The Church (The Cloister Trilogy 3)

I look over to see Mom lying on the ground, her eyes open, her mouth working silently, and a pool of blood spreading beneath her.

“Adam!” Emily runs to me and lifts my head into her lap. Her hand joins mine, pressing against the wound.

“Is he—” Noah drops next to me and his face blanches. “Oh fuck, she got him in the neck.”

“That bad?” I try to say, but no sound comes out, and the ache in my throat intensifies.

“Don’t try to talk.” His words are warm, despite the starkness in his eyes. “I’m going to get help.” Rising, he rushes out of the hall.

“It’s going to be okay.” Emily stares down at me and tries to smile despite the tears in her eyes. “You’ll be just fine.”

I love you. I can’t say it, but I hope she can hear me anyway. I will always love you. I blink, but can’t seem to open my eyes again. You saved me. I want to thank her, to throw myself on her mercy, to give her everything I am. But I can’t form the words.

They fly away in my mind like a murder of crows scattering ahead of a harsh wind.

Somewhere, a baby cries. And then I’m gone too, blowing up into the darkening sky like a single black feather.

Chapter 36

Emily

Noah pulls a flask from his pocket and turns it up. Frowning, he pulls it away from his face and holds it upside down. Not a single drop flows.

“Fuck.” He stuffs it back into his pocket.

I reach out to him. He takes my good hand in his as the doctor stitches up the other one.

“Think he’s out yet?” His palm is clammy.

Mine is too. “They would have said, right?” I look at the doorway leading into the bright white hallway. A nurse in light pink scrubs walks by.

“Right. They would have said.” He nods but stares out the door all the same.

The scent of rubbing alcohol stings my nose as the doctor wipes down another part of my hand. “Can you feel this?” she asks.

I don’t look. “I didn’t feel anything, if you did anything.”

“I pinched you, so we’re good. I’ve got about a dozen more stitches to go, and then I’ll start on your back.”

She already put some sort of antiseptic compresses across my shoulder blades, but the stitches are next.

I stare out the door and spare a thought for my mother. She’s sedated a few rooms away. The withdrawal wreaked havoc on her body, and they haven’t assessed all the damage yet.

But I can’t think about her for too long. Not when my heart is in an operating room three floors down.

“He’s going to make it, right?” Noah taps his foot on the polished white tile, and scoots his gray hospital chair a little closer to my bed.

“He will. He’s strong.” I wince as a flash of pain shoots up my arm.

“She needs more pain stuff.” Noah jerks his chin at the doctor.

“Thanks.”

“No problem.” He squeezes my hand and rests his head against the bed rail. “I fucked up. If I’d been quicker, he—”

“You killed your own mother to save him. To save me.” I squeeze back. “There’s nothing more you could have done. And I will never stop being grateful to you.”

He shrugs. “I sort of… I don’t know. It’s like it wasn’t me pulling the trigger. I had to do it. So I just… did.”

“I’m sorry.” I can’t imagine what it took for him to put her down.

“Don’t be.” He sits up. “She killed Georgia. She was my mother, but Georgia was…”

“I know.” I meet his sad eyes. “She was my everything, too.”

A knock at the door pulls my attention away. Zion strides in. My stomach heaves when I recognize him, and Noah’s grip on my hand tightens.

He walks up to my bedside, his FBI badge clipped to his waistband. “Emily.” Turning to Noah, he says, “I’d prefer to speak to Miss Lanier alone.”

I don’t let go of Noah’s hand. “He can stay.”

“I’d prefer—”

“She said I can stay.” Noah scoots even closer, as if he’s guarding my side.

“Once you’re done with your medical care, I’d like to get your statement.”

I stare at him, trying to square the officer standing before me with the horrors he committed on the Prophet’s orders.

“Do you think you’d be up to that?”

“Are you giving a statement, too?” I can’t keep the note of challenge from my voice.

“Yes.” He pulls up a chair.

“I didn’t say you could sit.”

Noah snorts.

Zion pushes the chair back and sighs. “I’m not the enemy here.”

“You look like him, talk like him. You are him.” I shake my head.

“I was undercover, Miss Lanier. Trying to bring down the entire organization from root to leaf.”

“Are you going to tell everyone what you did? How you beat Noah and kicked him while you let Sarah bleed out? About how you did whatever the Prophet told you? About how you treated your Maiden?”