The Saint: The Original Sinners Book 5 (17 page)

“My marriage will be common knowledge in time, and I wanted you to hear about it from me and no one else.”

“Go on.”

“It’s a long and fairly sordid story, so forgive me for giving you the bowdlerized version. My best friend in school was half French. His parents had died in an accident outside Paris when he was fourteen. He came to Maine to live with his grandparents. They sent him to the school I attended—a Jesuit boarding school. His older sister, Marie-Laure, was a ballet dancer in Paris. Brother and sister missed each other terribly. Neither of them had any money between them. She couldn’t come to America. He couldn’t go live in Paris again. This might come as a shock to you, but my father had a great deal of money.”

“Shocked. Stunned. Flabbergasted.”

“I had a sizable trust fund I’d inherit when I married. I wanted my friend to be able to see his sister again. She wanted to live in America. Marrying her meant I would receive my trust fund, which I planned to give to them. Money and citizenship—I thought that would be enough for her. Everyone would win.”

“What happened?”

Søren’s lips formed a tight line. A shadow passed over his eyes.

“Nobody won. Money and American citizenship weren’t enough for her. I had warned Marie-Laure in advance that ours would be a marriage in name only. I had no romantic interest in her whatsoever.”

“Why not?”

Søren sighed and gave a low mirthless laugh.

“Let’s save that answer for another time. Suffice it to say she wasn’t my type. And I won’t speak ill of the dead.”

“She’s dead?”

“She is. She said she was in love with me. I don’t think she was. I think she considered my lack of interest in her a challenge. She pursued me obsessively and failed in her pursuit. She saw me kiss someone else and ran away in anger. She tripped and fell and died. Her brother thinks she committed suicide. I don’t believe she had it in her to destroy herself. She loved herself far too much. Either way, she was gone, and I was a widower mere weeks after marrying. Her brother took her body back to Paris to bury her near their parents and never returned to school. I traveled Europe the summer of my eighteenth year and in the autumn I started seminary. That is the story—as much of it as I can tell you tonight.”

Eleanor leaned into her hands and breathed. She had no idea how to react to this news.

“So you know how to waltz because of her?”

“I tried to distract her from her painful attempts at seducing me by asking her about ballet, about dance, about anything that interested her.”

“You never had sex with her?”

“The marriage was unconsummated.”

“Your own wife.”

“I barely knew her when we married. And she was the sister of my closest friend.”

“Still, it was legal Catholic fucking. And you said she was beautiful, right?”

“When I realized how strong her feelings were for me, I considered it. I didn’t want to, but she was my wife for better or worse. I felt duty bound to make her happy. I failed. And it’s for the best. I’m not the sort of person who can engage in sex simply to pass the time. The one person I was intimate with as a teenager loved me deeply and made sacrifices to be with me. I exact a certain toll on a person.”

“I’m almost eighteen, Søren. You got married at eighteen. Stop acting like I’m too young for you.”

“My reticence has little to do with your age and everything to do with me being a priest who has no desire to drag you into a relationship that will dangerously complicate your life.”

“I want you so much.”

“Eleanor, I could barely breathe watching you walk down the aisle today. Do you know how much it hurt knowing you will never walk down that aisle to me?”

Tears burned her eyes.

“It hurt me, too,” she confessed, and blinked the tears away.

He took her chin in his hand and tilted her face up to meet his eyes. When she looked in them she saw no mercy, no compassion, no love, no kindness—only the cold, bitter truth.

“Little One, to be with me is to hurt.”

“To be without you would hurt more. It did hurt more. You won’t scare me off. I’m not afraid of you.”

He released her chin and Eleanor took a deep breath. Learning the truth about Søren was like fighting the Hydra. Every question he answered spawned three more questions. The more she learned the less she understood, the harder she had to fight.

“I’ll let you get back to your cleaning.” He stood up and Eleanor, still sitting, reached for his hand.

“Don’t go,” she said. “Please. We don’t have to talk. Stay a while. It’s been so long and I missed you so much....”

He threaded his fingers through her hair and she rested her head against his stomach.

“I missed you, too. Every day. But I can’t stay, Little One.” He caressed the back of her neck. “I have company.”

She turned her face up to him and tried to smile.

