Page 25 of Turn That River Red

So for now, it’s just an empty shooting range, a dried-up obstacle course. I see Ambrose looking at it, but he doesn’t say anything.

We cut across the grass, walking in silence. The dogs snuffle around, curious and alert. I smooth my palms against my dress; nine in the morning and I’m already sweating.

“Almost there,” I say with an apologetic little laugh. Ambrose glances at me sideways.

“This place is bigger than I thought it’d be.”

“Nearly a thousand acres.” I bite back the urge to give him the rest of the tour, which I’ve done dozens of times for Reverend Gunner’s guests. How he purchased the first five acres in the 1980s shortly after he married Madelyn, thinking he would build a house for his family. How, a year later, God came to him while he was on the property, near an old dried-up well, and told him to build a church instead, and that was the beginning of the Church of the Well. Now that well is the altar of the chapel where Reverend Gunner preaches and where, thirty-five years later, he took me as his wife.

But I don’t say any of it, because I don’t want to talk about Reverend Gunner with Ambrose. And because, before I knowit, the bunker entrance appears up ahead, a grey block jutting out of the middle of the western field.

“There it is,” I say.

Ambrose frowns. “Damn. When you said bunker, you meant it. It’s underground?”

“Well, yes.” Why do I feel like he’s judging me? Judging the Church of the Well? “It’s an emergency bunker. In case of government interference.”

“Hmmn.” The dogs stop to investigate something in the grass, and Ambrose stops with them, studying the bunker entrance. “And the files are in there?”

“We use parts of it for storage.”

“Until the government comes rolling in, anyway.”

I glare at him, irritation fluttering in my chest. “Reverend Gunner is aprophet. Of course the government wants to see him destroyed.”

Ambrose tilts his head, his eyes glittering. “Do you really believe that?”

His question brings me up short because although I know I’m supposed to say yes, my immediate response isno—not only to the threat of the government, which I’ve always been doubtful of, but to the idea of Reverend Gunner as a prophet. It’s something I’ve been told since I came here at eight years old, but no one has ever asked me if I believe it until now. It was always just taken for granted that I did.

Ambrose arches an eyebrow, waiting for my response.

“You can’t deny the devil is out there,” I say, knowing I’m evading the question. “In the secular world. And he wants us dead. He killed—” The sentence lodges in my throat.

“Yes,” Ambrose says softly, his eyes dark as pitch. “Yes, he killed poor Raul.”

Then he strides forward, pulling the dogs with him. As he walks, his voice rings out, and there’s the hellfire and brimstone preacher I saw in him yesterday morning: “‘Be sober! Be watchful!Your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.’”

I recognize the words from the Book of Peter, and goosebumps prickle along my arms. Something about the way he says the verse—it’s like he’s faced the Deceiver himself head-on.

I scurry after Ambrose as he makes his way up to the bunker entrance. It really isn’t much to look at. A door leading to nowhere.

“Have you ever been inside?” he asks over his shoulder.

I stop at his side. He’s studying the lock—a digital keypad. Only Reverend Gunner has the code. Memorized, supposedly.

“Yes, a couple of times.” I run my finger over the keypad. “But like I told you, I don’t know the code.”

“I suppose it’s safe to assume Reverend Gunner does.” Ambrose crouches down so he’s eye-level with the lock, and the dogs sniff around him. He bats them away distractedly, his attention focused on the door.

“Yes.” Then, for some reason I can’t fathom, I add, “He’s the only one who does.”

Ambrose makes a softmmmsound in the back of his throat.

The wind picks up, hot and dry and blustery enough to tug strands of hair out of my braids, and I hold my breath, waiting for Ambrose to demand I use my sinful feminine body to wring the code out of Reverend Gunner.

But he doesn’t. He only stands back up and turns toward me, dogs still snuffling around in the grass.

“Thank you,” he says. “I appreciate your help.”

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