Devil Without a Cause Read Online Free Page A

preschooler, obsessed with cars and SpongeBob SquarePants. Then came the headaches, the vomiting, the lack of appetite and energy. What she’d hoped was just an intestinal bug had become a nightmare of epic proportions—blood work, CAT scans, and MRIs, all culminating in the horrible news she’d gotten yesterday afternoon.
    “I’m sorry,” Dr. Wynecke had told her, “but the MRI confirms a small lesion at the base of Nathan’s skull. We’ll need to get a tissue sample to determine if it’s malignant.”
    Her first thought had been that she’d misheard him—the words he’d used made no sense. But there had been no mistaking the look of concern and sympathy in his eyes, and no mistaking what he’d said next.
    Cancer. Immediate surgery. Biopsy, possible chemotherapy, radiation therapy.
    Which was why she was sitting here now, in an empty chapel at Columbia Hospital, while her only child was lying on an operating table, his life in someone else’s hands.
    “Please,” she whispered, raising her eyes to the wooden cross on the wall before her. “Please don’t let him die.”
    “Do you think He hears you?” came a voice.
    Startled, she looked around, but there was no one.
    “Do you think He cares?”
    She stood, grasping the empty pew in front of her.
    “He doesn’t, you know. The life of one poor, sick child means nothing to Him in the big scheme of things.”
    It was a man’s voice, smooth and matter-of-fact. Frightened, Faith moved to leave the chapel, but stopped short at the distinct click coming from the chapel door. “Hello?” she asked loudly, wiping tears from her face with one hand. “Who’s there?”
    No one answered. The ensuing silence was laden with tension, causing the hair on the back of her neck to prickle. Moving quickly to the door, she tried the handle, but it was locked. Glancing nervously over her shoulder, she pounded on the door with her palm. “Hello? Is anyone out there? Can anyone hear me? I’m locked in.”
    “No one hears you,” the voice said, “except me.”
    Faith spun around, beginning to panic. One way in, one way out, and the way was blocked. “Help,” she shouted at the top of her lungs, pounding at the door.
    Columbia was a busy hospital. There’d been plenty of people around when she’d made her way here after they’d taken Nathan to surgery, unable to stand the sight of his empty hospital bed.
    No one came, and try as she might, she could hear nothing on the other side of the door.
    Willing herself to calm, she scanned the quiet chapel. No cameras, no speakers, just a small room, plain wooden pews filled with a scattering of Bibles, a prie-dieu for kneeling, and a simple cross on the wall. Blinking back tears, she hammered again on the door with her fists. “Help, someone! I’m locked in the chapel! Let me out.”
    “ ‘Malignant’ is such an ugly word, isn’t it?” The man’s voice came from nowhere, and from everywhere. “A big, ugly word that just doesn’t fit with the image of such a small head, capped with brown curls, just like his mother’s.”
    Faith lifted a trembling hand to her mouth and pressed it there, hard, to keep back the sobs that rose in her throat.
    “So helpless,” the voice went on, “so innocent. Nathan trusted you to keep him safe—yet you’re helpless as well, aren’t you?”
    “Stop it!” she screamed, frightened out of her wits. Who was it? Who could possibly be so cruel? “Leave me alone!” Crying harder now, she tugged on the door handle with both hands, desperate to leave the voice and the chapel behind.
    “I can help you, Faith McFarland,” said the voice. “I’m the only one who can help you.”
    Faith slumped against the door, leaning her forehead against the wood. Nathan would be out of surgery soon; she needed to be there for him. “Let me out,” she begged tearfully, with no idea whom she was pleading with. “Please.”
    “I will in a moment, but first we need to have a little chat.”
    She