a lot of time out there, playing hide and seek with his brother or grooming the horses. His father had worked at a nearby racetrack taking care of dozens of race horses and they stabled quite a few of the animals during the long and cold winters.

  He’d loved riding around the fields, though he hadn’t gotten to do it more than a handful of times with his father. The man spent his hours working and never gave Arthur his time. There was something peaceful about just running around the fields and spending a few hours enjoying the sunshine and wind.

  After his parents died so suddenly the place fell into modest disrepair. Neither he nor his brother really knew how to take care of a family home this big, but when he’d married his wife he’d fixed the place back up. He’d even rebuilt the barn to start stabling horses again.

  It was as though he’d gotten a new lease on life. He wanted his daughter to experience riding horses around the fields the way he had with his parents. He wanted to share this part of his childhood with his daughter. He’d always just put it off.

  Now she was gone.

  Now he would never have the chance.

  The guilt of it all weighed heavily on him as he slid open the old barn door. The rusty railing needed oil. The smell of hay and wood assaulted his senses as he stepped inside, moving out of the sunlight and into the shadowy interior of the barn.

  Sunlight flitted in from overhead through cracks in the ceiling and walls, and he could see dust hanging in the air around them in little streams of light.

  The hay loft overhead was starting to sag and one of the beams had almost completely rotted away. Termites would tear the place down eventually, but he wasn’t sure if he even cared. He knew he should spend some time treating the wood and fixing the barn back up, but he doubted he ever would.

  He had good memories of being in the barn, but it felt like another life. Another person, not him, had enjoyed spending time out here. That man was dead.

  “This was where we raised horses,” he said flatly, gesturing at the barn around him. “When I was little, every stall was full and we would spend about five hours a day out here working.”

  “Working?”

  “Yep,” Arthur said. “Takes a lot of time to groom and feed the animals. At least, if you want to do it right; that was my childhood.”

  “Did you raise baby horses?” Desiree asked.

  He nodded. “We had foals occasionally, depending on which owner my father was working for at the time. All of that ended when I was fifteen, though, so it’s been a long time. I would ride the horses around the field when I wasn’t supposed to and then would spend long hours out there searching for the lost horseshoes because of it. My father was a blacksmith and he would chide me before tacking them back on.”

  “Sounds fun.”

  “It was. My brother didn’t join me very often. He didn’t much care for the horses and would avoid them at all costs, but with my father there weren’t a lot of options. He was a strict man. He died when I was a teenager.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  Arthur shrugged. “It is what it is.”

  He turned away and headed back outside of the barn. He bypassed the empty paddock; the only place left: the house. He knew that going in there wouldn’t be as easy of a reunion, but he started walking that way just the same. One foot in front of the other. He heard Desiree and Niccolo trailing behind.

  He knew the interior of the house would be clean. There wouldn’t see any traces of the violence that had taken place there. Mitchell had long since fixed it up, hiring a professional cleaning crew that worked for the police to make sure no traces were left.

  That almost made it worse, though. It was as though his wife and daughter had been scrubbed out of existence.

  “Mitchell has been taking care of the place for the last several months,” he explained, more to distract himself than for his guests. Talking helped occupy his mind. “He’s been a real life saver, but he lives several hours away so the place has been unoccupied. I offered to give the house back to him after my family was killed, but he wasn’t interested. I think he thinks I’ll move back in at some point, but I have no intention of doing that because there is no way I’m going to live where—”

  His phone started buzzing. Arthur jerked in surprise and stumbled to the side.

  He glanced at Desiree and Niccolo, both of whom had solemn and serious expressions on their faces. Both of them, however, stifled laughter at his reaction.

  The image was so ridiculous that he burst out laughing. He slid the phone out of his pocket and glanced at the name on the little screen. Frieda. He flipped the phone open and held it to his ear.

  “Yeah, Frieda?”

  “Mount Carmen Church,” she said without any preamble. “Get there.”

  “On our way,” he said. “What are we expecting—?”

  He heard a click on the other end as Frieda hung up.

  “Never mind,” he said, putting the phone back in his pocket.

  She was probably in a hurry to do something, though he would have liked a little more information about what they were going to find out at the church.

  He knew where it was: it was south of here, somewhere outside of Akron, a little less than an hour away. He turned and headed back toward the car.

  “Come on,” he said. “Time to go.”

  “Is it a lead?”

  “Should be.”

  He had to admit a flood of relief that he didn’t have to go into the actual house. Not yet at least. It was nice having at least a temporary reprieve from that emotional confrontation.

