“I didn’t ask. I didn’t think it mattered. Maybe he was trying to protect her. What was she going to do at that point? Turn him in? They were looking at criminal charges—identity theft, fraud, who knows what else? If she was an accessory, she’ll still be facing charges if the FBI catches up with them.”
“Not if. When.” If Agent Weston couldn’t figure this out on her own then Courtney would explain it.
“I don’t have a problem believing Mrs. Aguilar would go along with whatever her husband said,” Marc continued. “What real choice would she have had? Turn him in? He kept a roof above the family’s head. But there’s still hope. The FBI picked up Jane Doe, so she’s off the streets. One kid down. One to go. And we know where to look next. Beats the hell out of IDing her body.”
Courtney pressed her eyes tightly shut against the image. Was there really hope that this “church lady” still provided a home to Araceli after so many years? There were too many pieces missing, too many questions that needed answers to make sense.
But Marc had hope, and he had compassion to consider how Mrs. Aguilar might have been stuck with her husband’s choices, understanding about trying to save another young girl from being recruited into a gang. Courtney liked what that said about him.
“Ironic that Jane Doe got caught up with a gang here, when that was what she came over to get away from. I’m glad the FBI tracked her down.” Courtney gazed up at him, made out his profile in the darkness. “Do you think Aguilar abused Araceli? Why else would she run away?”
He shrugged. “We don’t have enough information to answer those questions. I’m sure Aguilar wouldn’t have volunteered the information if he had abused her, and I didn’t ask.”
“What did you say? Your gun didn’t do all the talking.”
That made him smile. “I told him I was looking for the people who smuggled his niece over the border.”
“How did that translate into information about Araceli?”
Marc rolled his eyes, but she could tell he liked that no matter what his future held, no matter what mistakes of the day, he had come away with the information he’d gone after. He had something to hang on to. She understood.
“I implied Araceli was dead and he would get nailed for the murder of the kid whose identity his niece stole. He was quick enough to explain what happened and reassure me she had been alive the last time he saw her.”
Courtney had witnessed the scene, could imagine the man’s shock that the truth was coming to light after all these years. Had he thought they’d gotten away with their crime, or did he live in fear of being caught?
Was he still in touch with his niece?
“Knowing what we know of Araceli, I can think of any number of scenarios that might make her run away,” Marc said. “She was one determined little kid. But I don’t think she would keep making the same mistake.”
“What mistake is that?”
“She kept trying to get away. Mrs. Calderone brought her back and the church lady brought her back, too. The first time at least. If Araceli went for round three, she would go for a knockout. I don’t know what she would do, but my gut’s telling me she would make it very difficult for anyone to return her.”
“Oh, my God, Marc. You’re right. But how could she do that?”
He shook his head. “Who knows? But according to Aguilar, she wasn’t above lying.”
“So you think the third time might have been the charm?”
He pressed a kiss to her brow, a sweet gesture that did so much to reassure her. “If she was lucky. If we’re lucky.”
Against every sane thought in her head, Courtney felt very lucky right now.
* * *
MARC PLACED THE Ruger in the room safe and withdrew the key. He didn’t need to be armed to interview church ministers.
“I’m ready to go whenever you are.” Courtney appeared in the bedroom doorway, gorgeous in a linen skirt and jacket that emphasized the long lines of her body.
Sex agreed with her. She was an exquisite woman, had always been even when he didn’t like her. But this morning, with her hair pulled back from her face and her eyes sparkling, she made it a struggle to think about anything but stripping off that business-chic ensemble and getting her naked again. He didn’t think she would have minded. There was a contentment about her he hadn’t seen before, definitely not since they’d begun searching for Araceli.
He’d been very instrumental in putting a smile on the lady’s face. And making her blush now. The color rose in her cheeks the longer he watched her; one glance and the memory of being naked together was between them.
When he slipped an arm around her waist and pulled her close, she went liquid in his arms, molding against him.
Exactly the reaction he was looking for.
With her heels, she lined up differently against him. He could press his mouth to her smooth brow without bending. So he did. She tipped her face up, ready for a real kiss. He obliged.
Marc liked this vantage, he decided. In heels. Barefoot. She felt good either way.
Then they were on their way to get the car, riding down in the elevator in companionable silence, but they hadn’t made it to the third floor before he slipped his hand around her waist.
He couldn’t seem to stop touching her.
“I need to check with the desk to see if there are any faxes,” he said when they arrived in the lobby. “Why don’t you go deal with the valet?”
She took off with a wave, a delectable sight of smooth strides and swinging hips.
He had to tear his gaze away.
“Room 512,” he told the desk clerk while retrieving his wallet from his jacket pocket and sliding out a credit card. “Run this card instead of the one you have on file.”
“Of course, sir.” The clerk stepped away from the counter and vanished through a doorway.
When she returned, she gave Marc his card and assured him everything was in order. He thanked her. For the first time in too long, he was back on familiar turf.
