The Lord is My Shepherd

  Mark blinked several times. This? This is what they were all wasting their time over while the killer still roamed free? He dropped his hand, and the officers entered and hand-cuffed Randolph, who sobbed uncontrollably.

  Mark stood up as Paul entered the room. “Mr. Randolph, where do you keep your Shepherd's Cross?” Mark asked.

  Randolph looked at him in confusion. “On top of my dresser.”

  Paul headed off and a moment later returned with the cross dangling from its chain. “We're fast running out of suspects.”

  “I know.”

  Cindy pulled her car into the driveway, and Jeremiah parked immediately behind her. She walked toward the house, trying not to let her fear get the better of her. She heard Jeremiah's car door close, and she tried not to jump as he came up behind her.

  Taking a deep breath, she unlocked the door, and stepped inside. Everything seemed as it should be. She turned and nearly bumped into Jeremiah who had been right behind her.

  “Sorry,” he said. He moved toward the kitchen, which still showed the ravages of the intrusion.

  “Sorry,” she echoed. She walked in and scooped some books and papers off the floor and piled them on the table. It was stupid to be embarrassed, but she couldn't help it. Her mother had drummed into her that how clean you kept your house reflected on you as a person.

  “You don't have to do this now,” Jeremiah said.

  “No, it's fine.” She gritted her teeth and tried to sound cheerful.

  She dropped another stack, and a few scraps of paper went fluttering through the air. Jeremiah caught one and looked at it. “Somebody doesn't like crossword puzzles,” he said.

  She glanced at the scrap of paper and then at the other ones scattered around the floor. It was the crossword puzzle she had been working on Monday. It was the only paper that had been torn up.

  “That's really weird,” she said.

  “What?”

  Her cell phone rang, and she jumped. She yanked it out of her pocket and flipped it open.

  “Hello?”

  “It's Detective Walters.”

  “Did you catch Jack Randolph?” she asked, turning toward Jeremiah.

  “We did,” Mark said. There was a pause. “I'm sorry, Cindy, but it's not him. The killer is still out there.”

  The phone started to slip out of her hand. Jeremiah stepped forward, caught it, and pressed it to his ear.

  “Yes, this is Jeremiah. So, the killer is still out there?”

  Cindy pulled out a chair at the kitchen table and sat down, shoving the pile of books and papers back onto the floor where it landed with a crash.

  “No, nothing, just some books falling.” Jeremiah took a step away.

  She had hoped it was Randolph. She had wanted the nightmare to end. Of all the Shepherds, she had always liked him the least. She had almost been able to picture him as the killer.

  She stared at Jeremiah as he continued to talk on the phone, hating herself for the doubts she still had about him. The mysterious stranger swoops in to save the day but later turns out to be the killer. She was sure she had seen that before in a movie. She told herself that was why it seemed to make so much sense.

  She thought of the way he had appeared in the sanctuary that day. He had looked like some kind of devil. Maybe she had been right to think so. She took a deep breath and tried to calm her racing heart. Wild speculation wasn't helping any and only caused her to question the one person who seemed most willing to help.

  “Yes, she'll be careful,” Jeremiah said.

  He said careful instead of safe. That's because I'm not safe, and no matter how careful I am I can't make myself safe.

  “Yes, I'll be careful too,” Jeremiah said.

  Somehow, that made her feel a little bit better.

  Jeremiah hung up and put her phone down on the table.

  “Why don't you come with me tonight?” he asked.

  She wanted to, desperately. But unreasonable as it sounded, suddenly, the idea of locking herself in her house seemed safer than going out. The killer had already been there, and what was it they said about lightning not striking in the same place twice?

  She shook her head. “No, tonight's a special night, for your church, synagogue, family.”

  “Yes, but we're a family with a hundred Jewish mothers, which means, there's plenty of food for one more.”

  She forced herself to smile. “You know, I'm just really too tired to go. I think I need to get some sleep. It's been a long week, and it could get worse before it gets better.”