  “Where are we going?” Niccolo asked, heading around to the passenger seat.

  “A nearby Church, about an hour away.”

  “Do you mind if I stay here?” Desiree asked suddenly. “My stomach has been queasy from the last couple of days driving and I would love a chance to lie down for a bit.”

  “Sure.”

  Arthur headed over to unlock the front door of the house for her. His hand shook as he walked up the front steps.

  “The bedrooms should all be unlocked, though things might be a little dusty. I don’t think my brother has been here in months.”

  “I’ll probably just lie down the couch.”

  “Make yourself at home,” he said, unlocking the door before rushing back down the steps. His heart raced from being so close to where they died and he didn’t dare look back. “We should be back soon.”

  Once he was safely inside the car, he flipped the ignition on and peeled off down the driveway back to the main road. He knew the Church from his childhood: a place he had attended for a short while when he was about eight. Catholic p
arents, but not religious. His mother, in particular, wasn’t much for church.

  They had attended a few times in his life, but never longer than a month or two at a time. It was just a fight his father wasn’t willing to have.

  “Was it one of the children?” Niccolo asked as they drove. “Was there an attack? Is Jeremy involved?”

  “I don’t know yet,” Arthur replied. He tried dialing Frieda again, but she didn’t answer. “Most likely.”

  They continued in silence for a while before Niccolo finally spoke again.

  “It must have been difficult. Being back there.”

  Arthur hesitated. “It wasn’t what I expected.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It was painful, but it was terrifying in a completely different way. It felt like reopening a wound, something I had already dealt with.”

  “You never fully close a wound like that,” Niccolo agreed. “Still, it’s important that you face it.”

  “I know,” Arthur replied. “It was just … different.”

  Part of him worried that he might find closure for this chapter of his life. Would that be unfair to the wife and daughter he had lost? The family that died because of him?

  He didn’t know.

  What he did know was that he needed to find closure. He had chosen to adopt Abigail as his daughter after he rescued her from that cult. He would take care of her, and for that to happen he needed to find a way to come to peace with everything that had happened before. He couldn’t remain the split and unfocused man he’d been for these last months.

  Abigail didn’t deserve that.

  First things first, though. Whatever the Bishop had planned, a lot of people would die. He couldn’t allow his emotions to cloud his judgment.

  Chapter 4

  Three Hours Earlier

  “Where are we going?”

  “You ask a lot of questions,” Jeremy said, growing more and more frustrated by the minute as they rode in the back of the SUV. Megyn wouldn’t quit her incessant whining and it was grating on his nerves. It had taken him ten minutes of begging and prodding just to get her into the car, and he’d thought he won the battle at that point.

  Truth be told, it had taken a lot longer for his driver to harvest the organs than anticipated, and Megyn didn’t like just sitting in the car waiting with him. She wanted an explanation that he wasn’t willing or able to give. He couldn’t very well let her walk back into the service station, though, so he just lied.

  The other three of her friends would meet them there, he explained. They were out gathering supplies for the mission and everything was completely normal. He had never guessed it would be so difficult to convince Megyn that they were on a timetable and needed to get this done fast.

  Finally, the demon driver had returned and gotten them on the way, but even now Megyn wouldn’t stop questioning him.

  “I ask a lot of questions because I want to know where you’re taking me,” Megyn said, sounding very motherly.

  “It’s a very important mission,” he explained. “I promise you that everything will be made clear when we get there. We should arrive in the next couple of minutes.”

  “Will our Father meet us there?”

  “No. I told you, he’s out of the country right now. We are doing this for him, however. He will be very proud of us.”

  She sighed. “Fine.”

  He bit back his annoyance and turned to look ahead of the car instead. He wanted to slap some sense into her so she would stop asking about the Bishop. It was painful enough for Jeremy just having to think about the man, let alone worry about constantly lying to her that Leopold was still alive.

  They drove toward a church on the outskirts of Akron, hard to reach and secluded. That’s what made it the perfect target: no one would know anything was happening until it was too late. It was also Saturday, which meant there would be some people at the church, but not more than they could handle.

  “When are we going to see him?”

  “Soon. When he gets back to the States this is going to be the first place he comes. I promise.”

  She didn’t like that answer, but Jeremy didn’t much care. He didn’t have time to worry about her emotions or insecurities: he had a job to do, and that was honoring Leopold’s legacy.

  That meant punishing the Bishop’s enemies.

