Praise for Tiffany Reisz

‘The Siren is one of those books which has the amazing ability to create the scene in full colour in your mind’s eye—this is no small skill on the author’s part.’

http://carasutra.co.uk/

‘A beautiful, lyrical story … The Siren is about love lost and found, the choices that make us who we are … I can only hope Ms Reisz pens a sequel!’

—Bestselling author Jo Davis

‘The Original Sinners series certainly lives up to its name: it’s mind-bendingly original and crammed with more sin than you can shake a hot poker at. I haven’t read a book this dangerous and subversive since Chuck Palahniuk’s Fight Club.’

—Andrew Shaffer, author of

Great Philosophers Who Failed at Love

‘Tiffany Reisz is a smart, artful and masterful new voice in erotic fiction. An erotica star on the rise!’

—Award-winning author Lacey Alexander

‘Daring, sophisticated and literary … exactly what good erotica should be.’

—Kitty Thomas, author of Tender Mercies

‘Dazzling, devastating and sinfully erotic, Reisz writes unforgettable characters you’ll either want to know or want to be. The Siren is an alluring book-within-a-book, a story that will leave you breathless and bruised, aching for another chapter with Nora Sutherlin and her men.’

—Miranda Baker, author of Bottoms Up and Soloplay

‘The best erotica either leaves slut-marks on your back or a bruise on your heart. The Siren does both and I wish I’d written it.’

—Scarlett Parrish, author of By the Book

‘You will most definitely feel strongly for these characters … This was an amazing story and I’m so happy that it’s not over. I can’t wait to jump back into Nora’s world.’

http://ladysbookstuff.blogspot.co.uk

TIFFANY REISZ’s books inhabit a sexy, shadowy world where erotica, romance and gothic literature meet and do immoral and possibly illegal things to each other. The first book in her international bestselling series The Original Sinners was named the Romantic Times 2012 Reviewers’ Choice Award for Best Erotic Romance. She is a very bad Catholic. Visit her website www.tiffanyreisz.com for news, gossip and wholly inappropriate bedtime stories.

Also by Tiffany Reisz:

The Original Sinners: The Red Years

THE SIREN

THE ANGEL

THE PRINCE

THE MISTRESS

eBook Novellas

THE MISTRESS FILES

SEVEN-DAY LOAN

IMMERSED IN PLEASURE

SUBMIT TO DESIRE

LITTLE RED RIDING CROP

eBook Cosmo Red Hot Reads

MISBEHAVING

The story’s not over quite yet!

Watch for THE KING

The second book in

The Original Sinners: The White Years

Coming soon from Mills & Boon® SPICE

The Saint
Tiffany Reisz

www.spice-books.co.uk

Dedicated to St. Ignatius of Loyola, His Holiness Pope Francis and all the soldiers of God who serve in The Society of Jesus.

“He was part of my dream, of course—but then I was part of his dream, too.”

Through the Looking-Glass

Lewis Carroll

Table of Contents

Cover

Praise for Tiffany Reisz

About the Author

Title Page

Dedication

Epigraph

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

29

30

31

32

33

Endpages

Copyright

1

Nora

NORA SUTHERLIN WAS BEING FOLLOWED.

She didn’t know she was being followed as she drove through Bavaria and into the heart of the Black Forest. Who would follow her, after all? And why? No one back home knew why she’d left, and no one at all knew where she’d gone. She kept her eyes on the road ahead and didn’t once think to look behind her.

A vague uneasiness, a quiet sort of dread, had burrowed into her mind and made a home there. The sun, which had seen almost as much as she had in her lifetime, chased her car as she raced down a road shrouded in towering pine trees. Dark. Light. Dark. Light. Nora sensed the shadows wanted to catch her and keep her. She pushed the accelerator and fled deeper into the forest.

At last she came to the end of the road and spied a small thatched-roof cottage hidden among the pine and fir trees. Two stories and made all of stone, the little house seemed an exile from a fairy tale. A kindly woodcutter could live in that house—the sort who’d save a little girl from the jaws of a wolf. If the cottage were part of a fairy tale, who was she? The woodcutter? The girl?

Or the wolf?

She gathered her things from the car and strode toward the cottage. The owner had warned her there was no lock on the door but promised she would be safe. This part of the woods was on private land. No one would trouble her. No one at all.

Ivy covered the cottage from the ground to the chimney. She felt as if she’d stepped back four hundred years when she crossed the threshold. Gazing around the interior, she made her day’s plan. She’d build a fire in that great gray stone hearth. She’d drink tea out of ruddy earthenware mugs. She’d sleep under heavy sheets in a rustic bed with posts of rough-hewn wood. In another time and under different circumstances, she would have loved it here. But grief clawed at her heart, and her task lay hard before her.

And it wasn’t in Nora’s nature to relish the prospect of sleeping alone.

She took her bags upstairs to the sole bedroom and knelt on the floor by the smaller of her two suitcases. She unzipped the bag carefully, slowly, reluctantly. From a bed of velvet she pulled out a silver box the size of a pew Bible and held it in her shaking hands.

As the cottage owner had promised, she found the cobblestone path that led to the lakeshore. The smell of pine surrounded her as she wandered down the path. It was April but the scent called Christmas to mind…. “O Holy Night” playing on the piano, red and green candles, silver bows, golden ornaments and Saint Nicholas coming to hide coins in the shoes of all the good little children. Idly she wished Saint Nicholas would see fit to visit her tonight. She’d welcome the company.

The path widened and ahead of her she saw the lake, its dark clear waters silver tipped in the sunlight that peeked through clouds. She stood on the stony shore at the water’s edge.