No woman he slept with had ever paid a hotel bill.
Courtney still waited outside, but the valet brought around the car within minutes. Marc briefed Courtney on their cover on the trip to the Evangelical Mission Church, which had served as an emergency shelter for the nearby Gulf states during Hurricane Katrina. For once, his cane worked with a costume, lending him the eccentric air of literary elitist.
They met with Tamara Bradshaw, the church’s ministry director, a high-energy woman with the practiced graciousness of people in the business of evangelizing.
Marc handed her a business card that read “Manning Dumaine, critically acclaimed author of Expelling God from School.”
He introduced Courtney as his assistant, and launched into his spiel. “I’m an author writing about the essential function of NGOs during national crises. For the chapters on natural disasters, I’m collecting data about the specific role of churches, going back as far as Hurricane Andrew and as recent as Superstorm Sandy. Your church was listed as a shelter during Hurricane Katrina.”
“We run a long-term shelter mission here,” Tamara explained. “The largest in the Southeast.”
“That’s why we’re here. I need to understand exactly how you serve the needs of evacuees. My new book raises awareness on the function of churches during crises. It’s impossible for the federal government to provide services without support from nongovernmental agencies. Sadly, churches are getting a bad rap in the media nowadays. Too many people don’t recognize how they serve the community at large.”
Within minutes they were in a golf cart.
“We’re a vibrant church community here, and our campus is close to a hundred and fifty acres,” Tamara explained.
She’d obviously noticed his limitations, but the concession didn’t irritate so much wh
en Marc realized the shelter was clear across the campus. Or maybe he was just in a better mood today.
The worship center dominated the property. There was visibility with parking lots stretching in three directions, but still a hundred different places for a child to hide.
“So Pastor Waters wasn’t the pastor during Hurricane Katrina?” Marc asked.
“No, our dear Pastor Morris was at the helm then. He was our pastor for over twenty years and through two church relocations. He retired a few years ago.”
“He would have been the one to involve your congregation in the shelter mission.”
Tamara nodded, and waved to a landscaper as they drove past the child care facility. “We have seven thousand members in our congregation. We’re eager to do God’s work in our local community and distant communities. Pastor Morris arranged for disaster relief training with the Red Cross after Hurricane Andrew. We opened our first shelter in the fellowship hall back when it was still a separate facility from our worship center.”
Shifting around in his seat, Marc glanced at Courtney in his periphery, the breeze lifting her hair. So lovely.
“I’m interested in specifics about the services you provide,” Marc said. “If you served as a drop-off location for relief supplies from the Red Cross and FEMA or provided supplies. How you staffed the shelter. That kind of thing.”
“Once we opened the doors to receive the first buses of evacuees from Mississippi and Alabama, we didn’t demobilize until nearly five months later.”
She launched into a narrative of transforming church facilities into makeshift dormitories, staffing the shelter with teams of volunteers who worked in rotating shifts, cooking to provide hot meals, collecting linens, towels and clothing to launder, providing ongoing child care activities.
“Some of your families wound up staying with you for months, isn’t that right?” Marc asked.
She nodded. “Many became our brothers and sisters. Quite a few who stayed in the area have become a part of our church family.” Tamara wheeled up to the curb at a side door of the vast worship center. “We’ll go through this entrance.”
They disembarked, and she unlocked the door, allowing him and Courtney to precede her inside. Flipping on lights as she went, she led them down a hallway with doors on both sides.
“Our long-term families required a different kind of care,” she explained. “More outreach. People had left home without medications, so we needed to connect them with physicians and pharmacies. We had volunteers dealing specifically with children. Those who wound up remaining for over a few weeks needed to get to school. Enrollment in the area schools increased by close to five hundred.”
Marc guessed that the Aguilars hadn’t been the ones to enroll Araceli in school. He could tell by Courtney’s expression, the heightened interest as she jotted notes, that she suspected the volunteers of the church shelter had been responsible, too.
“We did a lot of counseling and spiritual direction and praying, of course. So many of our evacuees wanted to go home. Too many had no homes to return to. Others had no way to get there. There was a lot of depression, a lot of souls that needed uplifting and hope.” She pushed open doors to a massive hall. “Here we are. This was our hub.”
She guided them through the open auditorium, an industrial kitchen, restrooms, classrooms.
“What do you do with this space when you’re not housing people?” Courtney asked.
“Rent it for banquets and conferences. We have an event coordinator on our staff. The room partitions, so it’s multifunctional. And we were able to create dormitories to give our evacuees some privacy.”
Marc rattled off statistics about other shelters he had researched over coffee this morning. He asked about their volunteer structure as he noted exits and mazelike corridors that led away from the main auditorium.
“Four hundred volunteers.” Marc smiled at Tamara. “That’s impressive. How did you schedule your staff? I know some of the larger shelters we’ve spoken with utilized coordinators. The occasional smaller one, too.”
