Blood Sins

Chapter Four

GIVEN WHAT she'd been told and what she'd learned on her own about cults, Tessa had expected to be disturbed on any number of levels while she was among the congregation of the Church of the Everlasting Sin, but what she hadn't expected to feel was a sensation of sheer unreality. It was, she decided, a surface place.

The surface was pretty, ordered, calm, peaceful. The people Ruth introduced her to were smiling and seemingly content and greeted her with courteous welcome. The neat little houses boasted neat little well-manicured lawns and pruned shrubbery. The childrenall home-schooled, she was toldlaughed and ran around the very nicely designed playground off to the right of the main square, pausing in their play only long enough to run up, when summoned by Ruth, to be introduced en masse to Tessa.

"Children, say hello to Mrs. Gray. She's visiting us today."

"Good afternoon, Mrs. Gray. Welcome." It was a chorus, bright and cheerful, accompanied by big smiles.

Tessa wasn't all that familiar with children, but this bunch struck her as exceptionally polite. And rather eerily similar in that they were all impeccably dressedespecially for playtimewithout so much as a smudge of dirt or visible wrinkle in their neat white shirts, lightweight bluejackets, dark pants (the boys), and dark skirts (the girls).

"Hi," Tessa responded, wondering how many of these kids Sarah had known, if there were any she had been close to. By all accounts, she had taken a special interest in the children. "No school today?"

"Our children are home-schooled," Ruth responded.

"And it's our playground time," a dark, solemn-eyed boy told Tessa. "Not as cold as yesterday, so we can be outside longer."

"I see."

Ruth shooed them away before Tessa really had time to pick out any more individual faces; she wasn't even certain whose small hand touched hers briefly before the group ran back to their playground.

"They're all fine children," Ruth said to her.

"I'm sure they are." What else could she say?

"Perhaps you can visit with them longer on another visit. I didn't want you to be overwhelmed, Tessa. So many faces, so many names. I do want you to meet some of our members, even though we have plenty of time for you to get to know everybody."

"Yes. Yes, of course."

Ruth continued the tour, pointing out this or that as they walked slowly around the Square.

As scrubbed and neat as the children, all the buildings were beautifully maintained, as though they had been freshly painted only this morning.

Especially the big, gleaming white three-story church itself, which was very churchlike, with rows of stained-glass windows (though generic abstract patterns, with no Biblical scenes Tessa could identify) and a tall steeple with a simple cross atop a bell tower.

She could see the bells gleaming even from ground level.

The church was surrounded, like all the houses in the little neighborhood, with a neat lawn. Wide steps led from the front walkway that was pretty and cobbled up to the gleaming wooden doors that were wide and welcoming.

But there was something just a little bit off in all the Norman Rockwell Americana perfection, and it wouldn't take a psychic, Tessa decided, to pick up on it. There was an eerie sameness to the faces, the smiles, the simple clothing, even the gestures. From the children to the adults, they all looked almost indistinguishable.

Interchangeable.

I wonder if the missing people were just replaced by fresh ones, new recruits. And nobody noticed. Or cared.

That was a horrifying thought and one Tessa shoved grimly from her mind as Ruth continued to introduce her around.

"Welcome, Mrs. Gray. We're happy to have you here."

"Thank you." Tessa shook hands with a couple who looked a lot like the previous six couples she had met since her arrival: somewhere in their thirties, a faint scent of soap clinging to them, a kind of bedrock serenity in their smilesand an odd, shiny flatness in their eyes.

Stepford. I'm in Stepford.

"Everyone would love to meet you on this visit, of course, but we know that would be too much," Ruth told her as she led the way, finally, back toward the church. "Plus, many of our members work in town and haven't gotten home yet today."

The church, peaceful and perfect in appearance, was now marred slightly by a dirty Jeep parked nearby, the logo on its side the seal of the Grace Police Department.

Cops. Cops she could trust?

Or cops who would prove to be one more layer of deceptive normality in this place?

"I had no idea the Compound was so large," Tessa lied, ignoring the Jeep. "How many families live here?"

