The Grotto

By Linn Carr

A medicine woman will mend the birdmans broken wings, but take heed, my lovely, for he is a brooding angel.

So whispers a famous clairvoyant to neuroscientist Aimee Moreau, a woman who is not typically a follower of paranormal beliefs. This riddle propels Aimee on an amazing journey of discovery that will soon uncover deep secrets about her mother.

A few months after her visit to the clairvoyant, Aimee learns her mother is dead. In the midst of her grief, she finds a cryptic note concealed inside a rosary pouch. Aimee slowly begins to interpret clues that reveal her mothers double life, which included a clandestine relationship with a Jesuit priest. As she learns, she embarks on a mission to discover more. When Aimee arrives at the hermitage of the reclusive clericcalled the Brooding Angel by her mothershe is swept into a world of mysticism, magic, and paranormal seduction. Shocked by her findings and fueled by maternal loyalty, Aimee flees to her ancestral homeland, where she must join forces with her mothers beguiling companion to decipher a powerful spiritual riddle.

As Aimee finally unravels her mothers web of illusions, she uncovers something so sinisterso spellbindingthat it shatters not only everything she has ever believed in, but also everything she is.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Feb 24, 2018
• ISBN: 9781462069743

Linn Carr

Linn Carr has won honorable mentions in two Writers Digest short story competitions and enjoys attending literary conferences and workshops. She lives in New England with her husband and two daughters. This is her debut novel.

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THE GROTTO

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The Grotto

Copyright © 2018 by Linn Carr

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

iUniverse

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

ISBN: 978-1-4620-6972-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4620-6973-6 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4620-6974-3 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2011961571

iUniverse rev. date: 02/13/2018

Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2 Spring 2009

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56

Chapter 57

Chapter 58

Chapter 59

Chapter 60

Chapter 61

Chapter 62

Chapter 63

Chapter 64

Chapter 65

Chapter 66

Chapter 67

Chapter 68

Chapter 69

Chapter 70

Chapter 71

Chapter 72

Chapter 73

Chapter 74

Chapter 75

Chapter 76

Chapter 77

Chapter 78

Chapter 79

Chapter 80

Chapter 81

Chapter 82

Chapter 83

Chapter 84

Chapter 85

Chapter 86

Chapter 87

Chapter 88

Chapter 89

Chapter 90

Chapter 91

Chapter 92

Chapter 93

Chapter 94

Chapter 95

Chapter 96

Chapter 97

Chapter 98

Chapter 99

Chapter 100

Chapter 101

Chapter 102

Chapter 103

Chapter 104

Chapter 105

Chapter 106

Chapter 107

Chapter 108

Selected Resources & Recommended Reading

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

About The Author

CHAPTER 1

T wilight has fallen.

It is dusk on the vernal equinox—the ghostly interlude when day and night, light and dark, mortal and immortal are equal.

The Brooding Angel has work to do before he can begin the season’s sacred celebration. He glides around the stone grotto, hunting for a place to create his artwork. His black eyes scour the granite walls while his slender hands brush the rough façade. When he locates an area that is suitable, he retrieves a clay cup filled with red ochre paint and dips his fingers into the earthen vessel. As he smears scarlet pigment on the jagged wall, he whispers ancient invocations.

When he is finished, the Brooding Angel cleans his hands with oils derived from tree resin and then rinses them in a bowl filled with rainwater and rosemary. After drying his hands on a chamois obtained from one of the goats that roam the rugged mountains of France, he drapes the animal skin over a boulder to dry. He steps back to inspect his illustrations. His eyes scan the cave drawings before shifting to a collection of elaborate bird masks, avian headpieces, small winged creatures of stone and wood, and icons of mystical messengers. He exhales a satisfied sigh, then moves away.

The man-angel crouches down to stoke the fire that warms the primitive sanctuary. He adds a log of apple wood to the smoldering pit, then rises from his task, his body damp from the warmth of the hot fire and blazing wall torches. He removes his black shirt, then tosses it to a straw mattress. A leather cord adorned with hawk feathers and glass beads dangles over his chest along with a gold chain threaded through a woman’s wedding band. The man-angel searches the grotto until he locates the face of a female. Her eyes are the color of a moody winter sky; her hair, a halo of unruly flames; her mouth a suggestion of uncertainty.

She is a sip of stolen water.

A smile as elusive as the passing shadow of a migrating swallow sweeps over the man-angel’s face. He slides to his knees and tips his head skyward. He opens his arms as though to take flight into the vast world beyond.