She could do this. For days now she’d been preparing herself for this moment, preparing what she would say and how she would say it. She would be strong. For him, she would do this, could do this.

Nora swallowed hard and took a quick breath.

“Søren …” As soon as she spoke his name she stopped. She could get no more words out. They backed up in her throat and choked her like a hand around her neck. Turning her back on the water, she half walked, half ran to the house, the silver box clutched to her chest. She couldn’t let it go yet. She couldn’t say goodbye.

She set the silver box on the heavy wood fireplace mantel and turned her back to it. If she pretended it wasn’t there, maybe she could believe it hadn’t happened.

Outside the cottage, the wind picked up. The rickety, ivy-covered shutters rattled against the stone walls. Electricity brushed against her skin. Ozone scented the air. A storm was rising.

Nora started two fires—one in the great stone hearth and one in the smaller bedroom fireplace. The owner of the house had stocked the refrigerator and cabinets for her. An unnecessary kindness. She hadn’t had much of an appetite for two weeks now, but she’d make herself eat if only to stave off the headaches hunger inflicted on her.

The day passed as she kept herself busy with small tasks. The cottage was clean but it gave her a sense of purpose to wash all the dishes in a large copper kettle and to sweep the hardwood floor with a witch’s broom she found in the pantry. She worked until exhaustion overtook her and she lay down on top of the bed and napped.

Nora woke from a restive, dreamless sleep and ran water in the claw-foot porcelain bathtub. She sank into the heat, hoping it would seep into her skin and relax her. Yet when she emerged an hour later, pink and wrinkled, she still felt tight as a knot.

She dressed in a long white spaghetti-strap nightgown. The hemline tickled her ankles as she walked and brushed the tops of her bare feet. To distract herself, she stood in front of the mirror twisting and pinning her hair this way and that, taming the black waves into a low knot with loose tendrils that flowed over her neck and framed her face. When she finished, she almost laughed at the effect. In her white nightgown, with understated makeup and her hair coiffed in curls, she looked like a virgin bride on her wedding night. An older bride, of course—she’d turned thirty-six last month. But still the woman in the mirror looked demure, innocent, even scared. She thought grief aged people, but tonight she felt like a teenager again—restless and waiting, aching for something she couldn’t name but that she knew she needed. But what was it? Who was it?

She wandered downstairs and considered eating. Instead of feeding herself, she fed the fire. As the wood crackled and burned, lightning split the sky outside the kitchen window. Thunder rumbled close behind. Nora stood at the window and watched the night rip itself open. Bursts of thunder rattled the forest again and again. Between rumbles, Nora heard a different sound. Louder. Clearer. Closer.

Footsteps on stone.

A knock on the door.

Then silence.

Nora froze. No one should be out here. No one but her. The owner had promised her privacy. This cottage was the lone house for miles, he’d said. He owned all the land around it. She would be safe. She would be alone.

Another knock.

The cottage door had no lock. Whoever stood outside could walk in at any moment. For two weeks now the only emotions she’d felt were sorrow and grief. Now she felt something else—fear.

But Søren had trained her too well—Hebrews 13:2, “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.” And such a night was fit for neither angel nor demon, saint or sinner.

She threw open the door. A man, not an angel, stood on the opposite side of the threshold.

“Sanctuary?”

Rain drenched his dark hair and beaded on his leather jacket.

“What the hell are you doing here?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest, self-conscious about the low cut of her nightgown. She should have thrown on a robe.

“Begging for sanctuary. Should I do it again? Sanctuary?”

“Did you follow me?” she asked. She’d flown into Marseille last night and had dinner with him. She never dreamed he’d chase her all the way to Germany.

“I would have come sooner, but I took a wrong turn at Hansel and Gretel’s. A girl in a red cloak gave me directions, and now I’m here, Snow White.”

“You found your way here, Huntsman. You can find your way back,” she said. “I can’t give you sanctuary.”

“Why not?”

“You know what will happen if I let you in.”

“Exactly what we both want to happen.”

“It can’t happen—you and me. And you don’t need me to tell you why.”

The smile faded from his face.

“You need me,” he said.

“It doesn’t matter. I have to do this alone.”

“You don’t have to do it alone.” He took an almost imperceptible step forward. The toes of his rain-soaked buff-colored boots touched but did not cross the threshold. “You do too much alone.”

“I can’t let you in,” she said, and felt that fist in her throat again.

“Would he want you to face this alone?”

“No,” she said. “He wouldn’t.”

“Let me in.”

“That sounded like an order. I told you what I am. You know I give the orders.”

She could already feel her resolve crumbling. Twenty-five years old, tall, deeply tanned, dark hair with the slightest wave to it that demanded a woman’s fingers run through it again and again, clear celadon eyes—an inheritance from his Persian mother—and a face that someone should sculpt so it would endure even after both of them turned to dust and ashes … How could she turn him away? How could anyone?

“Then order me to come inside,” he said.

She closed her eyes and held the door to steady herself. This was wrong. She knew it. She’d sworn before she’d even seen him that she wouldn’t do this, not ever, not with him. But then she’d met him. And now, after all that had happened and the grief that threatened to overwhelm her, could anyone blame her for taking her comfort with him? One man would blame her. But was that enough to stop her?

“Order me in,” he said again, and Nora opened her eyes. “Please.”

She could never resist a beautiful man begging.

“Come in, Nico,” she said to Kingsley’s son. “That’s an order.”

2

Nora

SHE SHUT THE DOOR BEHIND NICO AND PULLED HIM to the fireplace. She helped him out of his jacket and boots. Battered and mud crusted, his shoes looked nothing like Kingsley’s spit-shined riding boots. These were work boots, steel tipped and utilitarian.

