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“You’re no savior,” Clyde says, straightening. His gaze cuts down at me, sharp and gleaming. “You’re just another sinner.” His lips curl in something between pity and triumph. “And it’s time for judgment.”

A figure steps closer from the shadows, his face resolving in the flickering light. My breath locks in my throat. It’s him.

Brother Jeb. He was one of them men in the picture. His name slams through me like a hammer to the chest. The world tilts sideways, the room warping at the edges.

“You’ve been busy,” he says, crouching before me. His voice is smooth, smug, curling at the edges like smoke. “Your father always said you had fire in you.” His lips curve into a slow, gloating smile. “Guess he was right.”

His gaze drifts lower, sweeping over me, lingering like fingers pressed against old bruises. “Still trembling, I see.”

I clamp my teeth together so hard my jaw aches. But the tremor in my hands won’t stop.

His grin deepens. “Just like that night in the cellar.” His voice drops, intimate and poisonous. “When you cried so pretty, begging him to stop. And he let me watch.”

My stomach lurches. A dry heave claws up my throat.

“You remember, don’t you?” Brother Jeb leans closer, his breath warm and stale against my cheek. “You think you’ve changed. But you’re still her. Still his.”

The light shifts, dims further, as they close in, shadows swallowing me whole.

I brace for what comes next, but inside, a flicker refuses to die.

A flicker of fire.

A flicker of me.

CHAPTER

FIFTY-SEVEN

They bind me to the altar, a crude contraption of splintered wood and cold steel. The ropes around my wrists and ankles bite deep, cutting sharper with every futile twist. Above me, the men form a tight circle, their faces emerging from shadow as they step closer, voices low and rhythmic, a mockery of prayer.

Their eyes are what catch me first. Not the shape of their mouths, not the roughness of their skin, but their eyes. Each one holds the same hollow vacancy. Flat. Lifeless. Like glass marbles set into human sockets.

“This,” one of them says, stepping forward, “is where you belong, Lydia. Beneath us. As God intended.”

Clyde stands at the edge of the circle, arms crossed, his face calm. But his eyes burn. “Do you understand yet?” he asks, voice soft but deliberate. “This is worship, Lydia. Not the worship of some distant god. The worship of what’s real. Of what belongs to us.”

A man steps forward, knife in hand, and crouches beside me. “God made man in His image,” he murmurs, the blade brushing my collarbone. “And He made woman for man. That’s all you are. A vessel.” The knife moves, slicing through the fabric of my shirt, the sound splitting the silence.

I force my breath to steady. “You think this is strength?” I say, voice trembling but fierce. “You think this makes you righteous?”

“Shut your mouth,” another man snaps, and his hand cracks across my face. My head jerks sideways, light bursting behind my eyes. But I don’t let the tears fall.

I lift my head, blinking through the stars in my vision, and meet his gaze. “You’re cowards,” I spit. “Twisting scripture because you’re too weak to face your own sins. Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. By their fruits you will know them.”

His hand rises again, but Clyde’s lifts first, a quiet command.

“No,” Clyde says. “Let her speak.” He crouches until his face fills my vision. “Let her show us how far she’s fallen.” He leans in. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? Jeremiah 17:9.”

The room falls into an awful hush. The doors open. Henry O’Rourke wheels him in.

My father.

He slumps in the chair like a puppet cut from its strings, head listing, jaw slack. His eyes are open but distant, flickering like a dying bulb. He looks at me, or past me, or through me.

“He wanted to see this,” one of the men says, glee threading the words. “He wanted to watch his daughter return to her rightful place.”

They gather around him, circling. “Do you approve, Pastor?”