Without Mercy (Mercy 1)

“Is there a problem here?” he demanded.

“I think we’re cool,” Father Jake said, and then to Hammersley, “We can handle it.”

Nodding, she said to the deputy, “Everything’s under control. Right?” she asked Shay.

“Right,” Shay said quickly, eager to be out of trouble, but that, of course, was impossible. She felt Father Jake’s gaze following after her as she left the room, but she wasn’t kidding herself that things were okay here.

She knew in her heart that she’d just made an enemy for life out of Eric Rolfe.

“I need a favor,” Trent said, praying that his cell phone connection wouldn’t fail as he drove on the winding road to the gatehouse.

“What’s that?” Larry Sparks’s voice was interspersed with static but was still audible. Sparks was an old friend and a detective for the Oregon State Police. When the OSP had needed assistance locating an escaped prisoner who’d crossed both the Oregon and Idaho state lines, ending up in Montana, Trent had helped track down the suspect and send him back in cuffs to Oregon. Sparks owed him at least one, maybe more.

“I’m down at Blue Rock Academy; there’s been trouble,” Trent explained, downshifting again for a sharp curve.

“I heard. Bad news. One dead, the other critical.”

“That’s right. I don’t know what’s going on, but I’m hoping you can help me out. Get official info for me if I need it, ‘cause down here all I’m getting is double-talk. It would be legit. I’m going to try and get myself deputized by the local sheriff, a yahoo named O’Donnell. I’ll give him your name as a reference.”

“Got it,” Sparks agreed, one step ahead of him. “Once you’re officially on the force, we’ll talk.”

Where the hell was the damned school? It had been over thirty minutes since she’d turned off the main road, five since her connection to Shaylee had been severed.

Her muscles were beginning to ache, her eyes straining from following the narrow tunnel of her headlights in the snowy darkness.

All her worries converged on her as night closed in.

Jules passed another sign, and finally the open space of a lit parking lot loomed ahead. She steer

ed the Volvo around a corner of the parking lot toward the guardhouse. She drove slowly, awed by the sight.

Security lights blazed, illuminating a massive stone wall and guardhouse built at the narrowest point of the gulch. There were two wide steel gates that swung open on either side of the gatehouse, the entrance to what appeared to be a fortress.

A few vehicles, covered with four inches of snow, were scattered near the edges of the parking area while a dirty news van with the logo and call sign for a television station from Medford was parked near the gate. Inside the idling van, visible through the windows, two people sipped from thermoses. The last vehicle parked near the guardhouse was a cruiser from the Rogue County Sheriff’s Department.

Stomach in knots, Jules nosed her car into a spot in the area marked STAFF and told herself everything was going to be all right.

A door of the sheriff’s vehicle opened. A deputy climbed out and headed her way.

Here we go, Jules thought, hoping she didn’t have to stretch the truth with the police. She cut the engine and rolled down the window, the warmth of the interior immediately chilled.

The deputy was short and stocky, his thick jacket adding extra weight, a broad-brimmed hat covered in plastic protecting his head. His name tag identified him as Frank Meeker.

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” he said through her open window. “The school is closed tonight.”

“I understand.” She flashed him her most sincere smile. “I’m a member of the faculty.” God, it was cold. The wind cut through her sweater, and she clenched her jaw to keep her teeth from chattering.

Meeker frowned. “Then you’ll be on the list.” It wasn’t a question.

“I assume so, yes. Julia Farentino. I was hired only this week. Dean Hammersley called and said someone would meet me here.”

“Did she mention the school is part of a crime scene?”

“She said there was an accident.”

His eyebrows rose over the tops of his glasses as he leaned closer to the open window, his gaze sweeping the dark interior of her car. “I’d like to see your ID.”

“Sure.” She dug through her purse, found her wallet, and managed to wiggle her Oregon driver’s license from behind its plastic window.