But I considered it more likely that this was a symptom of post-traumatic stress, her fight-or-flight response—and Lucia, clinging to her as always like a limpet—triggering a false alarm. Becca had probably seen someone who resembled Jimmy, and, unable to distinguish if the threat was real or perceived, her body had automatically reacted, heart rate, breathing, and stress levels rising as she’d tried to avoid him.
Enough of these kind of encounters, false or not, and anyone would start to lose it.
It was likely Jimmy had put as much distance between himself and the crime scene as possible in the nine years since Lucia’s death. There was approximately zero chance he was still in the area, and a less than zero chance that I was going to be able to track down where he’d gone . . . not without his last name, and a whole lot of luck.
And I don’t believe in luck.
It was right as I was thinking this that Becca looked up from the pile of tissues she’d massacred and squinted across the sun-bathed courtyard. “Is that Sister Ernestine?”
I followed her gaze. The nun was standing beneath the nearest breezeway with her arms folded across her ample chest, peering at us disapprovingly . . . or more specifically, peering at the triplets, who were still busy scooping coins from the fountain, their small bodies visibly more inside it than out of it.
Busted.
“Oh, yes,” I said breezily, giving Sister Ernestine a casual wave. “No worries.”
Wrong. Worries. Big, big worries.
Becca evidently sensed my unease, since she drew her hands from mine and asked, “You aren’t going to tell her anything about this, are you?”
“Not if you don’t want me to. But I do think you ought to tell your parents, Becca. You’ve been through something really terrible, and in some ways you’ve handled it really well, especially for someone so young—” I saw her puff up a little at the praise, like a flower soaking in the sun. The poor girl’s self-confidence was in ruins, and no wonder. She’d been living in terror for years. “But you really ought to be talking to a professional mental health counselor—”
She gave me a horrified look. “I have talked to one! You.”
“I’m not a professional, Becca. I’m still in graduate school. I’m just an intern here at—”
“But you’re a mediator!”
I glanced at Sister Ernestine. “Not so loud, okay? That’s supposed to be just between you and me. And I mediate for the undead. You’re alive, Becca.”
“I can’t.” She shook her head. “I can’t tell anyone else. I did once before, and it . . . it turned out to be a disaster.”
“Wait a second.” Sister Ernestine had decided my wave was a little too casual for her taste, and had begun to stride across the courtyard toward us. I wasn’t sure whom she was going to yell at first, the triplets or me. If it was the triplets, and the sister startled Lucia, she was going to be in for a big—and possibly painful—surprise. I needed to head her off at the pass before that happened, but I also needed to hear what Becca was about to say, because it sounded like vital information.
Fortunately Sister E wasn’t in the best of shape, and waddled more than she walked. It took her approximately forever to get anywhere.
“When I asked if you’d told anyone else about this, Becca, you said you hadn’t—”
“I didn’t. I swore I wouldn’t. But in second grade at Sacred Trinity they had us do our first Rite of Reconciliation . . . you know, confession, in the booth, and everything? And I figured since it was anonymous, and the priest couldn’t see me, I could tell him what had happened.”
I blinked at her. “Wait. You told a priest at Sacred Trinity about Jimmy?”
She nodded. “I thought—well, I guess I thought confessing to a priest wouldn’t be the same as telling. They aren’t allowed to report what they hear in confession to the police, right?”
“Right,” I said, still in shock. “The seal of the confessional is absolute.” I knew this from two years of Catholic school and eight years of hanging around a priest who happened to be my boyfriend’s confessor, and wouldn’t tell me a word they’d discussed, no matter how hard I’d wheedled. “You told this priest everything?”
“Yes. But nothing happened the way they said it would in religion class. You know how when you’re in there, you can see the priest’s face through the little screen, but the priest isn’t supposed to be able to see you, unless you want him to?”
I’d never been to confession, not being Catholic, but I’d seen this on TV. “Sure.”
“Well, after I started telling him everything, he pulled away the partition, so he could see my face. And then he asked my name. They aren’t supposed to do that, are they?”
Suddenly I didn’t notice Sister Ernestine’s progress anymore. All of my attention was focused on Becca. “No, they aren’t. What happened next?”
“Well, then, the priest told me that I was going to burn in hell for having told so many lies, and that the only way I’d be spared was if I came to his office after school so he could personally give me lessons in faith—”
I let out a curse word so blistering Becca wasn’t the only one I shocked.
“Miss Simon!” Sister Ernestine was just a few yards away, her wimple fluttering behind her in the breeze. “May I please have a word with you?”