Blood of Saints

by Maegan Beaumont

  Church gently pulled herself free, shaking her head. “The answer is no, Jared,” she told him, her tone sad but firm. “It will always be no.”

  “I’m sure nasha sem’ya will be sorry to hear that.” The man smiled up at them both. “If you change your mind … you know where we are.”

  Sem’ya was a word Sabrina recognized. It meant family.

  “I’ll never change my mind,” Church said, taking her by the arm to pull her toward the atrium. “My answer will always be no.”

  Sabrina threw a last glance over her shoulder as she and Church stepped through the door. The man was out of his seat, standing in the aisle they’d just vacated, watching them leave, that same easy smile on his face. But the light of it never reached his eyes.

  –––––

  “Did you find Alvarez?” Sabrina said as soon as they made it past the door. The uniform posted next to it was on his phone, probably trying to find out who his replacement would be.

  “I found his phone,” Church said, her attention divided between their conversation and the man still inside the chapel. “It pinged at the station when I ran the search. He probably dumped it in his desk drawer before he left.”

  There was only one reason he’d do that: Alvarez didn’t want to be found. “Okay …” she said, trying to keep calm. “How about Elena Hernandez? Did you find her?”

  “I had even less luck with her.” Church shook her head. “Phone’s shut off completely. There’s nothing to ping.”

  “But you can triangulate the last call.” Sabrina swiped a hand over her face, wiping away the thin film of sweat and grime that’d collected on her skin in the handful of seconds they’d been outside. It was past seven o’clock in the evening. They had another hour before twilight was gone. “The phone doesn’t have to be on to do that. You can access her phone records and find out where she was when she made or received her last call, right?”

  “What is going on, Sabrina?” Church said, reaching out to grip her arm. “What haven’t you told me?”

  The main door to the sanctuary swung open and the man Church introduced to her as Jared walked through it, breezing past the uniform on guard like he owned the place. In response, the cop glanced at him, brow slightly furrowed. “Agent Vance? Aimes?” he called across the lot to them, gesturing toward the man who’d just exited the building.

  “It’s okay,” she answered, giving the uniform a reassuring smile. Jared waved good-bye to her in response. “It is okay, isn’t it?” she said, addressing Church under her breath. “I don’t need to worry about that guy being left alone in the middle of a crime scene, do I?”

  “No.” Church shook her head. “Jared doesn’t care enough about you or your investigation to make trouble,” she said, watching him climb into a nondescript sedan and drive away.

  “Really?” she said, voice raised slightly in disbelief. “Because he cared enough about me to follow me all morning.”

  “He wasn’t following you to follow you. He was following you to be a dick,” Church said, waving a dismissive hand between them. “A nosey, annoying dick.”

  “Oh …” Sabrina said, suddenly understanding. “He’s your brother.”

  “What he is, is irrelevant,” Church said coldly, closing the subject. “You sent Croft to find Graciella Lopez. Probably not the smartest thing you’ve ever done.”

  “What else was I supposed to do?” Sabrina said, throwing up her hands. “I need answers and I need them now. He’s got Ellie and if I don’t find her—”

  Church’s hand reached out, wrapping around Sabrina’s bicep. “Ellie?” she said sharply. “Awfully familiar for someone you just met yesterday.”

  Tell her, darlin’. Maybe if she knew who her big sister is, she’d understand how serious this whole thing is.

  “Elena Hernandez.” Sabrina sighed. “She’s Valerie’s little sister,” she said in a rush, answering the obvious question. “And no, she doesn’t know who I am. She hasn’t seen me in nearly twenty years, aside from those fuzzy newspaper pictures.”

  Church narrowed her eyes at her anyway. “I think you’ve got some explaining to do, Kitten. Start talking.”

  Sixty-eight

  She recognized him.

