Page 97 of Veil of Silence

Nora wasn’t sure what that said about the person leaving them. But she was increasingly certain it said something critical about what they believed faith was supposed to accomplish.

Did this mean the culprit was someone religious? Or was he mocking their religion?

She looked through the fellowship hall windows again.

Dozens of people Nora had known most of her life lingered inside. Any one of them could have walked past her car. Any one of them could have left the envelope.

Her thoughts returned to the figure she’d glimpsed at the edge of the woods behind her house. She had dismissed it as a shadow—something exhaustion had created.

But what if someone really had been standing there, watching them?

Nora looked down at the page again.

The first message had said, Calling. Come. Home.

This one sounded like an order.

An order for Christian.

Chapter

Thirty-Eight

My phone vibrates while I’m stacking empty coffee cups in the fellowship hall.

The message contains five words.

The page is in place.

I delete it, then glance toward the windows.

Nora stands beneath the overhang beside the sanctuary, an envelope in one hand and a yellowed piece of paper in the other. Rain blows past her, darkening the pavement and tapping against the metal roof.

Even from here, I can tell she understands this message is different.

The first was a summons.

This one is a command.

Trust and obey.

The runaway knows those words. All the boys do. They learned early that obedience brought rewards and resistance brought pain.

Nora folds the page and looks through the fellowship hall windows.

I lower my gaze and move another cup onto the stack.

She’s looking at people differently now. Pastor Whitfield. Dale. Pauline. The deputies and volunteers moving around the room. People she has known most of her life.

Maybe even me.

I wish she would stop.

The Loveless girls were never supposed to be targets. They had another purpose.

They were the voices.

Their music opened church doors, filled fellowship halls and brought families together. Where the Loveless Sisters went, people welcomed them. Trusted them. Introduced their children and offered places to stay.