The Lost Saint(31)

I didn’t want to believe that Jude was trying to cause damage and terror on purpose. But if this was his final stop on his tour of his past crimes, then this could be my only chance to find him—especially since my only other lead hadn’t panned out.

I slowed my pace even more as I approached the parish, and I tried to will my heart to stop pounding so loudly. I listened as closely as I could over my disobedient heartbeat, concentrating on far-off noises: the sound of a car on the empty evening streets, a song whistled by another person somewhere down the block, the chirp of the crosswalk meter.

I followed another sound, a rustling noise, like boxes or objects being moved around, down the alley between the parish and the school. At first I thought the noise came from my father’s office. I hesitated for a moment outside the door in the alley, but then I realized the sound came from somewhere deeper inside the parish. I slipped around the side of the building to another door in the back. It was the entrance to the small caretaker’s apartment that had been unoccupied since Don Mooney died. Dad hadn’t rented out the apartment again, and it had been left untouched since the day we heard about Don’s death.

My ears picked up a rattling from behind the door. It sounded like a stuck drawer being forced open. Suddenly, I wasn’t thinking about rescuing Jude anymore. I was thinking about the destruction caused at Day’s Market. All the anger I’d felt today filled me again. Someone might be trying to do the same to your father’s parish, said that voice in my head. Starting in your friend’s old home. I wasn’t going to let someone get away with that—even if that someone was my own brother.

That rumbling anger surged through me. Clutched at my heart like a clawed hand. Before I could stop myself, I burst through the doorway into the room.

A tall man whirled around in front of Don’s desk. Something silver flashed in his hand. My feet and arms were not my own as I flew at him. A look of shock crossed his face as I knocked the knife from his hand and hit him in the chest with the butt of my hand. He flew back and slammed against the wall, and then landed on top of the desk. I jumped on top of him and grabbed him by the throat.

“How dare you,” I snarled. “How dare you try to steal my friend’s things?” I raised my fist above the man’s face, ready to smash it into his nose if he so much as made a false move.

But the man didn’t struggle. He just stared up at me. My breaths heaved in my chest, and my hand trembled with rage as I held my fist above his head. But I couldn’t help staring back into his steel-blue eyes—eyes that seemed familiar, like I’d gazed into them before. The man seemed young, mid-twenties maybe, but something about his eyes seemed absolutely ancient—like he’d seen enough of the world to fill a dozen lifetimes.

My fingers twitched against his throat. I could feel his pulse in my hand, steady and sure. Something foreign and hateful inside my head told me to squeeze. Punish this man for invading this place.

But did I really want to do that?

A smile slid across the stranger’s lips. It seemed as ancient as his eyes. “Hello, Grace,” he said, sounding somewhat strangled.

At the sound of my name, the power clutching my heart eased a bit. I gasped at the sight of my hand gripping his throat. But I didn’t let go. I couldn’t until I knew what this man was doing here. “How do you know me?” I demanded.

I looked the man over for the first time. Or what little I could see of him, since I was straddling him, pinning his arms down with my knees. He had longish auburn hair and a short trimmed beard. He was tall, almost as tall as Don Mooney—whom I always thought of as being as big as a grizzly—had been, but slim. He wore black from head to toe, which had made him seem sinister at first. But then, a horrible realization dawned on me as I noticed the white square notch in his black collar—a pastor’s collar, like the one my dad sometimes wore when he was working.

“Oh, no!” I let go of his throat and scrambled off him as fast as I could. I clutched at the moonstone pendant that hung from my own neck. I let its warm, calming strength wash through me. “I’m sorry, Pastor. I’m so sorry.” Heat seared my cheeks. “I don’t know what came over me, Pastor … I just … just …” I let my sentence trail off. How could I possibly explain what I had just done to this man?

I mean, I had attacked a pastor—in a freaking church! My anger had been replaced by embarrassment, which quickly edged into shame.

“I’m sorry,” I said again. Could I possibly apologize enough? “I saw you in here with that knife …” I pointed at the silver dagger, lodged in the ground with its handle sticking straight up in the air. A small scrap of fabric had fluttered to the ground near the knife when I’d knocked it from the man’s hand. It was Don’s infamous knife—the one that I’d plunged into Daniel’s chest. The one I’d used to break the curse. I’d found it in the parish a few weeks later, brought it here to Don’s apartment, and left it with his things, where it belonged.

“I thought you were a burglar. I thought you were trying to steal that knife.” The knife was ancient, made of very pure silver, and I always figured it could fetch a nice price with the right buyer. But pastors don’t break into churches and steal stuff. There had to be some other explanation.

The man smiled again, and with a quick movement he reached down and picked up the scrap of cloth and then wrapped it around the hilt of the silver knife and pulled it out of its sticking place in the floor. He looked at the dagger with appraising eyes, like a collector inspecting an antique. “How can I steal something that already belongs to me?”