Blood Sacrifice by Michael Lister

Author:Michael Lister
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Mystery, Thriller
Publisher: Pulpwood Press
Published: 2012-08-07T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirty-two

My heart beat just a little faster as I pressed the distantly familiar numbers. As I waited for a connection, my throat tightened a bit and my mouth became dry.

I had retrieved my cell phone from my room where it had been charging, and brought it with me down to the lake.

The connection was poor, and I didn’t have any idea what I was going to say, but I was determined. Chances were she wouldn’t answer anyway. I had called her cell, which meant my number would be displayed on her phone. Usually when I called her home line, which didn’t have caller ID, she’d answer but immediately hang up when she heard it was me, but because her cell phone displayed my number she often just didn’t answer. Maybe I’d get her voice mail and be able to say whatever it was I was going to say to it.

“Hello.”

There had only been two rings and I wasn’t prepared—of course there could have been two hundred and I’d have felt the same way.

“Susan?”

“Yes,” she said, her voice sounding hesitant, unsure.

“It’s John.”

She didn’t say anything, and I waited a moment for her to hang up, but she didn’t.

“I’m surprised you answered,” I said.

“I didn’t realize it was you.”

“Oh.”

“Not that I wouldn’t have answered if I did.”

“Really?”

“What can I do for you?” she asked, her voice flat and emotionless––cold, not angry.

“Accept my apology,” I said.

“Why? So you can feel better about yourself? So you can complete a step? It doesn’t change anything. Nothing’s ever going to change between us.”

“I just needed to tell you I’m sorry again,” I said. “And that I think I have a better understanding of your decisions and why you made them.”

“You think so, do you? Well, I still don’t know why the hell you did what you did to me, to my family, to our family, but as long as John Jordan has insight, can apologize and feel good about himself again, that’s all that matters, right?”

I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t.

We were silent for a long moment.

After a while, I thought she might have ended the call, but then I heard her sigh heavily.

“I wish we had never met,” she said. “And I’m trying to pretend we never did, so if you’re really as sorry as you say you are, you can prove it by never calling me again.”

“Okay,” I said, but I was saying it to myself.

Shutting the phone, I slipped it into my pocket.

“She’s not wrong,” I said aloud.

Looking across the lake, breathing more deeply, I tried to take in as much of the beauty and serenity as I could, allowing the power of this sacred place to help heal me.

For a long moment, I just stood there, praying for forgiveness, for insight and wisdom, for Susan and her family, for Anna and Merrill, for my mom and Father Thomas and St. Ann’s, and for all the people I had wronged or hurt—even unintentionally.

Eventually, the healing began, and I felt connected and nurtured by my surroundings, as if they were a direct conduit to what I needed most.

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