But she thought of Mary Beth and Dani and the fact that Oliver had so much wanted to talk to her today. Kicking herself for not listening to him, she walked to the back porch, reached under the lowest step and found the key. Within seconds she was twisting the lock and with Travis at her side, walked into her brother’s small, stuffy, spartan house.
She switched on the kitchen light.
Everything was as she would have expected. Not a dish in the sink, no stack of unread mail on the counter, neither of the two dinette chairs pushed away from the table. Aside from the hum of the refrigerator and the ticking of a hall clock, there was no noise.
“Oliver?” she called. A cold shiver of fear chased down her spine.
In the living room a Bible lay open on a table next to his chair, the seat shiny from years of use. The fireplace was cold, never used, and on the walls were various pictures of Christ and Mary.
Her feet creaked upon the worn carpet as she walked quickly to the two bedrooms. One, his office, was as barren as the rest of the house with only a desk, a daybed and books, all sorted neatly on shelves. She’d seen them before: texts on religion, theology, psychology and the like. The next room, his bedroom with its small, neatly made bed and a bureau that he’d kept from his youth, was empty as well, the bed not slept in.
“Where is he?” she asked as her eyes swept the open door of the bathroom. Empty. Neat. The blue hand towel lying near the sink folded with military precision.
“I don’t know.” Travis walked back to the living room, to the table where the Bible was. He snapped on the light and skimmed the pages.
“Anything there?”
Shaking his head, he said, “Nah. Don’t think so.”
“It’s so late.” She frowned and was ready to call and alert one of her brothers, was already on her way to the phone hanging on the wall in the kitchen, when she stopped and thought. Tried to get into Oliver’s head. She studied the crucifixes decorating the walls, the palm leaves, the artifacts. “If you were about to take your vows as a priest and you were worried about something…Something major was eating at you…” she thought aloud as she crossed the living room and turned the venetian blinds open to stare across the small front yards to the mission grounds on the other side of the street. Lights shone upward, displaying the bell tower and the crosses mounted high on the peaked roofs. “If you were really troubled, where would you go?”
“I don’t know. I’m not Catholic,” Travis said, but he walked to the window and, following her gaze, stared at the mission.
“When you’re upset, you, Travis Settler, where do you go when you want to sort things out?”
“I usually take a walk. Outside. Someplace quiet where I can think,” he said.
Shannon nodded, her finger pointed through the slats of the blinds. “I think he’s in the church at the mission. Across the street.”
“Could be,” he said.
Shannon was already striding through the kitchen, exiting the house the way they’d come in. She was running now, feeling a sense of urgency. Why hadn’t she stopped and listened to Oliver at their mother’s house? Didn’t she have a few seconds to give to her brother when he was so obviously tormented?
Stop it, Shannon, don’t beat yourself up. You still have no idea what was on his mind!
She dashed across the street and Travis was right beside her. They found a brick path and headed into the compound, an old mission that was still used by the church. This church was small, not nearly as large or modern as the main church, St. Theresa’s, located half a mile north, but it was close and Oliver’s car was nearby. This had to be the place.
The portico was shadowed as they approached, no sound from within.
Shannon wrapped her fingers around the big handle of the door and pulled. It opened silently and she felt a stir of trepidation, the same feeling she always experienced when stepping into a place where she wasn’t welcome, where there were NO TRESPASSING signs posted or implied. The church was like that—though friendly and warm and holy, filled with singing and prayers and organ music and hope during its hours of operation—dark and chilling, silent when no one was around. She’d always felt that way, ever since she was a little girl.
Her brothers, altar boys, had felt more at home inside the apse and nave, but she’d always felt alienated when the pews were empty, as they were now.
She stepped inside and stared up the aisle to the altar where candles flickered and the looming figure of Jesus hung on the cross, blood dripping from His forehead where the crown of thorns rested, His palms and feet, too, smeared with red, the slash on His side oozing.
For those without faith, who didn’t understand Christ’s sacrifice for humanity, the image could be frightening. As a small child, it had scared her to death.
She reached for Travis’s hand, linked her fingers through his and sent up a prayer for strength.
“He’s not here,” Travis said.
“But the candles are burning,” she whispered, motioning to the stand where several votive candles wavered as they passed. Glancing up at Travis’s shadowed features, meeting his gaze with her own, she said, “Someone lit them.”
“Shannon, the church is empty.”
“This part of the church is empty. We don’t know about the rest.”
“You want to go poking around in all the little nooks and crannies?”