He shrugged. “No reason that I know of. So, two bodies not a coincidence, but you finding the second one probably is.”
She nodded. “I can buy that. The alternative is too creepy.”
Jeremiah leaned back in his chair, his face blank and his eyes veiled. “So, why are you sharing all of this with me?”
She already knew the answer. It was because somehow she believed that he would understand, whereas her coworkers would not. Out loud she said, “Because you were there.”
Now she could feel him studying her, trying to read her expression. If they had been playing cards she would have done her best to give him nothing. They weren't, though, and she needed him to trust her because she needed someone to talk to about it all. So she let her emotions spill onto her face without trying to censor them.
After a moment he nodded, almost imperceptibly, and she let her relief show.
“In the spirit of avoiding home, can I buy my hero a cup of coffee?” she asked. Smooth, real smooth. Knowing my luck he'll think I'm hitting on him. Awkward.
He hesitated, and she resisted the urge to crack her knuckles.
“That sounds really good,” he said at last. “But it's going to take me several hours to clean tonight, and I need to get started.”
“Some other time then,” she said, trying to hide her disappointment.
“Of course, if you really feel the need to get away from your house and do something nice for the hero,” he said with a grin, “I could use some help cleaning out my kitchen.”
She started laughing, and after a moment he joined in. “Well, that's the strangest offer I've ever had.”
“Did I mention I hate cleaning out the kitchen? Come on, it'll be fun. I'll even buy us some pizza.”
“Pizza. That's a good Jewish food to start Passover with,” she said still laughing.
“Not at all. Pizza is a tradition. Jewish people can't eat anything with yeast in it during Passover. I always like to celebrate the last day or two before Passover and the first day after Passover with pizza.”
“Okay, if you buy the pizza, I'll help clean your kitchen.”
“Wonderful. Let me just get my coat, and we can leave.”
It was then that she remembered they'd only met a few hours before. She didn't even visit the homes of guys she dated until at least the fifth date, when she was sure they weren't psychos. Still, these were extenuating circumstances. She doubted that Jeremiah would have come to her rescue if he'd been a psycho killer. Another thought occurred to her, though.
“You sure it'll be okay? I mean, you're the rabbi, and I wouldn't want to create some kind of scandal for you.”
“You think we need a chaperone?”
She rolled her eyes at him. “Don't tease. I've known some pastors who were really touchy about having women over to their houses when no one else was there.”
He smiled at her. “You don't know my synagogue very well. It's a scandal even when I don't have women over to my home.” He stood up and crossed to a coat rack in the far corner where he retrieved the jacket that he had put around her earlier that morning. As he put it on she was glad to see that it looked no worse for wear.
“After you,” he said, opening the door for her.
She walked out, and he locked his office door before leading her past Marie's desk. “I'm leaving now, Marie. I'll be home this evening if you need to get hold of me.”
Marie stared at Cindy through narrowed eyes, and she couldn't help but feel that the other woman disapproved of her.
Once they reached the parking lot, she commented, “I don't think Marie likes me.”
He laughed. “All of the good Jewish mothers have been trying to set up the rabbi with their single daughters. She could tell you were single, and she probably didn't like it one bit.”
“That's what I was talking about,” Cindy said, suddenly uncomfortable. She had already been involved in one church scandal, and that was enough for any Monday.
“It's fine. Thanks to this morning everyone has better things to gossip about. Shall we just take my car? I can drop you back here later,” Jeremiah asked.
“Sure.”
Ten minutes later he pulled up outside his house. Once inside he called out for a pizza. Cindy noticed he even had the number memorized. Kind of sad.
“Pizza should be here in about forty minutes,” he told her when he'd hung up. “Would you like the grand tour?”
“Why not.”
“Okay, let's start here in the living room.”
As she turned slowly her eyes almost popped out of her head. “Rabbi,” she said, “I think you've been holding out on me.”
5
STANDING IN THE MIDDLE OF JEREMIAH'S LIVING ROOM, CINDY POINTED to the single bookshelf. “Emily Dickenson, Robert Frost, Shakespeare's Sonnets. I would not have taken you for the poetry type.”
He smiled. “And what type would you have taken me for?”
It was a good question, and it reminded her that she was standing in the house of a man she barely knew. She fought the sudden urge to run for the door. Strangers weren't safe. Still, he wasn't a complete stranger. He was her rescuer, the one who had come running when she screamed.
What if it's because he's the killer, a voice whispered in her head.
No, that couldn't be. Jeremiah would have had no way to access the church sanctuary. Since the dead man had no connection with the church, it had to have been his killer that unlocked the sanctuary. She shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. No, it couldn't have been Jeremiah. He just wasn't the killer type. Still, that didn't mean she was even remotely sure what type of person he was.
She forced herself to relax and she shrugged. “Don't know yet.”
“Let me know when you figure it out.”
He gave her a quick tour of the rest of the house. It was spartan, with very little in the way of furniture and decorations. Like her house it had two bedrooms, and like her, Jeremiah used one of them as an office and the other as his bedroom.
