The Angel (The Original Sinners) (19 page)

“Speaking of getting laid,” Nora began as she sat up and looked
at them both.

“Great way to start any conversation,” Griffin said.

“Søren called,” she continued.

“A horrible way to start any conversation.”

Nora reached out and swatted the bottom of Griffin’s feet. He
flinched and pouted at her.

“What’s up with Father S?” Michael rolled up and pulled his
T-shirt on. He caught Griffin watching his every move.

“That reporter bitch came by the church last night and
interrogated him,” Nora began. “She asked him point-blank if he and I were
sleeping together.”

“Shit.” Michael pulled a pillow to his stomach in nervousness.
“That’s bad.”

“She’s smart and she’s hot on our trail. We need to get her off
our trail.”

“Suggestions?” Griffin asked.

“We need a diversion. Let her see me with you. Make her think
we’re together.”

“I like it. Could work.” Griffin shrugged. “Just don’t drag me
to a Broadway premiere,” he said with such disgust Michael laughed.

Nora looked at Michael and smiled. Nora looked at Griffin and
smiled. Griffin looked at Michael, and Michael looked at Griffin. Neither of
them smiled.

“Let’s go to Sin Tax.”

Griffin whistled, sounding both dubious and impressed.

“I don’t know, Nora. We’re in Kingsley’s circle. Will they let
us in?”

“Of course they’ll let us in. Well, they’ll let me in, and I’ll
bring you with me.” Nora breathed on her fingernails and playfully buffed them
on her T-shirt. “I have a friend there.”

“Wait, what’s Sin Tax?” Michael asked, utterly lost in Griffin
and Nora’s shorthand yet again.

“It’s the one BDSM club in the city that Kingsley doesn’t have
his fingers in,” Nora explained. “It’s more public than King’s clubs. Sin Tax is
where celebs go if they want to look dark and cool. The famous people who go to
Kingsley’s clubs actually are dark and cool.”

“Like us.” Griffin winked at him. “So we go, get some
attention, get some pics taken, show up on Page Six, reporter thinks you and I
are together. That’s the plan?”

“That’s the plan.”

“What about Bruised over here?” Griffin glanced at Michael with
a grin.

“Oh, don’t worry about Michael,” Nora said as she crawled out
of bed and headed to the door. “We’re taking him with us.”

“And Søren will be okay with us going out in public together?”
Griffin called out after her.

Nora called back in a voice dangerous with feigned
innocence.

“Who?”

13

Wednesday evening at five, he’d said. Mary Queen Junior
High, two blocks from Sacred Heart. If Suzanne showed up she would see Father
Stearns without his collar on. And although she knew this was a really bad idea,
Suzanne couldn’t stop herself from going.

Parking in the main lot, she wandered around the outside of the
school. He hadn’t given her any specific information, no doubt wanting her
imagination to do all the work. As she neared the rear of the school—all too
similar to the Catholic schools of her youth, with its careworn exterior and
chipped Mary statues everywhere—Suzanne heard shouting followed by clapping.

Okay. She’d been right. This was a really bad idea. Out on the
soccer field, two dozen teenagers and twentysomethings and one tall blond man in
his forties played a hard-core game of soccer. Although older than the other
players by a couple decades, Father Stearns wasn’t only keeping up, he seemed to
be wiping the floor with them. He wore a fitted black T-shirt that showed off
his miraculously toned biceps and broad chest and black track pants that no
doubt hid equally toned hips and legs.

She stood at the edge of the field and watched the game. No,
not the game. She watched only Father Stearns—his blond hair like a halo in the
evening sun, his eyes hidden behind black wraparound sunglasses, the slightest
hint of sweat staining the shirt around his neck and lower back.

“Holy shit,” she breathed. She’d seen naked men less visually
arresting than this one soccer-playing priest.

“None of that,” came a voice from a few feet away from her. A
young man with sun-streaked hair sat on the sidelines with an ice pack on his
thigh. “Don’t even think about it.”

Blushing, Suzanne sat next to the young man and put on her own
sunglasses.

“Think about what?” she asked.

“Him. Father S. My priest. I’m Harrison, by the way. And
you’re…”

“Suzanne.”

“Suzanne, lovely to meet you. You’re that reporter chick,
right? He warned us you might be stopping by.”

“That’s me. Just working on a story.”

“For
Playgirl?
”

Suzanne laughed a little as Harrison adjusted his ice pack.

“You okay?” she asked.

“Strained a groin muscle.”

“Poor you. Rough game?”

“Wasn’t during the game.” He wagged his eyebrows at her.

“You’re flirting. And I’m ten years older than you.”

“He’s twenty years older than you and that’s not stopping you
from throwing the bedroom eyes at him. Best priest on the planet, and I have to
tell my own damn girlfriend to stop drooling all over him.”

Suzanne caught Father Stearns looking in her direction during a
pause in the play. She gave him a quick wave, which he returned before heading
down the pitch with remarkable grace and speed. The ball careened toward the
goal and he intercepted it with a hard kick that sent the ball halfway down the
field.

