Was she worried about me? I didn’t know how to respond to that. I wasn’t sure if anyone had ever worried about me.
“Neither are they. Vargas was excommunicated from the church,” I told her. I hadn’t mentioned it before. I hadn’t wanted to set her off worrying about her mother, seeing as she’d apparently been such a devoted follower of his.
Her eyes widened. She took a moment to process that information. I’d just heard from Giada this morning regarding Pavol’s and Benedict’s backgrounds, and they were no less shocking.
“Both Pavol and Benedict worked in medicine before losing their licenses and joining the Church. They barely made it a year before dropping out. They’re cosplaying as holy men and using it as an excuse to do whatever they want. This place has no connection with the Church anymore.”
She stared at me, as shocked as if I’d just told her that the world was flat. I suppose in her own way, I had. Her world as she’d known it for three years was never as she’d believed it to be.
“Sister Vera?”
“A former nun who left in disgrace.”
Katarina shook her head, stunned.
“Soon, Pavol won’t be a problem, and there will be no record I was ever here. But their investigation into what’s been happening here will see it shut down.” I was confident the police would at least do that much. Even if they were somehow on the payroll of Hallow Hall or Centrium Group, not everyone in the department could be, and I already had stories ready to leak in major national papers that would force scrutiny.
Hallow Hall was finished.
“I-I can’t believe it,” Katarina said numbly. “My mother has no idea. I mean, I don’t think she does. She always held Vargas in high regard. Always at the front during sermons, always volunteering, always giving our last spare penny to the collection plate.” She shook her head ruefully. “Now she’ll have to see how wrong believing him was. It’ll break her heart.”
I held my tongue, the truth weighing on my conscience.Fuck.How was I supposed to tell her the truth right now? Since I’dfound out about her mother, we’d been under constant threat. Katarina’s meltdown in bed, the tears that had threatened to wash her away, weren’t gone. They were lying in wait. Waiting for her to be free of this place and process all the terrible things that had happened to her here. To heap her mother’s death on top of that was unthinkable. I wouldn’t do it. Not now.
“Let’s worry about the real world when we get out of here and not before, okay? One thing at a time,micetta.”
She blew out a long breath and nodded. Fucking hell, she was strong. She’d just had her world tilted yet another time, and she was already adjusting.
She was an impressive woman... and all mine.
“Did you leave your . . . evidence?”
“I’m betting this whole place is crawling with evidence once they dig deeper, but I’m about to do that now. Nothing says ‘investigate further’ than finding a freezer with organs hidden in the fridge in the kitchen.”
She wrinkled her nose, maybe wondering for a moment how I’d removed said organs. The answer to that would be badly... but no one was going to use Benedict’s rotten old organs anyway. They were just the smoking gun to push the detectives into a full investigation here at Hallow Hall.
Tatiana wandered off to color, and Katarina remained by my side.
“I should go with her.”
I nodded.
She continued to loiter. “We never talked about the money in the safe... I was supposed to figure out the combination and pay you what I could.”
I raised an eyebrow at her teasingly. “Are you telling me you haven’t already done that? I told you I don’t work for free.”
She flushed, her gaze dropping to the floor before rising back to my eyes. “I’ll get the money somehow. I promised, and I’ll keep that promise.”
I fought a grin. She had no idea.
“I’m not interested in your money. You haven’t worked that out yet?”
She chuckled awkwardly. “I know... all my firsts, too. But we’ve almost covered them all, haven’t we? I mean... except for the—main event.”
Her cheeks were pink as a rose petal. My chest ached at the sight. An ache that seemed to grow the longer I was around her. The only thing that soothed it was to hold her tight against me.
“But there are so many firsts to cover... an infinite number, really,” I murmured. “First apartment... first trip abroad. First marriage and first honeymoon... first boy, and first girl. First retirement... first funeral.”
My words had struck her dumb. She just stared at me. I lost the battle of not touching her and reached out to push one hanging lock of hair behind her ear.