Page 138 of Stolen Faith

Eric’s gaze was sober as he nodded. “I know, and I’m sorry.” Then he grinned. “But you’re still doing better than us. My predecessor was assassinated in his own home.” Eric frowned. “Which is currently my home.”

“That’s some bad juju,” Juliette told him.

“I replaced the couch he died on.”

“Oh good. Because you can’t get rid of death cooties.”

“Cooties?”

“Cooties.” Juliette nodded soberly.

They spoke for several more minutes, Juliette answering Eric’s questions…for the most part. After they ended the call, she sat in the quiet of the comm room. It felt good to talk about what happened with someone who wasn’t emotionally invested.

She was sure Eric cared to some degree. They were…friends, maybe.

Frenemies, certainly.

But talking about what had happened with someone who wasn’t actively traumatized by it helped. Rose, of course, had wanted to arrange jailhouse assassinations, but even if Barry, TiffaniGrace, and Jonah hadn’t gotten out on bail almost immediately, assassinations weren’t the answer.

Devon had wanted to take it a step further. Arrange an accident that would affect everyone in the church who knew something. But even if she’d been willing to commit mass murder, that wouldn’t have helped. Though the church’s lawyers were making sure they didn’t talk, plenty of Barry’s inner circle had talked to the media prior to being told to shut up, mentioning the Trinity Masters by name. She’d done her best to deflect, to make it sound like the society the church was after was nothing more than a collegiate club.

For the most part, it worked. There was a percentage of the population who’d grabbed onto the idea of an evil secret society running their country with both hands. Then again, many of them had already believed that to some degree, so now they just had a new name for the society.

Juliette had ordered everyone, every member, to take off their triquetra jewelry. Wearing an identifying ring hadn’t been a great risk in the past, but now they couldn’t afford to draw attention.

Franco had begged her not to do it. Without his ancestor’s triquetra ring, Franco would never have believed Juliette the day she came to recruit him.

Juliette had still given the order.

She was very aware that she, and the entire Trinity Masters, were balanced on the edge of a knife. They were safe, for now.

Any more publicity, any more questions, and they might slip and fall onto the blade.

Epilogue

Amaya Rolland spread out the map of Boston from back before they filled in the back bay. She layered another map on top of that—an old city map, showing Copley Square.

Trinity Church at one end, Boston’s Central Library at the other.

She used a biography of Charles F. McKim to hold down one corner of the growing stack of maps.

Trinity Church, Trinity Fountain, and just across the square, a massive library built on land created by filling in the bay.

Amaya looked up, examining her serial-killer style wall of photographs. If she’d been dating—and she wasn’t—she wouldn’t have been able to have her dates over to her place without having to answer some very uncomfortable questions.

The photograph in the center was a still from the press conference, a moment when Juliette Adams Lissand—still at the podium—had turned to look over her shoulder. Though Devon Asher was behind her, Amaya was convinced that Juliette was looking at Franco Santiago.

Above the photograph, she had a collection of additional photos of Juliette. One image she’d grabbed from a cached social media account had a picture of young Juliette standing with Sebastian Stewart. In the photo, Juliette was identified as Juliette Adams. Adams was her middle name, so maybe she was one of those people who like to go by both names, but something about that just didn’t seem right.

More strings led out from there. From Sebastian to his Broadway-star brother. The brother, Christian, to Charlotte Mead. From Charlotte to Charles F. McKim, who’d shaped so much of the city of Boston.

There were more lines, more connections. People with very famous, and powerful, last names. Jefferson, Hamilton, Hancock.

Photos of those same people eating dinner, or going for a walk, in trios rather than duos.

Amaya took a step back, taking in the bigger picture, examining the result of a month and a half of nearly nonstop research.

She could probably have kept going with her digital research almost indefinitely, but at a certain point, she had to stop and take the next step.

---