Ultimate Sacrifice Read online

  Normally, on nights like these I head out to our fort, but even with the cop in our driveway I don’t want to step outside. Unless . . . unless Uncle Jerry is there. He’s not much of a sleeper either.

  I glance out my window that looks over the side yard and the log fort that is glowing softly in the exterior lights of our home. Uncle Jerry is there, his legs dangling out the open side, and just the sight of him eases my stress.

  Popping the screen from my already open window, I crawl through. My bare feet crunch across the dry grass of our side yard and over to the fort. Uncle Jerry sees me coming and I give him a little wave. The fort was built when Travis and I were just little kids. It perfectly matches our house. My brothers and I used to spend nearly every free day playing on this thing.

  I grab onto the first rung and climb the few steps to crawl through the opening in the floor.

  “Hey, Vick,” Uncle Jerry greets me, scooting over to make room. Between the two of us, we pretty much fill the small area.

  “How long you been here?” I ask.

  “Not long.”

  Uncle Jerry lives in the apartment above our garage. He’s ten years older than me and Travis and has always been more of a big brother to us than anything. Lifting a beer can to his mouth, he takes a slurp before offering me one. I shake my head, and we go about silently staring out at the pond that sits in front of our house and is glowing softly in the half moon. Beyond that winds County Line Road with a few left over news crews. I wonder if they will all be back in the morning.

  “You hear that?” Uncle Jerry asks.

  I tune in to the crickets chirping and the frogs croaking. “You mean the bugs?”

  “You won’t hear that anywhere else,” he says with a content tone.

  With a smile I close my eyes. I do love to hear frogs croaking. Me and Uncle Jerry are a lot alike that way. Both small town people. Neither one of us hold aspirations for anything else. I suppose that’s why my parents insisted I join this world service project after high school. They want me to travel and see things before college.

  I imagine most kids would welcome the idea of seeing the world. Frankly, I’m fine with going straight to college. I’m not looking near as forward to the travel as I probably should be. But I keep reminding myself it’s only for six months and then I’ll be back here.

  It’s funny how Travis is just the opposite. Him and Honey both want to climb mountains and surf oceans and cross deserts. Yes, they’re perfect for each other.

  I inhale a deep breath and let it out slowly as I tune in again to the crickets and frogs, and without meaning it to, my brain drifts to Michelle. I open my eyes and look over at Uncle Jerry. “You heard they’re saying Michelle’s murder might be part of a satanic ritual, didn’t you?”

  His eyes cut over to me. “Yes.”

  “What do think about that?” I whisper, my skin starting to crawl.

  He takes a second to finish off his beer before answering, “I think that’s made up by people who are looking for the next big news story. I don’t think there is any such thing.”

  I want to believe he’s right. But satanic ritual or not, something awful did happen in the woods just steps from my life.

  UNCLE JERRY’S WORDS linger in my thoughts throughout the night, but they don’t detour me from grabbing my laptop and doing a few searches. I focus on satanic sacrifices, specifically those involving goats and small children. If I thought I didn’t sleep before, I sure am not sleeping now. Not with the image I pull up first.

  It’s a pencil sketch of a ceremonial scene that looks exactly how Travis described finding Michelle—a goat gutted with its innards in a neat pile at its head; the naked toddler stuffed inside the empty cavity; twine trussed around the hooves of the goat and the wrists and ankles of the toddler; the slit throat. My eyes freeze on the picture, unwavering, and bitterness tangs my mouth, rolling down my esophagus and twisting through my stomach.

  I click off of it onto another picture, this one of a knife used in satanic rituals. The handle is ornate and carved with emblems, and the blade holds deep curves, almost like a large icicle.

  Next I select an article and begin reading: An initiation ceremony to cleanse the land . . . removal of someone who has sinned . . . foreshadowing the death of Christ . . . expression of adoration toward a new ruler . . . separating oneself from God . . . a prophecy put in motion . . . New Satanic Empire.