  ◆◆◆

  He had been a lowly priest living in Akron, Ohio. He had ministered at a little Church out in the country. The Church of Saint Thomas. His small and devout flock turned out to be monstrous people. They had turned against him and made up lies and rumors to harm his reputation, calling him a child molester and worse. He was run out of town, seeking haven in another city to the south in Alabama to lick his wounds and regroup.

  He hadn’t forgotten, though: that church and those people were why Megyn was stationed here. Her duty was to earn the vengeance he’d never been able to find. He wanted for those people to pay for their crimes against him, to suffer as he’d suffered.

  Leopold had confided this secret to Jeremy, never telling the other children about his secret failing in Ohio. He had trusted Jeremy would keep the information to himself until the time was right.

  That time was now.

  If Jeremy was being honest, he had always been a little bit offended that Leopold stationed Megyn here and not him. Something this important shouldn’t be left up to a little girl, no matter how powerful.

  No doubt it was because he wanted to keep Jeremy close to his side, though. That was the only reason that made sense. Jeremy was Leopold’s second in command, and the Bishop wouldn’t risk his safety just to pay back his betrayers.

  “That’s it, up ahead,” he said, spotting the church in the distance.

  It was a little white building sitting atop on a hill and surrounded by barren trees. The nearest house was over a half-mile away and it was impossible to see very far through the thick woods in all directions.

  The perfect place to launch his mission.

  This would be his crowning victory, punishing the people who had tried to harm the Bishop’s reputation so long ago. Thankfully, the Church had sided with him against the town’s lies. He was simply stationed in other cities and throughout Europe until the furor died down.

  He’d since presided over many churches, schools, and other Catholic organizations in his time as a priest, but this was the one that damaged him the most. This was his first.

  “Park just around the corner. You’ll wait in the car until we need you.”

  “Yes sir.”

  The driver pulled the car into the lot and into one of the empty spots. There were plenty of them. He kept the engine on and glanced at Jeremy in the backseat.

  Jeremy didn’t have to worry about his loyalty. The demon might be a little slow but he was also willing to do anything Jeremy asked of him. He had loved the Bishop as a father the same as Jeremy. He too wanted vengeance.

  Jeremy nodded at him in the mirror. He understood the full ramifications of what they were trying to accomplish here and how important it was. If Megyn refused to join them …

  He took a calming breath and pushed the concern away. No time for such thoughts. There was only one path: forward.

  He climbed out of the car and into the midday sunlight. He held the door for Megyn and beckoned for her to follow.

  “Come on.”

  “It’s so cold.”

  “I know,” he said, pulling his coat tighter. It had dropped at least twenty degrees since they first started driving. The volatility of the weather annoyed him. It hadn’t been cold in California, but winter’s here were much less comfortable. “We’re going inside, though, so it’ll be alright.”

  Hesitantly, she slid across the seat and stood up. She looked at the wide building with a concerned expression on her face.

  “Why are we here?”

  “All will be revealed, sister. Follow me.”

  He didn’t wait for her response, instead turning and wal
king toward the front entrance of the church. He could hear her footsteps behind him and smiled. There might be hope for her yet.

  He had imagined this moment over and over again during the last couple of days. This was to be the Bishop’s triumphant return to the church, and he’d never imagined that it would be his responsibility to see it through. He felt the weight on his shoulders and knew that he couldn’t allow himself to fail.

  He pushed the main door open and went inside.

  There were eight people in the central area of the church. He could see them spread out when he first stepped through the door. Several sat in pews and two milled around, speaking quietly.

  He would have come during a more packed service, except he wasn’t sure how Megyn would react to what he was about to do. This was as much for her sake as for the mission.

  “Stay close,” he ordered, striding up through the pews to the front dais.

  He climbed confidently up the steps to the podium and then turned back to face the gathered audience. Most of them were engrossed in their own thoughts or prayers and didn’t even notice him standing there. He saw one woman elbow her husband then nod discretely up at him, a smile on her face.

  He would take joy in wiping that smile away.

  “Greetings,” he called out. His hands were shaking and sweaty with nerves and his voice was higher pitched than he would have liked. He cleared his throat. “May I have your attention please?”

  A few of them glanced up at him, some curious and others annoyed, but in general the response was tepid and underwhelming.

  “My name is Jeremy Caldwell, and this is my friend Megyn Wilford. We’re here today because our dear father and mentor once presided over this church. His name was Leopold Glasser. You might have heard of him. His duty was to lead you to the hand of God so that you might all find eternal salvation.”

  He heard movement from off to his left and then a side door opened up.