Heart heavy, worry propelling her, she slipped through the hallways of St. Elsinore’s, the ghosts of the past giving chase as she embarked on her mission.

And you, are you so much better? Silently reproaching the selling of vacations, but you, skulking through the hallways, intent on doing anything you can to ensure your secrets are safe. Who are you to judge, Charity Varisco? A fine reverend mother you are!

She shut her ears to the nagging voice in her head, pasted on a smile she hoped looked genuine, then nodded to a few straggling parishioners who were still hanging in the hallways. But she didn’t stop to speak to any of them and made her way straight to the restroom and into a stall. She waited a few seconds, and once she was certain no one was inside, drew a deep breath and slid into the hallway unnoticed.

She didn’t return to the gymnasium but hurried away, in the opposite direction, under the ropes that indicated that the rest of the building and the south hallways were off-limits and restricted. Nearly running, her skirts rustling, the beads of her rosary clicking, she found her way to the door of the basement in the south wing. She was concentrating on withdrawing her key ring, one she’d kept for decades, and silently praying that the locks of the ancient building hadn’t been changed when she thought she heard something.

A footstep?

A sharp intake of breath?

She paused, looking into the dark corridor, toward the end of the building, the darkened, silent end. Was that a movement, near the far window? Her heart clutched, but as she squinted, she saw nothing lurking in the shadows. And she didn’t have time to investigate. Fifteen minutes, she told herself. She could only be gone fifteen minutes, twenty on the outside, before someone would notice or start asking questions. She could cover for herself for that short span of time, but not much longer.

At the door, she paused only to make a quick sign of the cross. Then she inserted her key into the lock, twisted, and with a welcome click, disengaged the bolt. “Thank you,” she whispered, feeling that God was guiding her as she slipped through the doorway and snapped on the light switch as her footsteps clattered loudly down the stairs.

God? Or a demon straight from Satan’s legion?

She thought about the mistakes she’d made in her lifetime, the falsehoods she’d spun all in the name of vanity and pride. She’d atoned for years, slapping herself with that sharp riding crop in the mirrored room, sucking her breath as the leather straps bit into her flesh, mortified that Father Paul was watching, the old lech.