"We have twenty-one cottages, plus the gatehouse," Ruth answered. "I believe all of them are currently occupied. And, of course, we have rooms and dormitories for our single members in the church itself."

"Really? Isn't that unusual?"

"Not for our church."

Since she wasn't offered any opening to probe that further, Tessa shifted the subject a bit. "No members live outside the Compound?"

"A few, though not many. We're a community," Ruth told her, smiling. "We don't require all our members to live here, but so far most have chosen to. Eventually."

That last word was oddly chilling, and Tessa did her best not to shiver visibly; it was a very mild day for January after all. "I already have a home in Grace," she pointed out.

"Your husband's family home. Forgive me, but can it really feel like home to you?"

Tessa allowed the silence to stretch as she walked beside the other woman up the wide steps to the open front doors of the church, not answering until they stepped over the threshold. "It doesn't," she admitted after a moment, being more honest than Ruth could know. "The house is too big and I ramble around in there. Sometimes it almost echoes it's so empty." She allowed her voice to wobble a bit, her eyes to tear.

"I'm sorry, TessaI didn't mean to upset you."

"No, it's just The happy families out there The way I feel in Jared's family home"

"There's a restroom off the vestibule where you can have a few moments alone. It's as safe a place as you'll find in there. The stalls are tiled from the floor almost to the ceiling, and the doors are big. The recreation area where people tend to congregate at odd hours is downstairs, so the main floor restroom isn't used much except around the times of services."

Tessa managed to squeeze out a tear. "If you don't minda restroom?"

"Of course, of course. It's just over there, ladies' room on the left side." Ruth's voice was warmly sympathetic. "I'll be here. Take your time."

The restroom was fairly large and brightly lit, with six stalls and three sinks, and like everything else she had seen was exceptionally neat, to the point of appearing to be newly scrubbed. Tessa looked around briefly but wasted little time in locking herself into the stall farthest from the door.

Hollis's information had been right: These stalls were designed for a great deal more privacy than those usually found in a public facility. In fact, the stall struck Tessa as a bit claustrophobic, and she had to take a deep breath as she closed the toilet lid and sat down on it.

Focus. Concentrate.

She was wary of opening herself up completely in a place where she felt so uneasy and even trapped, but she wasn't at all sure control was a luxury she could afford. Still, as she closed her eyes and concentrated, she did her best not to drop her shields completely.

Pain.

It was immediate and intense, fire burning along her nerve endings, exploding in her mind, and it took everything Tessa had not to cry out. Her hands reached out to the tile walls on either side of her, and she instinctively braced herself, or tried to, pushing against the cold tile, against the hot, shimmering pain, against the incredibly strong presence she was instantly aware of.

I see you.

He'd been given at birth the triple-barrel name that sounded so biblical and had served him so well: Adam Deacon Samuel. His mother's mocking joke.

There was certainly nothing biblical about being the bastard son of a whore.

Samuel frowned and shifted in his chair, keeping his eyes closed. It was his custom to meditate every day at this time, and every day God tested him by beginning the ritual with forcing him to remember where he came from and who he had once been.

It wasdifficult. But there was no relief, no peace to be found until he forced his way through the memories.

The first few years were fuzzy; by the time he was old enough to wonder why she hadn't just aborted him, he knew the answer. Because she wanted someone to endure a more tormented existence than she did herself.

And she made sure he did.

He doubted most of the Johns had even noticed, much less cared, that a usually filthy and often hungry boy had crouched in the corner of some seedy motel room and watched, eyes wide and fixed, the fornication that was always hurried and furtive, and often abusive.

She'd taught him to smoke, both cigarettes and pot, by the time he was four, burning his body with the glowing embers until he could inhale without coughing. Taught him how to steal by the time he was six and how to defend himself with a knife before he was seventhough she could always take the weapon away from him on those rare occasions when he found the guts to try to defend himself from her.

