Officer Jack Ballinger receives a phone call from the chief of police in the early morning hours regarding a dead body at an apartment building in a quiet neighborhood in the small upstate New York town of Black Falls. A female student lies in a pentagram outlined in her own blood, clutching a rosary. Ballinger and his former partner Officer Cory Ryan interview tenants in the building about the girl’s death, but are met with more questions than answers.<br><br>When another body is found in the same apartment building a few hours later, Jack knows something is wrong. As he ciphers through a patchwork of unexplainable clues, the investigation detours when Ryan disappears from the case and cannot be found.<br><br>With his future as an officer in question, will Ballinger be able to deal with the truth of these crimes once he dscovers everything he thought he knew was a lie?

Past Sins

I am buzzed from the booze, my head swimming with unpleasant thoughts. I step toward the door and unlock the chains, my hand hovering on the handle.


I look out through the eyehole; the hall is empty.


I aim the gun out in front of me as I turn the bottom lock counterclockwise and pull the door open slightly, the chain link lock still affixed, clattering in place.


Staring out the crack, I don’t see anybody. “Hello?”


I close the door and step out into the hallway, slowly, cautiously, looking left to right. Right to left, aiming the gun in every direction.


At the far end of the corridor, near the stairwell exit, I see a figure, masked in a dark hoodie, staring out the window to the tenant parking lot below.


The figure turns in slow motion, and I catch a glimpse of his long face in the bright moonlight spilling in from the high window.


Chapter 10