Carlton knew who. And he knew why.

  He pulled away, content, resolved.

  All of these things in his mind he knew he could do. He could do them easily and without hesitance. All of these messages he would be thrilled to deliver—Old Man Halm, Margarita, the kids at the crosswalk, Joanna Malloy and her twins—but that, he knew, would be selfish. Carlton’s guide had instructed him well. There was a far more important message to be sent today.

  It was only a few more minutes till he got there. Right before the turnoff, however, he began to feel sick. Nauseous. Edgy. But was it Carlton who was getting sick, or was it his guide?

  He jerked his gaze to the left and there it was. The sprawling white building with black trim, the big sign out front. The sun shot the shadow of the steeple across the road, a dark ghost.

  ST. MARY’S EPISCOPAL CHURCH, the sign read, along with a quote from Luke: “HERE AM I, THE SERVANT OF THE LORD; LET IT BE WITH ME ACCORDING TO YOUR WORD.”

  Carlton couldn’t help but stop the vehicle. He was about to throw up. It wasn’t the church—the Messenger had trod through many churches throughout history, to desecrate them. No, it wasn’t the church at all. It was something about the church…

  Carlton felt panicked when he looked upward. Atop the steeple was a simple cross, as anyone might expect. The cross had no power against him, nor the Messenger. But just below the cross, ensconced in the steeple’s body, something jutted. Carlton stared, sickness boiling up.

  A gold statute stood in the sconce: an angel with a trumpet.

  The Archangel Gabriel, the messenger of God.

  Carlton snarled at the figure, hurled some invective in a language that had never been spoken on earth. The profanation fired into the air loud as a cannon shot. Birds lifted off from trees en masse. Carlton wasn’t sure but it seemed that even the statute itself rocked at its base.

  The hands controlling his hands gripped the wheel. The foot controlling his foot stomped the accelerator. Carlton and the Messenger sped away.

  The vision of the Messenger’s nemesis left Carlton feeling crazed and depressed…but mostly crazed. It would all work out for the best, though—he knew that. It would help him deliver the message more effectively. His mentor’s rage was being shared with Carlton, it was becoming part of him. The Messenger’s heart beat in synchronicity with Carlton’s heart. The Messenger’s lust was now Carlton’s lust. Carlton and the Messenger were now essentially one.

  The sedate private school and its plush grounds shimmered in the sun. There was an opened gate access but no guard, no one to sign in with. The sign read THE SEATON SCHOOL FOR CHRISTIAN GIRLS. A cement fountain gently gushed at the center of the entrance court.

  Nice place…

  A hush seemed to spread across the grounds when he drove the LLV through the gate. Carlton drove past the administration building and St. Agnes Hall, which was the main classroom facility. A few moments later he was parking in front of the long, front-pillared dormitory building.

  “Why, hello!” the nun at the front desk greeted him.

  Carlton smiled.

  Sister Katrice was not a proverbial nun; in other words, she wasn’t elderly, bowed, and wrinkled. Instead, the woman in the habit who smiled back at Carlton was attractive and vibrant, mid-30s, a pretty face.

  Carlton’s smile steepened as he approached with his package. “Behold the Messenger,” he said jovially.

  Sister Katrice’s brow furrowed. “Pardon me? Oh, you mean you have a package for us.”

  “Yep. It didn’t get out on the first run, so I brought it over.”

  The nun seemed excited, something to break up what must be a very dull post. “Who’s it from?”

  It’s from the deepest crevice of Hell, the Messenger’s voice creaked in Carlton’s heart, and Carlton himself would’ve loved to say that but instead he simply looked at the return address and said, “Let’s see. Local address, no name, same zip code. Whoever sent it didn’t really need Express Mail. Still would’ve been same day. Oh, well.” Then he chuckled. “The post office needs the money anyway.”

  Sister Katrice grabbed a pen. “Do I need to sign for it?”

  “Actually, yes. There’s a return receipt request.” He pulled off the tab and gave it to her.

  “I wonder what it is,” she said with enthusiasm, scribbling her name.