"Stupid little bastard. I could have let them scrape you out of my belly when I knew his seed had taken root. But that don't mean I can't scrape you out of my life now. Understand, Sammy? Or do I have to show you just what I can do to you?"

It never made any difference if he answered, because she always "showed" him. Sometimes he was locked in a closet for a day or longer. Sometimes she beat him. Other times she played with him. Like a cat with a mouse, mangling and torturing its prey until the pathetic little creature just stopped trying to escape and waited dumbly for the end to come.

He'd believed he was numb to all of it, enduring his lot in stoic silence, until she began bringing in Johns with special tastes.

It amused her to watch them use him. And then there was the money. She was able to charge a premium for his virginity. After that well, he was still small. Young. As good as a virgin, she told them. She developed a skill for finding those men who enjoyed using him no matter how many had used him before.

Samuel gripped the arms of his chair and forced himself to breathe deeply and evenly.

Memories.

Just memories.

They couldn't hurt him anymore.

Except, of course, that they did. Always. But less and less as time had passed. As if holding a burning coal in his mind, in his soul, and blowing on it from time to time, like this, he could feel layers of himself being seared away. Cauterized.

It was a good thing.

He hadn't been able to do that then. Not in the beginning. Hadn't been able to stop the pain in any way at all. Hadn't been able to stop the mother who abused him or the Johns who did even more unspeakable things to him.

Looking back now, in the light of God's pure certainty, he understood what had finally happened to him. He understood that God had tested him. And tested him. He understood that those early years had begun to shape the steel of God's holy sword.

He hadn't seen those miserable, dark, dank motel rooms as a series of crucibles, or those faceless men, brutish and cruel, as anointed by God to destroy the base metal he had been in order to make of it something great.

But he saw now. He understood.

The first destruction of who and what he had been took place in one of those desolate rooms, late one night when it was cold and stormy outside. Maybe it had been winter. Or maybe it had just been one of those perpetually cold cities along his mother's long, wandering life. He couldn't remember.

He remembered only that he'd been vaguely surprised that she had found a John at all on such a night, far less one looking for a boy. But his stoic resignation had turned to quivering terror when a hulk of a man filled the doorway, almost forced to turn sideways in order to come into the room.

Samuel remembered few details of the next few hours, but he remembered a broad, coarse-featured face in which small eyes burned cruelly. And he remembered his mother's glee, her laughing encouragement, as the John held him in one giant paw and literally ripped the worn, too-small clothing from his body.

He could hear her laughter even now, echoing in his mind. Hear the John's hoarse grunts of sadistic pleasure. And he could feel his body ripping, tearing, feel the warm blood and the white-hot shimmering blaze of pure agony that had crackled across every nerve ending his small body possessed.

And then nothing.

A darkness unlike anything he had ever known or imagined surrounded him, enfolded him in warmth. He felt strong. He felt calm. He felt cherished. He felt safe.

Samuel had no idea how long that had lasted, though judging by what he found when he woke up, it was hours at least.

The room was warm when he woke, which surprised him because the sort of motels his mother chose invariably had heaters and air conditioners that hadn't worked in years, and this particular hovel was no exception.

The room was warm, and he was warm, and at some point he must have braved the stained and moldy bathtub, because he was clean and dressed. He wasn't even sore, which surprised him a lot because he was always sore and that John had been so big-Samuel saw him then. The John. Pinned to one wall of the room like a giant, ugly-ass butterfly in somebody's collection. He was bloody. Very bloody. He looked surprised.

The knife his mother always carried was buried to the hilt in the John's left wrist, and the knife Samuel had stolen for himself months before was likewise buried in the John's right wrist.

Neither would have supported the huge man's weight if not for the thick piece of wood protruding from the center of his chest, clearly driven into the wall behind him. It was a table leg, Samuel realized, from the rickety old table that had sat near the door.

He turned his head just far enough to see that the tabletop lay on the floor, upside down. With all four legs missing.

The room was utterly silent, except for his own suddenly audible breathing.

Slowly, Samuel turned to look at the wall across from where the John hung and saw his mother. Like him, she hung suspended, spread-eagled and pinned in place.