She excused herself to the bathroom and took the opportunity to splash cold water on her face in an effort to pull herself together. It had been a long day, and her nerves were shot. She stared at herself in the mirror and took a deep breath.
Pull yourself together, Cindy. Jeremiah is no killer. Besides, there was no way he could have gotten into that sanctuary last night.
Unless someone else left it unlocked.
She gritted her teeth in frustration. Resolutely, she left the bathroom and returned to the kitchen where Jeremiah had flung open the cupboards. “So, is tomorrow the beginning of Passover?”
He shook his head. “Passover starts Wednesday night. Normally, you clean the night before, but the first night's Seder is being held at the synagogue, and I have to help clean there tomorrow night. That means my house has to be cleaned tonight.”
“Okay, what do we do? You have to get rid of everything with yeast in it, right?”
He smiled at her. “Yes, but it doesn't stop there. Anything that swells when placed in water for seven minutes. So, anything that has yeast, rice, beans, and corn has to go.”
“Are you kidding?”
“I never joke about Passover.”
She pulled a box of spaghetti out of the cupboard. “So this just gets tossed?”
“Yes, unless there's something you want it all goes in the trash.”
“There's a homeless shelter that a lot of the local churches support. I'd be happy to box up whatever you don't want and take it over tomorrow.”
“Sounds like an excellent idea.”
He disappeared into his office and came back a minute later with a medium-sized box. She put the spaghetti inside while he reached for a package of leek soup.
“What's wrong with that?”
“You'll find that most packaged foods contain soy or corn.”
“I had no idea,” she said.
“Ashkenazim have stricter rules about food that has to be purged before Passover.”
?
??Ashkenazim?”
“Jewish people from northern Europe, mostly Germany and Russia,” he explained. “Others, Sephardim, can eat rice and beans during Passover.”
“Wow, deprived by genetics,” she burst out before she could stop herself.
He stared at her, surprise clear on his face. She winced and was about to apologize when he burst out laughing. She joined in, and it was a moment before either of them regained some composure.
“You want to know the worst part?” Jeremiah asked.
“Tell me.”
“It passes through the mother. My first cousin, his mother was Sephardim. We tried to have Passover at their house once when I was five, and it was a total disaster.” Cindy laughed again. “My mother wouldn't let us eat anything, because it might have been tainted.”
“Stop,” she begged, wiping the tears from her eyes.
“That's what she said every time my dad tried to sneak food when she wasn't looking.”
“That's perfect,” she said.
“That was the worst holiday meal.”
“I've got a better one.”
“Prove it.”
“When I was eight my grandmother convinced us all to have Easter dinner at her sister's house.”
“And?”
“Her sister was a wiccan. She insisted we all had to participate in some spring ritual of hers. She made us stand around the dinner table chanting. She had this ceremonial knife, and it was passed from person to person. My dad got it, and I don't know what came over him, but he stabbed the ham with it. My aunt starting yelling. My brother jumped up and down, screaming 'Dad, it's resurrecting, it's resurrecting!' There we were, my aunt yelling at all of us, and my dad stabbing the ham over and over. She kicked us out of the house, and we had to eat Easter dinner at McDonald's.”
“You win,” Jeremiah conceded.
“Thank you.”
“I can just see your dad and the ham,” Jeremiah said, snatching up a knife from the carving block and pantomiming stabbing the food box with it.
His smile was broad, and the muscles in his arm flexed as he wielded the knife. Cindy laughed, as much at him as from the memory.
He's strong enough to have driven that knife into the dead man. The thought came unbidden, and she instantly stopped laughing. She took a step backward, almost involuntarily.
Jeremiah caught the movement and looked at her for a moment before lowering the knife. “Maybe it's not a good day to discuss stabbing things,” he said, his voice suddenly serious.
She nodded and watched as he put the knife away. He flashed her a grim smile, and she returned her attention to the cabinet. The doorbell rang.
“Pizza,” Jeremiah said, sounding relieved.
They ate mostly in silence and returned quickly to the work at hand. Half an hour later Jeremiah carried a box of food to his car and came back with a look of satisfaction on his face.
“Now, the hard part,” he said.
She raised an eyebrow.
“Cleaning.”
Mark sat at his desk, leafing through papers. His partner, Paul, walked over and pulled up a chair. “Where are we?”
Mark shook his head. “The victim's name was Ryan Bellig from Raleigh, North Carolina.”
“What was he doing out here?”
“I don't know. I contacted his employer. He was on vacation, due back the end of the week. He never told anyone there what his plans were. I did find out that he was a churchgoer, First Presbyterian.”
“The church he was found in is Presbyterian. Maybe he attended services yesterday. Every time my in-laws travel they attend services at a church where they're traveling.”
“I thought about that,” Mark admitted. “But none of the church staff recognized him.”
Paul shrugged. “Maybe he kept a low profile.”