“Do I want to know how you found me?” she asked as she brushed the mud off Nico’s boots and set them to dry by the fireplace.

“I followed your trail of bread crumbs.”

“Bread crumbs?”

“You might have accidentally left your bag open at the restaurant and I might have accidentally seen the address on your rental confirmation.”

“Leaving my bag open was an accident,” she said.

“Finding the address might not have been.” He pulled off his socks and ran his hands through his hair, shaking the rain out of it.

“Like father, like son.” She sighed. “You’re as sneaky as Kingsley.”

“Are you angry?”

“No, I’m not angry.” She raised her hand to her forehead and rubbed at the tension headache lurking there. Nico pulled her hand down and looked at her with concern.

“Need food? Wine?” she asked before he could ask her how she was—a question she didn’t want to answer. “Or did you bring your own?”

“There might be a bottle or two of Rosanella in the car.”

“I won’t make you bring them in,” she said. Outside the storm still raged wild.

“I will later. First things first.” Nico took her by the wrist and pulled her close.

“Nico …”

“Don’t,” he said. “Don’t fight me. Let me help you.”

Sighing, Nora rested her head against his chest and let him rub the knot of tension in her neck. When they’d met in December she’d had Zach with her, and Nico—only his mother called him Nicholas, he’d said—had shown her editor/friend/occasional lover all due deference. But when she visited again a month later, Nico did nothing to hide his delight at having her to himself. He was barely twenty-five. Handsome and young and French, what reason did he have for wanting her—nearly twelve years his senior and with a long history of sleeping with the man he’d learned was his biological father? She got her answer while they were out walking one day. Two women—a mother and daughter—had stopped them, asking for directions. The mother looked forty years old, the daughter around Nico’s age. Both were well-dressed classic French beauties. Nico barely blinked at the daughter. To the mother he’d flashed a smile so flirtatious even his father would have been impressed. Kingsley’s son had a fetish for older women.

Well … how nice.

“You’re in pain,” he said. “I can feel it all through you.”

“I like pain,” she reminded him.

“No one likes this kind of pain. I would know.”

She lowered her eyes in sympathy. The man who’d raised Nico as his son had died five months ago. A month after that, she’d shown up and told him he had another father, which had torn the stitches on his still-healing grief. If anyone understood the pain she felt right now, it was Nico.

“Let me ease your pain tonight.”

“How?” She looked up at him. “Can you bring people back to life?”

“I can bring you back to life.”

She almost told him he was as arrogant as his father, but before she could speak, he kissed her.

Nervous as a virgin, her lips trembled under his. If it had been anyone but him, she would have wondered at this newfound shyness. She’d never been shy, never been demure, never been innocent. And yet, this was Kingsley’s only son, and by sleeping with him she would lose something far more dear to her than her virginity had ever been.

“You’re shaking,” Nico said against her lips.

“I’m scared.”

“Scared? Why?”

“I don’t know.”

“I’m here,” he whispered. “You don’t have to be afraid.”

He was here. That was why she was afraid. But the fear didn’t stop her from opening her mouth to receive his kiss. He kissed along her jawline to her ear, nipped at her earlobe. Over the pulse point in her neck, he pressed a long, languid kiss. The heat from his mouth seared her all the way to her spine. His kisses were neither tentative nor hurried. As he kissed her, her muscles slackened, her skin flushed with heat and the fear faded. For the first time in days, she felt human. Since meeting back in December, she and Nico had been in weekly contact. Emails, phone calls—he even wrote her letters by hand. Letters she read and reread and answered. Letters she burned before anyone found them.

Her head fell back as Nico kissed the hollow of her throat. He placed his hands on either side of her neck and rubbed his thumbs into the tendons of her shoulders.

“What’s this?” he asked as he lifted the chain of her necklace.

Nora wrapped her hand around the pendant. She couldn’t talk about it yet. It meant too much to her. Especially now.

“A saint medal. It’s a Catholic thing.”

“I know about saints. I am one, remember?”

“Saint Nicholas brought me Christmas early this year,” she said, smiling as he kissed her throat. “Although sleeping with him will put me on the naughty list for eternity.”

“It’s my list. I’ll be the judge of that.” He slipped the strap of her nightgown off her shoulder and traced her bare shoulder with his fingertips. Her body shivered with the pleasure from the touch of his work-roughened skin.

“You’re so beautiful in white.” Nico whispered the words into her ear as he ran his hand down her back, caressing the silk of her gown.

Nora said nothing. She’d bought the white gown to wear for Søren on their anniversary, a celebration that wouldn’t happen now.

She released the medal and it fell once more against her skin. She wrapped her arms around Nico’s broad shoulders and pressed her breasts to his chest. He wore a basic black cotton T-shirt and work jeans. She wore a silk nightgown. He’d been working all day and had come to her with mud on his boots. She’d been mourning all week and came to him with sorrow in her heart.

“I want to spend all night inside you,” Nico breathed against her neck.

She pulled away from his embrace, but only to take him by the hand.

“Come upstairs,” she said. “We can sleep when we’re dead.”

She led him up to the bedroom. He released her hand to tend to the fading fire. He fed it with paper first, then kindling, then threw a log on top of the smoldering flames. The room warmed and glowed red from the heat and firelight.

“You’re good at that,” Nora said. “Do you have a fireplace at your house?”

“Two of them,” he said. Two of zem. Nora bit the inside of her mouth to keep from laughing. She’d learned from Nico that he’d spent a year in California and another year in Australia in his teens. Even though he lived in France now, he’d mastered English to the point that his accent was faint. Still there, but certainly not as pronounced as Kingsley’s deliberately exaggerated accent. But every now and then Nico’s accent came out in full force. “You should come to my home. I’d like you to see it.”