“Hot date waiting for you?”

“He wishes.”

“Don’t we all?”

“We’ll talk again soon. Once I’ve sobered up and recovered enough self-control to be alone in a room with you without thinking the things I’m thinking.”

“Do they involve us breaking the gift table?”

“It never stood a chance.”

Eleanor heaved a melodramatic sigh and stood on top of a chair.

“What are you doing, Eleanor?”

“I wanted to look down on you. This works.” She slid her hands over his broad back and wrapped her arms around him. She rested her chin against his shoulder and closed her eyes.

“You owe me this,” she said. “You dumped me. Now you owe me.”

“I’ll make it up to you in time,” he promised. His arms tightened around her, tight enough she knew he meant it.

She started to release him, but he wouldn’t let her go. Smiling, she clung to him even harder, relishing the feel of his large, strong hands on her back and his arms holding her so close to him not even God could slide between the cracks. Her body temperature spiked from the heat of him against her. A thousand dark and beautiful images flashed through her mind—him pressing her against the wall, capturing her mouth in a kiss, clothes coming off seemingly of their own will and him on top of her, inside her, claiming her as his own all night long.

“Why are you a priest?” She dug her hands in the back of his hair. Such soft hair and pale as spun gold.

“I love being a priest. It’s who I am. And it’s who I am because God wants me to be a priest.”

“Are you sure?”

“If I had any doubt in my mind, do you think you’d still be a virgin?”

“Who said I was?”

Søren pulled back long enough to give her a dirty look.

“Oh, stop glaring and hug me, Blondie.”

Laughing, he pulled her close again.

“You promised me everything,” she whispered.

“And I will keep my promise. But not yet.”

“Don’t worry about it. I told you I can wait, and I’ll wait. I know this is a big deal.”

“What you want from me, what we want from each other...it’s forbidden, Little One. If I’m caught, if we’re caught....”

The warning tone in his voice gave her a chill.

“How bad would it be?” she asked.

“Best-case scenario? A transfer, therapy, public ridicule, private ridicule. Worst-case scenario? Laicization. Most people would consider me a sexual predator if you and I were found to be involved.”

“That’s ridiculous. I’m the one trying to get you into bed. And I’m seventeen. I can donate blood and get the death penalty if I murder someone, but I’m not allowed to have sex at seventeen? Jesus, it’s my body,” she said. “Mine, not theirs. And it’s your body. Why do they get to tell us what we can do with our bodies?”

“Eleanor, are you trying to use logic on Catholics?”

She tried to laugh but the sound didn’t come out quite right.

“I think someone smart once said that was a pointless strategy.” She smiled at him.

“The whole world is a courtroom. And everyone loves to play judge, jury and executioner. A Catholic priest sexually involved with a teenage member of his congregation? I will be crucified. I’ve seen this happen over and over again. And the only people who won’t hate me will be the people who hate you instead.”

“Is this my fault?” she asked, afraid of the answer. She had pursued him, hadn’t she?

“No. It’s destiny. Or doom, perhaps. Hard to tell the difference sometimes.”

“Maybe they’re the same thing.”

“Perhaps they are.” He looked into her eyes and she saw her doom and destiny waiting in them. One kiss. Surely one kiss wouldn’t kill them. She leaned in. She knew Søren would let her kiss him. She knew he would kiss her back.

But then she heard something. Whistling. Somewhere in the building someone whistled. She’d heard the song before but couldn’t name it or place it. Hurriedly she pulled back from the embrace and put two feet between her and Søren.

“I’m changing my answer,” Søren said. “It’s his fault.”

“Who is that?” she whispered in a panic. Søren did something she’d never dreamed she’d see him do. He rolled his eyes.

“
‘La Marseillaise’
—the French national anthem.”

“Who’s in the building?”

Søren sighed heavily and rubbed his forehead.

“I suppose tonight’s as good a night as any,” Søren said.

“For what?”

“For you to meet the in-law.”

18

Eleanor

THE WHISTLING SOUND
grew closer. Søren took her hand in his.

“Eleanor, allow me to apologize in advance.”

“Apologize? For what?”

“For him.”

“Who?
Moi?
” asked the man who strolled through the nearest door and right up to them. “I hope I’m interrupting something.”

