The monsoon hit while they were at the creek. One minute, Nate was enjoying the perfectly calm weather and a nice view of Rachel’s legs. The next, a gigantic black cloud rolled toward them, seemingly out of nowhere. It caught up with them before they could wade to shore.
“This is crazy. I’ve never seen anything like it!” Rachel yelled, laughing as the wind whipped her hair around her face and plastered her clothes to her body.
Nate was only an arm’s distance away, yet he could hardly hear her. “We’d better run! It’s about to rain!”
She increased her speed as she picked her way over the rocks, but she wasn’t moving fast enough for his liking. Grabbing her by the waist, he hauled her out of the water and dumped her near their shoes so they could scoop up their belongings before dashing to the truck.
The rain didn’t come down as soon as he’d expected. This monsoon seemed more like a tornado than any storm he’d ever seen. Not until they were in the driveway of the trailer did large fat drops begin to fall from the sky and spatter on the windshield—but those drops quickly turned into a deluge. As the rain pounded on the truck roof and instantly created puddles on the ground, they looked at each other in stunned surprise.
“Wow,” Rachel breathed. “Hard to believe I could be cold after how hot I’ve been since we arrived, but I am.”
That was apparent. Goose bumps stood out on her arms and legs—and her chest, which caused awareness to travel through Nate like a jolt of lightning.
At the creek, they’d been doing fine in their usual roles—work associates and friends. Other than a few glances at her various assets, reserved for when she wasn’t watching, Nate had felt more comfortable than he ever had around her. And she’d seemed equally relaxed. Gone was the sarcasm she’d used to battle the attraction between them. They’d simply talked and laughed and enjoyed cooling off.
But they weren’t talking and laughing anymore. They weren’t relaxed, either. They sat staring at each other with such desire he knew he’d only look foolish if he tried to pretend he didn’t appreciate her on a sexual level.
Fortunately, she tore her gaze away and wrenched open the door before he could do or say anything that might lead them down the wrong path. “Race you to the house,” she cried. Then she was outside.
He didn’t accept her challenge. He remained behind the wheel, telling himself exactly how he was going to behave once he reached the trailer. It didn’t matter that they’d be alone, that he remembered how she felt beneath his hands and was dying to touch her again. He’d let her heat water for a bath and take his own after she was finished. No way would they bathe together the way he wanted to.
“That’s it,” he said, encouraged when his heartbeat finally slowed. “You can do this.”
Rachel already had two large pans on the stove by the time he stomped inside. As he stood in the entryway drying himself with the towel she’d put there for him, she didn’t glance up. And he didn’t speak to her as he removed his shoes, left them on the mat and trudged to his room. After peeling off his wet clothes, however, he stood completely still, remembering her bra hanging on his lamp, her panties on his doorknob….
Her tread made the floor in the hall creak. She was so close. Would she stop at his room? Why not? They’d been together before. What would it hurt to make love again? If they could get past that night in January, they could relegate this to the same “experiences to be ignored or forgotten” file in their brains. Spending this night more comfortably than the last wouldn’t ruin anything. Would it?
He never learned the answer to that question. In the next second, he heard her bedroom door shut. Then the lock clicked.
He’d burned her once. She wasn’t about to let him do it again.
* * *
Ethan reclined on a velvet pad in the pit with the men he’d chosen as Spiritual Guides sitting on their own pads in a circle around him. They’d been arguing for two hours. But once Ethan had brought out the meth, tensions began to ease. Even Bartholomew was docile. He became ultramellow when he smoked, but he didn’t do it very often. Meth was really his only vice. He was impotent, so he didn’t much care about sex. He hated being unable to think clearly, so he refused drugs more often than he accepted. And he had little use for money. He lived a simple, devoted life. All he cared about was Ethan, and Ethan knew it.
Grady Booth took a hit on the pipe and passed it to Harry Titherington. “So what have we decided?”
“To put an end to the trouble she’s causing.” Bartholomew’s eyelids were heavy. When he was high, he looked even more like an Old Testament figure.