  It’d been different with Rachel. She’d been terrified, just like the rest of them. And like the rest of them, she’d looked him right in the eye and seen a stranger. Even when he told her who he was, that she’d known him her whole life, all she did was cry and scream and beg him not to kill her.

  But Elena didn’t need to be told. She’d known who he was. After all these years, she’d recognized him. It should’ve brought him some measure of satisfaction, knowing she finally remembered him. It should’ve, but it didn’t. What it did was make him angry.

  Years of being all but invisible to her and her snotty clique of friends. Being ignored so completely there were times he’d begun to doubt his own existence. He’d been no one to them—less than no one. A shameful secret none of them knew. An unfortunate fact no one could deny. That she recognized him now, after all this time, told him the truth. She’d seen him. Even when she’d pretended not to, she’d seen him. She’d just been too much of a coward to admit it.

  She was a coward then and she was a coward now—pretending to be unconscious while he stood over her. Or at least trying to. The slight, uneven hitch in her breathing gave her away and it made him smile.

  She’d fought hard, not that it mattered. She ended up bound and tossed into the trunk of his car, just like the rest of them. Tasers really were one of the better inventions of the twentieth century.

  Says you. Me? I prefer my girls a bit more lively …

  He crouched down beside her, setting the bolt gun on the floor within easy reach. “Elena,” he said her name softly, pleased to see the sound of his voice so close frightened her. “I know you’re awake and that you can hear me.” He reached out to touch her, gently moving the dark length of hair that fell across her cheek. The brush of his fingers against her skin made her flinch. “I’d like you to answer my question.”

  Her eyelashes fluttered in response, moisture gathering at the rim of them, but she kept them closed. Lifting the bolt gun he’d set down, he pulled on the knob at its top until he heard a loud click. She flinched again, tears slipping past the seal of her closed lids to collect against the bridge of her nose.

  “You were supposed to be with her that night. Wade and I had plans for both of you. I wanted Rachel. She was a bitch and needed to be taught a lesson, but Wade … he wanted you,” he said, confiding in her. “He almost took your big sister once—” He pressed the bolt gun against her temple, digging until the tip of it all but disappeared. “But she slipped through his fingers. Just like you did,” he said, and her eyes popped open—whether it was from the pressure against the side of her head or his mention of her sister, he didn’t know. “There she is,” he said, on a soft sigh. “I need you to stop being stubborn and answer my question, please.”

  “I haven’t heard a question yet,” Elena said, her voice rough from hours of silence. “All I’ve heard, so far, is you postulating like a lunatic.”

  “Careful,” he said quietly. “It’s not nice to call names.”

  “Fuck you.” Her eyes rolled in her head so she could give him a sidelong glance. “You’re going to kill me anyway so how about you just get it over with.”

  He pushed even harder against her temple, so hard her eyelids fluttered in response.

  You’re the one who needs to be careful, boy. You’re letting this little cooze get the best of you.

  “You’re right,” he said, easing up. “You’re right, I’m sorry.” He sat back on his heels with a nod, dragging the bolt gun with him as he went.

  Just ask her again so we can move on to the fun stuff.

  “Don’t rush me,” he said quietly. “She needs to understand why she w
as chosen. Why I’m going to do what I’m about to do.”

  It’s time to take the training wheels off, boy. You chose her for the same reason you chose the rest of them. Because you’re—

  “I understand why,” Elena said from where he’d tossed her on the floor. “It’s because you’re a psychopathic whackjob—”

  “Shut up,” he screamed at her, lunging forward to wrap both hands around her neck. “Shut. The. Fuck. Up.” He squeezed, slamming her head into the cement floor, punctuating each word. Her eyes bulged, bound hands flailing uselessly as she brought them up to try to push him away. “Say you’re sorry,” he hissed in her face. “Say, ‘I’m a rude little bitch and I’m sorry for interrupting your conversation.’”

  Silence.