  “New Satanic Empire,” I mumble and quickly type that into my search engine. Not much pops up, and I select the first thing I see. “Believed to be the most recent and secretive denomination of Satanism, established in nineteen-seventy in—” I feel my eyes go wide— “East Tennessee.”

  I keep reading: Though next to nothing is known about The New Satanic Empire, it is believed to be based on a prophecy that upon a series of rituals, Satan will return to Earth and rule.

  I try to find more on this Empire thing, but that seems to be all there is, and so I sit back for a second and just think. But my brain is more bogged with questions and confusion than anything. Cleansing the land from and for what? And removal of a sinner? But Michelle was just four, how could she be a sinner? Plus, the death of Christ—but he’s already dead. And a new ruler—does that mean Satan?

  But mostly I get stuck on the last part and the word prophecy.

  I don’t like that word.

  Closing my laptop, I go to find my parents, eager to tell them everything I just read, but instead I find my entire family in the kitchen. Mom, Dad, PaPaw, Uncle Jerry, Travis, and Kevin. My steps falter as I look around the room.

  Mom gives me a soft smile. “We were just about to come get you.”

  “Oh,” I murmur and take a spot right next to Travis.

  “Not sure if any of you have looked outside this morning,” Dad continues, “but the reporters and news crews have doubled in size, not to mention the police who are currently collecting everyone’s garbage.”

  “Is that allowed?” Travis asks.

  Dad nods. “I called Detective Crandall, and he said our garbage is considered public property once it’s put on the street for pick up. It’s not just our garbage they’re collecting, it’s everyone within five miles of the murder scene.”

  “Does that mean the reporters can search it, too?” Travis asks.

  “Technically, yes,” Dad answers. “But the police have been here for hours, so they’ve got things barricaded and aren’t allowing the news anywhere near the garbage.”

  My gaze drifts past my parents and through the kitchen window that looks out over our yard, and through the trees I see the scene my dad is describing. Police. News vans with satellites. People milling about.

  I turn back to the kitchen to look at my family. To PaPaw leaning against the granite counter, staring intently at my father. Uncle Jerry sipping coffee and looking bleary eyed at the wood floor. Mom standing close to my father. Travis stiff and tense and staring just like PaPaw at Dad. And Kevin looking out the window at what I was just taking in. Everyone seems lost in the weight of their own thoughts. I wonder if they, too, did some research last night.

  “I want all three of you kids to stay inside today,” Dad says.

  “But I was planning on going to see Bee-Bee,” I tell him.

  “Let’s wait on that,” Dad says. “Her house is just as swamped as ours. The last thing any of us need are reporters snapping a bunch of pictures. Also Crandall is coming here today. He wants to meet with each one of us individually.”

  “Shouldn’t we have a lawyer or something?” Travis asks.

  Dad looks at Mom and then PaPaw before saying, “We’ve talked about it, and at this point decided no. None of us have anything to hide.”

  “Don’t be scared of the questions,” PaPaw tells us. “I will be the adult in the room when you three kids meet with Crandall. Cooperate, be extremely respectful, and tell the truth. Like your father said, none of us have anything to hide.”

  I DON’T GET a chance to talk to my famil
y about everything I read on the Internet because Detective Crandall shows up within minutes of our family meeting in the kitchen. After a few perfunctory hellos, he takes Dad first to the back of the house where the office is located, leaving the rest of us gathered in the living room with a cop standing watch in our doorway. If he’s hovering there for intimidation factors, it’s working because none of us speak while we wait for Dad and Crandall to return.

  PaPaw goes next, then Mom. Uncle Jerry, then both of my brothers, leaving me last, and my nerves completely frayed by the time I walk down the hall and into the office where Crandall is waiting. My gaze immediately goes to where PaPaw is sitting in the corner, and he gives me a reassuring nod.

  “Have a seat,” Crandall says, not doing a single thing to make me feel at ease. “Where were you Sunday at 8:04 a.m.?” he goes right into the questions.