The Brooding Angel gazes through the rocky oculus to the distant heavens that are awakening with nocturnal light. The moment he spots the nine-star constellation Virgo, he falls into a trance—a deep, blissful ekstasis. His breathing slows, his eyes glaze, his mind expands. He is transformed.

He is no longer man or priest.

He is no longer human.

CHAPTER 2

SPRING 2009

A pink-eyed cat hisses inside the glass vestibule of the Greek Revival house. Aimee Moreau considers a quick getaway, but for some inexplicable reason, her feet are glued to the brick platform. Her eyes dart to the street. She hopes that no one she knows sees her lingering on the threshold of the most famous mind reader in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Not only is consulting a clairvoyant bizarre, it’s downright embarrassing.

While Aimee ponders her predicament, the front door swings open. The clairvoyant’s appearance is as startling as the cat’s lightning-speed exit. Aimee was expecting an old, warty woman sporting a gaudy bandana, fringed shawl, and hoop earrings. Obviously she has seen too many movies because the psychic standing before her is not a day over forty, is impeccably groomed, and is dressed in stylish, designer clothing. There is no violet eye shadow, and no magenta lipstick or fake fingernails with stick-on moons and stars. Despite her perfectly normal appearance, the psychic doesn’t seem quite normal. There is aloofness buried in her well-mannered greeting, a manufactured smile framing her sugared voice, secrets swimming in her searching eyes. The woman is sophisticated yet spooky. Despite herself, Aimee is bewitched.

The psychic ushers her reluctant caller inside the house. The reading room where Aimee is taken provides yet another surprise. There is no foreboding crystal ball, no sinister deck of cards, no arcane palm diagrams, no ghostly atmosphere, and no clock without hands. The room is airy, immaculate, and contemporary. Aimee sits on the edge of an apple-green, upholstered chair while the psychic settles on a tangerine chair on the opposite side of a whitewashed, crescent-shaped table.

A shiver of dread passes over Aimee when the psychic asks her to write her first name and date of birth on a piece of paper. When the psychic’s moss-colored eyes fall to the biographical notation, she begins chatting as though they are girlfriends sharing gossip over pomegranate martinis. Aimee has to admit that the encounter is weirdly pleasant—at least until the witch-woman dredges up business that makes her very nervous: her mother and men.

The first peculiar utterance to spill from the psychic’s glossed lips is about her mother. I see a mother riddle threaded through your life, the chic clairvoyant murmurs.

Aimee is unsettled by the menacing remark and immediately requests clarification. Oddly, the psychic seems perplexed by her insight, which makes Aimee wonder if the woman is really a quack. Before Aimee can decide, the soothsayer explains that the supernatural message floated into her mind as she gazed into Aimee’s eyes. Aimee asks if the impression is about the past, the present, or the future, to which the cunning clairvoyant whispers, All of them, my lovely … none of them. When Aimee’s brow furrows in confusion, the psychic clarifies. It’s outside of time, my sweetness.

Outside of time? Aimee thinks. What the hell does that mean? She can’t imagine how anything can defy time, or how a telepathic medium could be baffled by her own prescience. Before Aimee can probe the fortune-teller’s peculiar prediction, a second vision emerges. There is a man in the days ahead, the soothsayer proclaims, a man who is fire on the outside and water on the inside. A man who soars in the wind but nests in the earth.

At this point, Aimee can barely keep a straight face. Comic relief quickly vaporizes, however, when an eerie cadence and a chilling cautionary infuses the psychic’s final revelation. A medicine woman will mend the birdman’s broken wings, the soothsayer whispers, worry and wonder lacing her hushed words. But take heed, my lovely, for he is a brooding angel.

Aimee breaks into a cold sweat. She had never said a word about being a doctor.

Neither does she care for angelic men.

CHAPTER 3

F ather Adriano Vasari cringes at the sight of Saint Lucy, who stares sightlessly into the distance while holding a ceramic platter containing her eyeballs. Although it is his third month working at the Divine Mercy Gift Shop in the North End of Boston he is startled every time he encounters the morbid statue.