Harry rubbed his bald head, managing to muss what little hair he had growing on the sides. “The way you put an end to Courtney?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Ethan said. “I let Courtney go.”
“Sure you did,” he muttered, but Ethan was so high he didn’t react to the subtle challenge in that statement. With his sandals off and his knees pulled in to his chest, he was enjoying the relative cool of the dirt floor and walls that surrounded them. Several wall sconces held torches, which added a touch of the medieval and created a smoky haze that filtered through the cavernlike room, enhancing the effects of the drugs. Digging the pit had been one of his best ideas. Hidden down here beneath the Enlightenment Hall they had real privacy.
“She’s gone. That’s all that matters.”
Wearing a scowl, Harry marshaled the energy to roll over and sit up. “To you, maybe.”
“To all of us,” Ethan said pointedly. “She found out about this place.”
“The pit?”
“Umm-hmm.”
“Are you sure?”
“Are you questioning my word?” Ethan countered.
Harry quickly retreated. “No. ’Course not.”
It was Stan Whitehead’s turn with the pipe. He sat cross-legged while he smoked. “I don’t care if you killed Courtney. God wouldn’t have wanted her to stop the progress of this great church. Far as I’m concerned, as long as you have the Lord’s sanction, you can deal with Martha the same way.”
“I agree,” Grady said. “I’ve never liked her, anyway, ever since she gave me that venereal disease.”
It was more likely that Grady had given chlamydia to Martha. When they were passing through South Dakota, searching for the perfect place to build their commune, half the church had been forced to get antibiotics, and that was just a few weeks after Grady had joined. But Ethan didn’t point that out. Although Grady used to frequent lowlife hookers, he was one of the Guides now, above reproach. What he’d done in his previous life was irrelevant.
“There was a woman who knew her place. She felt it was a blessing to pleasure any of us Guides. She never refused,” Harry said. “Remember the first time we brought her down here?”
Stan nodded. “She loved it.”
“I bet that kid of hers is mine,” Ezra Mooney added.
Peter Marshall nudged him. “Looks more like me.”
“Doesn’t matter.” Harry covered a yawn. “God’s plan has provided for all the children born to this people. Every Covenant member is married, so every child has a mother and a father.”
“How’d you dispose of the body?” This question was directed at Ethan and came from Joshua Cooley, who’d been unusually quiet all evening.
“What body?” Ethan refused to offer details.
Bart cut in before Joshua could answer. “We’re not talking about Courtney. We’re talking about Martha.”
“But you took care of the problem?” Joshua said. “The…evidence won’t resurface and ruin us, will it?”
“Courtney is no longer a concern,” Bartholomew said.
Stan stretched out on his back. “You’re a spiritual giant, Bart, you know that? Maybe God’s deprived you of life’s greatest pleasures, but He’s given you the biggest balls of any man I know.”
Ethan wondered if references to his impotence bothered Bart. They brought it up occasionally, but he never let on whether it upset him.
“We’ve already tried to find Martha and had no luck.” It was Grady who steered them back to the situation at hand. “What makes you think we’ll be able to find her now?”
“Have faith, Brother. As soon as she starts to feel safe, her guard will go down,” Bart said.
“And once we recapture her?” Manuel Fry wanted to know. “What then? She disappears, like Courtney?”
“If that is God’s will,” Bart said. “We’ll leave that up to His anointed.”
“We could always use her for a celebration,” Grady suggested.
Ethan wondered if that would appease them, make them forget about his blunder with Courtney. “What kind of celebration?”
“One that honors the procreative powers God has bestowed on us. Only this one could last for days.”
Ezra Mooney squinted through the smoke. “So…what, Grady, you’re saying we rape her until she’s dead?”
The drugs were making their tongues too loose, but Ethan didn’t chastise anyone. Grady’s gaffe took the spotlight off him.
“Last I heard, raping a woman didn’t kill her,” Grady said. “I say we keep her in a cage and use her indefinitely. She’s been cast out of the kingdom, so she doesn’t count anymore. She’s like garbage…to do with what we will.”