  Instinctively, I look at PaPaw, and Crandall reprimands me. “Look at me when you answer.”

  My eyes snap back to his, and I swallow. “I’m sorry.”

  “Where were you at 8:04 a.m.?” he simply repeats, again saying nothing to help ease me.

  “Sitting on our porch swing reading.”

  “Did your brother, Travis, seem upset when he ran from the woods?”

  “Yes,” I answer. “He was terrified.”

  The detective scribbles something on his notepad. “Do any of your family members do suspicious things?”

  “Like what?” I ask.

  The detective looks at me. “I don’t know. You tell me.”

  “No, we’re normal. We love God,” I add, in case he thinks we worship Satan or something.

  Crandall glances up at me again, like he’s surprised I brought God up at all. I start to look at PaPaw and instead make my eyes stay steady on the detective’s. A beat of contemplative silence goes by before he looks back down at his pad, and I blow out a silent breath.

  “Tell me about your Uncle Jerry,” he says next, and I do.

  “Tell me about Kevin,” comes after that, and I do.

  “Do your parents get along?” is the next question, and they just keep coming after that.

  “Would you consider Travis a happy young man?”

  “How did your grandfather handle your grandmother’s death?”

  “What does your mom do in her spare time?”

  “You babysit Michelle? How long have you been doing that?”

  On it goes.

  Question.

  Answer.

  Question.

  Answer.

  Everything centered around my family, though. What about our neighbors, aren’t they being looked at by the police? This is what I want to ask the detective, but I don’t. I keep to the Q and A and am respectful, just like PaPaw said to be. I don’t bring up God or Satan again.

  Finally, Crandall dismisses me, and if I had one of Uncle Jerry’s beers, I’d probably down it. As it is, I rejoin my family in the living room. Minutes later Crandall leaves, and everyone starts speaking at once. I listen to my family talking over each other, recounting every single question and answer they went through—basically, the same scenario I just encountered.

  When the conversation finally dies, I get my chance to speak. “I did some digging last night,” I begin, “and I found a lot of disturbing stuff.” I rattle off everything I read and follow it up with the questions I posed to myself last night, and then I stop talking and wait to hear what everyone has to say.

  Dad’s the first. “You found all of that on the Internet?”

  I nod.

  “The fact is,” PaPaw begins talking in his psychiatrist voice, “something horrible happened in our woods. I have no doubt it was a satanic ritual conducted by a clearly disturbed individual. A person who I am sure the police will find. Was it all part of an elaborate prophecy? In that person’s mind, probably. But we live in reality where things like Satan ruling our world are considered fantasy. Do not let your imaginations latch onto this and turn it into something it is not. We all need to keep our lucidity in check.”

  I take his words in, and I know he’s right, but I still ask, “What about this New Satanic Empire that was apparently established here in East Tennessee?”

  “Yes,” PaPaw agrees. “I have no doubt there is probably something like that out there. Just like there are a million different other religions and followings popping up all over the place. Think about those cults that do mass suicides or those that claim the end of the world. Well, guess what, the end of the world came and left and we are all still here. Right?”

  Well, put that way.

  “Your parents raised you to be independent thinkers,” PaPaw says. “Don’t get sucked into this, and do what Crandall said. Avoid the media, don’t talk to anybody, and let the cops do their job.”

  THE NEXT MORNING I find Travis in his room hunched over his iPad. “What are you doing?” I ask.

  He looks up at me. “You’re not going to like this.” He hands me his iPad, and I swipe my finger across the screen to unfreeze it. A blog pops up where several people have posted pictures of my family.

  There’s one of my parents standing outside of the post office in an obvious heated argument. One of Uncle Jerry at a softball game, sitting on the hood of his car and staring at a couple of teenage girls strutting by. There’s one of Travis and Honey leaning up against his truck in a very passionate make out session. Another of Kevin snorting gas from a red jug. And me . . . oh my lord . . . one of me smoking a joint.