She’d refused all invitations to come to his home and instead met him in neutral locations—Arles, Marseille. She knew once they were alone together in his house or hers this would happen. And so it had.

“If I come to your house, will you put me to work?” she asked as she came to stand next to him. The fire crackled and a burning ash landed near her foot. Nico brushed it away with his bare hand.

“Everyone works at Rosanella.”

“I still can’t believe you are what you are.”

“Why not?” He smiled up at her.

“Kingsley does not get his hands dirty. Not in the literal sense anyway.”

“You think he’s ashamed that I’m a farmer?”

“You make wine. He drinks wine. He’s proud of you.”

Whether he’d admit it or not, Kingsley had fallen in love with the idea of being Nico’s father. “My son the vintner,” he said sometimes, and Nora saw the pride in his eyes. It broke her heart that Nico had yet to feel any pride that Kingsley was his father.

“And you?” Nico looked up at her from where he knelt on the floor. “Are you proud of me?”

“Does it matter?”

“It matters more that you’re proud of me than him.”

She caressed his face with the back of her hand. The slight stubble on his chin chafed her skin. Once she’d asked him what he was looking for every time he went to bed with a woman ten, fifteen, twenty years older than he. A mother figure? A teacher? A trainer? “My Rosanella,” Nico had answered, referring to the name of his vineyard’s bestselling Syrah, “the one woman who is all women.”

“Yes, my Nico. I’m proud of you.”

They gazed at each other. The shutters were closed. Fire alone warmed and brightened the room. Outside, the wind and rain poured and howled so wildly she imagined everyone but she and Nico had been wiped off the face of the earth. Only they two remained, sole survivors.

Nico rose up on his knees, put his hands on her waist and kissed her stomach through the fabric of her gown. Slowly he slid his hands down the backs of her legs and grasped her ankles. Nora buried her fingers in his hair as he kissed her bare thigh where it peeked out of the hip-high slit in her nightgown. He ran his hands back up her legs. Everything he did, every way he touched her, set her nerves tingling and her stomach tightening. Now with his thumbs he parted the slit of her gown. Nora grasped the bedpost behind her as Nico pressed a kiss onto the apex of her thighs. She pushed her hips forward as Nico sought her clitoris with his tongue.

“What’s this?” he asked, tickling the little metal hoop he’d found.

“Clit ring.”

Nico raised an eyebrow.

“I’m going to play with that later.”

“You can play with it now.”

She opened her legs wider, and he slid one finger between her wet seam and inside her. He hooked his finger over her pubic bone and ground his fingertip into the soft indention he found there.

He teased her with his tongue before sucking on her clitoris in earnest. She leaned against the footboard behind her to steady herself. The room carried the heady scent of smoke. The heat from the fire stoked her own inner heat. She could hear Nico’s ragged breaths as he licked and kissed her. He turned his hand and pushed a second finger inside her. He spread his fingers apart, opening her up for him. Her inner muscles twitched around his hand. It was too much. She couldn’t wait anymore.

“Stop,” she ordered. Nico obeyed and rested back on his hands. She grasped the fabric of his T-shirt and he raised his arms. He unbuttoned his jeans as she tossed his shirt to the floor. Hard muscles lurked under his clothes—muscles he’d earned working the vineyard and not at a gym. He put those muscles to use as he rose up and pulled her hard against him. She felt his erection pressing against her. She raised one leg and wrapped it around his back, opening herself up to him. The tip went in easily and Nico lifted her and brought her down onto him, impaling her. It was only a few steps to the bed and he carried her there, laying her on her back across the burgundy coverlet.

Nico covered her body with his and drove into her with a slow sensuous thrust that sent ecstasy radiating from her back to her fingers. He pulled out to the tip and pushed back in again, her wet body giving him no resistance. He showed total mastery of his desire as he moved in her, advancing, retreating, performing the ancient steps of this primal dance with powerful male grace. He seemed in no hurry to come, as if he fully intended to stay inside her all night. She ran her hands down the length of his torso and let them rest at the small of his back. She could feel his taut muscles working as his back bowed every time he entered her and arched with each retreat.

With every thrust, Nora raised her hips to meet his. The base of his penis grazed her clitoris, and she lifted her head to kiss and bite his shoulders. Fluid ran out of her, glazing her inner thighs. She lifted her knees to open herself even more to him. She breathed in and inhaled his scent—warm and alive, like the new spring that surrounded them in the forest.

He slipped his hand between their bodies. She shivered beneath him, her head falling back against the bed as he grasped her swollen clitoris between his fingertips and stroked it. He pushed forcefully into her, and Nora gasped as her inner muscles clenched around him.

The world went still and silent around them. Nora couldn’t even hear the storm anymore, the crackling of the fireplace, the creaking of the bed. All she could hear was the quiet metallic jangling of Nico’s belt, his ragged breaths and the sound of her wetness.

Every part of her body went tight as Nico bore down on her, and came inside her with a shudder. He pulled out and kissed a path down her chest and stomach. With his head between her thighs he lapped at her clitoris again. Her back tensed, her stomach quivered, and she inhaled and forgot to breathe out. He pushed his fingers into her dripping body and sent her over the edge. Every muscle inside her spasmed violently. She hadn’t had sex in so long that it felt as though a week’s worth of orgasms thundered through her all at once.

Nico’s semen spilled out of her and onto the bed. Nora wrapped her arms around him as he relaxed on top of her, covering her neck and shoulders in carnal kisses.

