Father, help me, please, she silently prayed, tripping again. When she caught her balance, she felt the knife at her back, prodding her forward through the crypts and tombs. She knew her attacker, or thought she did, though the figure draped in black was unclear.

Her heart thudded wildly, bidding her escape. She wanted to run, but her legs would hardly do her bidding. It was all she could do to stay on her feet.

As the oldest daughter of seven, Asteria had always done what she was told.

Had never questioned.

Never balked.

From the time of her first Communion, her faith had been supreme, and throughout her life it had wavered only once, for a short while. She cringed at the memory.

Joseph.

She’d been a silly girl, barely sixteen and swept away by an older man, twenty-four at the time, or so he’d claimed. What Joseph Allard hadn’t mentioned was his wife and daughter.

To think she’d fallen in love with a married man . . . Her own sin made her sick. When the truth had come out, she had rebuked him mercilessly. She’d been horrified that he’d lied to her and wouldn’t hear any of his lame excuses about being “unhappy” or “trapped” in a loveless marriage.

She had refused to see him again. Within the week, while his wife and infant daughter had slept, he’d slipped into the garage with the doors shut, sat in his car, and turned on the engine.

Having learned of the affair, Joseph’s wife had blamed Asteria for making her a widow, and a penniless one at that without his income. Even his small life insurance benefits had been invalidated because of the suicide.

Asteria had felt vile. Upon graduation, she had reaffirmed her decision to enter the convent. She’d put all her romantic fantasies aside and dedicated her life to Christ.

But she hadn’t realized she would meet someone like Father Frank O’Toole, a man of God. Her heart wrenched as she thought of him. So handsome, so virile, so . . . everything.

And so, so, wrong.

Had Satan tempted her again?

Oh, no, no . . . not with Father Frank.

And yet here she was, slightly dizzy, wearing the bridal gown, knowing she was going to have to pay for her sins in this cemetery, here among the boxlike tombs that stood like hulking beasts aboveground.

Her heart pounded, threatening to explode in her chest. As her fingers twined in the beads of her rosary, she felt her veins throbbing in fear.

How had she come to this?

She let out a sob and felt the tip of the knife slice through the flimsy dress to prick the skin at her side. Cold steel against her hot, frightened flesh. She tried to scream but failed and felt warm blood oozing down her rib cage. “No,” she whispered, her heart pounding in her eardrums.