“Don’t you?”
“It seems sacrilegious.”
“It is.” Pulling on his hand, she started down the center aisle of the nave, her gaze darting left and right, searching for anyone or for anything out of place. With each step her heart pounded in deeper trepidation and the hairs on the back of her arms raised, warning h
er. “Oliver?” she called in a voice slightly above a whisper. “Oliver, are you here?”
She paused. Listened.
Nothing.
Travis shook his head, but she started forward again, pushing aside her ridiculous reservations. This was a building, God’s building, and surely He would want the truth known. At the altar, she looked up, made the sign of the cross as the image of Jesus stared at her, but she didn’t genuflect. Just gripped Travis’s hand more tightly in her free hand.
She walked to one wall and opened the door to the small chapel, a place for private worship where she thought Oliver might have decided to speak to God. The room was dark. She fumbled for a switch and threw the lights. The room was empty.
“He might not be here,” Travis said, giving her hand a small, comforting squeeze.
“Let’s make sure.” Leaving the muted lights in the chapel burning, she walked toward the front of the church again, past the transepts, then peered behind the altar. Nothing. Just silence and the smell of ash and incense, a burning scent that permeated the stale air.
She eyed the sacristy but saw nothing other than the vestments and vessels used by the priests. On one wall, she saw the confessionals: two dark booths. Pulling Travis after her, she made her way to them. She remembered entering as a child, telling Father Timothy on the other side of the screen how she’d sinned: saying a bad word, or talking back to her mother or lying to her brothers. Then she’d waited for the priest to come up with a soft-spoken penance.
Now, she approached the booths.
Heart thudding, she opened one creaking door.
Nothing.
Holding her breath, she approached the other, her hands trembling as she yanked back the door. It, too, was empty.
Carefully, she walked to the side where the priests took their seats and opened each door, only to find them, too, vacant.
“Oliver?” she called again, her voice louder, echoing off the rafters, sending a chill through her own body.
“He’s not here,” Travis said gently, but then, she felt his fingers grip her hand more tightly. She saw him lift his head, turning his face toward an arch leading to a dark hallway.
“What?”
“Shhh!” he said, tensing, starting toward the arch. “Do you smell that?”
“What?” She sniffed the air, picked up a thin hint of smoke.
“The candles…”
He shook his head, released her hand, and motioned her to stay behind him as he crept toward the dark opening. This is nuts, she thought. We’re in a church. And we’re acting as if we’re in some teenage horror flick.
Yet she didn’t say another word. As she crept behind Travis into the darkened hallway, her heart was knocking loudly, blood pounding in her ears. The odor of smoke, which she’d attributed to the votive candles or a residue from old incense, became more intense.
Fire?
Goose pimples raised along her spine.
Oh, please, God, no. Not here! Not again!
Travis stepped around a corner to a short hallway and a door that was ajar. Through the crack in the doorway she saw shadows, golden and shifting, moving against the wall and stairs leading downward to the basement.
“No!” she cried as the smell hit her fully and she heard the first crackle of hungry flames. “Oliver!”
Travis tossed her his cell phone. “Call 9-1-1! Now!” He threw open the door and hurried down the stairs.