Nora Roberts - Sacred Sins

With his partner snoring lightly, Roderick kept watch.

Tess was learning the fine points of canasta from Lowenstein when the phone rang. The relaxed girl talk ended with a snap.

“Okay, you answer it. If it’s him, keep calm. Stall if you can, agree to meet him if you have to. See if you can pin him down to a location.”

“All right.” Though her throat dried up, Tess picked up the receiver and spoke naturally. “Dr. Court.”

“Doctor, this is Detective Roderick.”

“Oh, Detective.” Her muscles went limp as she turned and shook her head at Lowenstein. “Yes? Is there any news?”

“We’ve got him, Dr. Court. Ben picked him up less than two blocks from your building.”

“Ben? Is he all right?”

“Yes, don’t worry. It’s nothing serious. He wrenched his shoulder some during the arrest. He asked me to call you and let you know you can relax. Ed’s taking him to the hospital.”

“Hospital.” She remembered the tray with the blood-soaked bandages. “Which one? I want to go.”

“He’s being taken to Georgetown, Doctor, but he didn’t want you to bother.”

“No, it’s no bother. I’ll leave right away.” Remembering the woman breathing down her neck, Tess turned to Lowenstein. “You should talk to Detective Lowenstein. I appreciate you calling.”

“We’re all just glad it’s over.”

“Yes.” She squeezed her eyes shut a moment, then handed the phone to Lowenstein. “He’s been caught.” Then she dashed into the bedroom for her purse and car keys. When she hurried back in for her coat, Lowenstein was still pulling details out of Roderick. Impatient, Tess tossed her coat over her arm and waited.

“Sounds like a clean collar,” Lowenstein said when she hung up. “Ben and Ed decided to do a few more sweeps of the area and saw this guy come out of an alley and head toward your building. He had his coat open. They could see he was wearing a cassock. He didn’t protest when they stopped him, but when Ben found the amice in his pocket, he apparently lost it, started fighting and calling for you.”

“Oh, God.” She wanted to see him, talk to him. But Ben was on his way to the hospital, and Ben came first.

“Lou said Ben got a little banged up, doesn’t sound serious.”

“I’ll feel better when I see for myself.”

“I know what you mean. Do you want me to take you to the hospital?”

“No, I’m sure you want to get back to the station and tie up the loose ends. It doesn’t look as though I need police protection any longer.”

“No, but I’ll walk you down to your car anyway. Tell Ben I said good work.”

As ben crossed the parking lot to the station house, Logan pulled in behind him and hurried out of his car. “Ben.” Hatless, gloveless, dressed as he rarely was in a cassock, he caught up with them on the steps. “I was hoping I’d find you here.”

“Not a good night for priests to go walking around, Tim. We got a lot of nervous cops out tonight. You could find yourself cuffed.”

“I was saying late Mass for the sisters and didn’t have time to change. I think I have something.”

“Inside,” Ed said, pushing open the door. “Your fingers are going to fall off.”

“I was in such a hurry.” Absently, Logan began to rub his fingers together for warmth. “For days I’ve been going over everything. I knew you were fixed on the use of the name Reverend Francis Moore and were checking it out, but I couldn’t get my mind off the Frank Moore I’d known at the seminary.”

“We’re still digging there.” Impatient, Ben looked at his watch.

“I know, but I was with him, you see, I knew that he bordered between being a saint and a fanatic. Then I remembered a seminarian who’d been under him and had left after a celebrated row with Moore. I remembered him because the young man had gone on to become a well-known writer. Stephen Mathias.”

“I’ve heard of him.” As excitement began to drum, Ben edged closer. “You think Mathias-”

“No, no.” Frustrated by his inability to speak quickly or coherently enough, Logan took a deep breath. “I didn’t even know Mathias personally, since I was already established in the university when all that went on. But I remembered the gossip that there was nothing, and no one, Mathias didn’t know about in the seminary. In fact, he used plenty of inside stuff for his first couple of books. The more I thought about that, the more things clicked. And I remembered reading one novel in particular that mentioned a young student who had suffered a breakdown and had left the seminary after his sister-his twin sister-had died as the result of an illegal abortion. Apparently there was a tremendous scandal. It was discovered that the boy’s mother was confined to an institution and that he had been treated himself for schizophrenia.”

“Let’s track down Mathias.” Ben was already heading down the hall when Logan stopped him.

“I’ve already done that. It only took me a few calls to locate him. He’s living in Connecticut, and he remembered the incident perfectly. The seminarian had been unusually devout, as devout to Moore as he was to the Church. In fact, he served as his secretary. Mathias said his name was Louis Roderick.”

It was possible for the blood to freeze, for the heart to stop pumping, and for the body to remain alive. “Are you sure?”

“Yes, Mathias was positive, but when I asked, he went back through his old notes and checked on it. He’s willing to come down and give you a description. With that and a name, you should be able to find him.”

“I know where he is.” Ben spun around into the squad room and grabbed the first phone he reached.

“You know him?” Logan grabbed on to Ed before he lost him as well.

“He’s a cop. He’s one of us, and right now he’s heading up the outside surveillance on Tess’s building.”

“Sweet God.” As the room in front of him humped into action, Logan began to pray.

Units were dispatched to Roderick’s address, others to back up Tess’s apartment. Logan was on Ben’s heels as they headed to the door. “I want to go with you.”

“This is police business.”

“Seeing a priest might calm him.”

“Don’t get in the way.” They hit the glass door and nearly ran over Lowenstein.

“What the hell’s going on here?”

Half wild with fear, Ben caught her by the collar of her coat. “Why aren’t you with her? Why did you leave her alone?”

“What’s wrong with you? Once Lou called to verify it had gone down, there was no reason for me to hang around.”

“When did he call?”

“Twenty minutes ago. But he said you were on your way-” Though her mind rejected it, the expression on Ben’s face told her everything. “Oh, God, not Lou? But he’s-” A cop. A friend. Lowenstein kicked herself back. “He called twenty minutes ago, telling me there had been a clean arrest and to pull off the guard and come in. I never questioned it. God, Ben, I never thought to verify with headquarters. It was Lou.”

“We’ve got to find him.”

She grabbed Ben’s arm before he could push past her. “Georgetown Hospital. He told her you’d been taken to Emergency.”

Nothing else was needed to have him streaking down the steps to his car.

Tess pulled up in the parking lot after a frustrating twenty-minute drive. The roads were all but clear, but that hadn’t stopped the fender benders. She told herself the good part was that Ben was already fixed up and waiting. And it was over.

Slamming her door, she dropped her keys into her pocket. On the way home they were going to pick up a bottle of champagne. Two bottles, she corrected. Then they were going to spend the rest of the weekend in bed drinking them.