  “Elena …” He eased off, his hands softening around her throat. Red, angry welts glared up at him, already turning purple around their edges. “Elena?” he said again, pushing her chin with the tips of his fingers. He watched as her head flopped listlessly to the side. Something thick and dark glistened in her hair. Blood.

  You’re one dumb sonofabitch, you know that? This little girl just beat you at your own game. Course, she had to go and die to do it.

  Sixty-nine

  She told church everything.

  She didn’t want to. Trusting Church went against everything she knew about Livingston Shaw’s former number-one operative, but she didn’t see where she had much choice.

  You’ve got a choice. You’ve got me, darlin’.

  “Let me get this straight,” Church said, turning away from the passenger window she’d been staring through while Sabrina explained everything on their way to the station. “Elena, the crime scene tech, is Valerie’s little sister? Who happened to be the childhood bestie of Rachel Meeks, victim number four?”

  “Yes,” she said, cutting a quick glance toward the woman next to her.

  Church nodded. “Who, in 2000, was kidnapped and raped by your brother and Nulo, his little pet nutjob.”

  “Yes,” she said through clenched teeth. “And he’s my half-

  brother.”

  If Church realized she’d hit a nerve, she didn’t seem to care. “And Stephanie Adams, victim number two, had your DNA under her nails? Elena found it but no one believed her, so they scrubbed the report. Which is why we’re both here? Because Ben got hold of the scrubbed report and decided you needed to get involved.”

  She sighed. “Yes.”

  “And you think Nulo, the guy who’s running around killing women now, is Mark Alvarez. A cop … who has now, according to you, kidnapped Elena Hernandez.” Church swiped a hand over her face. “Jesus H. Christ, Kitten, I’m dizzy.”

  Church dropped her hand and looked at her. “And what, exactly, does this have to do with the priest and his pregnant girlfriend?”

  “I’m not sure yet,” she admitted, pulling into the station parking garage. “As soon as Croft locates Graciella Lopez, that’s the first thing he’s going to ask her.”

  Cut her loose, darlin’. We don’t need her.

  “Look,” Sabrina said, slamming the car into park. “You don’t have to get involved any further. I don’t need you here.”

  Church laughed in her face. “You’re not stupid enough to really believe that, are you?” she said, shaking her head. “If the killer is Alvarez then you’re definitely going to need me here. Because he’s a cop. You don’t have the resources to find him. I do.”

  I’m all the resource you need. No one knows our boy like I do.

  “Yeah, you’ve also got orders to kill anyone who might recognize me, so if it’s all the same to you—”

  “He’s not my brother,” Church said. “At least not biologically.” She looked away, aiming her gaze through the windshield to stare at the concrete wall in front of their car. “My mother and father were trained by the Russian government during the Cold War. They were paired together in The Program and she was impregnated with me before being embedded in America.”

  “Impregnated? You mean she was forced.” The thought made her sick. She knew what it was like to not have control of your own body. “They made her get pregnant?”

  “We were necessary to their cover. No one suspects a family.” Church shrugged but Sabrina could tell that her apparent disgust stung her. “Jared was an orphan when he was taken into The Program. He was five years old and already understood his purpose. Why they’d been sent there.”

  Sabrina sat, transfixed by what Church was telling her, remembering what Livingston Shaw had told her about Church. He’d called her Korkiva but mentioned she preferred Courtney. That her parents had been Russian spies, and that they’d been rooted out and killed after being abandoned by their government at the end of the Cold War. “They were killed.”

  Church nodded. “After the Cold War ended, we were left behind,” she said, seemingly unsurprised Sabrina already knew a measure of the truth. “Given up to the CIA by another family in exchange for immunity. You asked me why I didn’t kill Valerie and her baby like I’d been ordered to. That’s why.” Church looked at her. Her eyes were dry. “I’ve done things—horrible things that I never lose sleep over—but I won’t kill children and I won’t kill their parents while they watch.” She popped the door open, stepping a foot into the dark, sweltering heat. “That’s why I let Valerie and her baby live. And I won’t kill her little sister either.”