She looked surprised too.

One of the table legs, split neatly in half, pinned each of her wrists to the wall. Another table leg, also halved, had been driven through her legs just above her ankles.

The fourth and final table leg, whole, was driven into her body between her breasts, buried so deeply that only a few inches were visible enough to identify what it had been.

It looked like she had bled a lot; thick reddish stains coated the peeling wallpaper below her wrists and legs, and the short skirt she wore was no longer pale pink.

Samuel stared at her for a long, long time. He thought he should probably feel something, even if only relief, but all he felt was a kind of indifferent curiosity.

It must have taken a lot of strength, he thought, to have pinned the huge John to the wall. And he knew his mother, knew how ferociously she'd fight to defend herself. So it would have taken somebody strong to do that to her. Somebody really strong.

Her eyes were open, he realized.

Openand white. No color at all.

When he looked at the John, he saw the same. Eyes open. But totally without color.

Weird.

He still didn't feel anything and for a long time just sat there looking back and forth between the two dead bodies. Eventually he got up and dragged his mother's old duffel bag from inside the closet. Since they never unpacked, his few bits of clothing and her things were still in it. He dumped all the contents on the bed, then picked out his own things and put them back in the duffel.

He raided the bathroom of its meager supplies of threadbare towels and tiny shrink-wrapped soaps and put those in his bag. He found on the floor the man's pants and emptied the pockets, finding a big switchblade, a few coins, a couple of crumpled receipts, and a wallet. The wallet had several credit cards and a surprisingly thick wad of cash.

Samuel hadn't spent more than a week at any one time in school, but when it came to money, he could count. Twenty-seven hundred dollars.

It was a fortune. It was enough.

He put the money and the knife in the duffel, then added to it the far-less-princely sum he found in his mother's secret hiding place. Less than two hundred dollars.

He put the last of her cigarettes in the duffel, weighed her lighter in one hand for a moment, then set it aside and zipped the bag closed. It was heavy even with so little in it, but he was strong for his size and lifted it easily. He picked up his mother's lighter and went to the door, pausing only then to look back at the bodies.

He wondered idly what had happened to their eyes, because that was just weird. Really weird.

Then he shrugged it off, life so far having taught him that if the answer wasn't obvious, it was probably best left alone.

The lighter was the kind you didn't throw away, the kind with a lid that opened and a wheel that turned and sparked off a flint. He opened the lid and turned the wheel with his thumb, and for a moment he just watched the small flame. Then he tossed the lighter to land on the floor near the bed, where an ugly, stained bedspread lay crumpled.

Immediately, it began to burn.

Adam Deacon Samuel unlocked the door and left the motel room, closing the door behind him. He turned right, because it seemed as good a direction as any other, and started walking. He never looked back at the burning building.

He was ten years old.

Tessa struggled to breathe.

Pain. Awful, soul-rendering pain that wasn't only physical but emotional as well. Pain that washed over her in waves, each one greater than the last.

And darkness. A darkness so black it was almost beyond comprehension, so black it swallowed all the light and reached hungrily for life. Reaching grasping

She could hear herself trying to breathe, hear the jerky little pants, but every other sense was turned inward as she grappled with the pain, tried to dull it.

Hurt

Mute it.

Hurt

Deflect it.

Hurt

She tried to feel her way through the horrible darkness, beyond it.

It seemed impossibly difficult for the longest time, for what seemed eons, until finally, faintly, she became aware of other things besides the continual burning pain.

Sensations. Emotions. Fragmented thoughts.

the poor thing

must get away

should it feel so good?

have to get away

joy utter joy

why did he kill them?

it won't happen

why them?

have to get Lexie out of here

it can't happen

if that's what heaven is

escape

he takes

takes

I'm hungry.

Her eyes snapped open, and Tessa stared fixedly at the stall door. That last bald statement, stark in the darkness, gnawing in its hollow desperation, echoed inside her mind. For no more than a heartbeat or two, she had the sense of an emptiness so great it was almost beyond her ability to grasp.