Adriano rubs his hands over his face. Disagreement over gruesome images is the least of his problems. He looks around the souvenir shop that adjoins the Italian parish where he has spent the past three months. He doesn’t understand how he has gone from being a respected Jesuit scholar, tenured professor of physics, and acclaimed president of the Pontifical Institute of Science to a dispossessed, disillusioned, discontent store clerk in a matter of weeks. Adriano flinches at his recent run of bad luck. He has no idea how a misfit son of a patriarchy, a priest touted as both a religious traitor and a spiritual warrior, is going to salvage his shattered life or, even more daunting, save his sorry soul.

Adriano watches a flock of pigeons peck for crumbs in the crevices between the cobbles of a weed-ridden courtyard. A long sigh betrays his muddled state of mind. That very morning, he had sent off a petition for a leave of absence to his Jesuit superiors. He had also sent requests for sabbaticals to MIT and Saint Augustine’s Seminary where he teaches physics and religious studies. He needs time to sort things out.

As Adriano unpacks a crate of holy water, he second-guesses his decision to resign from the Pontifical Institute of Science. The minute he dropped his letter to the Holy Father into the Federal Express drop-off box, he nearly had a coronary. Leading the Institute has been the highlight of his ministry and the pinnacle of his academic career. Even though he doesn’t want to resign, he has no choice. Scandals are simmering, and any disgrace that he suffers, the Church suffers. Of course there is always a chance that the Holy Father will reject his resignation, in which case he will face the choice of leaving the Institute without the pope’s blessing—an unthinkable option—or finishing out his term, which will be a lame duck session at best and a witch hunt at worst. Adriano moans. Picking one’s poison is not very pleasant.

The Pontifical Institute for Science is a five-hundred-year-old society. Being appointed president of the Institute was an honor beyond his wildest dreams. Serving has also been far more challenging than he ever imagined. Very few people know about the international organization or its potential to influence the lives of billions of people around the world. A prominent publication recently described the Institute as the Pontiff’s Secret Science Club. Adriano cringes as he organizes a display of scratchy, woolen scapulars. Even though the media pays little attention to the Institute, this particular observation is chilling.

A Lucite paperweight depicting the Vatican complex where Adriano maintains an office for Institute business reminds him of his induction into the elite society. Although the Institute’s membership elected him in recognition of his pioneering work in quantum physics, it was the pope who appointed him president of the Institute’s governing council. Not only is he the youngest man to ever hold the office, he is the first cleric—a handicap that has caused no shortage of conflict.

While Adriano restocks a rack of spiritual brochures, he thinks about the topics that he has sponsored on behalf of the Institute: evolution, intelligent design, creationism, big bang theory, stem cell research, and a variety of other provocative subjects. Now that it is payback time, now that he needs support for his own groundbreaking work, everyone he has supported has conveniently vanished. Apparently, when push comes to shove, you’re totally on your own.

Despite unrelenting clerical criticism and mounting collegial ostracism, Adriano is convinced that integrating science and religion is vital to civilization’s progress. Unfortunately, he hasn’t been able to convince the global intelligentsia. He probably should have backed down when he encountered resistance, but he didn’t, and now he is paying the price. Actually, all of humanity is paying the price. And the price is not small.

Adriano sighs before pondering the title of the speech he presented at the recent Sacred Science Summit—the international symposium that propelled his life into an uncontrollable tailspin: "Fiat Lux—words from Genesis: Let there be light."

Adriano shakes his head in disbelief. Not only did his keynote speech destroy two decades of his work within minutes, it handed his enemies the ammunition they needed to bury him.

Adriano rakes back his blue-black hair and focuses his ebony eyes on Saint Lucy. The determined expression on her mutilated face makes one thing very clear: when it comes to God, there is no room for wimps.

A lesson he can’t afford to forget.

CHAPTER 4

M other riddle … mother riddle … mother riddle …

Like the nagging lyrics of a popular song, the haunting expression has been streaming through Aimee Moreau’s head for hours. She tosses her pencil on the desk and takes a sip of iced coffee. She wonders why the menacing remark uttered several months earlier by a psychic would suddenly resurface. She sits back and replays the curious premonition.

I see a mother riddle threaded through your life.

Aimee doesn’t understand how anyone can see a supernatural message in a person’s face, but then again, there are a lot of things that she doesn’t understand. Prophecy is but one of them.

Unable to concentrate, Aimee abandons a pile of paperwork and moves across the room to a mahogany wall unit. She scans the book spines lining the shelves until she locates a black-speckled composition book wedged between two medical digests. When she edges the drugstore notebook out of its niche, goose bumps graze the back of her neck.