  The headline to the blog reads:

  NOT EXACTLY THE CHRISTIAN FAMILY THEY SAY THEY ARE

  “Whose blog is this?” I ask, scrolling down and up, trying to figure out where it came from.

  “I don’t know. The date stamp says it originated yesterday. But it’s public, so any one can post to it.” As he says that, another comment and picture pops up, this one of PaPaw pointing a 22 at a big growling dog.

  I look again at the picture of me smoking a joint, and try to remember who all was there that night. It was at a field party with the usual crew. Any one of my friends could’ve taken that with their phone.

  Travis slides the iPad out of my hands. “I didn’t realize you smoke pot.”

  “I don’t. I tried it last year at a field party. I coughed myself raw.”

  Someone knocks on his door, and Travis hides the iPad. “Come in.”

  Kevin opens the door and he frowns when he sees both of us standing here. “What are you guys doing?”

  Travis steps around him and closes the door again. “What’s up with the gas snorting?”

  Kevin’s eyes go wide. “How do you know about that?”

  Travis shoves the iPad at him, and we both watch as our younger brother looks at the blog.

  “More importantly,” I say, “why were you snorting gas?”

  Kevin shrugs. “It’s no big deal. It just gives a buzz. Same reason why you’re smoking pot,” he arrogantly points out, and I narrow my eyes.

  “Okay, this is so not the point right now,” Travis interrupts. “The point is, this doesn’t look good for any of us. This makes us look like we’re bad or guilty or something.”

  “We need to show this to Mom and Dad,” I say, knowing full well I’m about to get into trouble for the pot.

  “No!” Kevin snaps, and I almost take a step back. “You can’t show them this!”

  Even though I’m used to Kevin’s mood swings, it still takes me a second to digest how quickly he went from lackadaisical to angry. “Kevin, I’m going to be in trouble, too,” I tell him, thinking that will calm him. “But they need to know. Heck, Crandall probably already does know.”

  Kevin’s jaw tightens into this furious line, and an odd tension gathers in the air between the three of us as his nostrils flare with an angry inhale, and I watch as he hisses out an equally angry exhale.

  “What the heck is wrong with you?” I ask. I hate when he gets so angry. It just makes no sense sometimes.

  “Why don’t you let me talk to hi
m,” Travis suggests, already opening the door and giving me a little shove out.

  I turn right as Travis closes the door in my face, and I’m left standing in the hall at a complete loss. It’s not like my brothers to leave me out of things. I don’t get it. What just happened?

  MINUTES LATER I walk into the kitchen to find Mom staring at the TV.

  “Please,” Bee-Bee pleads into the camera. “Please, if anyone knows anything, I implore you to come forward.”

  Mom mutes the TV and sets the remote on the kitchen counter. “Poor Bee-Bee.” She looks at me as I slide up onto a bar stool. “I’m going over there later today when I get home from work. Do you want to join me?”

  “Actually, I was thinking about heading over there this morning. I planned on going yesterday, but with everything going on.”

  Mom nods. “I know. Listen, I talked to your school and apparently reporters are crawling your campus now. They’re everywhere. But I don’t want any of us to put off going over there to see her and support her. So if you do go this morning, take your brothers and don’t look or talk to the reporters. Other than that, stay here in the house.”

  “Okay.” I watch Mom get her keys and check her purse, wanting to tell her about the blog and pictures, but I hold off. Me and my brothers need to do that together. “Where’s Dad?”

  “Him and Jerry are already gone. There’s also a new cop in our driveway. If you do go to Bee-Bee’s this morning, see if he’ll escort you. At least then the reporters will probably stay back.”

  “Hey, Mom, what about a funeral? When do you think that will be?”

  “I don’t know, but we’ll check. You’ll want to go?”

  I nod. “Of course.”

  She gives me a quick kiss on the top of my head. “Gonna be late, see you later.” Then she’s out the door.

  Travis scoots in from the hallway. “Thanks for not telling Mom about the blog.”