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

He turns and says, “I’ll call you.”


An incoming call on my cell phone interrupts us.


I hold up a finger as if to say Hold on


I dig my iPhone out of my back pocket and stare at the screen: It’s Chief Barton.


I look up at Steve. “I’ve got to get this.”


Steve nods, and turns to go, leaving me standing alone in the diner with Lou.


It feels like déjà vu when I return to the scene of the crime at Firewood Road ten minutes later. Looker-loos post like statutes on their front stoops, and I hear them whispering in the light of morning as a shimmering swirl of red and blue light from three police cruisers illuminate the street. An ambulance is parked in the driveway.


I cuss under my breath as I walk up the gravel driveway to the apartment building.


Chapter 19