  He stared at her with doubt in his eyes. She knew she was going to win, though. He would have to leave soon, and he couldn't force her to go with him. Not unless he's the killer.

  She shook her head and jumped up from the table. She got the orange juice out of the refrigerator and poured herself a glass to give her something to do so she wouldn't have to look him in the eyes.

  “Thank you. Maybe next year.”

  It was lame, but it worked.

  “Okay, call me if you need me,” he said.

  “I will.”

  “Lock the door behind me.”

  “I will.”

  He left.

  She locked the door and then stood against it, shaking.

  10

  FINALLY, CINDY MOVED AWAY FROM THE DOOR, CHASTISING HERSELF FOR being so suspicious. She hoped Jeremiah didn't know what she'd been thinking about him.

  She glanced around the room in disgust. Evidence of the intrusion was still everywhere. Her mom would die if she saw the place looking like it did, and Cindy was positive no amount of excuses about killers and burglars would make up for the fact that it was in a shambles and that she had let somebody see it that way.

  She started with the piles of books and papers in the kitchen. As order overtook the chaos, she felt a bit better. It terrified her to think of someone prowling around her house, going through her things. The harder she worked to undo the damage, though, the more her fear turned into anger.

  At least I'm actually doing something. Unlike the police. Why can't they just do their job?

  “Stop it!” she ordered herself out loud. It was unfair. The police were working as hard as they could, and if they hoped to catch the killer they didn't have time to post twenty officers to guard her around the clock just so she could feel safe.

  When she was finally finished cleaning she grabbed a frozen dinner, popped it in the microwave, and then went into her bedroom to change into some sweats.

  She checked her pockets, and her fingers brushed paper. Cindy pulled out the crumpled up program the homeless man had given her. She walked into the bathroom and tossed it in the trash. And suddenly, she remembered something. She remembered heading into the church Monday morning, seeing a crumpled piece of paper on the ground, and shoving it into her pocket to throw away in the office. But she never made it into the office.

  She blinked. What had she done with that paper? Monday morning was a blur. She vaguely remembered washing her clothes, and she was pretty sure they were still in the dryer. She walked to the laundry room and stood there, trying to recall the events of Monday.

  It came to her in a flash. She had removed her necklace and the piece of paper from her pocket and put them on the shelf right before the phone rang. She looked, and there it was.

  Her heart began to race, and for a moment she wondered if she should call Mark. Odds were, though, that the piece of paper was just some bit of trash one of the youth group kids had dropped, and she would have pulled him away from the search for nothing.

  Her hand closed around the paper, and she carried it back to the kitchen. She sat down at the table and slowly opened the piece of paper. A thick, dark scrawl covered it. She reached for her cell phone and a moment later heard Mark's voice as he answered.

  “It's Cindy. I'm at home, and I found something. I think it's important. Yes, I'll be here. Hurry.”

  Sundown. Passover had just begun, and yet Jeremiah wished it were over
. He sighed as he stood at the door to the hall and greeted families as they arrived. Most met him with broad smiles, and he had a feeling that having the responsibility of the Seder fall upon the Synagogue was a relief to many.

  A small table had been set up at the front of the hall where he would preside. Then six long tables stretched toward the back of the room. Chairs lined the walls and provided a place for people to sit while they awaited table assignments.

  Samuel walked in and clasped his hand. “Thank you, Rabbi. We told our neighbors what to expect tomorrow night, and they are still excited to join us.”

  “Great, Samuel. I'm sure it will be a blessing to your house to have them there.”

  The man beamed, fished a raffle ticket out of the bucket, and escorted his family inside. Fifteen minutes later everyone who had said they were coming had arrived. Jeremiah closed the door and then moved to the front of the room. He chose the table on the far left and then drew a raffle ticket.

  “Ticket ending in 0082.”

