Cries of Penance (33 page)

Oh , shit. Now she says mommy.

I meet Hektor’s gaze as he is pushing a spoonful of cereal into his mouth.

“Aunt Celia?”

I jerk and look at Olympia.

She is twirling her spoon in her bowl and not eating. She doesn’t make eye contact even though she said my name. “Should we al cal you mommy now, too? Instead of Aunt Celia?”

I don’t know what to say.

I don’t even know what to think. Aside from the tears they shared with their father, they haven’t cried. I hated my father and almost had a nervous breakdown when he passed. How can they be so calm?

I watch her spoon swirling in the bowl and grab her hand to stop the motion.

“Olympia?”

Her gaze meets mine, and I see her eyes are brimming with unshed tears.

“I am so sorry your mother is dead. I can never replace her in your heart.”

She comes into my arms, sobbing, and I stil don’t know what to say. I’ve had years of experience working as a grief counselor in my father’s parish, but nothing I experienced there prepared me for this.

“I want Mama.”

“I know, baby, I know.” I kiss her hair and she seems so very warm, not feverish, but warm. “I was only eight when my mother died.”

God, did I just say that? Why did I tel her ?

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She pul s back, looking at me with wide, wet eyes. “Your mother died too?”

“Yes.”

Hektor leaves his seat and joins his sister. He puts his hand on my arm.

Sensing something is wrong, Atso squirms in my lap, fussing. I readjust her so that she can reach the cornpuffs in her bowl.

“Was your mother’s death horribly gruesome?” Hektor asks.

What child asks that question? What did Thomas tel them?

I drop my face and nod. “I was with her when she died. She had hung herself with a rope around her neck, and I tried to hold up her weight.”

Oh God. Why I am tel ing this?

The pain in my heart feels like I am there, like I am the young girl again, trying and failing to save my mother. Silent tears slide down my cheeks, but I don’t wipe them away. “I tried to keep her alive.”

Hektor and Olympia fal into my arms as I weep silently. Atso reacts with a sudden outburst of tears, frightened, and Hektor and Olympia are suddenly sobbing too. I am definitely not getting the mother of the year award here.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” I tel them, hugging them, kissing them both. “It was a very sad day the day your mother left this world. She was a good woman, a strong woman, and I know she loved you.”

Looking up I see both Thomas and Garrett standing in the doorway between rooms. Thomas is as pale as a ghost when he turns and walks away.

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“I tel you the truth, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and wil not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life.”

John 5:24

The desert is stil and silent in the early morning heat. I ran as far as I dared, and I dare not be too far from my family. I needed to be alone.

Celia is bonding with my children and she makes it seem almost effortless, making it seem Latisha was expendable, replaceable, and I know my bitterness is unfair. This situation is not Celia’s fault, and yet she is the only one of us behaving with any dignity.

Hearing Celia reveal the secrets of her soul, I know that she knows better than any of us what my children are feeling and she is wil ing to relive her pain to help them experience their own. I wish I could be as selfless.

Does pride makes me cling to the rules of manhood so that no one wil see me express my sorrow? Or fear that my loved ones wil not fol ow if they see anything less in me than strength?

Pul ing off my shirt, I stand beneath the blazing sun. I need to feel the heat as a reminder I am alive. Stretching out my arms, I present myself to my God.

I want to share with him the ache ripping open my chest.

I know death intimately. I have caused a death wound and waited patiently for the last breathe. I have fought to keep a fal en comrade breathing and cursed the 311

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moment I knew they were gone. I have experienced the sense of a soul leaving a body, and so I believe there is an after beyond life.

I. Ache.

My heart, my mind. There is a heaviness in my gut that hurts as badly as a bul et.

I never thought I’d grieve Latisha so deeply.

I do not know if I am better off or worse for having seen the proof. Yes, I believe her death, but after seeing, I know she was executed, a single blow separating her head from her body.

No one held her as she died.

No one heard her last breathe or felt her soul fly.

I sob, thinking about that. She didn’t deserve to die thusly. If it had to be so, her murderer shouldn’t have been such a coward. He should have held her as closely as a lover. He should have experienced her death with her.

Standing, I scream. Raw. Primal. The val ey echoes with my grief. I believe the ground beneath my feet rumbles. I scream until there is no more air in my lungs and I fal forward, oxygen deprived.

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“Grief, grief, I suppose and sufficient

Grief makes us free

To be faithless and faithful together

As we have to be.”

D.H. Lawrence, Hymn to Priapus

Thomas is somewhere out in the desert, running, because Lord knows he needs to stay in shape. Heaven forbid the “secret-agent man” should get a little soft around his middle.

Celia. My Kit en. Covered in children, like a marsupial on the prowl, not just the twins, each attached to a nipple, but four more, surrounding her, touching her. Always touching her!

I am in a fucking desert! Surrounded by dirt! Dirt and rock and more dirt.

Life as I know it is over. Lewd Larry’s. Home. My friends. God. My friends.

Jackie.

Morgana.

George.

Enrique.

What do I do now?

I walked away once before, away from my family, my fiancée, my future medical practice, with no more promise than the promise of love. Tony. Then, I think it was more hormones than true love, and the al ure of living openly with my homosexuality and depravity.

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Surely my ménage means more to me now than Tony ever did then, so why was it so easy to walk away from al I’d ever known and loved?

Why is it so hard now?

I want to sneak away and cal Jackie. I need to hear her voice. I need to know that she is okay. I need to tel her once more that I love her. I always have, and I always wil . I know I don’t have to worry about Jackie. Jackie Sandburg always was and forever wil be a survivor.

I want to cal her!

Who wil I ever be able to talk to that knows me half as wel as she does? It is pure selfishness that would put her life at risk just to hear her voice again.

God.

Who wil take care of Morgana now? Or Enrique?

