The 1000 Souls (Book 2): Generation Apocalypse (33 page)

“Oh sure. We’re at the beach after all.” She pointed to the painting.

His grin was shy and pleased. “Yeah. We should go to the beach someday. I hear it’s not very crowded anymore.”

He took off his shirt and held it in his lap—more cover. Kayla wanted to pull it away, to say it was fine and healthy and normal that he was aroused, but she was dealing with a strange sensation herself. She wanted him. She had almost died so many times in the last month, and she was alive and she wanted to touch and be touched, to love and be loved. She was the one staring at his chest. There was a very thin patch of hair centered between his nipples, and she wanted to stroke it, caresses it. What was going on with her? She was aroused as he was, even though he didn’t know.

He was a mystery she wanted to solve.

“Tevy, what did you mean, back at the river, when you said you wouldn’t live without me?” There. She had asked.

“Oh, yeah.” He stared at the painting again. “About that. I mean, I know I’ve no right. I know I shouldn’t be thinking about you that way. I just—”

He turned to meet her eyes. He was trembling! Was he afraid? Aroused? What the hell was going on?

“Thinking about me what way?”

“I know I’m young.” He looked back at the painting. “But we’re so good together. It almost makes me think those Ericsians know what they’re talking about. Like we were meant to be together.”

He wanted to be together? That could mean anything from a quickie to marriage.

“Tevy.” She placed a hand on his leg, thinking it would be comforting and then remembered that it was more likely to further arouse. She should pull her hand away, shouldn’t she? Instead she held firm. “We are good together.”

He gave a shy smile and returned to staring at the painting.

“I was thinking,” he said, the tremble so obvious now he had given up trying to hide it. “Maybe after this is over, after Vlad’s dead and the city is safe, I was thinking maybe you and I could get married.”

Kayla had been proposed to a few times at St. John’s, usually by men who had figured out they would never get into her pants any other way. With them it had been easy to say no. Today was different. It was sincere, awkward, and totally cute. It made sense to say no. They hardly knew each other. She was eight years older. They were at war.

“That’s a bit of a jump, isn’t it?” Her mouth was dry. “Maybe if we get to know one another. Maybe if we live and everything is good and safe for children.”

But suddenly she knew the truth. She didn’t want to talk about marriage or children or the future. She wanted him now. It was the opposite of the fear of battle, or maybe the same emotion turned sideways. She had to have him before either of them died.

Her hand slide up his leg, not too far, because she didn’t want to frighten him, and she could sense that he was remarkably inexperienced. She leaned in with her lips parted slightly, terrified that he wouldn’t understand, would leave her hanging in the air. But he must have sensed her movement, because he turned and met her kiss with passion and fury, an amateur mashing of lips, his arms going behind her back sliding up under her blouse.

She let go of his leg and wrapped her arm behind his back, loving the touch, loving the bare skin. Her other hand slide up to explore his chest hair and then down to feel his flat stomach. She couldn’t help herself. She should be safe. It was the right time. She wouldn’t get pregnant. She didn’t care. Her hand slipped down over that bulge in his jeans, prompting a gasp from him, a tremendous shudder. For a moment she feared he’d lost it already, but he was still as passionate as ever. There was no sense that he’d found release.

She undid his belt and unbuttoned his jeans. He pulled back from her lips as her fingers found his zipper. He met her eyes, searching, questioning. “Are you sure?” he whispered.

She loved that he could hardly contain himself. She knew he wanted to yank her clothes off and thrust madly, yet he held himself in check, trying to be a voice of reason. But Kayla didn’t want reason.

“I’m very sure.” She leaned in to kiss him and pulled down the zipper, discovering no underwear and finding what she sought, causing another delightful shudder from him.

He broke the kiss again. “I’ve never done this before. I don’t know what to do.”

Kayla remembered her only experience with sex, drunk after a pool party in Atherley during frosh week. It was painful and she didn’t enjoy it, but the girls in her dorm assured her that she would like it better next time. She never imagined that was years away.

“I’ve done it once before, a long time ago, but I think I know what to do.”

There. She had told him she was no virgin.

