Chapter 4 - The Fire in the Rectory
The sight of Father Michael’s wrists being bound in steel behind his back created an uproar.
Parishioners stood on the pews. Some were shouting questions, others were weeping, and several older men were openly confronting the diocesan lawyers who were frantically trying to pack their leather briefcases.
"Wait!" Father Michael screamed as Captain Miller began guiding him toward the side exit. His composure was entirely gone now; his face was slick with sweat, his collar twisted sideways around his neck. "You can't do this! The records in the rectory... they aren't complete! Sarah modified them! She’s trying to ruin me!"
He suddenly jerked his shoulder out of the officer's grip, lunging toward the side door that led directly through a covered breezeway to the parish rectory—his private living quarters.
"Stop him!" Olivia shouted.
Michael hit the heavy oak door leading to the rectory with his shoulder, bursting through into the private hall. Despite being handcuffed, he ran with the wild, frenzied speed of a cornered animal. He knew what was inside that house. He knew that if the state police searched his private office before he could destroy his secondary hard drives and personal ledgers, he wasn't just facing fraud charges—he was facing a life sentence for murder.
"Emily, stay with Olivia!" I yelled, taking off after him down the narrow breezeway.
Rain blasted through the open side arches of the walkway, soaking my hair and clothes as I sprinted after my uncle. Captain Miller and another trooper were right behind me, their heavy gear clattering violently.
Michael burst into his private study on the ground floor of the rectory. By the time I reached the doorway, the smell of lighter fluid and acrid smoke was already choking the hall.
He had kicked over a small metal trash can in the center of the Persian rug, shoved a stack of old paper files inside, and used a desk lighter—fumbling wildly with his cuffed hands—to ignite it. Flames were already roaring up toward the dry velvet curtains behind his desk.
"Michael! No!" I screamed, grabbing a heavy brass floor lamp and slamming it down across his shoulders to knock him away from the fire.
He fell against the wall, grunting in pain, his eyes wide and bloodshot through the gathering smoke.
"It all goes!" he shrieked, laughing hysterically as thick black smoke filled the small room. "If I go down, the whole diocese goes down! Your mother thought she was so pure, Sarah! She thought she could destroy everything I built! She stood on those stairs and looked at me like I was nothing!"
The smoke was so thick I couldn't breathe. My eyes burned, tears streaming down my face as the velvet curtains caught fire, sending a wall of flame shooting toward the ceiling timber.
Captain Miller rushed into the room, grabbing Father Michael by the arm and dragging his writhing, screaming body out into the hallway.
"Claire! Get out of here!" Miller yelled over the roar of the flames. "The whole room is going up!"
"The hard drive!" I choked out, spotting an external desktop storage unit sitting right on the edge of the burning desk, just inches from the flames.
I didn't think. I ripped my wet jacket off, wrapped it around my hands, and lunged across the burning desk. The heat scorched the skin of my face, smelling of singed hair and burning varnish. I grabbed the heavy metal drive, ripping the cords straight out of the wall, and scrambled backward toward the door just as a section of the plaster ceiling collapsed into the flames with a shower of red sparks.
I burst out into the rain-soaked breezeway, coughing violently, clutching the hot metal drive and my mother’s diary against my chest like a shield.
Behind me, the ancient rectory windows blew outward in a shower of shattered glass, flames licking up the stone exterior toward the dark gray sky.
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Emily ran down the breezeway, throwing her arms around me as I collapsed onto the wet flagstones, gasping for fresh air.
"I got it," I wheezed, looking up at the burning building through my tearing eyes, holding the drive out to Captain Miller. "I got the truth."
