Second Honeymoon

Chapter 104

SARAH AND I slid into the pew to our immediate left. The bride’s side. The upside was that we could take out our guns without Cole being able to see us, something we both did instinctively.

The downside was that we were sitting. Sitting ducks, I was afraid. Still, I liked having a gun in my hand.

“Martha, we’ve done everything you’ve asked so far,” said Sarah. “We came in, we sat down where you wanted us to. Now I have to ask you to do one thing for us. You need to let Father Reese go.”

Cole smirked. “Are you left-handed or right-handed, Agent Brubaker?”

“Why do you ask?” said Sarah.

“Because I’m wondering which side of your seat would I find your gun sitting on right now.”

“You can come here and take a look for yourself. You won’t see a gun,” Sarah lied. “Not from Agent O’Hara, either.”

I was listening to this exchange, but I was also watching. For the first time, I was able to take a good look at Martha Cole in her white wedding dress, with its square-cut neckline and lace sleeves down to her elbow.

Brand new, the dress was surely pretty. Now it was dirty, scuffed, and soaked with sweat. In fact, Cole looked to be drenched from head to toe. Even her hair looked as if she’d just stepped out of the shower.

What a contrast the priest was. Sure, he hadn’t run twenty blocks swathed in taffeta on a hot June afternoon, but with a gun to his head you’d think he’d be sweating all the same. Instead, he appeared to be absolutely calm. At peace.

In fact, I almost got the sense he knew something that I didn’t. Of course, that was the feeling I always got with priests, but this was different. More earthbound.

Either way, it was probably a good thing, because Martha Cole had no intention of setting him free. Not yet at least. I hoped she wasn’t planning on setting his soul free.

“Do you know what Robbie told me when he proposed?” she asked. “He said that the two of us would be together for the rest of our lives. Forever and ever. He was very convincing.”

“Martha, I understand how upset you are,” said Sarah. “But—”

Cole cut her off as fast as a New York taxi. “He broke my heart, destroyed it,” she said. Then she flashed a sick smile. “That’s why I put a knife through his.”

Sarah shook her head, her voice growing stronger. “The killing has to stop, Martha.”

But she wasn’t listening.

“I deserved what those other couples had. I deserved it!” she screamed.

I could practically read Sarah’s mind. Stay calm, keep the dialogue going, say her name as often as possible to keep her trust.

“I’m sure you did, Martha, but those couples didn’t deserve to die,” said Sarah. “They didn’t do anything to hurt you.”

“We all die, Agent Brubaker. I saw it every day in the war. The only variable is timing.”

“But you don’t get to decide that, Martha. You don’t get to play God.”

“But I did, didn’t I?”

There was something in the way she said it, the emphatic use of the past tense. The sense of finality.

My mind started racing. So many thoughts, questions, unknowns.

Two in particular.

Where was that strange green bottle the young priest outside had mentioned to us? And what was in it?

I looked up at the large gold cross looming over the altar. It suddenly occurred to me. This wasn’t going to be a long, drawn-out hostage situation. In fact, it wasn’t a hostage situation at all.

My eyes shot back down to Cole. I stared at her again, from head to toe. She was drenched, all right, only it wasn’t sweat, was it?

Oh, Jesus, Jesus…

I could smell it now, the odor finally traveling the distance from the altar to our pew. Isopropanol. Rubbing alcohol.

“Good-bye,” she said.

I jumped up from the pew as Martha dropped the gun, revealing a small lighter in her other hand. So quick, so fast, she flicked a thumb.

“No!” I yelled. “You don’t have to do this! You don’t!”

That’s when Martha Cole spoke her last words—the two words there at the altar that she never got to say.

“I do.”

There was nothing we could do. Cole pushed Father Reese away and brought the lighter to her dress.

She went up in flames.