And then it was gone. All the other emotions, gone. The bits and pieces of thoughts, gone. The overwhelming pain was gone.

She was safely protected, once again, behind her shields.

Tessa drew a breath and felt her hands slide down the cold tile, felt the ache in her arms that told her she had been literally pushing against the walls of the trap she had felt in her mind.

I see you.

Hard as she tried, Tessa couldn't decide if that clear statement, that amazingly strong presence, had been positive or negative. She thought it was not the same "voice" that had declared its hunger, because that voice had definitely come out of the darkness.

I see you.

Who saw her? Who was able to reach her like that? Able to reach her mind, semiguarded though it had been, and deliver that simple, clear statement?

She got to her feet, shaky, and automatically flushed the toilet before leaving the stall. She went to one of the sinks and stared at her reflection in the mirror, only then aware that her cheeks were wet with tears, her eyes red-rimmed.

It might, she supposed, look like grief.

But the trickle of blood from one nostril would not.

Tessa got some tissue and wiped away the blood, conscious now that her head was throbbing and she was chilled to the bone. Neither of those things was something she had ever experienced before while using her abilities.

Had her own efforts caused it, leaving her vulnerable to damage from the sheer force of the energies in this place? Could it be that simple, thatrelativelyunthreatening?

Or had it been a specific attack, force directed at her?

She didn't know.

But either possibility was frightening.

When she was sure the bleeding had stopped, she splashed water on her face, then dried it with a paper towel, wondering how long she had been in here. Not as long as it seemed, surely, or else Ruth would have been knocking at the door.

Right on cue, a soft knock fell.

Tessa gave her reflection one last look, squared her shoulders, and then went to open the restroom door.

"I'm sorryI didn't meant to be so long."

"Oh, no, child, no need to apologize." Ruth's sharp face softened, and she reached out to pat Tessa's shoulder. "I should be the one to say I'm sorry, to have upset you."

"It wasn't you, honestly. Just I just felt overwhelmed for a few minutes. It happens sometimes."

"But less and less often. I know, child. I'm a widow myself."

"Then you understand." She managed a smile, wondering if it ever got any easier, pretending to be something she wasn't.

"Of course I understand. Everyone here understands, believe me. We've all faced loss of some kind. Grief. Pain. And we've all found solace here."

As the older woman took a step back, Tessa came out of the restroom and joined her in the vestibule. She was just about to say something about still being unsure, knowing it would be viewed with suspicion if she seemed to give way and give in too suddenly, when three other people appeared from inside the church, paused near the front doors, then came toward them.

"Oh, dear," Ruth murmured beneath her breath.

The obvious cop was the young woman, hardly more than a girl, really, who wore her crisp uniform with an entirely visible pride. But the man on her right was also a cop, if Tessa was any judge, even though he didn't wear a uniform. At least a decade older than the young woman, he was casual in dark slacks and a leather jacket worn over an open-collar shirt. No tie. In fact, the shirt looked somewhat rumpled.

He looked somewhat rumpled.

His square jaw was shadowed by a faint beard that probably needed shaving more than once a day, and his dark hair looked as though fingers or wind had ruffled it in the very recent past. But there was nothing untidy or careless about that level, dark-eyed gaze.

Oh, yeah. Definitely a cop.

Tessa looked at the third person, a tall man with wide shoulders and the most coldly handsome face she had ever seen on something not made of actual stone. He had thick fair hair and pale blue eyes, and even though he was expressionless and without the pleasant, eerily serene smile worn by practically every other person she had seen here, he unquestionably belonged.

With an effort, Tessa pulled her gaze away from that hard face.

"Hello, Mrs. Gray," the male cop greeted her. His tone was probably meant to be polite, but nature had given him a rough, gruff voice that rumbled slightly and made his words somewhat abrupt.

"I'm sorry," she said. "Have we met?"

"Not officially. I'm Chief Cavenaugh. Sawyer Cavenaugh. I knew your husband."

Oh, great That's just great. Because I never met the man.