Introduction

A Watchman Mystery

Introduction

You stand behind the pulpit like a king before his court. The people of Jericho Bend look up at you, hands folded, heads bowed, waiting for your voice to tell them what they already know in their bones—God is watching. And so are you.

They fear you. Oh, they love you, too, in that desperate way the guilty love the man who holds their absolution. They call you wise. They call you anointed. They whisper about your sermons, how you always seem to know. A wife’s quiet indiscretions. A deacon’s stolen tithe. A drunkard’s debts. It’s a gift, they say. A holy thing.

But you know better, don’t you, Reverend?

It isn’t God whispering in your ear. It’s something much closer to home—something bought, paid for, and fed like a mongrel dog sniffing at the door of every house in town. You’ve spent years keeping them in line, bending them to your will, and as long as the secrets keep coming, the people keep kneeling. It’s a fine little kingdom you’ve built for yourself.

But a man like you ought to know—when you spend your life digging up the sins of others, sooner or later, someone starts digging up yours.

And when they do, Reverend… oh, when they do… you’re going to wish you never learned how to read.