“Thank you,” she said. “I needed that.”

“So did I. I’ve needed it for months.”

He kissed her long and deep on the mouth before pulling himself up.

He crawled off the bed and grabbed his shirt off the floor. She watched him pull himself back together. She’d always loved this part, watching a man dress after sex. She loved the perfunctory way Nico pulled on his shirt as if it never occurred to him she would be watching him and enjoying the view.

“Where are you going?”

“You need to drink my wine. Want some?”

“Nico, if you came in a cup I would drink it.”

He stared at her. Had she actually made the son of Kingsley Edge blush?

“We’ll save that vintage for later.” With a wide grin, he left her alone in the bedroom.

She pulled herself up slowly. She’d come so hard even her arms trembled. Was that from the sex? Possibly. She also hadn’t eaten anything all day. She cleaned herself off in the bathroom and found Nico downstairs in the kitchen uncorking a bottle of red wine. He handed her a glass, and she raised it to her lips. It had a sweet pungent scent, and when she drank it, she could taste its potency. A virile wine, just like its maker.

“Parfait.” She sighed as she lowered the glass. “But that will get me drunk in about two more sips if I don’t eat something.”

“Sit,” he said and pointed at the large battered armchair by the fireplace. “If you please.”

She laughed at his chivalry.

“I do please,” she said, sitting and pulling her legs to her chest. She felt relaxed now, loose limbed and spent. She could almost make herself forget the box on the mantel. Almost. But not quite.

“What is it?” Nico asked.

“Nothing. Only wondering how much trouble I’m in for sleeping with you.”

“Trouble with whom?”

“Kingsley.”

“Is it his business?” From his tone, Nora could tell Nico had no plans to tell Kingsley anything about tonight.

“You’re his son. He’ll make it his business.”

Nico brought her a plate of cheese, crackers and grapes.

“Don’t worry about it,” he said. “If he’s angry, we’ll tell him I took advantage of you in your grief.”

“Oh, good idea. He might buy that except for the part where you took advantage of me.” She took the plate from him and balanced it on her knee. “He does know me, after all.”

“Being with you was my choice,” Nico said. “My choice, my consequences. Not yours.”

“Oui, monsieur. Merci beaucoup,” she said in her best sultry French.

“You know I speak English,” he reminded her as he took a grape off her plate.

“I know,” she said. “But I speak French, too. Thank your father for that skill.”

“He made you learn it?”

“He and Søren would speak it all the time around me while I stood there like an idiot not understanding a word. I had to learn it so I knew what they were saying about me.”

Nico sat on the floor in front of her, his arms clasped around his knees. He looked young sitting there like that, but still undeniably strong and masculine. In the low firelight she could see the veins in his forearms, and the light dusting of dark hair on his skin.

“How do you know Kingsley?” he asked between sips of wine.

“How do I know Kingsley? That’s a loaded question. You sure you want to know the answer?”

“I asked.” He shrugged his shoulders and in that moment, in that shrug, she saw his father in him. So dismissive. So French. So Kingsley.

“Why do you want to know?”

“I don’t understand him at all,” Nico confessed, and she saw a flash of grief in his eyes. Grief to match her own. She crooked her finger and Nico moved closer, close enough to kiss her knee and rest his chin on her thigh.

“He’s a hard man to like and a very easy man to love. But he’s nearly impossible to understand,” she said, caressing the back of his neck.

“But you understand him.”

“I do. But he and I, we’re the same in many ways.”

“I want to know him. I want to know you even more.”

“Unfortunately, there’s no way to tell you the story of Kingsley and me without telling you the story of Søren and me,” she said. “It’s all one story, the three of us.”

“Will it hurt to talk about it?”

“Yes,” she said. “But a little pain never stopped me before.”

“Will you tell me?” Nico asked. He took her hand in his, twining their fingers together. She looked down at their interlocked hands—his tanned, calloused hand dwarfed her paler, daintier fingers. Moments earlier he’d lain between her thighs, and only now did they hold hands for the first time. The day they’d met she’d told him who he was. Perhaps it was time to tell him who she was.

“Okay, story time, then. But I’ll charge you. I get paid for my stories.”

“I’ll pay you in orgasms.”

“It’s a deal,” Nora said and she and Nico laughed. God, it felt good to laugh like this again. A few days ago she would have bet she’d never laugh again. He turned his hand and sensuously rubbed the center of her palm with his thumb.

“Since this is the Black Forest, we should make it a fairy tale,” she said.

“I like fairy tales.”

“You’ll like this one, too. It begins with a whimper but ends in a bang.”

“Is it a real fairy tale? Are there witches and fairies in it?” he teased.

“Sort of.”

“Kings, yes?” Nico grinned.

“Definitely,” she said. “One king. One queen.”

“What else?”

“Since we’re in Grimm’s territory, we’re going to do this right,” she said. “Ready?”

Nico kissed Nora’s fingertips.

“Ready,” he said, gazing up at her with heat in his eyes. She could still scarcely believe Nico was here. She’d idly wished for him earlier and behold—he’d come to her in a storm, begging sanctuary. What other magic might work itself tonight?

“All Grimm’s fairy tales start and end the same way,” she said.

She took a deep breath and began.

“Once there lived …” She paused and let the knife of grief stab her stomach again. She took the pain, breathed through it and let it out. “Once there lived … a priest.”

3

Eleanor

SHE WAS EITHER DYING OR HAVING AN ORGASM. ELLE couldn’t quite tell which.

“Something funny, Miss Schreiber?” her teacher demanded.

Elle glanced up and stared at Sister Margaret’s forehead. Safer than looking her in the eyes.