  “Hmm, look at that…” Carlton looked at the edge of the box. The flap was unsealed. “It must must’ve come open so let’s see.” He stuck his hand into the box.

  Sister Katrice was frowning but she didn’t say anything. From the box Carlton withdrew a carpenter’s hammer. It was a quality one: fiberglass handle, anodized stainless-steel head, one end flat, the other bezeled.

  Sister Katrice squinted at it. “A hammer?”

  Carlton hefted it in his hand. “Sure looks like a hammer to me.”

  “Why on earth would someone send us a hammer?”

  “Here’s why,” he told her.

  And that was just the beginning of a glorious day.

  (II)

  Jane was too perturbed. When Steve Higgins left her office, she sat there a moment and just shook her head. Yes, the situation was curious, but there could be many explanations.

  Next thing she knew, she was up and out of her office, trotting out to the parking lot. “Chief Higgins! Wait!”

  He’d already gotten into his patrol car and rolled down the window. He seemed to be putting his radio back in its slot when he looked up at her.

  “You can’t just go arrest Carlton because someone at the QWIK-STOP saw him last night with dirt on his face. That’s ridiculous.”

  “It’s not ridiculous, Ms. Ryan,” he said. “It’s probable cause. We’d be negligent not to investigate.”

  “So where are you going?”

  “To the address of the delivery he’s on, Seaton School for Christian Girls. And I’ve already dispatched a uniformed unit.”

  “Would you please wait a minute!” she insisted. “This is a mistake!”

  “If it’s a mistake, then we can make that determination after questioning. So if you don’t mind… I’ve got to get out there now.”

  “I’m going with you,” she huffed.

  “Ms. Ryan, please. It’s police business. You can’t—”

  Jane slipped around to the other side of the car and got in. She slammed the door closed.

  “You’re persistent, aren’t you?” Steve observed.

  “I’m Carlton’s boss. It makes sense for me to be there.”

  “All right, fine.” He pulled off. “But I don’t want you getting in the way. I don’t even want—”

  “Besides, I want to be there to see you eat your words,” Jane added. “For goodness sake. You’re all up in arms because someone saw him dirty. Did you ever think that maybe he had a flat tire.”

  “What was he doing out at that hour?”

  “It’s a free country, isn’t it? He’s got to be at work by six in the morning anyway, which means he’s up by five at least. We all get up early in this job. Maybe he was simply out for a drive. You ever done that?”

  “I’ve never done that only to be reported later to the police as being covered in grave dirt,” Steve replied.

  “He didn’t say grave dirt! He said he was dirty. So what?”

  “The clerk said the man had bits of soil on him. And he positively identified the man as Carlton Spence.”

  The more Jane thought about it, the more laughable the situation became. Of course, there was nothing funny about what had happened, but the idea of a low-key guy like Carlton getting involved in some cult and digging up a grave was preposterous.

  Steve didn’t say anything as he drove. The silent type? For some reason, though, he didn’t strike her that way except for maybe when he was at work. He’s a good-looking man, she caught herself thinking. Intense eyes. Lean, not overtly muscular but in shape. In spite of the heat, he kept the a/c off and the window down, his blondish hair waving in the wind. When he put his sunglasses on, he looked even more attractive—enigmatic, perhaps—but more like a cop.

  She smirked at herself. What am I thinking? The nip of guilt panged her. The last thing I should be doing is sizing a guy for his looks after all that’s happened here lately. Jeez…

  He looked over at her, eyes hidden now. “Could you put your seatbelt on, Ms. Ryan?”

  Jane rolled her eyes. “The Seaton school is less than five miles away.”

  He looked back at the road ahead. “It’s a state law.”

  Jane laughed. “Let me guess, you’re going to arrest me.”

  “No, but I’ll give you a five-hundred-dollar fine if you want.”

  She held on the words a moment, looking back at the side of his face. I…guess he’s serious, she realized.

  Jane buckled her seatbelt.

