a prepackaged prayer. Since childhood, church attendance had always been a given, the need for it drummed into her by a grandmother for whom prayer had been the only barricade against defeat. Now, as she tried to formulate one and failed, she realized how odd it was that at a crossroads in her own life, when most people turned to God, all outward manifestations of her faith had simply vanished.
Charlotte closed her eyes, hoping to connect with something larger than herself, but instead she felt herself falling into a void as dark and limitless as a night sky without stars. Her eyelids flew open, and she could hear her own heart beating. Perspiration filmed her cheeks and dampened her hair, and even though her hands were folded in her lap, they trembled.
The stillness of the chapel seemed to close in around her, as if to ask why she was there. She couldn’t find words, and her mind fluttered from image to image with no place to land. But there was something else the church could offer.
Someone else.
There were no confession booths at the Church of the Covenant, and Charlotte’s minister was younger than she was, stylish and outspoken. They had butted heads on so many occasions that now Charlotte wondered if, deep in her heart, Reverend Analiese Wagner would find pleasure in her turmoil.
Yet where else could she go? Who else could she talk to?
For a woman who had always had answers for everybody, she was surprised to learn how few of them really meant anything.
* * *
As she pulled into the church lot, the Reverend Analiese Wagner was thinking about food, which was not unusual. She always thought about food when she was worried, or when she had five things to do at once. Maybe that was why she was picturing double cheeseburgers in her mind, along with double scoops of Ben & Jerry’s Chunky Monkey. This afternoon she was doubly stressed.
“If I make it through the memorial service, double cheese on my next pizza,” she promised herself out loud, although she hadn’t eaten pizza for years because it was as impossible to stop eating as salted peanuts. Even now, at thirty-eight, after years of adulthood as a willowy size ten, the fat little girl inside her was still clawing to get out. For the rest of her life she would be forced to watch every bite and exercise without mercy.
Someone had parked in the slot against the side fence reserved for clergy. To be fair, the driver hadn’t exactly parked in the slot. She—and Analiese knew it was a she—had parked beside it, but not well, so the silver Audi was actually taking up two places, one of them Analiese’s. She recognized the car.
“Charlotte Hale.” Mentally she thumped her palm against the steering wheel of her ten-year-old Corolla, the very same Corolla that Charlotte Hale had asked about several months ago, just before she handed Analiese the business card of a car dealer who could arrange a low-interest loan and a trade-in.
Analiese couldn’t recall seeing Charlotte at services or meetings in the past month or so, but that was likely to mean that today Charlotte had a list as long as her arm of problems she wanted to comment on.
Analiese found another spot at the end of the row, but once she turned off the Toyota’s engine, she sat quietly and closed her eyes.
“Please, Lord,” she prayed softly, “help me mind my tongue, my manners and while we’re at it, today please give me an extra spoonful of compassion, no matter how bitter it tastes.” She hesitated. “A slice of no-cal pizza would be good, too, but I know better than to push.”
Out of habit she put two fingers against the hollow of her throat to loosen her clerical collar—until she realized she wasn’t wearing one. In half an hour she would be changing into her robe for the service she was here to conduct, so she was wearing a simple round-necked navy dress. Right now anyone who didn’t know her would assume she was one of the mourners come to honor Minnie Marlborough.
There was nothing particularly ministerial about Analiese. Her nearly black hair was shoulder-length, and she rarely pinned it up so she would look older or plainer. Her regular features added up to something beyond striking. While no one insisted a minister be attractive, her first career had been in television news, where physical beauty had served her well.
She opened her eyes and continued to breathe deeply, staring at the building just beyond her parking place.
The first time she had been driven to this spot by a member of the ministerial search committee, she had sat just this way, gazing at her future. With its arrowhead arches and multispired north tower—not to mention imposing blocks of North Carolina granite and stained glass from the famous Lamb Studios of Greenwich Village—she’d been certain that Asheville’s Church of the Covenant would withstand Armageddon and hang around for the Second Coming.
In any architectural textbook, the city’s most influential Protestant church was just a yawn on the way to more impressive renderings of Gothic Revival glory. The church paled in significance beside the ornate Roman Catholic Basilica of St. Lawrence downtown, or the Cathedral of All Souls in nearby Biltmore Village, the seat of the region’s Episcopal bishop. But Analiese had never quite gotten over that first punch-in-the-gut impression of the church to which she had later been called. Now, as then, she felt unworthy to be its spiritual leader.
One last deep breath propelled her out of the car. Before she locked it she reached into the backseat for the colorful needlepoint tote bag her oldest sister had made as an ordination gift. With the bag slung over her shoulder, she hurried toward the church, avoiding the parish house and, she hoped, the silver Audi’s owner, as well. At the door, she saw Felipe had arrived first. For a moment she was glad she didn’t have to wrestle with the cast-iron lock, which on a good day took the better part of a minute. Then, as she was about to slip inside, she wondered if Felipe had unlocked the door, or if someone else had borrowed the key and was waiting for her inside.
Someone she wasn’t anxious to see.
Her brief burst of good humor disappeared.
She was happiest when the sanctuary was filled with people, and music echoed from the walls. Today the pews were empty, but that wasn’t necessarily the end of the story. Cautiously Analiese found her way along slippery polished tile floors to the transept, following it to the cozier side chapel that had been added early in the twentieth century by an industrialist friend of the Vanderbilts.
Historically the chapel had been a place for quiet contemplation, but most often these days it was used for children’s worship services. Felt banners made by one of the Sunday School classes hung between two narrow stained-glass windows of contemporary design. Stylistically wrought jewel-tone doves and olive branches vied with off-center renditions of the Star of David, the Taoist yin-yang and multiple Buddhas, both smiling and glum.
The woman sitting in the front row staring at the banners was neither, but then Charlotte Hale was not a woman who often showed emotion. In the ten years of her ministry here, Analiese had learned that the Charlottes in a congregation were the members an alert minister should most fear.
She debated what to do. She couldn’t believe Charlotte had come for Minnie’s memorial service. Beyond that, the service didn’t start for almost an hour, so mourners could attend after work.
Analiese almost turned away, but something told her not to. Maybe it was the way Charlotte was sitting. Maybe it was the stillness in the chapel and the sanctuary beyond, plus the fact that Charlotte had entered this quiet place alone.
She walked through the doorway, making enough noise to alert the other woman. Charlotte was not dressed for a memorial service. She wore a casual lightweight turtleneck with three-quarter sleeves and a skirt of the same mulberry. Her auburn hair was windblown, and she hadn’t bothered with jewelry except tiny gold studs in her earlobes. She looked as if she’d run out for milk and bread and forgotten her way home.
“Charlotte?”
Charlotte turned to look at her. Her expression was blank, her cheeks pale, and she looked exhausted, which was unusual. “Reverend Ana.” She nodded, but she didn’t smile.
“I’m not sure what to do,” Analiese said. “Offer