  Samuel hurried his family forward, beaming broadly as they took their place at the top of the table. Jeremiah then proceeded to call several more numbers until the table was filled, and then he moved on to the next one.

  Remarkably, his plan seemed to work. Some were excited, others were not, but no one blamed him for where they were seated. Belatedly, he had realized that drawing the tickets himself might not have been a smart move, but it seemed to have turned out well.

  When everyone was seated, he moved to his table. The Seder plates were made of paper, with the pictures on them drawn by the children the week before. It had not been his first choice, but the Synagogue had not budgeted for buying Seder plates, which meant it was either convince a member to donate the money or allow the children to take part in that way. The teachers had told him that it ended up being an excellent learning tool, and he could see there was already a surreptitious game going on at the tables with children attempting to identify the plates they had decorated.

  Jeremiah tried to hide his smile as he watched them. He picked up the first of his four cups of wine and gave the blessing:

  “Barukh atah Adonai, Eloheinu, melekh ha-olam borei p'ri hagafen shehakol nih'yeh bid'varo Barukh atah Adonai, Eloheinu, melekh ha-olam asher bachar banu mikol am v'rom'manu mikol lashon v'kid'shanu b'mitz'votav vatiten lanu Adonai eloheinu b'ahavah mo'adim l'sim'chah chagim uz'manim l'sason et yom chag hasukot hazeh z'man sim'chateinu mik'ra kodesh zeikher litzi'at mitz'rayim ki vanu vachar'ta v'otanu kidash'ta mikol ha'amim umo'adei kad'shekha b'simchah u-v'sason hin'chal'tanu Barukh atah Adonai, m'kadeish Yis'ra'eil v'haz'manim.”

  He took a deep breath and repeated it in English, for the benefit of any who might be new to the Seder and its customs.

  “Blessed are you, Lord, our God, sovereign of the universe who creates the fruit of the vine who made all things exist through His word. Blessed are you, Lord, our God, sovereign of the universe who has chosen us from among all people, and exalted us above every tongue and sanctified us with His commandments, and you gave us, Lord our God, with love appointed festivals for gladness, festivals, and times for joy this day of the festival of Sukkot, the time of our gladness a holy convocation, a memorial of the exodus from Egypt because You have chosen us and made us holy from all peoples and your holy festivals in gladness and in joy you have given us for an inheritance. Blessed are you, Lord, who sanctifies Israel and the seasons.”

  He drank the cup, and his congregation followed his lead.

  Cindy stared in disbelief at the scrap of paper in her hand. “Meet me at the church tomorrow night. R.B.” R.B. had to be Ryan Bellig. Ryan had known his killer and had requested the meeting to be at the church. Why? What could he possibly hope to gain?

  Justice from the man who had killed his family? He should have stayed home and let the police handle it. She snorted in disgust and sympathized with Bellig's action. She was almost afraid to leave the murder case entirely to the police. Ryan probably felt too angry or too frustrated to let the system bring down his family's killer.

  A couple of minutes later the detective knocked on her door. Mark came in quickly, eyes eager. “What do you have?”

  She presented him with the paper. “I completely forgot about it until just now. I found this crumpled up outside the sanctuary Monday morning when I got to work. I put it in my pocket so I could throw it away in the office, and, well, I never made it there.”

  Mark read it over. “R.B.”

  “I figure that has to stand for Ryan Bellig,” she said.

  He shot her a disapproving glance, but he didn't argue. “It's not a lot, but every little bit helps,” he said at last.

  “Have you contacted all of the Shepherds yet?” Cindy asked. “If not, I can do some checking for you at work and see if we have alternate contact info for any of them.”

  “We've had at least a preliminary discussion with all of them.”

  “And?”

  He shook his head. “At this point I don't want to risk leaking any information that could be crucial to the case.”

  “You haven't arrested anyone or you wouldn't have rushed over here.”

  “Unless we have arrested someone, and I hoped you had a piece of evidence that would make the case airtight.”

  She studied his face intently. “No, I don't think that's it. I think I had it right.”