  You can’t trust her. She’s been trained to lie from the day she was born.

  –––––

  She found Santos at his desk, going over the files he and Church had put together while she was gone. A quick glance in its direction told her that Alvarez’s desk was still empty. “Where’s your partner?” she said, not really expecting an answer. No matter what he said to her earlier, Santos was angry she was no longer focused on Paul Vega as their prime suspect. To add insult to injury, she’d opened her suspect list to include local law enforcement. As soon as the rest of the precinct caught wind of it, she and Church could all but kiss their cooperation good-bye.

  Santos shot her a glance before redirecting his attention to the file in his lap. “He called in while we were at Saint Rose’s. Said something about following up on a lead.”

  “Does he do that a lot?” she said, refusing to slink away with her tail tucked. “Take off on his own?”

  “I don’t know. I guess so.” Santos sighed, closing the file in his lap to trade it for another. “We have different investigative styles,” he said, his admission reminiscent of what Alvarez had told her earlier of their partnership. He glanced up at her again, eyes narrowed like he was catching on to her line of questioning. “He’s a good kid, he just likes to take a different approach to stuff sometimes.”

  Funny, ain’t that what the padre called Nulo? A good kid …

  “Does that include leaving his phone in his desk so that no one can get hold of him?”

  Santos sat up a bit straighter, narrowing his eyes even more. “How do you know his phone is in his desk, Agent Vance?”

  Her own phone vibrated against her rib cage and she reached for it, hoping it was Croft and that he’d found Graciella Lopez. “Excuse me,” she said, thumbing the touchscreen as she turned her back on a glaring Santos without checking the number. “Hello?”

  “Do you know who this is?” Male voice. One she recognized.

  “Yes,” she said, fighting the urge to shoot Santos a look over her shoulder.

  “Good,” he said quietly, like he was worried about being overheard. “I think we should meet. Alone.”

  Church was in the conference room. She could see her through the blinds, honey-blond head bent over a stack of files. She’d be pissed if she took off again without her, but it couldn’t be helped. Elena was out there somewhere. She needed to find her, and reading through files wasn’t going to get the job done.

  “I thought you’d never ask.
”

  Seventy

  Funny he’d ask you to meet him here, don’t you think, darlin’?

  Funny wasn’t really the word she’d used to describe it. Ignoring the voice in her head, Sabrina pulled the car into an empty slot in front of Luck’s truck stop and killed the engine.

  No, I think funny is exactly the right word to use. It’s funny because this is where I—

  “If you don’t shut the hell up,” she snarled, hands wrapped around the steering wheel so tight it felt like she was strangling it, “I’m going to eat the entire contents of the pouch Phillip gave me, understand?”

  Her threat was met with silence and she smiled.

  She popped the door to let herself out of the car. “I’ll take your silence as a yes,” she said, crossing the lot toward the restaurant. “Now, don’t open your goddamned mouth unless I ask you a direct question.”

  More silence.

  “Fantastic.”

  Pulling the heavy glass door on its hinges, Sabrina was greeted by a blessed wall of refrigerated air. A different girl this time. A pretty Native American girl, the name Paulette stitched across the embroidered shamrock on her uniform, came at her from behind the counter. “Is a table—”

  “I’m meeting someone,” she said before the waitress could pull a menu from the hostess station, pointing toward the back of the restaurant.

  Following her finger, the waitress stood a little straighter. “Of course,” she said with a small nod.

  Sabrina wound her way through the restaurant before depositing herself in the corner booth where Paul Vega waited for her, a half-eaten Denver omelet and a side of bacon on the plate in front of him.

  “Should we wait for your brother?” She offered him a cheery smile. “Sorry, I meant lawyer.”

  “No.” Vega’s smile was decidedly less friendly. He shook his head, lifting his cup of coffee off the table between them. “Arturo doesn’t know I’m here.”