Eleanor’s eyes widened at the sight of the man.

“I love that reaction.” He pointed at Eleanor’s face. “That is the ‘you didn’t tell me how pretty he was’ look,
oui?
”

“Didn’t I almost punch you on a set of stairs once?” she asked him.

“You broke into my house. What do you have to say for yourself?”

“You have Eddie Vedder hair,” Eleanor said, which was the only thing she had to say for herself. She was still trying to recover from the shock of the man. He wore the most amazing suit she’d ever seen in her life. Black trousers, riding boots, long black jacket, black-and-silver embroidered vest. He had dark shoulder-length hair and a face that belonged on a male model. And to make matters even worse, he was French. So this was the brother-in-law? The best friend? The Kingsley?

He picked up her hand as if to kiss the back of it, but at the last second he raised her fingertips to his nose and sniffed them. She pulled her hand back.

“So this is
elle?
”

“This is she. Eleanor, this is Kingsley. Kingsley, Eleanor. Now please go back to the rectory, Kingsley, before Eleanor starts liking you.”

“Liking me more than you, you mean. Too late. Isn’t it?”

“You are seriously French,” she said.

“Would you like to see how French I am?” He imposed himself between her and Søren and stared down at her with the most seductive expression she’d ever seen on the face of a man with all his clothes on.

“Kingsley, please,” Søren said.

“I’m not talking to you. I’m talking to her.”

Kingsley stepped even closer.

“How old are you?” he asked her.

“Seventeen. How old are you?”

“Thirty. Is your hymen intact?”

Eleanor stood up straighter.

“Is your brain intact?”

“I ask for a reason.” He shook his finger in her face to hush her. “I fucked a virgin last week. I didn’t mean to.”

“What happened? You trip and fall into her hymen?”

“You jest, but do you know how hard it is to get blood off raw silk upholstery?” Kingsley asked, sounding positively perturbed. “She could have told me before I fucked her. I would have put a towel down first. But
c’est la guerre.
What’s the etiquette for accidentally fucking a virgin? Should I send flowers? If I fucked you and broke your hymen, what would you want from me after?”

“Hair of the dog that bit me?” Eleanor suggested her father’s favorite hangover cure. “Fuck me again?”

Kingsley looked her up and down. He seemed to like what he saw.

“Would you like to play a round of Justine and the naughty monk with me?”

“Never heard of it.”

“I swear I will have you arrested,” Søren said to Kingsley. He sounded stern but Eleanor saw amusement in his eyes.

“Have you ever read
Justine
by Le Marquis de Sade? Wonderful book. Little twelve-year-old Justine runs away to a monastery and the monks rape her and subject her to orgies and beatings over and over again. So that’s how you play the game. Shall we?”

“How do we know who wins?”

“Whoever has lost the least blood by the end of the game wins.”

“Sounds fun,” Eleanor said. “I’ll play the monk. You play Justine.”

“Why, Kingsley,” Søren said in a taunting tone, “it’s like she knows you already.”

Kingsley only gazed at her a moment and she sensed him taking stock of her. The smile left his face; the amusement disappeared from his eyes. In a warning tone, the man addressed Søren.

“You are asking for so much trouble with this one,
mon ami.
”

“He didn’t ask for trouble,” Eleanor interjected. “I offered.”

Kingsley nodded his approval.

“You weren’t exaggerating,” he said to Søren.

Søren put his mouth near Kingsley’s ear.

“I told you so,” Søren said in a stage whisper.

“Can I have her?” Kingsley asked. Søren replied something in French, something that made Kingsley grin even more broadly.

“What did he say?” she asked Kingsley.

“He said, ‘wait your turn.’”

She glared at Søren, who only shrugged as if Kingsley had lied to her. She knew he hadn’t.

“She doesn’t like my translation.”

“She should learn French,” Søren said. Kingsley nodded his agreement.

“Hello!” Eleanor waved her hands. “I’m still here. I can hear you both talking about me. And you, I can see you giggling.” She stabbed the center of Søren’s chest with her finger.

He gave her an affronted look.

“Priests don’t giggle.”

“What are you looking at?” she demanded of Kingsley, who seemed to be undressing her with his eyes.