  “Mind reader, Ms. Preston?”

  “Your face is easy to read. That's funny. You'd think a detective could put on a better poker face.”

  “And you'd think a church secretary would be easier to read.”

  She smiled. “That's how much you know about working at a church.”

  He shook his head. “Is there anything else?”

  “No,” she said, feeling a little deflated that he didn't seem to find the paper as significant as she did.

  “Call if you think of anything else. At this rate, just go ahead and put me in your speed dial.”

  She laughed, but as soon as she locked the door behind him she did exactly that. She added both his and Jeremiah's cell phones to speed dial on her cell. Now she wished she could curl up with a good movie and not think about what might be happening outside her door. She wished she could just let it go.

  Jeremiah smiled as a small child, barely four, finished asking the final question of the first telling of the Passover story. Choosing him had been simple since the youngest child at a Seder was supposed to ask the questions, and he was the youngest child present who could remember the questions.

  The second telling involved four older children, and to avoid the appearance of favoritism the teachers had chosen the four children who had had the most exemplary behavior in the preceding month.

  He loved this part of Passover. He loved the ritual and the retelling of the story of God leading the Jewish people out of slavery in Egypt. It was a story no less powerful for the millennia that had inserted themselves in between that time and the present. He thought of those in his native country, who were a symbol of hope to Jewish people the world over. It was a land plagued by fear and terrorism. Yet it was indescribably beautiful because it was theirs. Truly the promised land.

  As the second retelling began he allowed himself to relax, losing himself in the ancient ritual, living every breath in the moment and shutting out the future, the past, and the world outside the room.

  No matter how much she wanted to, Cindy couldn't let the murders go. She sat down at her computer and meant to print out the latest crossword puzzle. Instead, she Googled religiously themed murders. The same references to the Raleigh murders came up. The Passion Week Killer had killed Ryan's family three years earlier, also during Easter week. The more she read about the murders, though, the more confused she became.

  There had been the killing of the man on the donkey, the killing that represented money changers, and the killings of the woman washing a man's feet. The woman had been Ryan's wife. She had taken her daughter with her to work that morning, and the child had a
lso been killed. Probably because she saw the killer's face. Then it had just stopped. No one knew why. And no one seemed to have been killed in a church.

  Ryan's death had definitely broken the pattern. He must have searched for three years to find the killer and that search had led him to Pine Springs. To First Shepherd. She thought about a typical Sunday morning service and all the faces that she knew so well. Was one of them really a killer?

  She stood up and grabbed a deck of cards from the closet and headed for the kitchen. She slid the cards out of the case and sucked in her breath. She could see her other deck of cards scattered around the body of Ryan Bellig, a man who had been trying to get justice for his murdered wife and daughter.

  After taking a deep breath, Cindy forced herself to shuffle the deck and then start a game of solitaire while she thought about everything she had read. Evidently, Ryan had tracked the killer to Pine Springs, just in time to confront him after the first murder.

  But why not go to the police? Maybe they wouldn't believe him. Or maybe he was looking for revenge. She had assumed the knife belonged to the killer, but it could just as easily have belonged to Ryan.

  So why had the Passion Week killer only gotten halfway through Easter week before stopping? Had the police been closing in on him? Had killing the little girl somehow ruined his plan? As much as she couldn't imagine why somebody would kill innocent people, she really couldn't imagine what would make them stop.

  The Passion Week killer had never been caught. And now, three years later, it looked like he had started up again across the country. Her game of solitaire ended, one of the worst hands she had ever played. She took it as a sign and headed back to her computer where she sat down and hesitated.

  Leave it alone. The police will take care of this, the rational part of her brain whispered.

  You're never going to feel safe again unless you can figure this all out, the other side countered.

  Once again she typed the Passion Week Killer into her search engine. After a moment's thought she added the words my wife's killer. At the top of the list she found exactly what she was hoping to find—Ryan's blog.