“Best priest on the planet? That’s high praise.” Suzanne wished
she’d brought her notebook with her. A flirtatious teenage boy could be a
wellspring of information. Reluctantly she pulled her eyes away from Father
Stearns and cast them on Harrison. She remembered guys like him from high
school—cocky, gregarious, always the center of attention.

“It’s true. He speaks like twenty languages, has two or three
PhDs…and kicks ass on our church league team. So don’t go after him because
you’re pretty enough to tempt even him.”

Suzanne shook her head.

“A teenage boy defending the unsullied virtue of his Catholic
priest—interesting,” she noted. “Do all the kids like Father Stearns?”

“Yeah, of course. He’s really laid-back.”

Suzanne’s eyes widened. Father Stearns, the couple of times
she’d talked to him, seemed intimidating and rigid.

“Laid-back?”

“Doesn’t lecture, doesn’t bitch at us for swearing, treats us
like people. It’s nice. Blake over there—” Harrison pointed to Father Stearns’s
goalkeeper “—goes to St. Mark’s. His dad’s a deacon there. Hates it. They’ve
been through three priests in three years. One went to rehab for booze. The
other got transferred for ‘reasons,’” Harrison said, putting the word
reasons
in scare quotes. “And the new guy is sixty
going on one hundred and sixty. Father Stearns rocks. So if you put the moves on
him, you and I will have words.”

“Have words? That’s cute.”

“I’m cute. And I’m not a priest.”

Suzanne turned back to the game for a second. Father Stearns
and his goalie seemed to be plotting. The goalie had a water bottle in his hand.
He took a swig before pouring some into Father Stearns’s hands. He took the
water and swept it through his hair, slicking it back. At that moment Suzanne
realized she’d never been so attracted to someone in her entire life. Need
pooled in her stomach like a simmering fire. Priest or not, enemy or not,
asterisk or not…she wanted him.

Adam,
she whispered to herself.
Remember Adam.

“So no rehab trips for Father Stearns? No weirdness?”

“Only weird thing is what’s he doing here with us in the
suburbs? He should be pope.”

Suzanne leaned back on her elbows and crossed her legs at the
ankles. She wished she’d worn shorts or a skirt, something to show off her legs
to Harrison.

“Maybe he’s got a reason for sticking around here.” She looked
at Harrison out of the corner of her eye.

“Like what?”

Suzanne shrugged. “I don’t know—Nora Sutherlin?”

Harrison clamped his hand to his chest.

“God, Nora. Be still my heart. Be still my groin.”

“That hot, is she?”

Harrison turned wide eyes at her and slowly nodded.

“You’re a fan?” Suzanne asked.

Again he nodded.

“Father Stearns also a fan?”

Harrison rolled his eyes.

“He’s male and straight. I’d worry if he wasn’t a fan.”

Suzanne pulled a dandelion from the grass and caressed her
bottom lip with it. Flirting with a teenager to get answers? How low could she
go?

“Think they’re together?”

Harrison shook his head. “No way. Why would he still be a
priest getting paid peanuts, putting up with us losers, if he had her waiting
for him at home? Besides,” Harrison said, dropping his voice to a whisper. Out
on the pitch, Father Stearns blocked yet another attempt at a goal. The
teenagers on the team looked tired and thirsty. He’d barely broken a sweat.

“Besides what?”

“I think Nora has a thing for younger men.”

Suzanne raised her eyebrow at him.

“Got any evidence? Or just wishful thinking?” God, now she
sounded like Father Stearns.

“Now I’m not one to tell tales out of school,” Harrison began.
“But there’s this guy at church—Suicide Mike.”

Suzanne’s hands went cold at the mention of suicide. But she
kept her face neutral.

“Suicide Mike?”

“I know. It’s horrible. I never call him that,” he said
although he just had. “Michael Dimir.”

“The boy who tried to commit suicide in the sanctuary?”

“The same,” he said, nodding. “Here’s the thing about
Suic…about Michael. Michael, he’s glass, breakable. Kid is scared of his own
shadow. Barely talks. You say hi to him and it takes a year off his life.”

Suzanne’s stomach dropped in sympathy. Withdrawn? Anxious?
Constantly on the alert? Michael sounded like a classic abuse victim to her. But
where had the abuse come from? Home? Or church?

“So?” Suzanne prompted, not wanting but needing to know
more.

“So Nora’s a little on the intimidating side. Famous, rich,
beautiful…you’d think if she said hi to him, he’d die on the spot. But no. I’m
sitting there two weeks ago, Sunday morning, staring at Nora like usual. And she
looks at Michael and winks at him. I thought, ‘Oh, shit, call 9-1-1—Mike’s going
to have a heart attack.’ But no, guess what he does?”

“What?”

“He stuck his tongue out at her like they were old buddies or
something. She stuck her tongue out back at him, and the temperature in the
sanctuary shot up twenty degrees from the heat of those two eye-fucking each
other.”

