Before He Sins

Mackenzie noticed the way the young men were getting their terminology mixed up. Pastor, reverend, priest…it was all confusing. Mackenzie didn’t even know the difference actually, assuming it had something to do with differences in beliefs between denominations.

“And your father spent a lot of time with him?”

“Oh yeah,” Brian said, a bit angry. “All of his damn time, I think. If you need to know anything about Dad, he’d be the one to ask.”

Mackenzie nodded, well aware that she would not be getting any useful information out of these two young men. Still, she wished she had more time to speak with them. There was clearly unresolved tension and loss between them. Maybe if they broke through whatever emotional walls were keeping them so tranquil, they’d have more to offer.

In the end, she turned away and gave them her thanks. She and Ellington left the apartment quietly. As they took the stairs down side by side, he took her hand.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Yeah,” she said, confused. “Why?”

“Two kids…their father just died and aren’t sure how to handle it. With all of the speculation about your dad’s old case as of late…just wondering.”

She smiled at him, reveling in the uplifting way he made her heart feel in those moments. God, he can be so sweet…

As they walked out into the morning together, she also realized that he was right: the reason she had wanted to stay and keep talking was to help the Tuttle brothers resolve the issues they’d had with their father.

Apparently, the ghost of her father’s recently reopened case was haunting her more than she realized.

***

Seeing Cornerstone Presbyterian Church in the light of morning was surreal. Mackenzie drove by it on the way to visit with Reverend Jerry Levins. Levins resided in a house that sat just half a block away from the church, something Mackenzie had seen a lot of during her time out in Nebraska where the heads of smaller churches tended to live in very close proximity to their houses of worship.

When they arrived at Levins’s house, there were numerous cars parked along the side of the street and in his driveway. She assumed these were likely members of Cornerstone, coming by to seek solace from or offer comfort to Reverend Levins.

When Mackenzie knocked on the front door of the modest little brick house, it was answered right away. The woman at the door had clearly been crying. She eyed Mackenzie and Ellington suspiciously until Mackenzie raised her badge.

“We’re Agents White and Ellington, with the FBI,” she said. “We’d like to speak with Reverend Levins, if he’s in.”

The woman opened the door for them and they stepped into a house that was filled with sniffling and sobbing. Somewhere else within the house, Mackenzie could hear the sound of murmured prayers.

“I’ll get him for you,” the woman said. “Please wait here.”

Mackenzie watched the woman go back through the house, turning into a small living room where a few people stood by the entryway. After some whispering noises, a tall bald man came walking toward them. Like the woman who had answered the door, he had also been weeping.

“Agents,” Levins said. “Can I help you?”

“Well, I know it’s a very tense and sad time for you,” Mackenzie said, “but we’re hoping to get any information we can on Reverend Tuttle. The sooner we can get any leads, the quicker we can catch who did this.”

“Do you think his death is related to that poor priest’s from earlier this week?” Levins asked.

“We can’t know for certain yet,” Mackenzie said, though she was already certain he was. “And that’s why we were hoping you could speak with us.”

“Of course,” Levins said. “Outside on the stoop, though. I don’t want to interrupt the prayer we have going here.”

He led them back out into the morning, where he took a seat on the concrete steps. “I must say, I’m not sure what you’re going to find on Ned,” Levins commented. “He was a stand-up believer. Other than some issues with his family, I don’t know that he had anything closely resembling an enemy.”

“Did he have friends within the church that you might question being moral or upstanding?” Ellington asked.

“Everyone was friends with Ned Tuttle,” Levins said, wiping a tear away from his eyes. “The man was as close to a saint as they come. He regularly tithed at least twenty-five percent of his pay back into the church. He was always downtown, helping to feed and clothe the poor. He mowed lawns for the elderly, did home repair for widows, took three missions trips to Kenya every year to help with a medical ministry.”

“Do you know anything about his past that might be shady?” Mackenzie asked.

“No. And that’s saying a lot because I know a great deal about his past. He and I, we shared a lot of stories about our struggles. And I can tell you in confidence that among the few sinful things he experienced in his past, there was nothing that would suggest being treated in the way he was last night.”

“How about any people within the church?” Mackenzie asked. “Were there members of the church who might have been offended at something Reverend Tuttle said or did?”

Levins thought about it for only a moment before shaking his head. “No. If there was such an issue, Ned never told me and I never knew about it. But again…I can tell you with the utmost certainty that he had no enemies that I was aware of.”

“Do you know if – ” Ellington started.

But Levins held up his hand, as if shooing the comment away. “I’m very sorry,” he said. “But I’m quite sad about the loss of my good friend, and I have many grieving members of my church inside. I will happily answer any questions you have in the coming days, but I need to report to God and my congregation right now.”

“Of course,” Mackenzie said. “I understand. And I am truly sorry for your loss.”

Levins managed a smile as he got back to his feet. Fresh tears were streaming down his face. “I meant what I said,” he whispered, doing what he could to not break down in front of them. “Give me a day or so. If there is anything further you need to ask, let me know. I’d like to take part in bringing whoever did this to justice.”

With that, he headed back inside. Mackenzie and Ellington walked back to the car as the sun finally took its rightful place in the sky. It was hard to believe it was only 8:11.

“What next?” Mackenzie asked. “Any ideas?”

“Well…I’ve been awake for nearly four hours now and I haven’t had coffee yet. That seems like a good place to start.”

***

Twenty minutes later, Mackenzie and Ellington were sitting face to face in a small coffee shop. As they drank their coffee, they looked over the files on Father Costas they had taken from McGrath’s office and the digital files on Reverend Tuttle that had been emailed to Mackenzie’s phone.

Aside from studying the photographs, there was not really much to study. Even in the case of Father Costas, where there was paperwork to go along with it, there wasn’t much to tell. He had been killed from either the puncture wound to his lung or a deep incision in the back of his neck that had gone deep enough to reveal white glimmers of his spine.

“So according to this report,” Mackenzie said, “the wounds to Father Costas’s body were likely what killed him. He was most likely dead before he was crucified.”

“And that means something?” Ellington asked.

“I think there’s a very good chance. It’s clear there’s some sort of religious angle here. The mere subject of crucifixion supports that. But there’s a huge difference between using the act of crucifixion as a message and using the imagery of crucifixion.”

“I think I follow,” Ellington said. “But you can keep explaining.”

“For Christians, the image of crucifixion would really just be a depiction of sorts. In our cases, death as a result of crucifixion doesn’t seem to be the goal. If that were the case, the bodies would likely be mostly free of injury. Think about it…the whole of Christianity would be quite different if Christ was already dead when he was nailed to the cross.”

“So you think the killer is crucifying these men just for show?”

“Too early to tell,” Mackenzie said. She paused long enough to take a blissful gulp of her coffee. “I’m leaning toward no, though. Both men were men of the cloth…leaders of a church in some form or another. Displaying them strung up like the Christian figure those churches revolve around is too much of a sign. There’s some sort of motive behind it all.”

“You just referred to Jesus Christ as a Christian figure. I thought you believed in God.”

“I do,” Mackenzie said. “But not with the strength and conviction someone like Ned Tuttle had. And when it gets into the Bible stories – the talking snake, the ark, the blow-by-blow of the crucifixion – I think faith has to take a back seat and rely on something closer to blind belief. And I’m not comfortable with that.”