The last thing Aimee wants to do is review the notes that she compiled following her meeting with the psychic. Even though she thinks about what transpired more often than she should, she hasn’t once reviewed the transcript of her one-and-only telepathic encounter with a mind-reading medium. She wonders if the fact that it is July 22, her mother’s birthday, has anything to do with the maternal phrase snaking though her brain. Perhaps the expression is a subconscious prompt or, worse, some kind of omen. She has to admit that many strange things have happened since she visited the clairvoyant. In fact, she is still dumbfounded by the experience, and it takes a lot to throw her, especially when it comes to the human mind.

As a neuroscientist, Aimee has mixed feelings about the paranormal. Her medical training has taught her that there is nothing mystical about a lump of soggy human tissue. On the other hand, her work with human consciousness has proven that there is far more to the human mind than wrinkled gray matter. Actually, she thinks with a chuckle, there is a lot of gray matter when it comes to the brain, but it has nothing to do with three pounds of organic material.

Aimee opens the homemade chronicle. The pages of the composition book are crisp, the contents recorded in indigo-colored ink purchased in Venice—a gift from her mother. She scans the handwritten notes, her facial expression shifting with each chilling revelation and uncanny reminder. She skims the pages until she locates the passage in question. She reads the psychic’s words, but still can’t determine if the remark is a reference to the past, a reflection of the present, or a preview of the future. She wonders if the visionary gave her a puzzle to solve instead of an insight to ponder. Then again, it could merely be bait for a second visit. After all, even fortune-tellers need to earn a living!

Going to a psychic was the most uncharacteristic, incredibly preposterous, unbelievably creepy thing that she has ever done. She still can’t believe that she actually went through with it. Even though she justified the experience as harmless fun, by the time the session concluded, Aimee knew there had been more to the encounter than cheap entertainment. Like it or not, the revelations were inexplicably accurate, shockingly perceptive, and utterly haunting. For some reason, when she got home, she had felt compelled to record the supernatural disclosures, and then she stashed them away. The fact that one particular passage would emerge out of the blue and hound her for hours is very unsettling. Aimee closes the notebook and shoves it aside.

To have a mother riddle in one’s life, there has to be a mother in the equation, yet Aimee knows of no predicament involving her mother, who lives a totally ordinary life in France. She supposes the psychic’s message could apply to a different woman, but there are no maternal surrogates on the scene. Neither, given her lackluster love life, are there any prospects for gaining a mother-in-law or becoming a mother. In fact, Aimee doubts that she will ever marry, never mind have children. As tragic as the thought might be, motherhood is not her destiny.

Even though her love life is a joke, comedy isn’t the meaning of the riddle reference. According to the psychic, the word riddle means mystery. In other words, there is a mother mystery woven through her barren existence. Aimee shakes her head wondering for the hundredth time why she is giving such nonsense a second thought. It’s not as if she believes any of it.

Mother riddle!

Aimee groans. She has a ton of work to do, and the persistent epithet keeps taunting her. She tries to focus on her research, but it’s no use. The irksome tagline won’t let go.

Aimee closes her eyes and takes a few deep breaths in an attempt to short-circuit an anxiety attack. When she looks up, her attention is drawn to a photograph taken on her last visit to France. She and her mother had been in the orchards. It was Mother’s Day or, as it is known in France, Fete des Meres. Aimee’s throat constricts before her damp eyes dart to the window.

Bold white smudges are slashed across the cobalt sky. She knows that these are clouds painted by angels. At least that’s what her mother used to say when she was a little girl, when they used to lie on the grass and sky-watch together. She remembers her mother pointing to a fluffy cloud formation, each of them trying to guess what image the milky blob resembled. She can still see the golden down on her mother’s outstretched arm, the pale half-moons of her fingernails, the way her little finger bent inward. She thought then that her mother was the most beautiful woman in the world.

She still does.

Aimee glances at the clock and computes the time overseas. She needs to call her mother. She needs to wish her a happy birthday. She needs to know that everything is okay. And this time, as she reaches for the phone, she is determined not to cry.

CHAPTER 5

M adeleine Maxime Moreau reaches to the bones beneath the hollow of her throat and touches the spot where a gold pendant has rested most of her adult life. Earlier that day she decided to preserve the necklace for her daughter along with a cryptic, but sufficiently revealing disclosure. It’s not that the necklace is expensive, but it is a special inheritance passed from Maxime woman to Maxime woman for generations. She hasn’t been herself lately and is worried that, if anything happens, not only could the heirloom be lost, but the Maxime legacy could be forgotten.

