Unholy Shepherd by Robert Christian (classic literature list .txt) 📗

the front door of the store. It shows her walking in and out, and then running back in a few moments later.”

“I see,” Manny said.

Maureen felt for him. She could see that he felt useless at the scene and was searching for something that the rest of the authorities hadn’t thought of that would reclaim some of his worth.

“Maybe we could go talk to Tasha?” Maureen suggested. She was looking at Manny, but speaking to Layton.

The agent clearly sensed that and gave a resigned nod.

Maureen and Manny walked over to where Agent Lorenzo was finishing with Tasha. She had since been joined by her husband, still wearing his firefighter’s shirt. He was clearly in a state of shock, saying nothing and rubbing the base of Tasha’s neck, trying to comfort her. Lorenzo looked over their shoulders as they approached, raised her eyebrows, and nodded. She must have gotten confirmation from Layton that they were allowed to approach. She closed her notebook and stood to one side.

“Tasha, Ben,” Manny began as they came to stand in front of the couple, “I’m so sorry for what’s happened. Can we talk to you for a minute?”

“I’m not saying a word with her here,” the woman said pointing at Maureen. “Whatever’s going on, I know she has something to do with it!”

“Tasha, I can assure you,” said Manny, “Maureen has been with me all morning.”

“Didn’t know you liked slumming it,” Tasha scoffed, rubbing the tears from her eyes with the palm of her hand.

Maureen knew that the woman was simply projecting her grief onto her. She tried not to take it personally, to pretend it didn’t bother her. It did, of course, but she knew she had to bury it down with the rest of her baggage.

“Look, I’m not going to lie to you,” Manny said, appearing to speak to the husband. “I’m not strictly a part of this investigation, but I still want to do whatever I can to help. And Maureen here is helping me, so you can trust her too.”

“You can’t help!” Tasha shouted. “Either of you! Just leave us alone, Manny! You haven’t helped the other families, so get lost!” She turned and buried her head in her husband’s chest and began to cry again.

Maureen watched as Manny reached into his pocket and pulled out a business card. He maintained a stoic look on his face, but Maureen could sense tension in his body that meant the woman’s words had hurt him very deeply. “Just in case,” Manny said softly, handing the card to the woman’s husband.

The man reached out with one hand, took it from him, and nodded.

“What now?” Maureen asked him when they had gotten back into his truck.

Manny sat in the passenger’s seat with his chin resting on one fist, staring out of the window. “I don’t know. Our theory of the victims being related is out the window, though.”

“How so?”

“Ben Jr. is only three,” he said wearily. “The kids wouldn’t know each other from school. Tasha has been an agnostic for as long as I can remember—and pretty outspoken about it, too—so the church is out. And she’s a fitness instructor. I don’t remember any gym memberships showing up in either Tom Lowes’ or Sandra Locke’s financials. We’re back to square one.”

“Well then, we’ll just have to find another thing that ties them together.”

“I don’t see how,” he said, pulling out his phone and looking at the display. “It’s almost noon. We’ve got twelve, fourteen hours tops before the kid is dead, and we’re not going to be any help to the Feds. Everything we’ve given them hasn’t helped at all. Let’s just go home.”

Maureen turned the key and looked over at him. He was probably correct, but it didn’t seem right for some reason. Her giving up was to be expected, but she couldn’t fathom Manny giving up like this. It wasn’t right.

Somehow, Maureen decided, it was up to her to make him fight.

THIRTY-FIVE

Manny paced in front of his couch while Maureen sat in silence with her legs curled under her. The morning had dawned, and no fire had been reported anywhere in the area. There was no sign whatsoever that the killer had struck again. The pervasive thought in the community became that the child was not taken by the same ghoul, and that they would need to expand the search parameters to include the more standard kidnapping fare. He, of course, knew from Maureen’s dream that they were looking for the same person, but they decided to keep that to themselves and help out as much as they were allowed, in the hopes that a mass search would flush out the guilty party. The prospect that he could still prevent the boy’s death had reinvigorated him, and he was now ashamed that he had even considered giving up the previous day.

Being a Saturday, it hadn’t been hard for the police to round up enough volunteers to search the surrounding area for any sign of little Ben Naismith. They had combed fields, searched along the river, and even sent the county K-9 unit through the woods into the next county. Hundreds of residents were interviewed, and the Amber Alert was sent out. No word came back from the surrounding counties, and nobody who was interviewed was of any help. Now that the sun was setting, the possibility of the boy only being found once he was set upon a pyre was becoming a firmer reality in his mind. And to Manny, that was unacceptable.

“We’re doing enough, right?” he asked Maureen, desperately hoping she could provide him with some kind of satisfaction. “I mean, there’s nothing we’re missing, right?”

“I don’t know,” came her stoic answer. It was not what he wanted to hear.

“C’mon, Maureen help me out a little,” he said, his voice beginning to rise. “Please. We’ve got to be missing something! We know this person is religious to the point of zealotry. We know he’s setting these crime scenes up