The edge of Danner’s hand sliced down on the side of the priest’s neck in a karate chop.
Danner stepped back as he watched Father Barnabas crumple and fall unconscious to the floor. “Fool,” he muttered. “I didn’t want to hurt him. I like him.”
“But you threatened him,” she said. “What did you expect? He’s a man who would try to guard and protect. It’s his vocation.”
“I know, I know. But he should take care of himself. He made me do it.” He glanced at the granite paperweight still in her hand. “Drop that and come along. Or you might force me to reconsider my feelings about Father Barnabas.”
She hesitated. It was her only weapon.
But it had only been effective because she’d had the advantage of surprise. She released the paperweight, and it fell to the floor. “You said something before.” She moistened her lips. “You said ‘she’s waiting. The little girl.’ What did you mean? Why do you want me to go with you?”
“Because she wants you to go.” He gestured with the knife. “We have to leave now. Someone might come.”
She didn’t move. “She?”
He opened the door to the garden. “I keep telling you, the little girl.”
She inhaled sharply. “What do you—”
He shook his head. “No more talk. It can’t happen here. It’s not the right place. Come on.”
She stared at him, her heart pounding. What was the right place?
Because she wants you to go.
The words of a madman?
Or a message from Bonnie? The opportunity to bring her daughter home.
“Why are you being stubborn?” He was frowning. “You have no choice.”
She had a choice, but if she made the wrong one, he might kill her right now, and Bonnie might be lost forever.
And wasn’t this what she had wanted? To find Ted Danner, to make contact and make sure that he was Bonnie’s killer? To find Bonnie? It might not be the way she wanted it to happen, to be helpless and at his mercy. Of course it wasn’t the way she wanted it to happen. But she might still be able to work the situation to her advantage. She had no weapons, but Joe had trained her in hand-to-hand martial arts and Danner might not expect her to be versed in any deadly skills.
She moved toward him. “I’m coming.”
“I thought you would once I got rid of the priest.” He stepped aside to let her precede him. “I knew everything was going to come out all right for me. I should have relied on myself in the beginning. But I was so afraid.…”
* * *
THERE WAS A POLICE CAR parked in front of the cathedral, its lights blinking.
“Oh, shit.” Gallo pulled up behind the police car and jumped out of the car. A TV news truck pulled in right behind him, and techs and reporters were right behind Gallo as he took the steps two at a time and burst through the front entrance of the cathedral. Father Barnabas and Father Dominic were sitting in a pew talking to two men dressed in dark suits, and there was a uniformed officer beside the altar.
Gallo stopped short as the media crews poured down the aisle on either side of him and ran toward the priests and police.
Not good.
No Eve.
Father Barnabas looked up and saw him and fought his way through the ring of reporters and strode toward him down the aisle. “I’m sorry,” he said gently. “I tried to stop him.”
“My uncle?” Gallo said jerkily. “Eve? What the hell happened? I thought she was safe. I was gone less than two hours. Did he hurt her?”
The priest shook his head. “I don’t think so. He wanted her to go with him. He threatened me to make her do it.” He smiled ruefully as he rubbed his temple. “As I said, I tried to stop him. Eve Duncan hit me on the head to keep me from rushing him. I wasn’t expecting that. She was evidently trying to protect me.”
“Yes, Eve can be unpredictable,” Gallo said absently. Unpredictable and brave and strong. Dammit, he should never have left her. “Did he give you any idea where he was going to take her?”
Father Barnabas shook his head. “When I woke up, they were gone, and Father Dominic was standing over me.”
“He didn’t say anything?”
“He said that he knew Eve wasn’t a demon.”
Gallo muttered a curse. “Is that supposed to be good?”
“Yes, Danner thought he was surrounded by demons, particularly of late. The last time I saw him, I even wondered if he included me in that group.” He paused. “And he believed he had to destroy demons. It’s a good thing that he doesn’t think Eve Duncan is one of them.”
Gallo felt a chill. But what if his uncle changed his mind? “Then why did he want her to go with him?”
Father Barnabas hesitated, then said, “He said the little girl was waiting for her.”
The little girl.
Shit. The chill he was feeling became pure ice.
“You believe he was speaking of Bonnie Duncan?” the priest asked quietly. “And the little girl who is waiting is dead?”
“Yes.”
“And that would mean he’s going to—”
“It doesn’t mean anything. Maybe he knows who killed Bonnie. There might be some other explanation.” No, he wouldn’t believe it. But it still scared the hell out of him. “Listen, you’ve got to tell me where you think I can find him.”
“I don’t know. If I did, I’d tell you.” He met Gallo’s eyes. “I’m not a fool. I know that she’s in danger. Danner has gone over the edge. He wouldn’t listen to me.” He paused. “But I may be able to help you find him. I don’t want to be left out of this. I know him very well.” He paused. “Better than you, Mr. Gallo.”
“You know him as some kind of sicko. That wasn’t the man I knew while I was growing up.”
“Then we’ll have a complete picture, won’t we? But I never considered Danner a sicko. All I knew was a man in torment, trying to find solace for his pain.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Those detectives will be getting restless. I was planning on asking them to allow me a few moments alone with you to break the news about Eve Duncan’s kidnapping. But you were lucky that you came in with that horde of reporters, and the police were too busy to pay any attention to you. But I’d better get back to them.”
“Did you tell the police who I was?”
“Of course, I wouldn’t lie to them. I skimmed over your connection with Eve, but as next of kin of her abductor, they’ll be very interested in talking to you.”
The last thing he needed was to have the police interested in him, Gallo thought in frustration. He was still wanted in Wisconsin for questioning, and there was no way he could waste time being grilled by the local police when he had to find Eve.
“I have to get out of here.”
The priest nodded. “I thought you would. Go on. You’d better be very quick. As I said, I won’t lie to them.” His lips tightened. “But I believe that the people who know Danner best have the best chance of catching him before he does something…” He trailed off as he turned. “Go. I’ll be very slow getting back down that aisle to them. Call me if you run across anything that I can help you with. I’ll be trying to remember any details about him that could make sense about where he might take her.”
“Or what he wanted with her. I can’t believe he wants to kill her.”
The priest didn’t answer as he moved slowly down the aisle.
Gallo whirled and ran out of the church and down the steps. In seconds, he was behind the wheel of his car and tearing away from the curb and down the street. Get away. Put some distance between him and the police.
Think.
He could do little else but think in those minutes of flight. Father Barnabas’s words were pounding in his mind like a drum. Why? His uncle would have no reason to target Eve.
But if they were right about him, his uncle was without reason.
He felt sick. So many memories were flooding back to him of those days of his childhood. Ted Danner had been hero and savior to him.
And in a world in which Gallo could trust no one, his uncle had never once let him down. The man who killed Bonnie was a monster. How could that friend of his childhood be a monster?
It didn’t matter. Stop thinking of anything but the fact that Eve had been taken and could die. No matter what rejection he felt about the possibility, he had to admit that it existed. What to do next?