Mark shook his head. “I spoke to his pastor at First Presbyterian in Raleigh. He said Ryan used to be a regular attendee, but he hadn't gone to services in three years. It seems his wife and daughter were murdered, and the killer was never found. After that, he stopped going to church.”
“And now he's murdered and in a church. There's irony for you.”
“Tell me about it.”
“So, the question is, why here, why now?”
Mark leaned back in his chair. “His boss said this is his first extended vacation in years. He's taken the occasional long weekend, but that's it. I contacted the Raleigh police and asked to see the file on his wife and daughter.”
“You think whoever killed his family waited three years for him to leave the state, followed him, and finished him off?” Paul asked.
Mark shrugged. “Right now I don't know what to think. How are we doing on the donkey guy?”
“He has no family in the area, and we've ruled out friends. They were all at a church gathering Sunday night when he was killed.”
“Don't tell me.”
“Yeah, you're going to love this. He didn't go to First Shepherd, but his friends do.”
Mark groaned. “Two murders connected, albeit loosely, to the same church.”
“Yeah.”
Mark stood. “I'm going home to get some sleep. I have a feeling tomorrow's going to be a long day.”
“I won't blame you if you want to go home now,” Jeremiah said.
Cindy looked pale, but resolute as she shook her head. “I said I'd help, I'll help.”
He handed her some gloves and a sponge. “Okay, we'll start here in the kitchen. Everything that food might have touched, or the steam from cooking food, has to be thoroughly purified.”
“And by purification you mean what exactly?”
“It depends on what it is. Some things get immersed in boiling water, some things are passed through fire, and some things, like the light switches, can just be wiped down with ammonia.”
“You've got to be kidding!”
“I never—”
“I know, you never joke about Passover. Where do you want me to start?”
“How about the light switches and the doorknobs throughout the house. Everything has to be cleaned, not just the kitchen.”
“Wow.”
“I even have to check my clothes and make sure there are no crumbs anywhere, including the pockets.”
“I could never be Jewish.”
“Why's that?”
“It's too much work.”
He smiled.
They worked for a little while in silence. He glanced over at her from time to time. It had been foolish to invite this woman into his home, to spend more time with her and possibly incite her curiosity. For someone who was trying hard to stay out of the whole murder mess he was doing a terrible job of it.
After he finished cleaning the oven he taped it closed since he had no intention of using it during Passover. He did the same with several cabinets. Finally, they both ended up at the sink, wringing out sponges at the same time.
“This is going to take forever,” she said.
He smiled. “It would be much worse if I was actually having a Seder here.”
“I can't imagine what you're going to have to do at the synagogue tomorrow night!”
“Care to volunteer?”
“No, thank you,” she said with a laugh. “Two nights of this, and I'll be the one they find dead … of exhaustion.”
He knew it was hard for her to joke about what she had seen that morning, but the fact that she was trying was a good sign.
“How do you think that guy got into the sanctuary?” he asked.
She stopped and looked up at him. “You know, I've been thinking about that. There's no way he was killed while the church was open and then someone accidentally locked him in. The lights were off. It's pitch dark in there regardless of the time of day.”
“Which is why you tripped over him and didn't see him in the dark,” Jeremiah filled in.
“Exactly. If it happened last night, the light would have had to be on in the sanctuary for the killer to even see him, let al
one stab him to death.”
“Unless you're dealing with a blind killer.”
She looked uncertain for a minute and then shook her head. “No, there are no blind people who are in any way associated with the church.”
“Okay, let's assume for now our killer was sighted.”
“Then he'd have to have seen what he was doing, which means the light would have been on when he killed him.”
“But the light was off this morning.”
“Yes.” Cindy moved to stand directly in front of him, eyes quickening with thought. “Whenever you lock up the sanctuary, it's standard to turn the lights on for a minute just to make sure no one's in there praying, or asleep, or —”
“And if whoever locked the door had the light on, they would have seen the body and called the police.”
“Exactly,” Cindy said.
“Which means, that whoever killed him turned off the lights and locked the door.”
“Which means,” Cindy continued. “The killer definitely had to have a key to the church.”
“Unless someone had a key stolen and hasn't bothered to report it, the killer goes to the church,” Jeremiah said, staring intently at her.
“The killer is either on staff or one of the ministry leaders,” Cindy finished.
They both stood for a moment in silence, staring at each other.
“Oh no,” she whispered as realization set in. “I know the killer.”
Looking at her stricken expression and panic-filled eyes, Jeremiah knew she wouldn't rest easy until the killer had been caught.
He put a hand on her shoulder and steered her toward the dining table. She sat down, and he got them both some ice water. He grabbed a pad of paper and a pen and put them down on the table.
“Okay, Cindy, let's just think this through logically.”
“How?”
“Which staff members have keys?”
“All ten of us.”
“Okay, who?”
She took a deep breath. “There's me, Pastor Roy, Associate Pastor Jake, Wildman—”
“Wildman?”
“Pastor Wyman. He's the youth pastor.”
“Kids nicknamed him?”
“I believe the name actually came from seminary.”
Jeremiah shook his head. “Okay, who else?”