Madeleine would have preferred to give the keepsake to her daughter in person accompanied by a more fitting explanation, but Aimee has gone away, and she doesn’t know when she will see her again. Never did she imagine that her daughter would venture far, never mind leave France. Even though Aimee is a grown woman, Madeleine still wishes that her daughter would come home. Life hasn’t been the same since she went away. Despite the years that have passed, Madeleine has yet to conquer the smiling agony of an empty nest.

Madeleine winces. She isn’t happy about her daughter’s defection or her roundabout way of conveying information, but she can’t risk saying too much. She can only hope that, after she is gone, Aimee will search for the pendant and come to learn its extraordinary meaning. Perhaps then she will give her mother the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps she will forgive her.

Uncertainty flashes across Madeleine’s face. Even if she could explain the circumstances surrounding the Maxime memento, she isn’t sure that Aimee will understand. Now that her daughter is a scientist, she rejects the way of life they once shared. Her interests are different. Her dreams have changed. Even her faith has faded. Regardless, Madeleine hopes that in due time her daughter will realize that her mother had reasons for being guarded, and that she never intended to hurt anyone. Hopefully, Aimee will see that she did what she had to do. That she acted out of love.

Madeleine’s eyes moisten. She doesn’t want to think such distressing thoughts, but at fifty-five years old, she isn’t getting any younger. Like it or not, she needs to prepare for what’s ahead. Since today is a midlife birthday, it’s a good time for letting go.

On that note, Madeleine scans the family chapel. This is her sanctuary. Her queendom. She studies the stained-glass windows, their hallowed images illuminated by sunlight. Her attention drifts to the stations of the cross, pausing for a moment on the ravaged body of Jesus. Her throat constricts before her eyes move to the front of the chapel, to the familiar face of a female icon.

Madeleine slides to her knees and bows her head. As she prays, the sky darkens and the fruit trees gyrate in a gust of wild storm wind. A matching surge of energy ricochets through Madeleine’s body. She hears her heart pounding as though she has been running through the orchards on a fine spring day when the fruit blossoms are like stars, too spectacular for words. She pulls herself upright, trying to make sense of what is happening.

Then it hits.

Madeleine’s heart explodes beneath her lace chemise, spewing unspent vitality through the labyrinth of her bones. As she slumps into the center aisle leading to the altar, she slices her wrist on an old nail that protrudes from the side of the pew. A burning sensation scorches her flesh.

Lying in a pile of silken surprise, Madeleine reaches into her pocket and extracts a small vial. She brings the bottle to her mouth to rip the wax seal. As she tugs on the stopper, the vial slips from her grasp and rolls across the floor. Madeleine reaches for the tiny flask, but another round of pain prevents her from retrieving the Elixir of Eternity. In a rush of panic, she sweeps her arm back and forth creating a bloody cross-mark on the stone floor.

A third jolt causes Madeleine to recoil. Her breath catches in her throat while bits of apple wax sweeten her mouth.

She rolls back.

Despite the chaos churning inside her body, time kicks into slow motion. Sprawled across the tile floor, staring at a mourning dove perched within the vaulted ceiling, Madeleine struggles to stay conscious so she can confess her sins. She has tried to live a decent life … to be a loving wife and a devoted mother. She has tried to honor her legacy and execute her mission. But there is one transgression … one so shameful that she cannot bear to ask forgiveness. It is a sin of love.

Unholy love.

Madeleine searches the chapel with startled eyes. She will miss her loved ones and her ancestral orchards. But most of all, she will miss the man who took possession of her soul. The man she calls the Brooding Angel.

Frolicking cherubs painted by a long-forgotten artist gaze down on Madeleine. She is too weak to call for help, too life-tired to struggle. When her body turns to ice and her skin becomes the same blue-violet as the lavender fields bordering the manor house where she has lived her entire life, she knows that it is time.

Madeleine stares blindly overhead. Suddenly she is beyond the wooden rafters, floating in a river of warm, white light. From the dazzling distance, she sees her daughter gazing at the vivid blue sky. Aimee is cloud-watching as she likes to do when she is worried about some silly this or that.

Then she is gone.