“Okay, good.” He was totally breathless now, as if at the end of a sprint. His hand slipped into her shirt and their lips met again, even more urgently.

She got him the stand so that she could peel off his jeans. He tore a button on her blouse in his haste and apologized. She pulled off the bikini bottoms and pulled him on top of her. She invited him to join, giving him the guidance he needed. He lost it right away, but not his erection. Thankfully, he was young and strong. He just kept going. It was hot and sweaty and desperate and innocent. By the time they settled, spent and exhausted, Kayla knew it was the best sex she would ever have in her life.

Now she was afraid. Very afraid. What if he died? Now she understood his panic at the bridge. She would not live without him the way Joyce lived without Bertrand. Despite the heat, she pinned Tevy close to her and kept her legs wrapped around him as if she would never let him go. Forever they would be one.

Tevy had to decide whether to tell the whole truth to his confessor. When he reached the bishop’s office door in the rectory, however, he had still to make up his mind about what was sin.

An advantage of having been one of the first of the Brat Pack was that Tevy knew Bishop Alvarez back when he was still Father Alvarez. In the early days of the apocalypse, Alvarez spent as much time educating the Brat Pack as Helen or Emile, and the priest hadn’t limited his teachings to just catechism, often taking them out to shoot targets. If the weather was bad, he still found an hour for a lesson on the disassembly and cleaning of firearms.

So when Tevy had asked one of the deacons for an appointment with the bishop, he knew the request would be granted. Now he stood in front of the door, waiting for his knock to be answered and waiting for inspiration.

“Come in.”

Tevy opened the door to find Bishop Alvarez seated behind his desk, an ornately carved and dark masterpiece that reflected the craftsmanship of the German immigrants that had built St Mike’s. Daylight flooded the room through two large windows, both open to allow a breeze. A green lamp still sat on the desk, although a Coleman lantern beside it indicated that even the bishop didn’t often have electricity from the generators.

“Tevy, good to see you.” Alvarez dressed today in a black cassock with a red lining and a red sash at the waist—more formal than usual, especially with the red cap on his head and the large crucifix hanging over his heart. He stood immediately and came around his desk to give Tevy a blessing, the Sign of the Cross. Tevy knelt and kissed the ring when offered, as he had learned to do just last year. Alvarez waved him to the leather chair across from his own and retook his seat.

“You’ve done God’s work, my son. Your bravery is unmatched.”

“Thank you, Father. I mean, Your Excellency.”

“Please,” Alvarez waved a dismissive hand. “I am and always will be your father in spirit. You are one of my children, and you may address me in this way. Now, what can I do for you?”

Tevy decided that the whole truth was essential. “Father. I have sinned and I want to put it right in the eyes of God.”

Alvarez, who had been looking down at a document on his desk, looked up sharply. “This perhaps is a discussion for the confessional, not for my office.”

“I want to get married.” To Tevy’s surprise, Alvarez looked relieved.

“Oh,” he said, nodding. “You have had carnal relations with someone. Is she Catholic?”

Tevy doubted this himself. She seemed very in with the Ericsians, and yet she never said much about it one way or the other. “She’s from St. John’s,” he said. “She never talks about the Ericsians, but she was forced to take their determination at the same time they insisted I take it.”

Alvarez’s eyes narrowed. “This is the first I’ve heard that they attempted to induct you into their cult. What did they tell you?”

Suddenly, Tevy sensed that it was time for a sin of omission, not an outright lie, but to state that he was supposed to host a portion of Bertrand’s soul would inflame the bishop, would make him furious and dangerous. But had Bobs already told him about the results of the determination? Tevy decided to take a chance and go with a half-truth.

“Pagan nonsense, Father. Stuff about this soul and that soul as if I didn’t have a soul of my own. It was all very confusing and silly. I know my soul is my own, but I went along with their shtick so that we could get their help.”

Alvarez nodded. “I’m glad we sent you if we had to send someone. I worry about people of weaker faith interacting with this cult. What of your fiancé, what did she think of their determination?”

“I don’t know, father, but she never speaks of their cult.”