“We came across one church that opened the doors to an old convent, and housed maybe a dozen evacuees,” Courtney added. “They ran a shelter with only four volunteers. Of course, they also had outreach. Parishioners providing laundry services and bringing meals, et cetera. I don’t think the entire parish had four hundred parishioners total.”
Tamara gestured to the facility around her. “God provides. We’re blessed with so many generous people. They’re the ones who make all this possible.”
Marc had been waiting for just this opportunity to ask personal questions about the volunteers. “I hope to get across that exact message. It’s vital people realize they’re the ones who must make this happen, not the faceless bureaucracy. We have to work hand in hand with government, not look to them for everything so we lose the ability to do for ourselves.”
“Well said, Mr. Dumaine.” Tamara shut off the lights in a hallway of classrooms and led them back to the auditorium.
“We came across quite a few names connected with your shelter. I assume they’re coordinators or people instrumental in running the shelter, because yours was one of them.” He glanced at Courtney. “Read me some of the names on the list please.”
Courtney rattled off a number of names they had pulled directly from the church website.
“A few of those are coordinators.” Tamara laughed. “But you also have the executive pastor, the secretary and the ministers of Biblical training and athletic outreach.”
Courtney chuckled. “I even have one with no last name. Debbie? Do you have one of those around here, too?”
“That would, no doubt, be Debbie Abercrombie, but she’s not here. We borrowed her when we learned we would need to keep the shelter open for longer than anticipated.”
“Borrowed her from where?” Marc asked.
“From our association,” Tamara explained. “We belong to a movement of churches dedicated to spreading the Gospel of Jesus Christ and making disciples of all nations. Debbie comes from a family of one of the founding ministers.”
“I obviously didn’t research enough,” Marc admitted.
“You may simply not have gone back far enough. Our association began in the sixties with a group of congregations dedicated to fruitful mission work here and abroad. We’re still a tightly knit group of churches.”
“A network, hmm. That would certainly expand your abilities. So you needed extra help and reached out to another church and they sent you Debbie?” Marc asked.
“Sort of,” Tamara explained. “We can bring in volunteers from other churches, but most people have families and roots, which limits their time commitments. That’s when we call on our church planters. They start new churches in places where they’re needed, so they live more mobile lives.”
Marc held the door as the ladies passed, but once they were outside again, it was Courtney who asked, “Okay, so Debbie was a church planter? Do I have that right?”
“Indeed you do. Debbie was a second-generation church planter to be exact. She was reared in our missions in Mexico, South America, Africa. I’m not even sure where else. She’s quite the free spirit. I met her on a mission in Mexico years ago. As soon as I heard we needed to keep our shelter open long-term, I tracked her down because she possesses two qualities that I value highly—she’s extremely organized and such a cheerful giver.”
“Tracking her down? Sounds like it wasn’t easy.”
“Not with Debbie.” Tamara smiled fondly. “When she was on deputation, she was easy to find. Our network circulates a newsletter, so we can pray for our missionaries’ special needs. But Debbie hasn’t been out of the country in a few years, so she just flits around from church to church to church.”
Marc knew they had the next step in their search even if it encompassed a lot of area
. He happened to specialize in big areas. Things were looking up. “Has she been back in Atlanta since Hurricane Katrina?”
Tamara shook her head. “No. I haven’t seen her since I put her on a bus to Arkansas when we closed our shelter.”
“Was she going to the shelter in Little Rock?” Courtney asked. “The longest-term shelter was there.”
“That’s right.” Tamara nodded. “The church that ran the shelter is one from our network. The central location made it a hub for Louisiana, Texas and Mississippi, so they couldn’t seem to shut it down. Their program ran several months beyond ours. Debbie helped me wrap things up here and then headed there.”
They piled back into the golf cart and made the trip back to the offices. Marc thanked Tamara for her help and then chatted idly. He finally asked, “So what’s your cheerful giver doing nowadays?”
“Funny you should ask.” Tamara shifted her gaze his way, and she shook her head. “I spoke to someone from one of our northeastern churches who asked me about her recently. They had wanted her help during Hurricane Sandy.”
“Did she help?” Marc asked, curious.
“No. Strange, but no one could seem to track her down.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
WE SAT ON the riverbank in the park. Kyle worked on his new song while I sketched him. The perfect afternoon. Sunny and cold. No work. No homework. Just the riverboat cruising past, big paddlewheel churning the water until it sounded like part of the music. Of all the places I might have gotten stuck, I didn’t mind Nashville. It reminded me of home in so many ways.
The music. The river. The tourists.
Kyle.
He hadn’t been part of New Orleans, had never been there as far as I knew, but he was the best part of Nashville.
With his throaty voice and feelings that came out in his music, he made everything better, pushed all the loneliness I’d been feeling to the edges where I could barely see them. When we were together, anyway. Or when I thought we would be together, which was happening more and more often. We weren’t official yet, but we’d kissed.
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