Pastor Tom’s wife was a butch woman with bowlegs and black peach fuzz on her upper lip. She invited Dani into the house and asked the deputy to wait in the dining room while she fetched her husband out of his evening meditation.
When Pastor Tom entered the dining room, Dani realized the man of God was as effeminate as his wife was masculine. It was as if the married couple had swapped hormones.
It didn’t take much convincing before the preacher had retrieved two glasses from the armoire and was encouraging Dani to fill his up to the top with some of the homemade brew.
“Your daddy’s a preacher, right?” Pastor Tom asked as he sipped his whiskey.
Normally Dani hated talking about her daddy, but this was the one occasion where her no-good old man would serve a useful purpose. “Yes, sir. Preached in Baptist Flats for a good long while before he took up with a church in Kentucky.” That was the short version of the story. The long version was that her old man had finally been run out of town. His diddling habits sank down into the youth ministry, and he was caught spreading the word and his seed in a learning-impaired girl who was finishing up her second year of twelfth grade. Technically she was of age, but that didn’t matter to her folks who threatened to have Dani’s daddy defrocked if he didn’t leave town on the double.
“They sent you to the Anointed Daughters school?”
Dani nodded. She wouldn’t be able to fake her way through a pleasant conversation about the school, so she quickly changed the subject. “How long you been married, Pastor?”
As if he were counting off a prison sentence, he said, “Twenty-one years, two months, thirteen days, and”—he looked at his watch—“five and a half hours. Give or take a minute or two.”
“Well, isn’t that just so sweet. Children?”
The pastor laughed as if that was the silliest question ever asked. “Heavens no. The missus and I have dedicated our lives to tending to our flock of believers. We haven’t had time for the blessings of children.” He gulped half his drink.
Dani topped off his glass. “I tell you what, having children in this area is rough, ain’t it?”
He nodded before taking another sip.
“Rough as a three-day-old beard.” She listened to him swallow.
“It’s a tough thing all over,” he said.
“Yeah, I suppose, but what with the high number of abductions up the slopes, it just makes it that much rougher around here.”
“Oh, that,” he said before tossing some more whiskey down his gullet.
“It’s a terrible thing, ain’t it?”
He seemed to lose control of his nod as he attempted to agree with Dani. “Terrible.”
“Why is it, do you think, that the mountains are riddled with case after case of missing girls?”
He shrugged. “The Lord works in mysterious ways, Dani.”
She rolled her eyes without him noticing. “My daddy always used to say the same thing, Pastor. He surely did, but I can’t help but think that there’s something besides the Lord’s mysterious ways at work in these cases.”
He chuckled. “The police are always suspicious of such things. I can understand that.”
“You must run into some of your preacher friends here and there who have consoled a brokenhearted mother or two.”
He finished his glass of whiskey and held it out for Dani to refill. She complied. “How about it, Pastor? You ever hear from any of your colleagues about these missing kids?”
He downed the whiskey and then blew out a liquor-laden breath. “That comes up on you, don’t it? It does have a kick to it. Yes, sir, it does.” He held out his glass. “I’d like another kick, if you please?”
Dani filled his glass again. “You might want to slow down there, Pastor. This is a home brew. It’ll strip you down quicker than store-bought.”
He sniffed the contents of the glass. “I swear I smell a hint of honeysuckle.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
He sipped his drink. “What question?”
“Have you heard from mountain preachers about missing kids?”
His head wobbled as he considered her question. “Now, mind you, I rarely hear about these things firsthand. I mostly hear rumors from this parishioner and that, so it’s not something that I ever get official word on. Mostly.”
Dani sat back, feeling as if she’d gotten the wrong preacher drunk.
“Had a strange encounter with a preacher in Cornwell once, I will say that. It was about a missing girl.”
Dani perked up. “Strange?”
“Very strange. June Hargrove, you know her, right? Her husband sells produce off the highway.”
“I know the Hargroves, yes, sir.”
“Well, she told me about a cousin of hers whose daughter went missing. Girl of about fourteen, if I remember right. June give me the name of the church where her cousin worshipped, and I put in a call to the pastor. Offered prayers, offered to raise funds, even offered to send up a group from the congregation to help in the search.” He took a drink.
“He didn’t take you up on your offers?”
“Not a one. Turned me down flat. Said the best thing we could do was not speak on it.”
“You’ll excuse me for saying so, Pastor, but that sounds like a heartless thing to say.”
“I agree. I do. I told the man as much, and he didn’t put an argument on it. He basically said his hands were tied on the matter. He had a benefactor he had to answer to, he said.”
“Benefactor? Who?”
Pastor Tom looked up as he tried to recall the benefactor’s name. “I’m not sure he told me. I do remember that he used the word ‘she.’ ‘She’s called on me to discuss the story of Jephthah,’ he said.”
“Jephthah?” Dani asked, the blood draining from her face. She knew the story too well. Judges 11. Her father had tormented her with it.
“Yes, and I have to say I don’t see it as a fitting message for such an occasion. It compounds the tragedy.”
Dani sat silently.
“Do you know the story?” the pastor asked, his words slightly slurred. “A father sacrifices his daughter to satisfy a vow to God.”
“I know it,” Dani said more sharply than she intended.
The pastor held his glass and studied the liquid inside. “It’s a vile message to deliver to a congregation that is grieving a missing child…not just a child, but a girl. I urged him to reconsider, but he said he couldn’t. The sermon was set.” He drank a little whiskey and then titled his head as he contemplated a thought. “I never did hear if they found the girl.”
Dani took a sip from her glass and then said, “They didn’t.”
“Then you do know the case?”
Her mind settled on an image of Laura Farrow. “I don’t, no, sir. But I’ve come to find that one is like the next. You can tack the same ending onto them all.”