Page 52

"Peter kept it. Took it from his father's body, maybe." She turned another page and drew in a sharp breath. This photo showed Peter alone, perhaps twelve years old, standing in a mine tunnel. He wore what looked like prison chains, their links gleaming in the camera flash. His father's cross hung too large around his thin neck.
"He's smiling," Finn said quietly.
He was right. Unlike the blank expression in other photos, young Peter beamed at the camera, eyes bright with something that might have been joy.
Or madness.
They found more photos, more evidence of Frank's obsession with darkness and redemption. But nothing to suggest Peter had returned here recently. The house was exactly as it had been left decades ago, layers of dust undisturbed except for the occasional curious teenager or urban explorer.
In Frank's study, Sheila found a Bible with hundreds of handwritten notes in the margins. But these weren't typical religious annotations—they were twisted interpretations, paranoid ramblings about punishment and darkness that had nothing to do with actual Christian teachings. Frank had created his own religion, using fragments of scripture to justify his cruelty.
"Look at this," she said, showing Finn a passage where Frank had written: The darkness shall be his teacher, as it was mine. Through suffering comes understanding. Next to it, in different handwriting—perhaps Peter's—someone had added: The darkness speaks its own gospel.
"He wasn't following any real faith," Finn said, examining more of Frank's writings. "This was his own creation, his way of justifying what he did to his son."
"And Peter adopted it," Sheila added. "But he made it his own. Where Frank used Christian imagery to hide his cruelty, Peter embraced darkness itself as his religion." She gestured at the crosses scattered throughout the house. "These weren't symbols of faith for them—they were markers of control, of power."
They found more evidence of this perversion in Frank's journals. While he quoted scripture and claimed divine guidance, his actual beliefs had nothing to do with traditional Christian teachings of love, forgiveness, and redemption. This was a cult of one, passed from father to son, transformed through years of abuse into something even darker.
The entries also traced his descent into madness, which seemed to have begun in 1958, during Frank's early days as mine foreman. His military engineering background had made him confident—perhaps too confident—about the mines' stability. Then came the collapse that killed three workers under his command—and trapped him in total darkness for six days.
The early passages of one of the journals showed a man grappling with trauma—nightmares about the weight of earth above him, panic attacks at the sight of dark spaces. But as the weeks turned to months, something shifted. The darkness that had terrified him became an obsession. He began writing about its "purifying" qualities, how it stripped away pretense and weakness.
His fear was overcome by a sense of power—the realization that he could control who lived and died in the darkness.
Later entries suggested he'd started deliberately spending nights in the mines, claiming the darkness "spoke" to him. His religious references grew more twisted, mixing scripture with ravings about tests of faith in the depths. By the time Peter was born, Frank had fully embraced his delusion that darkness was God's chosen instrument of revelation—a belief he would eventually inflict on his son in the most horrific ways.
They were interrupted by the buzzing of Finn's phone. He answered, listening for a moment. His expression changed. "We'll be right there."
"What is it?" Sheila asked as he ended the call.
"Another missing person," he said grimly. "One of the protesters."
***
Sheila stood in Sarah Riggs' crowded office at Save Our Mountains headquarters, watching the protest leader pace between filing cabinets and stacks of signed petitions. The space smelled of coffee and printer ink, and a wall of monitors showed live feeds from the mine entrances—the protest group's own surveillance system.
"Michelle was covering the mountain residences," Riggs said, shuffling through papers on her cluttered desk. "We have strict protocols—check in every two hours, never enter homes, stay on marked roads." She found what she was looking for—a clipboard with a list of addresses. "But we're missing her route sheet. She took it with her."
"When was her last check-in?" Finn asked. He'd positioned himself near the door, trying not to disturb the organized chaos of the small office.
"Nine-thirty." Riggs checked her watch. "Almost three hours ago. She was supposed to call at eleven." She ran a hand through her steel-gray hair. "I should never have sent her up there alone. But with the media coverage of Diana Martinez's disappearance, we needed those signatures. Needed to show the mining company that people want these death traps sealed now, not after some endless safety review."
Sheila studied the wall of monitors. "Your people really watch the mines twenty-four seven?"
"We track everything—vehicles entering the area, unusual activity, any sign the mining company is trying to destroy evidence of their negligence." Riggs gestured to a young man monitoring the feeds. "Show her the footage from this morning."
He pulled up a recording. The time stamp read 9:15 AM. Michelle Waring appeared, clipboard in hand, walking toward a cluster of mountain homes. She was young—early twenties maybe—with long dark hair and the earnest expression of someone who believed she could change the world.
"That's the last visual we have," Riggs said. "The cameras don't cover the private residences. Too many complaints about privacy."
"We need a list of every house on her route," Sheila said. "And any information about who lives there."
"Already compiled." Riggs handed her a folder. "Most are longtime residents—retirees, artists, people who like their solitude. But there are some rental properties, some vacation homes. And a few..." She hesitated. "A few where we're not sure who lives there."
Sheila opened the folder, scanning the list. Twenty-three addresses. Twenty-three possibilities.
"Any of these residents ever give you trouble?" she asked Riggs. "Complaints, threats, unusual behavior?"