Without Mercy (Mercy 1)

“Hey, I’m serious. I think that’s why she disappeared,” she said, leaning on the handle of her shovel. “I think she knew too much.”

“So now they’re a deadly cult?”

Lucy mopped the sweat off her brow with the back of her hand. “I know it sounds crazy, but maybe it’s not so far off base. I mean, what do you really think happened to Nona and Drew?”

“I don’t know, but I don’t think a lunatic group of TAs attacked them. I mean, come on, Drew Prescott is one of them! Don’t tell me you think they all ganged up on him because he’s, like, a rogue TA or something? And the same with Lauren Conway. She didn’t fit in, so they what, killed her and got rid of her body somehow?” Shay rolled her eyes. “You know, Lucy, this is right up there with Maeve’s great Shakespearean tragedy.”

“I know it sounds out there, but I’m tellin’ ya. There is something going on here.”

Wind whistled around the building, and overhead the timbers creaked. Lucy glanced up, and Shay knew what she was thinking, that this was where Nona and Drew were attacked. Where Nona had lost her life.

“That’s how they do it, you know,” Lucy said. “This”—she motioned to the half-cleaned stalls and their shovels—“this isn’t the real punishment. It’s the psychological stuff. Lynch’s specialty.”

“What do you mean?”

Lucy looked around to make sure no one overheard. “We could have been assigned to the kennels, or the barns, or the pigpens. Right? Wouldn’t that have been worse, the pigs? But, no, we’re here in the stable”—she looked up toward the loft—“right where Nona was killed.”

“So?” Shay said.

“Think about Reverend Lynch’s last name. Lynch. As in noose. As in hanging.” Lucy actually shuddered. “You th

ink that’s a coincidence?”

Before Shay could respond, the lights flickered ominously.

“Oh, for the love of God,” Lucy whispered, and the sound of angry voices swept into the stable.

“And I expect you to maintain focus,” Flannagan was saying, obviously irritated. “We didn’t handpick you so you could go punching girls, Mister Rolfe. Don’t screw up again.”

Lucy met Shay’s eyes and lifted a shoulder, as if to say, Didn’t I tell you?

“Oh, so now what? Flannagan’s involved, too?” Shay laughed. “I hate to tell you this, Yang, but Flannagan’s a little old to be a TA. And so is Lynch.”

With a grim slash of a frown, Lucy moved on to another stall. Shay bent into her task as Eric, his face red from the cold and a dressing-down, wheeled the cart down the aisle.

He stepped into Omen’s stall. “I hate that old man,” he said under his breath as he scooped up another shovelful of straw and manure. “I wish the son of a bitch were dead.”

Jules stomped the snow from her boots before pushing open the door to the empty chapel. She had left the dining hall with the dinner meal in full swing, wanting to be on time for her appointment with Dr. Lynch, though the thought of crossing the campus alone after dark had given her some pause.

Once inside, she pressed into the shadows of the nave. The tile floor reflected the glow of battery-powered candles placed strategically to light the way up the center aisle to the altar. Behind her, recessed lights illuminated the massive cross built into the window.

Her footsteps hushed by the red floor runner, Jules made her way to a side door and down a short hallway to Reverend Lynch’s private office. She knocked, listened. When no one answered, she tried the door.

Of course it was locked.

It seemed she was alone in the building.

A shiver ran down her spine at the thought. What would prohibit him, the killer, from walking into a building like this and striking again?

Keep moving, she told herself. Moving and exploring.

She made her way to the main staircase and descended.

Downstairs was a warren of a basement where, she knew, some of the theology, psychology, and religion classes were taught. She snapped on lights as she looked into the rooms with their egress windows, whiteboards, overhead projectors, and flickering fluorescent fixtures.

Nothing sinister or suspicious.

At the end of the hall was a set of restrooms and a locked door marked CUSTODIAN, which she assumed was a janitor’s closet or furnace room. She felt a jab of disappointment that she’d discovered nothing spectacular or out of the ordinary, but then, if Blue Rock had dark secrets, they would be well buried.