A closeted pastor’s secret turns deadly, leading to cover-up, exposure, and downfall. His saintly image burns to ash, along with the truth.
Copyright Priya Florence Shah. All Rights Reserved.
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The carpet in Room 413 smelled of industrial cleaner and cigarette ash, the kind that clung to your nostrils like guilt.
Pastor Micah Langley sat stiff on the edge of the queen bed, Bible open on his lap like a prop he forgot to put away.
He wasn’t here to pray.
A soft knock — two taps, then silence.
Micah opened the door to reveal a boy. Maybe nineteen. Maybe not.
Gaunt cheeks, bruised eyes, hoodie zipped up to the chin despite the muggy heat outside.
“You Langley?” the boy asked, his voice scratchy, his jaw grinding slightly.
“Call me Micah,” the pastor said, stepping aside.
The boy walked in like he’d done it a hundred times, which he had.
He dropped his bag on the armchair and pulled out a bottle of orange pills.
“Half up front,” he said, not looking at the man behind him.
Micah fumbled for his wallet, fingers trembling. “You — uh — what’s your name?”
“Cody.”
It was probably fake. Micah didn’t push. He handed over the cash.
Cody snorted two pills dry off the room service menu and cracked a grin that didn’t reach his eyes. “You nervous, preacher man?”
Micah flinched. “Don’t call me that.”
“Sure. Micah.” He stretched on the bed like a cat who’d lived too many lives. “You want to talk first, or just get to the sinning?”
Micah said nothing, staring out the window like he could still back out.
Then Cody’s body jerked.
And again.
“Shit,” Micah whispered, lunging forward.
Cody was seizing, foaming at his mouth, twitching like a puppet with cut strings.
“Jesus Christ.” Micah fell to his knees. “No. No, no — wake up.”
It took six minutes for the twitching to stop. Cody’s chest rose once. Then didn’t again.
Micah sobbed.
Not for Cody. For himself.
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The night manager, Kiran, was only twenty-three, new to the job, and owed more than his life was worth to the wrong people.
“You didn’t see anything,” Micah whispered, pulling out a thick envelope. “He was never here.”
Kiran looked at the boy’s body, his own face pale. “I could lose my job.”
“You could lose more than that.”
Two more workers were paid off by dawn. The security footage disappeared.
The body, wrapped in a hotel shower curtain, was loaded into Micah’s trunk and driven to a remote crematorium outside Elmsbridge County — run by a man who owed Micah a favor from decades past.
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Sunday morning, Pastor Micah Langley took the pulpit at Grace Redeemed Church, as always.
He spoke of fire and judgment.
He spoke of secrets.
“God sees what we hide in darkness,” he intoned, voice trembling with poetic irony. “And one day, the mask will fall.”
No one noticed his shaking hands.
No one noticed how long he stared at the flame of the communion candle.
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But Kiran couldn’t sleep.
Night after night, he saw the boy’s blue lips in his dreams and woke choking on guilt.
His mother found the stash of money. Then she found the burned clothes.
By the third week, he cracked.
They came for Micah Langley at dawn.
The trial was swift.
Evidence came in waves. Cell phone pings. Trace pills. Witness statements. A fireman who recalled the cremation request at 3 a.m.
And then the photo. Cody, alive. Smiling. A school ID from two years earlier. Fifteen at the time.
The courtroom gasped.
Micah stood stone-faced, hands clasped like he was still preaching.
When the verdict was read — guilty on all counts — he bowed his head.
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In prison, Micah was no longer Pastor Langley.
He was inmate #46890.
The guards called him “Father Ash.”
His cellmate, a tattooed ex-con named Reno, laughed when he learned Micah used to preach.
“You burned a kid and thought God wouldn’t notice?”
Micah didn’t reply.
At night, he prayed.
But the words came out hollow.
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Outside, Grace Redeemed Church replaced the stained-glass window that bore his likeness.
Cody’s mother held a candlelight vigil on the church steps.
The press called him a predator.
The town called him a monster.
And the only thing that remained of the saintly image he built was ash.
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