“Nope. I … That’s a great sculpture,” Elle said, pointing at the image on the projector screen at the front of her Catholic studies class. “Is she getting, you know, murdered there? Or … something else?”

“Not murdered,” Sister Margaret said with a smile. “Although I can understand why you might think that she was dying.”

Sister Margaret turned back to the image of St. Teresa of Avila she’d projected onto the screen. Every Friday was Know Your Saints day at St. Xavier High School.

“This famous sculpture by Gian Lorenzo Bernini is called the Ecstasy of St. Teresa. Teresa of Avila was a mystic. Can anyone tell me what a mystic is? Mr. Keyes?”

She pointed to Jacob Keyes in the front row.

“Um …” he said. “People who had mystical experiences?”

Elle rolled her eyes. Didn’t he know you weren’t supposed to define a word with that same word?

“Close,” Sister Margaret said. “Throughout our Catholic tradition, our clergy has acted as the intermediary between the faithful and God. Mystics are those rare souls who connect with God in a profound way without an intermediary. In the case of St. Teresa, an angel of the Lord came to her. Let’s read her own words about it. Page three hundred seventy.”

They all turned to the page and at the top in a box Elle read:

I saw an angel near me, on the left side in bodily form. In this vision it pleased the Lord that I should see it thus. He was not tall, but short, marvelously beautiful with a face which shone as though he were one of the highest of angels…. One of the highest of angels who seemed to be all of fire. I saw in his hands a long golden spear, and at the point of the iron there seemed to be a little fire. This I thought that he thrust several times into my heart, and that it penetrated to my entrails.

“As you can see,” Sister Margaret said, “the sculptor was attempting to show the profound and sudden closeness to God St. Teresa experienced when the angel came to her and struck her with the arrow, and, Miss Schreiber, you seem to be laughing again. Would you care to share with the class exactly what you find so funny?”

Elle sensed all eyes in the class on her. She really wished Sister Margaret would stop calling on her. Maybe if she told her the truth, Sister Margaret might learn her lesson.

“Nothing,” Eleanor said. “Except St. Teresa’s having an orgasm.”

“Excuse me?” Sister Margaret sounded scandalized.

“Oh, come on. She’s got her head back and her eyes are closed and her mouth’s all open. And the angel is thrusting the arrow into her and she’s all on fire. Seriously, penetrated to the entrails? Sign me up for that. I wanna be a saint if I can get some of that action.”

The entire class burst into uproarious laughter. Only Sister Margaret didn’t seem amused.

“Eleanor,” Sister Margaret said and nothing more.

“I know. I know.” Elle gathered up her books and headed to the vice principal’s office.

Again.

Luckily V.P. Wells didn’t have time for a theological argument today. He told her to stop talking about orgasms in her Catholic studies class and she promised to keep her commentary to herself from now on. He only threatened her life once before sending her out. After gathering her books from her locker, Elle left school and headed home.

As she turned a corner at Elm Street, Elle sensed something behind her. She glanced back and saw a car in her peripheral vision. Ignoring it, she started walking again. The car followed, going slow enough to stay behind her.

Finally the driver pulled up next to her and rolled down the window.

“I lost my new puppy,” the man in the car said. “Will you come help me find him?”

“Oh, hell, no,” she said, glaring into the car at the almost-handsome man sitting behind the wheel. “I saw that very special episode of Diff’rent Strokes.”

“Then will you come help me drive this Porsche into the ground?”

“Oh, hell, yes!”

Elle raced around to the passenger side, threw herself in the car and launched herself into the driver’s arms.

“Dad, what are you doing here?” She clung to him tightly and pressed a kiss onto his cheek.

“I haven’t seen my little girl in weeks. I thought you’d want to come on a test drive with me.”

She slammed the door behind her.

“Then let’s drive.”

Her father put the car in gear and tore down the street. With her father at the wheel, the Porsche slunk through the narrow city streets with the lissome speed of a cheetah. Elle put on her seat belt without being told. Once they hit the highway her dad would rev the engine and swerve in and out of lanes. He knew where all the speed traps were and always had a radar detector with him.

“I love it.” Elle rubbed her hands over the dash.

“That’s real leather.”

“Where’d you get it?”

“Borrowed it from a friend.”

“Can I drive it?”

“You have a valid driver’s license and proof of insurance?”

Elle glared at him.

“Dad.”

“Fine.”

He took the exit ramp and they changed seats in a gas station parking lot.

“Now go easy,” he warned her as she put the car in gear. “It’s got a featherlight touch. The space shuttle doesn’t accelerate this fast.”

“That’s because the space shuttle doesn’t have its engine up its ass.”

Elle put her foot on the accelerator and gunned it. Gravity introduced itself to her body, but she and her stomach ignored the pressure and didn’t back off. Her dad was a good driver. She was better. He handled a car like a NASCAR driver. All power and speed. She drove like a Formula One driver—pure feminine finesse. Porsches required finesse. The engine sat in the back, not the front, and many a new Porsche owner had wrecked their baby on the way home from the car lot because they didn’t know how to handle a rear engine.

She took the exit and soon they were careening down a scenic two-lane highway at eighty miles an hour.

Her dad sat back, looking utterly relaxed even as the trees raced by them in nothing but a brown blur.

“Keep it steady. Don’t pump the accelerator.”

“I’m not pumping. I’m pushing. I love this car.”

“I’m not keeping you from something, am I?” her dad asked.

“Nah. Just a hot date with an extremely religious, much older guy.”

“Anybody I need to kill?”

“Already been killed. I have to write a paper on Jesus.”

“Okay, you can date Jesus. But nobody else.”