Peter inhaled too deeply from the pipe and had to cough. “Might as well save Bart the trouble of disposing of another corpse,” he said when he could speak.
“So we’d have a woman available whenever we felt the urge?” Harry smiled. “I could go for that. But what if she gets pregnant?”
“Bart will make sure she doesn’t,” Ethan said.
Dominic Studebaker, their resident medic, sat across from Ethan. They’d gone to the same college for a year but hadn’t met until Joshua Cooley had brought Dominic to one of Ethan’s meetings. He’d been listening and smoking but hadn’t contributed. Apparently, the fact that Ethan hadn’t relied on his expertise offended him and he finally broke into the conversation. “With a little surgery, I can make pregnancy impossible.”
Ethan rose to his feet. “So we’ll keep our options open and decide exactly what her punishment will be once she’s back. Have we come to an agreement on that much?”
Everyone shifted as they prepared to vote.
“Will all those in favor of making sure Martha cannot harm the church say aye?” he called out.
Ayes resounded, without a single nay. But Joshua Cooley didn’t seem enthusiastic, and that concerned Ethan. “Do you have something else to say, Joshua?”
All eyes turned on the twenty-eight-year-old father of three.
“Yeah. I say we get rid of her for good, like Courtney. We’ve got wives. And if that isn’t enough to satisfy every itch, we’ve got the Covenant women who participate in the rituals. We get all the sex we need.”
Ethan arched an eyebrow at him. “You think our celebrations are about sex?”
“I think they’re about honoring the procreative power, just like you do.”
“And yet you think it would be kinder to kill her?”
“I don’t want to face her every time I come down here. It’s different with the other women. They participate willingly or we protect their innocence by making it so they don’t know what’s going on and don’t remember when it’s over. As long as they aren’t aware, I don’t see how it hurts anyone. But…a sex slave? You have to look at this through the eyes of the outside world. They won’t consider that God’s punishment. They’ll call it torture. And what if someone were to find her? We’d all go to prison. It’s easier to hide a body than a live human being.”
“Who’d find her?” Ethan asked.
Joshua stood. “Courtney stumbled onto this place, didn’t she?”
Ethan kept his gaze averted. Courtney hadn’t stumbled onto it, exactly. He’d hinted, left her clues. He’d wanted her to come here because he’d been excited about having her participate. He’d thought Courtney would offer herself to the group, become a partner in their worship. She’d begged him from the beginning to let her attend the most secret rituals.
But she hadn’t understood the religious underpinnings of what they did in the pit. She’d used what she knew and tried to blackmail him. And he’d had to stop her. But suspicious though they might be, Ethan could never admit to the Guides that he was directly to blame for her death. Allowing her into the pit without the usual precautions had been poor judgment on his part.
“I mean, if she’d gone to the police, we’d be awaiting trial right now,” Joshua was saying.
Harry knew the truth, of course. He’d seen Courtney with Ethan before their big argument. But he had plenty of motivation to accept the lie. He didn’t want to lose his place among the Guides.
“Forget Courtney.” Ethan adjusted his robes so he wouldn’t have to meet anyone’s eyes.
Joshua pivoted to face the others. “So you want to do this? You really want to add torture to the list of things we do down here and call it sacred?”
No one responded.
“You’re making a mistake,” he said. “You’re feeling untouchable, but you’re not. None of us are.”
“No one can hurt us,” Ethan said. “Even if someone found Martha here, they wouldn’t be able to get out of the compound before we stopped them. And God is the only power we answer to. If He provides her for our use, we will use her as we see fit.”
Joshua wouldn’t back off. “There’s always a chance someone will find out,” he said stubbornly.
“No, there isn’t. You know how good Bart is at security. Trust him, as I do.”
“It’s not about trust. Courtney might be dead but—” he raised a hand when Ethan opened his mouth to interrupt “—but that doesn’t mean we can forget how she got that way. I’m sure her parents and the police are searching for answers.”