Alvarez leaned forward, holding his crucifix by the bottom below the feet so that it rested just above the desk, not obscured by the oak. “Perhaps if you could bring her to mass and introduce us, I can arrange for a wedding in a month. But we need to ensure she is a good Catholic and not susceptible to a pagan cult. I must speak with her and hear her confession. What is her name?”

“Kayla Falco.”

Alvarez sat back and let the crucifix drop onto his chest. “But she is our liaison to the Erics cult now. She even leads them in battle, I’m told. Surely, this is a dangerous woman to be involved with. Surely, she is susceptible to their ways.”

“But Father, she hasn’t succumbed to them, and perhaps meeting me is God’s way of saving her soul.”

But Alvarez didn’t look convinced. “Who initiated these carnal relations?”

“We both did.” But did they? He went to her room. She was nearly naked. He tried to prevent his erection, tried to think about cleaning guns and dead rippers, but his body was so alive, so attuned to her every movement, her every breath. He took his shirt off at her invitation. She touched him. He touched her. It was all a jumble, a memory he could not sort out without causing yet another erection.

Alvarez stood, leaning over his desk to meet Tevy’s eyes.

“First,” he said. “You must go to confession and seek absolution for this sin. Second, she must confirm that she is a good Catholic. If she has never participated in a confirmation, then she must, as well as communion. All this will take time.”

Tevy stood. “But Father, with the offensive coming, who knows how much time we have left.”

“God will protect you. Just ensure that you sin no more. You should not be alone with this woman again until you are joined in holy matrimony.”

Tevy wanted to beg, to plead. He had hoped for a marriage this afternoon. He had hoped that by tomorrow he and Kayla would be sharing a marital bed. But he knew that look in Alvarez’s eye, knew that there was no arguing. He stood, and when Alvarez came around the desk and held out the ring, Tevy knelt and kissed it.

Alvarez put his hand on Tevy’s head for a moment. “Go with the blessings of Christ and the strength of Bertrand.”

After the door closed behind him, Tevy stood in the corridor for a moment, resting his forehead against the wood paneling. Another thought had just occurred to him.
What if she was already pregnant?

Tevy wanted to find Kayla immediately, wanted to tell her that they may have a problem getting married, but there was short line in front of Father William’s confessional. He decided to immediately get through the proper confession. Father William didn’t seem shocked at all, was happy to hear that Tevy wanted to make an honest woman out of Kayla and was disappointed that the bishop hadn’t granted an immediate wedding.

“Far be it for me to question his Excellency,” he said. “Ten Hail Mary’s and ten Our Father’s and an Act of Contrition. And my son, keep the zipper up until you’re married.”

The relief Tevy felt of having been absolved from his sins vanished as soon as he stepped out of the confessional to find Bobs leaning against the nearest pew and waiting for him. She wore a belt today with her favorite gun, her Beretta 92, in a holster on her hip. Her white blouse was not transparent like Kayla’s and only the top button was undone.

“We need to talk. Follow me.”

She led him at a brisk pace up to her war room and slammed the door.

“Take a seat,” she said even though she stood at the head of the table. Her map was back in place and so were all the toy tanks and trucks and flags that marked the diverse units of her armies.

“Now,” she said. “Are you with me? Are you still my go-to guy around here?”

“Yes. Of course.” Tevy wasn’t even convinced himself but this was no time to out internal debates. “You know I’ll do anything to bring down Vlad and the rippers.”

“But you listened at my door and you told Emile about the plan to nuke the rippers.” That she contained her fury worried Tevy more than if she were to again scatter the toy army.

Tevy decided that offense was the best defense. “It’s the only way I can find out what’s going on, isn’t it? And that’s what you trained me for all these years, to go and listen.” He stood, letting his own fury out. “And I’m damn good at it, but you know what I’m better at? Fighting. That’s what I’ve been doing since you sent me to St. John’s and then to the Ericsians. I’ve been fighting where you tell me to.”

Bobs studied him for a long minute, Tevy not breaking eye contact: challenging.

“Okay, sit down,” she said at last, taking her own seat. “It’s just that I don’t need to argue with everyone of the fucking Companions about whether we go for broke or not. A good thing this is way out of our hands by now.”