Alice nodded.
The bartender poured one more. When he brought it back, he said, “I’ll need to settle up.”
“Very good.” Alice put two twenties on the bar. “The rest is for you, barman. Thank you for a lovely evening.”
“Thank you, Sister.”
Her phone rang. She fished it out of her bag, nudging the Tanfoglio aside as she did, and thumbed the screen. “Constable, it is rather late to be calling.”
There was silence on the other end.
“Constable?”
“I’m at Mike’s. Get over here. Now.” Rafferty’s tone was short. He hung up before she could answer.
No doubt, she was going to get a talking-to when she arrived at Michael’s house. Rafferty would be as upset about the room service woman as Michael was.
Alice sighed and shot back her last drink. Time to take her medicine.
* * * * *
As Alice pulled to the curb outside Mike’s house, she noticed Rafferty’s police cruiser parked askew out the front. He must really have been angry when he pulled up.
Alice stepped out of the car and hung her handbag from her elbow. She crossed the street and headed up the familiar walkway to the front steps.
Rafferty met her at the door. “Hurry up. I need you to do that healing thing that you do.” He grabbed her by the upper arm and pulled her inside.
Mike lay peacefully on his back on the living room floor. His arms lay across his stomach, his hands together, one atop the other.
As Alice approached, she saw the bullet hole in the middle of his forehead and the bloody cross over the top of it. Just like she left all her targets.
“Mary, mother of God,” she muttered as she rushed over to his body.
She knelt beside him and lay a hand on top of his hands. As she spoke, her eyes filled with tears. “Lord Jesus Christ, Saviour of the world, we pray for your servant, Michael Fredericks,” her voice hitched when she said his name.
She moved her other hand to his forehead.
Rafferty snatched up her wrist and shook it. “Don’t say any of that shit,” he snarled. “I need you to heal him!”
Alice’s gaze flickered to Rafferty’s eyes before she looked back to Michael’s face and continued. “Commend him to your mercy. For his sake you came down from heaven; receive him now into the joy of your kingdom. For though he has sinned, he has not denied the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, but has believed in God and has worshipped his Creator. Amen.”
“Okay, good,” he said and ripped his folding knife out of his pocket. He flicked it open and held it out to her. “Now, cut your finger open and heal him.”
Tears ran down Alice’s face. She met Rafferty’s gaze steadily. Sadly. She took a deep, shaky breath. “Much as I would like to, Martin, I cannot raise the dead.”
Rafferty fell to his knees, his lips pressed together so hard, they turned white. “Fuck!” he roared, dragging it out. He slammed the knife onto the floor.
Her cellphone buzzed in her bag. Slowly, her eyes never leaving Michael’s face, she lifted the phone out of her bag and thumbed the screen. A text from an unknown number, a burner phone, no doubt. The message made her blood run cold.
This is only the beginning.
Rafferty read it over her shoulder.
“Where are Geraldine and the girls?” Alice asked.
Rafferty’s eyes grew wide. “At home. Alone.”
They sprinted for the door, frantic.
* * * * *
Both their cars skidded to a stop in the middle of the street, in front of Rafferty’s house. They both left the engine running and the driver’s door open as they sprinted up the walkway to the front door.
They burst through the door, guns drawn. They panned left and right, Alice low, Rafferty high.
Silence.
Alice stalked across the living room so she could look into the kitchen.
“Clear,” she muttered.
Rafferty pointed upstairs.
They rushed up the stairs, not caring if they made noise or not. At the end of the hall, the glow from the television in the master bedroom flickered behind the half-open door. They sprinted toward it and burst into the room, guns ready.
Geri and the girls were on the bed, all snuggled together. Both girls were fast asleep. Geri’s eyes went wide when she saw them.
Rafferty and Alice both sagged in relief.
Fifteen minutes later, with Alice watching the front of the house and despite strenuous protests, Geri and the girls were dressed.
Both Rafferty and Alice brandished their weapons as they led their three sleepy charges to Rafferty’s cruiser.
“Take them wherever you’re going and stay with them. I will take care of Buscaglia and his cohorts,” Alice told Rafferty as he bundled Geri and the girls into the car.
Rafferty slammed the car door and dashed around to the driver’s door. “Won’t God be upset with you? Killing for revenge?”
In the distance, lightning flashed. Moments later, thunder rolled across Philadelphia. The darkness intensified as thick black clouds roiled toward the city, obscuring the moon and the stars.
“You let me worry about God.” She waved toward Geri and the girls in the car. “Just keep them safe.”
Before he could respond, she turned and rushed to her rental car.
* * * * *
The twenty-ninth floor of the Ritz-Carlton was deathly silent when she stepped off the elevator. Just like last time, she’d had His Holiness’ guards look after the security cameras. There would be no record of her entering Buscaglia’s suite, and no record of what happened in the suite but her memories.
The image of Michael laid out on his living room rug flashed through her mind as she stalked down the hallway, the suppressed Tanfoglio clenched in her hand, merely an extension of her arm.
As she closed on the double doors, she planted one foot and savagely thrust the other against the center, right below the knob. The twin doors burst apart, splinters flying in all directions.
Buscaglia’s two henchmen were reclined on the couch in the loungeroom of the suite.
She knew it was one of