  All business, she presumed, and she didn’t see a ring on his left hand, not that she’d really looked that consciously. She wondered what the man did for fun and then it occurred to her that he probably didn’t have much. Being chief of police must be even more time-consuming that being a station manager for the post office. Guess he’s not married unless he’s one of these guys who never wears the wedding ring on the job, she considered. Has he got kids? Does he have a girlfriend? She’d never seen him out anywhere, now that she thought of it, save for once or twice when she was front-service manager at the Main Branch.

  Would you get off it?

  She returned her mind to the current predicament—a complete calamity. She could never even imagine such a thing. But one thing assured her:

  Carlton has nothing to do with any of this.

  Steve’s radio hissed in a burst of static, then a voice came on, “Unit One, this is Unit Six. Do you copy?”

  “Go ahead,” Steve said after pushing on the intercom.

  “I just pulled up to the school’s dormitory. There’s a mail truck there.”

  “Is Spence in it?”

  “No, sir. No one in the vehicle. No sign of anyone around the vehicle. He’s gotta be inside the building.”

  Steve thought through some static. “All right, check it out. Proceed with caution. This might be nothing, but you never know. My ETA’s about five minutes, but I don’t want you to wait. Find him and detain him. If it gets hairy, pull out and call for backup.”

  “Roger, Unit One. I’m 10-6 as of right now.”

  The transmission ended.

  Jane scoffed. “You’re kidding me. ‘If it gets hairy?’ This sounds like some cop show.”

  “It’s no show, Ms. Ryan. Do I have to remind you that in the last couple of days we’ve had almost thirty people murdered by the same woman, and last night that same woman’s corpse was exhumed from her grave?”

  Jane couldn’t argue with that. Instead, she thought it best from this point on to just keep quiet and let the police find out for themselves that Carlton was innocent.

  I’m certain of it, she thought. I KNOW he’s innocent.

  (III)

  Carlton stood naked, every square inch of his body gleaming scarlet from all the blood. He’d done the work so quickly, as if it were second nature. He could feel the Messenger’s satisfaction in their shared heart. He felt uplifted.

  Behold. The Messenger.

  He didn’t feel that he was standing in a simple dormitory shower room—he felt as though all that blood on him was actually sunlight and he was standing on the highest mountain peak of the earth.

  He looked around at all those bodies and smiled.

  All those girls.

  The hammer dripped. It felt weightless in his hand.

  They’re coming now, the voice in his heart told him, but Carlton was not worried. You’ve done well. You’ve sent my message with honor and pride. I thank you, and the Father of the Earth thanks you, the first fallen Light of the Morning…

  But you must hurry now. There’s still one left alive…

  No. Alive was no good, not in this case. Alive was insufficient and signified failure. He knew that he mustn’t fail the Messenger.

  What was a little more blood on him, anyway?

  He heard some scuffling somewhere. I know I got everyone in the shower room. There must be one more hiding in here somewhere.

  Where? Where?

  Next, he heard a whimper. Muffled. Then a single sob.

  He stalked around the locker room, his bare feet leaving red footprints. He could feel the Messenger right behind him, guiding him; when the Messenger stepped forward with his left foot, Carlton’s left foot stepped forward. When the Messenger’s right hand tightened around the hammer’s haft, Carlton’s right hand tightened.

  When the Messenger’s hear beat, Carlton’s heart beat at the exact same time.

  Their footfalls took him toward the dorm chaperon’s office. A lithe, wiry woman, almost a cliché for that position. One of her jobs was to monitor the girls when they took showers after gym class, and he really had to wonder about that. Slate-brown hair, short and choppy, her body long, muscle-toned, nearly breastless. A little long in the tooth, pushing fifty probably. She’d been the first one Carlton had killed actually. He brought the hammer’s bezeled end right down into the top of her spine. She hadn’t even known he’d entered the office, so intent she was leaning over her paperwork at the desk. She’d convulsed on the floor for a few moments, shuddering, then died.

  But there was someone else in the office. The Messenger sensed it, and since the Messenger’s senses were now blended into his, Carlton sensed it.