Suzanne didn’t say anything at first. Father Stearns seemed
rather defensive about both her and Michael Dimir. If he acted as confessor to
both of them, then no doubt he knew the thirtysomething author was having an
affair with a teenage boy. Together she and Harrison watched the game for a few
minutes in silence. Or almost silence. Despite being sidelined, Harrison
couldn’t seem to stop yelling advice and encouragements at his own team.

She didn’t know much about soccer, but she could tell that
Father Stearns owned the field. His team responded to his every quiet command
like well-trained soldiers. And he seemed indefatigable, running up and down the
field with the fearsome long-legged agility of a jaguar.

“God, he’s good,” she said, as he weaved in between two players
and scored a goal from the center line.

“Of course he’s good,” Harrison said, taking off the ice and
rubbing his inner thigh. “He’s one hundred and fifty percent pure European. Got
the soccer gene on both sides.”

“How can somebody be one hundred and fifty percent European?”
Suzanne asked, recalling what little she’d discovered about the priest’s
past.

“His father’s British, was British. Dead now. His mother’s
Danish. And he went to seminary in Italy.”

Danish mother? That would explain the hair and eyes. And the
inscriptions in the books and on the photo—must be Danish.

“Thought his mother was from New Hampshire.”

Harrison scoffed.

“Does that,” he said, pointing at Father Stearns, “look
American to you?”

“No,” she admitted. He looked spectacular to her—masculine and
handsome and so incredibly attractive. But not particularly American. “European
genes—guess that’s why he’s your best player.”

“Second best.”

“Second? Let me guess—you’re the best.”

Harrison shook his head.

“No. Father Stearns’s brother-in-law comes and practices with
us sometimes. He’s even better. But don’t tell Father S I said that. They’re
really competitive.”

Suzanne furrowed her brow. She knew Father Stearns had a
sister, but the older sister, Elizabeth, didn’t live in Connecticut.

“Brother-in-law? One of his sisters is married—”

Harrison shook his head.

“Father S was married.”

Her heart shuddered a little in her chest.

“Father Stearns was married?”

“Yeah, when he was my age—eighteen. Legal adult,” he reminded
her. “Apparently didn’t last long. She died. Some kind of accident. If I was an
eighteen-year-old widower, I’d probably join the priesthood too.”

Suzanne could barely speak.

“Married…”
I’m not a virgin…I wasn’t born
a priest…
“Eighteen…that would have been a long time ago. He and the
brother are still friends?”

“They’re either best friends or they want to kill each other.
Hard to tell sometimes. They constantly swear at each other in French.”

“French?”

“Yeah. Brother-in-law’s French.”

Harrison said something else but Suzanne had stopped listening.
She looked out across the field and saw the practice coming to an end. Father
Stearns’s team had won 2–1. Standing up, Suzanne brushed the grass off her jeans
and walked toward him.

As she came to him, he pushed his sunglasses up on his
head.

“Good game,” she said. “You were married?”

Father Stearns looked over her shoulder and shot Harrison a
death stare. Harrison blew a kiss at Suzanne.

“Every Thursday I devote to praying for vocations for the
church,” Father Stearns said. “I pray Harrison will be called to become a
Cistercian.”

“Cistercian?”

“They take vows of silence. This prayer has not been answered
yet.”

Suzanne laughed and fell into step beside Father Stearns. She
had to lengthen her already long strides to keep up with him.

“Yes, I was married,” he finally said. She realized with the
church so close by, he likely had just walked here. She decided to walk with him
until he shooed her off. “Very briefly. She died shortly after we wed.”

“Can I ask how or is that too personal?”

“Not personal,” he said as they hit the sidewalk. “Merely
painful. Marie-Laure fell to her death while out in the woods. I was a mile
away, lest you think my asterisk refers to a murder.”

“Beautiful name. She was French?”

“She was. A ballet dancer.”

Suzanne experienced an odd sensation then. Something like
jealousy. She pictured a beautiful French ballerina and her handsome young
husband. What passion they must have had for each other.

From the street they turned onto a path shrouded in darkness. A
canopy of trees lined the walkway. Ahead of them she spied a small two-story
Gothic cottage.

“And your mother was Danish? I thought she was from New
Hampshire?”

At the gate, they paused. Suzanne stood looking at him, waiting
for him to say something, do something.

“My parentage…it’s quite a long story,” he said, his gray eyes
as shadowed as the path they’d just walked.

Suzanne swallowed. She should not be doing this, should not be
alone with him. Not here. Not in his house.

“I’ve got time.”

* * *

A helicopter. They flew to the city in a freaking
helicopter.

The entire way there, Michael sat at the window staring at the
ground below, the clouds above and the horizon beyond… He couldn’t believe
Griffin could conjure up a helicopter as easily as one called a cab.
Griffin…Griffin must think he’s crazy. During the trip, as Michael nearly
drooled over the view, Griffin only watched him with unconcealed amusement.
Michael didn’t care if Griffin thought he was nuts—he couldn’t look away from
the beauty of the evening at eight thousand feet.

“I’ve got my camera.” Griffin tapped Michael on the knee to get
his attention. Michael loved the way Griffin looked in his aviator sunglasses
with the helicopter’s headset on. “Want to take pics to send your friends?”