“He’s about the only guy I know of who doesn’t piss me off constantly,” she said.

“You’re never going to get a boyfriend with an attitude like that so … keep that attitude.”

“I don’t want a boyfriend. Every guy at school is an asshole.”

“I’m happy to hear I don’t have to get the shotgun out yet. I kind of like the thought of you not having a boyfriend. Ever.”

“Don’t worry. No boys for me.”

“Girls?” He gave her a steady, “is there something you need to tell me” stare.

She shook her head.

“No girls, either.”

“Thank God.”

“I want a man.”

“Where’s my shotgun?”

“Right here.”

Elle gunned the engine.

“Mom said I’m not allowed to date. Ever, I think. She didn’t give me an age.”

“You know your mother. She doesn’t want you getting in trouble like she did.”

“You mean knocked up at seventeen? And whose fault is that?”

“Elle, shut up and drive.”

“Sorry, Dad.”

Elle shut her mouth and concentrated on the curves ahead. They could come out of nowhere on these back roads, but that was what made the drive so much fun. Whipping around curves, facing the unknown, looking death in the face. It was exactly like high school, except for the part about it being fun.

As they drove deeper into nowhere, Elle noticed her father studying her.

“What?” she asked. “Something wrong?”

“You look like your mother.”

“You want me to let you out right here?” She pointed at the expanse of nothingness around them.

“Your mother is a very beautiful woman.”

“She is a very crazy woman who is driving me crazy. Did I mention the crazy?”

“What’s she doing that’s so crazy these days?”

“Our priest, Father Greg, is sick. Mom worshipped him so she’s real upset.”

“Did you worship him?”

“He called me Ellen.”

Elle turned around in a driveway.

“I have homework,” she said. “I should get home.”

“No problem. Glad I got to see my baby girl.”

“Ugh. Don’t call me that.”

Her father laughed and ruffled her hair. Maybe she could crash the car in such a way it would only hit his side….

“Sorry, kid. You’re growing up too fast.”

“You know I’ll be sixteen in less than three weeks.”

“God, you make me feel old.” He exhaled heavily. Her dad wasn’t old at all. Only thirty-five. And he would have looked thirty-five if he didn’t live so hard. He drank too much, did things he shouldn’t, hung out with bad, scary people. But still, he didn’t make her go to church or do her homework, so between him and her mom, she knew which parent she preferred to hang out with.

“I can’t wait to get older. Trust me, I’m counting the minutes until my birthday. Driver’s license, here I come.”

Elle grinned at the prospect of finally being able to drive to school, drive to the city, drive anywhere she wanted, especially away from her mom and her house and her life.

“Elle?”

“What?”

“You know I can’t buy you a car, right? And neither can your mom.”

Her stomach knotted up.

“Dad, you promised me two years ago—”

“I had a lot more money two years ago than I do now.”

“What happened?”

“Life’s expensive. Business isn’t great.”

“Business isn’t great,” she repeated. “You mean the car-stealing, chop-shop business? Did that get hit by the recession, too?”

“You have a smart mouth,” her father said, all affection gone from his voice.

“If you weren’t going to buy me a car, you shouldn’t have promised me one.”

“You want to keep this one?”

“You’re the car thief in the family, not me.”

“Can you back off me for five fucking seconds, please?”

Elle pulled over a block from her house, where there would be no chance of her mom seeing her with her father.

She turned off the car and sat in silence.

“Elle … baby … I’m sorry. I wish I could buy you anything you wanted, but I can’t right now. I owe some money. I have to pay it back.”

“Whatever.”

“Don’t be like that. You know I love you, and I’d do anything for you.”

“I know,” she said, although she wasn’t certain that she did. “I gotta go.”

Her father grabbed her forearm, pulled her over and gave her a gruff kiss on the cheek.

“Don’t be mad at your dad. He’s doing the best he can.”

“Tell my dad I’m not mad.” Her shoulders sagged. Her heart sagged. Her hopes sagged. “I just wish things were different.”

“Yeah, well … you and me both, kid.”

She gave him a faint smile and got out of the car.

She shut the door behind her and said under her breath, “Don’t call me kid.”

As she walked the final block to her house she choked back tears of disappointment. Two years ago, on her fourteenth birthday, he’d promised her with all his heart and all his soul he would get her a car for her sixteenth birthday. And she’d believed him even though deep down she knew better. He made promises all the time and never kept them. I promise I’ll see you at Christmas. I promise I’ll make the school play. I promise I’ll get a new job so you won’t have to worry about me. Promises made, never kept. One day she’d learn.

Maybe it was her fault. Maybe nobody could be trusted to do what they said they’d do. Once in her life she’d love to have someone who gave enough of a shit about her to make her a promise and keep it. For once she wanted someone to treat her like she mattered.

Nice pipe dream there. That happening was about as likely as her getting banged by an angel like St. Teresa.

Eleanor unlocked the back door and walked into the kitchen. The car was in the driveway, but where was her mom? Her mom worked the night shift as a motel manager and did bookkeeping part-time for a small construction company. If she wasn’t at work, she was either asleep or at the kitchen table with her ledgers and adding machine. Eleanor made herself dinner—a bowl of cereal—and went into the living room to eat.

She found her mom in her shabby bathrobe curled up on the frayed paisley couch, wiping her eyes.

“What’s wrong?” Elle asked her mother. Her mom swiped at her face with a tissue. “Did Father Greg die?”

“No,” her mother said, pushing a hank of black hair over her ear. “But he’s probably not coming back. Not anytime soon.”