  He could smell the sweat pouring out of her skin. He could smell her blood racing through her veins. He could smell her terror.

  “There you are…”

  He saw the tip of her bare foot edging just a half inch out of the shadow under the assistant’s desk.

  Sopping wet, like a dog just in from the rain. Hair drenched from the shower. She was wearing a white terry robe. Carlton reached under the table, grabbed her hair, and then proceeded to drag her screaming into the showers…

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  * * *

  (I)

  “Jesus Christ, Chief!” the voice erupted over the radio.

  Steve keyed the intercom unit in the car. “What! What’s wrong?”

  A pause. “This is not looking good…”

  “What the hell is wrong!” Steve blared. “Where are you? Are you in the building yet?”

  “I’m…” A burst of static. “I’m… I’m heading up the stairs to the second floor, where the dorm rooms are. There was nobody downstairs in the reception area, but I didn’t check around. I thought I heard something coming from upstairs.”

  “What did you hear?”

  “Not sure. A shriek maybe.”

  “Have you seen anyone in the building yet?

  “No, sir, nobody, but…but… My God, Chief, there’s footprints running up and down the hall floor.”

  “Footprints?”

  Another burst of static. “Blood. It’s got to be blood.”

  “Get up there! Find out what’s going on!” Steve rekeyed the mike. “All units, this is Unit One. Respond Code Three to the Seaton School for Girls on 4th and Westmore! Suspect is a white male, approximately one hundred and eighty pounds, brown hair, in a postal uniform. Consider him dangerous.”

  Jane sat back in her seat, aghast. “Bloody footprints? Is that what he said?”

  “That’s what he said,” and Steve floored it.

  The school was just around the next bend, sitting at the edge of the woods that fronted the bay. Several patrol cars were already screeching into the front court. Jane felt the inertia shove her back when Steve fishtailed around the fountain at the center of the court. The car shuddered, its brakes shrieked. Jane whipped forward and back when the car finally stopped.

  Steve popped off his seatbelt, drew his gun from the shoulder holster.

  Jane was staggered. Something very serious was happening here and she was sitting in the middle of it. Could Carlton really have exhumed Marlene’s body? And the footprints? Could those really have been Carlton’s bloody footprints that the cop on the radio was talking about? Finally, she just said, “This is impossible for me to believe—”

  Through the open window they heard a long, loud, terror-driven scream.

  “Believe it,” Steve said and jumped out to join his men.

  Jane felt as though his urgency was dragging her behind him on a towline. Uniformed police officers were jolting out of their cars and rushing toward the dormitory’s entrance from all points; Jane couldn’t sort her thoughts for all the noise: sirens, radio squawk, shoes tramping pavement.

  Just inside, though, everything was dead silence.

  “Careful,” Steve ordered, holding his pistol upward, finger off the trigger. “Is that blood there?”

  A uniform confirmed it. So did Jane’s eyes. A line of what could only be blood led from the chair, behind the desk. Now every set of eyes followed the smear-like line; it tracked back to an office.

  Two cops stood at each side of the door. One turned the knob, while a third officer three-pointed into the room…

  A second of silence, then they heard: “Oh, my God…”

  Everyone poured into the room, and when Jane saw what they were looking at, she almost fainted.

  A nun hung from the farthest wall. Jane could only tell that she was a nun for the wimple around her face, and the veil—the rest of the woman hung naked, pristine white skin badged with crimson smudges. Her head leaned to one side, her mouth agape. Her arms spread out as if crucified, from nails driven into her palms. A puddle of blood ten feet wide shined below her feet.

  Jane put her face in her hands.

  “Who was the first responder?” someone asked.

  “Jackson, I think.”

  “Well then where the hell is he?”

  “He’s upstairs,” Steve said. “Said something about the showers.”

  The trampling shifted now, out of the office and a stampede up the steps. Again, Jane felt as if in tow. The first cop up the stairs stopped at the landing, holding up a hand.

  “Watch it,” Steve warned.

  They all saw it, a leather mail pouch sitting on the floor, its top flap hanging open.