“She’s spirited, this one,” Kingsley said to Søren.

“Unholy spirited,” Søren agreed.

Kingsley turned his attention back to her.

“Why do you have your clothes on?”

“Was I supposed to take them off?”

“I’ve never heard a stupider question in my life,” he said with a very French, very disgusted sigh. “You weren’t supposed to have them on to start with.”

“I get it,” Eleanor said to Kingsley. “I do. You’re Prince Charming if Prince Charming wasn’t charming.”

“And wasn’t a prince but a king.” Kingsley raked her body with his eyes. She might have been embarrassed by his nakedly hungry stare but he had a French accent, Eddie Vedder hair and the power to annoy Søren. The man got a free pass to make a pass.

“I could lose my watch inside you,” Kingsley finally said to her.

“And good night.” Søren grabbed the Frenchman by the back of the neck. Kingsley shivered as if the viselike grip Søren put on him seemed to have the opposite effect of the one Søren intended. “I can’t take you anywhere. Go back to the rectory. I will be there soon.”

“I have to go?”

“He really doesn’t,” Eleanor said.

“He really does.” Søren released Kingsley, who gave her an apologetic smile.

“
Je suis désolé, ma belle.
I must leave you. I will be inside the priest’s rectory tonight if you need me, want me or desire me. You know where to find me.”

“In his rectory.”

“Firmly ensconced. If I’m not there, I’ll be inside a bottle of Syrah. I’m getting the priest very drunk tonight.”

“I think he’s already there,” Eleanor said. She’d never seen Søren so playful before. They should get him drunk more often.

“Merely warming up.” Kingsley took her hand, and this time he kissed the back of it instead of sniffing her fingertips. “Rest assured I leave you entirely against my will and with the firmest of convictions that we shall meet again someday.”

“Nice to meet you,” she said, fairly certain that
nice
was the least correct word she could have used in that sentence.

“And a pleasure to meet you at last,” he said. “I look forward to you making the acquaintance of my ceiling.”

He turned on his booted heel and, whistling the French national anthem, again headed to the door.

“I want to be his best friend.” She grinned broadly at Kingsley’s retreating back.

“Don’t let your guard down yet. He’s not finished,” Søren said.

Søren was right. At the door Kingsley turned on his boot heel and strode back to her. He looked down into her eyes. A moment before he’d worn the air of a dashing rogue like something out of a romance novel. No more. Now he seemed dangerously sober to her.

“A word of warning.” Kingsley looked at her and only her. “Your shepherd is a wolf. You will learn that eventually and you will learn it the way I learned it.”

“How?”

“The hard way.”

“Kingsley, that’s enough.” Søren wasn’t joking anymore. Neither was Kingsley.

“Tell her what you are,
mon ami,
” Kingsley said to Søren, his eyes never leaving her face.

“You’ve either had too much to drink tonight, or not enough.”

Kingsley smiled broadly, but Eleanor saw no amusement in his eyes.

“Never enough.” He bowed his head at her, turned on his heel again and left the room, this time without whistling. As he walked away she heard the sound of his military-style boots echoing off the floor.

Søren exhaled as if he’d been holding his breath for the entire exchange.

“Eleanor, allow me to finish apologizing—”

“What did he mean my shepherd is a wolf?” She turned her eyes to Søren. He didn’t blink, blush, laugh or demure. But he didn’t answer the question, either.

“The wolf eats the sheep,” she said. “Should we, the sheep of Sacred Heart, be scared of you?”

“No.”

“No?”

“I only eat other wolves.”

“That’s a comfort, I guess.”

“It shouldn’t be,” he said.

“Why not?”

Søren gave her a look so dangerously hungry she’d almost describe it as wolfish.

“Because, my Little One, you aren’t a sheep.”

After that, Søren bid her the most perfunctory of goodbyes. She didn’t blame him for leaving so abruptly. If that Kingsley person were in her house, she wouldn’t want to leave him unsupervised, either. No telling what, or whom, he would get into. So that was the brother of Søren’s dead wife? She had to sit down again while the reality of Søren’s revelations sunk in. It didn’t matter really, did it? Didn’t matter that he’d been married once twelve years ago? No, it didn’t. The dead wife was a dead issue. Buried. Gone. Eleanor shoved her out of her mind and resolved never to think of her again.