Thomas assured me an agent, posing as an attorney, would travel to San Francisco with enough money to hide any trail we left and enough lies to trick our friends into not coming to look for us. He wil get my affairs in order.

I have turned Lewd Larry’s completely over to George.

By now it is probably a done deal, signed, sealed, delivered.

Lewd Larry’s is mine! Damn it! It’s mine!

I am tired…so fucking tired…and this insanity has only just begun. How wil I ever survive an entire week? Months? Years?

“Can you watch the twins a second?”

“What?” I look up at Celia, knowing she asked a question, but not having a clue what she said.

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“The babies. Keep an eye on them while I take Atso to the potty. Thomas said every hour so there’s no accidents.”

I nod robotical y and watch her lead Atso away by the hand. The other three children fol ow her.

I sit in the chair she vacated and look down at the sleeping twins. It would be so easy to circumcise them right this second. Snip. Snip. Foreskin gone. Bending over I push up a sleeper, push down a diaper. So easy—if I had a scalpel.

“What are you doing?”

“Nothing,” I say too quickly and my voice comes out too high pitched and sounding guilty. “I was seeing if he was wet.”

I can see it in her eyes that she doesn’t believe me and without a word she picks up the drawer and carries it outside to a shady corner of the courtyard. I fol ow her, but am stopped dead in my tracks, hearing a scream.

Celia and the children are just as alarmed.

The scream seems to go on forever.

The children hug Celia’s legs and she looks at me, fear and questions she’s afraid to ask out loud fil ing her eyes.

“It’s okay,” I assure her, praying that it is. I look at my watch, knowing Thomas took off half an hour ago. If he isn’t back in thirty minutes I’l fol ow the animal trail he took even though I have no idea how to track him if he went off trail.

* * * *

“We want to go with her,” Olympia demands.

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“Not this time. Celia needs to talk to your daddy.”

Crossing her arms, she stomps her smal foot and gives me a look that is terrifying. I try to cajole her, “You used to like staying with Uncle Gar.”

Her bottom lip pouts out, and her eyes fil with tears. “I want my Mommy.”

Beside her Atso and Hektor turn on the waterworks, both of them wailing.

“Mommmeee.”

Oh God.

I have truly been transported to hel .

And then the twins wake up and start to cry.

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“I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love.”

Mother Teresa

The trail is steep and rocky, too much for the flip-flops I left the house in. I yank them off and step careful y with bare feet. I’m so relieved when I find Thomas; I throw myself into his arms. “Are you al right?”

“I’m fine.”

“We heard a scream.”

Thomas pul s me into his arms. His skin has been warmed by the sun and his shirt is soaked through with perspiration, but I am so relieved he is not injured I don’t care. I hold him tight. He kisses the top of my head. “I’m sorry I scared you.

I needed to vent.”

I look up into his face and his body shadows me from the sun so that I can see his features. “I thought as much. I’m so sorry. I should have never al owed the baby to cal me mommy and then the older ones would have never—”

His mouth closing over my lips stops me from saying anything else. I’m an idiot.

His pain has nothing to do with what I said. My words might have triggered the reaction but the ache was already there.

Pul ing away, I cup his jaw. He is growing a ful beard and his stubble is stil stiff. I wil be glad when it softens. I rub my hands back and forth, enjoying the prickle. I think he enjoys it too, because he closes his eyes.

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Wrapping my hand around his neck, I pul his face down to kiss me again. “I don’t think I’l be able to wait six weeks.”

“Is that what Garrett told you?”

I nod.

“It’s safe once you have stopped bleeding for a few days.”

“He is a doctor. He should know what he’s talking about.”

“What he is is a pain in my ass.”

I rub my hands down his back and reaching his buttocks, squeeze tight through his shorts. “Pain in your ass, huh?”

“Yesss,” he hisses.

I bite his cheek. “I think I’l be more agreeable to your time table.”

He moans when I bite harder.

I want to cause him pain.

I push his shirt up, baring his chest, and bite, sinking my teeth deep into his pecs. He grabs the back of my head and forces my face tight against his chest, making it impossible to bite or even breathe.

“You know I have something you can chew on if you need to use that mouth of yours.”

Stil can’t breathe.

He releases me, and I suck in air. “Please, Lord Fyre. I need you.”

He unbuttons and unzips. I gladly drop to my knees, needing to service him, wanting to heal him. I want to make him forget Latisha ever existed even though I know he wil think of her each time he looks in his children’s faces. But not every child. Two of his children wil remind him of me.

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His erection springs forward, hard and ready. Before I even push his head into my mouth, I can taste him—the taste I’ve memorized as him—and salivate. I feel like an addict denied, I’ve never wanted anything as badly as I want his cock in my mouth.

His palm in the center of my forehead holds me back. “Why, Sophia, why do you want to suck on my cock?”

“I adore your cock.”

“Why?”

I reach with my lips and teeth, trying so hard to gain access, but he holds me back, damn, strong, man. “I need to taste you, I need you to come in my mouth.”

“Tel me why.”

“Isn’t it enough that I have missed you for months? Isn’t it enough that I need you like I need air to breathe and food to eat?”

“That isn’t the reason.”

“Please,” I beg, refusing to tel him the truth, and too overcome to think of a lie. “Let me comfort you. I am yours to use. Use me.”

He releases my forehead only to grab me by the hair on top of my head. It hurts, but I don’t care. He pul s me into him, insistently, and I gladly open my mouth to take him, but he pushes in too hard, too fast, too deep, making me gag and choke. My eyes water. He pushes deeper, and I gag and choke again. Tears slide over my cheeks. He pushes harder, deeper, and his length goes deeper into my throat, leaving me gagging around it. I’m past choking now, I can’t breathe.

He uses my throat, deep, deep, deeper.