CHAPTER 6

A imee Moreau can’t believe that her mother is dead. She wishes that she was dreaming, but the toll of church bells insists otherwise. Tears well in Aimee’s eyes when she glances at the hearse positioned to lead the procession. Unfortunately, the vehicle transporting her mother’s casket is no figment of her imagination. When the car engine starts, Aimee sits back. One by one, vehicles roll into place. Moment by moment, her life falls apart.

The funeral convoy commences its final journey. Aimee stares out the car window as scenery streams by as if in a silent movie. When the motorcade glides through a bustling French village, elderly men remove their hats while old women make the sign of the cross and mumble worn-out prayers. The young people move about their business, indifferent to the funeral march that mocks their fragile security. If they only knew, Aimee laments. If only I had known, she silently bemoans.

Aimee glances at her father, who is crouched in the corner. He too is staring blindly out the window. Neither of them has spoken since entering the car. They sit silently at opposite ends of the backseat trapped inside their separate sorrows. As always, they are strangers.

Aimee leans back and closes her eyes. She is restless and exhausted at the same time. For days, disturbing thoughts have raided her brain. She doesn’t want to think any more. She just wants to turn back the clock. Mercifully, the numbness of bereavement finally takes hold, and Aimee drifts to sleep. She is a child again, roaming around her great-grandmother’s house where she grew up.

The Old Memere invites Aimee to her bedroom, a shocking privilege for a seven-year-old. Aimee accepts and eagerly mounts the stairs behind her grandmother. When she enters the bedroom, she is awestruck by its cleanliness and stillness. She inhales the scent of lavender, starch, and beeswax. There is a crucifix hanging over the bed. The room is dark and spooky. Like a church.

The Old Memere opens a mahogany armoire and retrieves a box containing a remnant of cloth. She explains that it is a piece of Saint Veronica’s veil. The Old Memere says that Veronica wiped the face of Jesus as he carried the cross to the top of Golgotha. She informs Aimee that the relic has been preserved by Maxime women for centuries, and that the holy artifact will one day be hers to safeguard along with another treasure, one too complicated for a child’s inexperienced mind. One that will be hers when she is ready.

Aimee whimpers in her sleep. Although she is thirty-three years old, her mother has not given her any family treasure. She must have forgotten. And now it’s too late!

A sick feeling wrenches Aimee awake. She peers outside. The procession is approaching the wrought iron gates of Sacre Coeur Cemetery. She drops back and closes her eyes in dread.

When the car slows to a stop, Aimee doesn’t need to look to know that she has arrived at the burial site. She begins to tremble. Michel Claude Moreau reaches over and clasps his daughter’s hand. Aimee glances at her father. His eyes are bloodshot, his nose red, his mouth pinched. She has never seen the slightest weakness in him. His fragility propels harpoons of fear through her body.

When the car engine stops, her father’s words are weary. It is time, Aimee.

Aimee withdraws her hand and looks away. In the distance, she sees two grave diggers smoking cigarettes, their shovels impaled in the sun-hot ground. The men glance furtively at the bereaved, then step into the shadows. Aimee watches until a yellow bulldozer rumbles over a grassy knoll. She looks back at her father. Their eyes lock for a fraction of a second. She can see that he is as broken as she is. She doesn’t know which is more disturbing—his grief or his affection.

A long, jagged sigh splinters her father’s self-control. His voice cracks when he repeats the words he has not spoken for nearly three decades. We must hurry, little dove. Mama is waiting.

Aimee stares at her father in wild disbelief.

Bastard!

CHAPTER 7

O ld age has wreaked havoc with Ema Croteau’s seventy-nine-year-old body. Not only has she lost two inches in height from bone compression, she doesn’t have the stamina that she used to have. She sits, slightly hunched, behind a walnut counter in the library of Saint Augustine’s Seminary trying to get comfortable, which isn’t easy for a woman with a decaying skeleton and a bony butt.

Despite constantly aching joints, Ema nods and smiles at the stream of seminarians, scholars, and clerics entering the library. Even though she knows some of them from her work as a consultant for the Pontifical Institute of Science, most are acquaintances from her research work at the library. Even at her advanced age, she takes pride in being useful. But that isn’t the only reason for her affiliation with the elite Boston seminary. Although her motives for not retiring must be concealed, she can’t deny that the real reason—the only reason—for living and working in the United States is to be close to the man she has loved for more than six decades. The man she cannot have. The man she must address as His Eminence.

She left everything for him. But it has been worth it. She catches a glimpse of her beloved almost every day. Sometimes she gets lucky and they speak in person. Occasionally, they meet in private. Even when they are apart,