But Kingsley—now, he interested her. Søren had admitted to jealousy over her and that Lachlan guy getting to third base. But Kingsley had stood six inches in front of her and joked about beating her, raping her, fucking her, losing his watch inside her, which she didn’t even understand.... Oh, fuck. Yes, she did.

Ow.

Kingsley had eye-fucked her, word-fucked her, teased and taunted her, and all the while Søren had stood by doing nothing except trying not to laugh.

And what had Kingsley meant when he called Søren a wolf? What had Søren meant when he admitted to being one? Too many questions. Not enough answers.

Eleanor finished cleaning up. It didn’t take long, as Diane and James had a small wedding with fewer than a hundred guests. They couldn’t afford much more than that, but neither of them seemed to mind. They’d both smiled so much today Eleanor’s cheeks had sympathy pains. It had caused some controversy when Søren had hired twenty-five-year-old Diane. She was black, for starters, and Wakefield was a lily-white town. Black and very pretty, which also raised eyebrows. Even more shocking, she’d been divorced. A divorced woman working for a Catholic priest. Søren had helped her get her first marriage annulled so she and James could marry in the church.

If only all priests were as rational and open-minded as Søren. Never once in his year and a half at Sacred Heart had she heard him give a homily condemning homosexuality, premarital sex or abortion. Instead he focused his attention on social justice issues—feeding the hungry, helping the needy, visiting the sick and the dying and those in prison. He was a good priest, the best priest. No matter what his secrets, no matter that he desired her as much as she desired him, he was still the best priest on earth.

A little after 3:00 a.m. Eleanor finally made it home. Mom had no doubt been in bed asleep for hours. Alone in her room, Eleanor stripped out of her shoes and jeans. In her T-shirt and panties she sat on her bed, the radio tuned to the classical station. She wanted to sleep, needed to sleep, but her mind wouldn’t let her. She wanted to talk to someone, but there was no one to talk to. No one but God. Might as well give it a go.

When Søren had been taking her through the Spiritual Exercises, he’d taught her a specifically Jesuit way of praying. Søren said most people couldn’t concentrate during silent prayer. The mind wandered here and there. Speaking prayers out loud helped with the focus. But Jesuits didn’t stop there. One technique, Søren told her, involved standing before an image of God or Christ and speaking the prayer aloud to it. Some Jesuits even sat empty chairs in front of them and spoke to the chair as if God sat there.

“And this really helps them get through to God?” Eleanor had asked with more than the usual level of skepticism.

“No. It helps God get through to us. To quote my grandfather’s namesake, Søren Kierkegaard, ‘Prayer does not change God, but it changes him who prays.’ All these tricks and techniques are for our benefit, not God’s. God’s a parent. Call Him, send Him a letter, go to His house, it doesn’t matter how you reach out to Him, He wants to hear from His children.”

Tonight Eleanor wanted to hear from God. She didn’t expect an answer, but those few minutes she’d spent in Søren’s arms had been like a gift. The embrace, the words of comfort, they’d come from nowhere. She hadn’t asked for them or expected them. When given a gift, she’d been taught to say thank you. She didn’t know who to thank for the gift of comfort she’d received today so she thought she’d give thanking God a try. She put a chair in the middle of her room and sat on the edge of her bed staring at it.

“I feel like an idiot,” she said to the empty room.

The empty room didn’t answer.

“Something’s not right here. Søren’s getting drunk tonight with the second-hottest guy on the planet, and I’m home alone praying. I think we accidentally switched our to-do lists.”

Still silence.

“Tough crowd,” she said and pulled a pillow over her lap, squeezing it for comfort.

She considered giving up and crashing, but her heart hadn’t stopped racing since the moment she’d stepped foot onto that rose-petal–strewn carpet today. And today, after a year of ignoring each other to the point of pain, she and Søren had finally had a real conversation. She’d been living with a question mark for a year now wondering what, if anything, would happen with Søren. And tonight with a hug and a few words he’d proved himself worthy of her devotion again. She couldn’t loiter in limbo anymore. She had to make a decision.