The Father didn’t comfort him. Instead he took another swig of scalding tea and looked up at the altar. “If you believe that she is leading you somewhere, how do you know that this is not part of the design? Maybe this was always part of the journey?”

“I don’t understand.”

“The long dark night of the soul,” the Father said, and offered no further explanation.

“You’re saying,” Robin said, trying to see if he got the Father’s meaning right, “that Sam wanted me to play a major role in freeing a prisoner. You’re saying she wanted me to nearly get blown up saving someone, that her design got me this cut on my forehead?”

The Father drained his tea and looked at Robin simply. “I’m saying that things are rarely easy. And you must keep your faith. If not faith in God, then faith in her.”

He didn’t want to talk about this anymore; he swallowed half of his tea in one gulp. “What is this?” Robin said, pulling out the poster for the group. He handed it to the Father.

The man looked at it for a second. “Ascend was one of the groups designed to bring the community together through the power of the church.” He folded it up and gave it back. “It didn’t really take off.”

“Were the Standedge Five involved?”

“What?” Father Michaels seemed genuinely confused. “No. I mean, I suppose I can’t say for sure. I didn’t run the group.”

“Who did?” Robin said, pretty sure he already knew the answer.

“That would have been Amber Crusher.”

Chapter Forty-Four

He walked down the road, back to The Hamlet, mulling over what he had learned. He needed to talk to Amber again—she knew something. She had to. She was obviously closer to Tim than she had let on, and now she might know something about the Five’s Ascend tattoos. He couldn’t go back to London with this looming over him. He needed answers. And who knew? Amber might know what forced Matthew out of the friendship group and turned him murderous.

He needed to get back. If Amber wasn’t at the bar, he’d wait. He could have a drink, regroup and then talk to her.

He cut through the alley to get back to the main road. He was about halfway before he looked up.