“They won’t find anything,” Bart said.
“They could,” he insisted.
Ethan studied him. “Are you losing your faith? Are you beginning to doubt me, Joshua?”
With a scowl, he said, “Of course not. I understand why you feel entitled. I’m just saying the outside world won’t.”
“I will not be judged by the outside world!” Ethan thundered.
Silence descended. Finally Joshua cursed under his breath. “Fine. I’ll go along with it, too. But…shit, Todd’s my friend.”
“Todd’s getting a divorce,” Ethan said. “He hates his wife.”
“He doesn’t hate her. He’s a believer. He believes in us. And he’s brokenhearted to think she could lose her faith. There’s a difference.”
Ethan accepted the pipe. “Don’t worry about Todd,” he said as he exhaled. “He will be rewarded for his belief. There are other women available to him. And, by your own logic, what Todd doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”
“God willing, he’ll never find out.”
Handing him the pipe, Ethan patted him on the shoulder when he bent to accept it. “Relax. You like it here, don’t you?”
“What’s not to like?” he said grudgingly.
Ethan smiled. “God supports those who support Him. So stop worrying and remember who you are.” Nodding toward the bong, Ethan waited until his friend had taken one hit and then another, and soon Joshua was sitting down again, talking about what he had planned for Martha, just like the rest of them.
* * *
At first, Nate fought the memories. He knew they’d only make sharing a trailer with Rachel more difficult. But it was so hard to believe the woman sleeping in the next room had crept into his condo, into his bed, six months ago that he couldn’t help replaying the incident. He couldn’t sleep right now, anyway, so he let his mind wander back to that night as it so often did.
His unlocked door gave it away first. When he found the extra key on the kitchen counter, he thought his brother had come over. Randall was younger by eight years and did that sometimes. He raided the refrigerator or borrowed Xbox games. Sometimes he even brought a girl over to watch a movie or just hang out at his older brother’s place. But Randall was loud. And he didn’t smell of perfume.
Curious, Nate walked into the living room—and saw a lacy white bra hanging from a lamp.
His visitor definitely wasn’t Randall. Was it some prostitute the guys at Department 6 had hired, thinking it would be funny to put him on the spot? The practical jokes usually ended when they got busy, and they were currently shorthanded. But…
No. He rejected the prostitute idea. The guys wouldn’t bother unless they could be around to witness his reaction. And if they were here, they were doing a damn good job of hiding. So…who was it? He dated occasionally, but he hadn’t been in a serious relationship for ages. Not since Susan had he brought a woman home….
The floor creaked as he followed a trail of discarded clothing down the hall to his bedroom. How had this woman, whoever she was, gained entry to his condo? It wasn’t as if he kept his spare key above the door or under the mat like most people.
Then it dawned on him. Last week, he’d forgotten a file at home and sent Rachel Jessop to get it for him. He’d given her his keys, so she could get into his place. Could she have made a copy?
No, this couldn’t be Rachel. He’d never even asked her out. And yet…
The door to his bedroom stood partially open and had a pair of bikini panties hanging from the knob. He fingered the silky fabric, even brought it to his nose, imagining Rachel as he did so—and felt his body react. It’d been a long time since he’d been with a woman. And whether he wanted to admit it or not, Rachel appealed to him.
The door creaked as he pushed it wider. The room was dark, but in the light from the hall he could discern the color of the hair spilling across his pillow.
Blond, as he’d expected. Almost before that detail could register, she turned to look at him. Their eyes met, and he felt his knees go weak. It was Rachel, all right.
For a second, he was torn by indecision. She was taking a huge risk, doing something he couldn’t imagine she’d ever done before. She was usually so careful. He didn’t want her to be embarrassed but, after Susan, he’d sworn he’d never take a woman’s love lightly again. Which meant he couldn’t accept what she was offering.
What now?
“Hey.” Her lips curved in a self-conscious smile.
Knowing he needed to do something before she felt even more uncomfortable, he crossed over to her. He’d simply talk to her, explain that he wasn’t interested in a relationship with anyone at the moment, least of all someone he worked with. Having grown up without the usual teenage sexual exploration, she didn’t fully understand the emotional complexity of what she was doing and how it might affect both their jobs. It didn’t help that she’d become a police officer. Law enforcement had kept her circumspect. She’d seen too much but experienced too little. This was the first time he’d ever known her to cast all reservation aside.
God, what a way to go….
Without actually touching her, he sat on the edge of the bed. “What’s…going on?”
“The panties didn’t give it away?” Her smile suddenly faltered, which told him she was already losing her nerve. He wanted her to lose it, didn’t he? He thought so—but he wasn’t sure. He’d never been so much at war with himself.
“Rachel…we work together. As your boss…this probably isn’t…” He struggled for the right words, the kindest words. But rejection sounded like rejection, which made this very difficult indeed, especially because, on a very base level, he didn’t really want to turn her away. “…the best thing for us to do,” he finished lamely.
“I guess I’m having trouble thinking of anything better,” she responded, and then she guided his hand beneath the covers to her bare breast, burying all his good intentions beneath an avalanche of testosterone. He couldn’t even remember what he’d said or where he’d planned to go with his little speech. He’d just been glad she hadn’t really listened.
Stop now, his mind screamed in one final attempt to keep him out of trouble, but he didn’t have the strength to withdraw. He willingly let go of sanity the moment their lips met. Maybe if he gave her as much pleasure as she gave him, it would be an equal trade and everything would be fine.
He’d folded back the blankets, taken one look at her and realized he’d willingly trade just about anything to have her. She was so beautiful, so soft, so responsive. And it wasn’t as if she wanted it polite and easy. That seemingly unbreachable wall of caution she generally put between herself and the world was gone. She’d gotten wild with him—sunk her fingernails into his back, bitten his shoulder and rode him as hard as he rode her—which whipped him into a frenzy unlike any he’d ever experienced. He was confident he’d just had the best sex of his life. Until morning. Then, as he slumped over her, exhausted, he’d heard the softly uttered words that’d chilled him to the bone: I love you.
A noise in the hallway brought Nate to a sitting position. Rachel was up. Judging by her footsteps, she was adjusting the setting on the swamp cooler.
Rubbing a hand over his face, he willed himself to relax. That memory had been so vivid his heart was still slamming against his chest. The only way he could get it to slow down was by focusing on the ending: I love you….
No matter what happened, he had to keep his hands to himself. Susan had taught him that I love you were three very dangerous words.
* * *
The next evening Rachel had to take Nate’s truck and go to the first meeting alone. She’d known that from the beginning. In a way, it was a relief to leave Nate at the trailer and set off on her own. Since the storm, the tension between them had only grown more intense. It seemed that he couldn’t look at her without lowering his gaze to her lips or her breasts, and she wasn’t faring much better. It didn’t matter where he was, she felt compelled to seek him out. Even when he went outside to fix the air-conditioning in the truck, she’d gone to the window time and again, just to catch a glimpse of him.
They needed to infiltrate the Covenanters as soon as possible so they’d have something else to concentrate on—like guarding their true identities and finishing this assignment. Maybe, if they did, they could siphon off some of the excess energy that was putting them on edge.
But when the tall fence and barbed wire surrounding the complex came into view, Rachel grew nervous. That fence was a metaphor for what she’d experienced as a child, and her heart quailed at the thought that she’d be left to the mercy of another person’s dictates. That she’d be cut off from the world she’d embraced since fighting so hard to establish her freedom.
Telling herself to calm down, she waited for the beat-up Volkswagen bus ahead of her to pass through security. The Covenanters were obviously very careful about who they allowed onto the property. They were checking IDs and vehicles as if this was a military installation.
Maybe the dossier Milt had created had been purposely vague, but he’d done his homework when it came to her ID. Department 6 had someone on staff who took care of that sort of thing. Someone good. Rachel wasn’t worried that the Utah driver’s license issued to Rachel Mott would be spotted as a fake. But she was concerned about what she’d learned from Thelma and Martha. She was also nervous about the sentiments expressed in the letters Ethan Wycliff had written to Charles Manson. Just how crazy was he?
Once the Volkswagen rattled inside the compound, she let Nate’s truck move slowly forward until she came even with the two men working the checkpoint. “Hello,” she said with a smile.
“Good evening, ma’am. May I see your identification?” One man, about twenty years old, peered closely at her face, comparing it to her picture. The other, a portly older gentleman wearing army fatigues like his younger companion, walked around her vehicle using a long-handled mirror.
As the younger man returned her license, Rachel tried not to stare at the crudely made C on his forehead. “Do you have any weapons with you?” he asked.
“Weapons?” she echoed as if bewildered. She felt naked without her gun, but was glad she’d left it at the trailer.
“It’s just a precaution.”
“I’m not a member or anything. I was told there’s an Introduction Meeting here and that it’s open to the public.”
“That’s true. It starts in a few minutes. We’re only documenting who comes and goes and making sure no one brings any weapons into the commune. We are a nonviolent people.”
“I see.” Apparently the Covenanters didn’t consider stoning to be violent. Continuing her act of innocence, she said, “I have nothing, nothing at all.”
“How did you hear about the meeting, Ms. Mott?”
“Mrs. Mott. I met one of your members yesterday when I was out taking photographs with my husband.”
His eyebrows slid up. “So you’re the one.”
“The one?”
“Yesterday evening Brother Bartholomew mentioned finding a young couple with a camera along the perimeter. Where’s your husband?”
“He wasn’t interested in coming. He…he doesn’t feel any need for religion.”
The young man rested his hands on her open window. “Maybe someday he’ll change his mind.”
It was a shame this boy had carved up his forehead. “I hope so.”
His partner finished checking the truck’s undercarriage and returned to their post, a small platform where he could take advantage of an overhang he soon wouldn’t need. Dusk was settling in. And he certainly didn’t have to worry about rain. Last night’s monsoon had moved on as quickly as it had hit. By the time Rachel woke up at eight-thirty this morning, there were no puddles or even mud to show there’d ever been a storm—just some broken branches scattered by the wind.
Grateful that Nate had managed to fix the truck’s air-conditioning, Rachel adjusted the closest vent and drove into the compound. There, she was directed by a third man, this one bald and wearing a T-shirt with ripped-out sleeves, to park near a large tent.
She did as she was told. Then she checked her cell phone. No service, as she’d suspected. This place was too remote.
“Damn.” She couldn’t text Nate to let him know she was inside. But it hardly mattered, since he didn’t have service at the trailer, anyway. Not having a conduit to other people she trusted was as odd as it was uncomfortable. She was working without a safety net.
Despite its uselessness, she dropped her phone back in her purse and got out.
A woman wearing Islamic-style clothing—a green thobe and headdress with sandals—greeted her with a bouquet of wild flowers, one of which she slipped into Rachel’s hair. “Hello, I’m Louise.” Approximately thirty years old, the woman had a pretty face completely devoid of makeup and bore the same mark on her forehead as the men Rachel had met at the gate. “Welcome to Paradise.”
Whether or not it was Paradise remained to be seen. “Thank you.”
“Have you ever been here before?”
“No, this is my first time.”
“I hope you enjoy your visit.”
Rachel would’ve admired Louise’s pleasant manner, except her vacant eyes and subdued behavior suggested she was on something, likely a sedative. Rachel was about to ask the woman where she was from and how long she’d been part of the group when a far more resonant voice interrupted.
“Sister Louise, you’ve made a new friend?”
Turning toward the sound, Rachel saw a tall man duck out of the tent. With his black hair slicked away from his face and his eyes shining like pieces of obsidian, she recognized him immediately. Ethan Wycliff was as well groomed as his picture. He walked toward her, wearing an expression of curiosity and avid interest.
Rachel was just as interested in him. She was also surprised. Although not everyone wore the Covenanter’s mark, she’d certainly expected to see it on him….