“I’m sorry,” Elle said, sitting cross-legged on the floor. Her mom never let her eat on the furniture, which made no sense. The furniture was old and threadbare and stained. Like a little cereal on the couch was going to make things any worse than they already were. “What’s going to happen?”

“We’re getting a new priest in the meantime,” her mother said, entirely without enthusiasm.

“That’s good, right?”

“No, it’s not good.”

“Why not?”

“The new priest is …”

“What?”

“He’s a Jesuit.”

“A what?”

“A Jesuit,” her mother repeated. “They’re an order of priests. They founded your high school, although I don’t think any Jesuits teach there anymore.”

“Are they bad priests?”

“They’re scholars,” she said. “Scientists. And very, very liberal.”

“That’s a bad thing?”

“Jesuits are … They can be … It might be fine. I would have preferred a loving shepherd to a scholar, though.”

“Well,” Elle said, taking a bite of her cereal, “maybe you’ll get lucky. Maybe this new priest will really love sheep.”

Her mother glared at her.

“I know. I know,” she said for the second time today. She gathered her food and her books and went to her room. Did no one like having her around?

She finished up her cereal in her room and stared at her pile of homework. But how could she even think about doing homework with so much shit going on? Her dad wasn’t getting her a car for her birthday like he promised. Her mom was having a nervous breakdown over the new priest. And she was turning sixteen in a couple of weeks and had no boyfriend, no money, no car forthcoming and no hope that things were going to get better, now or ever. Her stomach felt like someone had punched it. Her head ached and her throat itched. She didn’t know if she wanted to scream or cry or both at the same time.

Instead she walked into the bathroom and locked the door behind her.

She turned on her curling iron and sat on the toilet while waiting for it to heat up.

Five minutes later she stood in front of the counter and rolled her left sleeve up. She picked up the curling iron and took a breath.

Easy. You can do this. She started the countdown.

Three.

Two.

One.

On the one Elle pushed the burning metal barrel against her left wrist. She whimpered as pain scalded her right to her soul. She lifted the curling iron off her arm, then pressed it back down again. After one full second she pulled it off and dropped the curling iron back onto the counter.

She panted through the pain, not fighting it, but accepting it, relishing it, letting it remind her she was alive and could feel everything she wanted to feel. There were boys at school who would have cried like little bitches if they’d gotten burned like that.

She rolled her sleeve down over the burns and turned off her curling iron. She went back to her room and sat on her bed, her hands still slightly shaking. She opened her math book and got out a pencil.

She felt much better now.

4

Eleanor

SUNDAY MORNING, ELLE DECIDED SHE WOULD NEVER go back to church again. She’d thought about this decision ever since she’d found her mother crying in the living room. All her life, her mother wanted to be a nun. She dreamed of the day she’d take her vows and put on her habit the way other girls dreamed about their wedding days. But at seventeen she’d fallen in love with a handsome charmer named Will and a few months later, she was married and pregnant, and not in that order.

And here her mother was, sixteen years later—divorced, working two jobs and going to church five days a week because it was the only thing that gave any meaning to her life. Well, it didn’t give any meaning to Elle’s life. She doubted God actually existed. She thought the Catholic Church was stupid to ban birth control and then tell priests they couldn’t get married. Make up your damn mind. Either people should be fruitful and multiply or they should be celibate and childless. The church didn’t get to have it both ways. The hypocrisy disgusted her. The Catholic Church was one big business and they all worked for it.

So she was quitting. Now how to tell her mother this?

Elle flinched as he mother banged on her door.

“What?” she yelled as she grabbed a pillow and slammed it down on her face.

“Eleanor Louise Schreiber! Get out of bed this instant.”

Here we go. Now or never. She steeled herself and called out with more confidence than she felt …

“I’m not going.”

“What?”

Elle lifted the pillow up.

“I’m not going to Mass this morning.” She enunciated every word. “I’m a Buddhist!”

“Eleanor, get out of bed this instant and get ready for Mass.”

“I’m an atheist. I’ll incinerate the second I walk into church. It’s for everyone’s good I stay away from that place.”

Her mother growled under her breath.

“I don’t even know what that is, but I’m not having this argument with you.”

“Then don’t. I have civil rights. You can’t force me to go to church against my will.”

“As long as you’re underage, and you’re living in my house, I can.”

Elle sat up completely and met her mom’s eyes. Enough joking around. She meant it this time.

“Mom,” she said, her voice as calm and as reasonable as possible, “I don’t want to play this game anymore.”

“Church isn’t a game.”

“It isn’t real.”

Her mother said nothing at first but she didn’t leave, either. Bad sign. Her mom wasn’t giving up. Her mom was about to bring out the big gun—guilt.

“Father Greg is officially retiring soon. He’s not coming back. Today is the day the new priest is starting. If the new priest hires someone else to the church’s books, you don’t get free tuition to St. Xavier anymore. I need you to help me make a good impression.”

Elle shrugged. “Don’t care. Send me to public school. No more uniforms.” And no more fights on the bus. No more getting mocked because her dad had been in jail. No more getting teased for her breasts that didn’t seem to want to stop growing. No more blood on her knees.

“Eleanor, I’m serious.”

“Mom, I’m serious. You’re going to have to give up trying to turn me into a junior version of you minus the kid you didn’t want. Go without me. There’s nothing at church for me. Not now. Not ever.”

Elle threw herself back into bed. She knew she hadn’t heard the last of this topic, but maybe winning the battle was the beginning of winning the war. Covering her face with her pillow again, Elle tried to will herself to fall back to sleep.

She waited to hear her mother’s footsteps retreating. But instead of creaking floors, she heard whispered words. Eleanor peeked out at her mother from under her pillow. Too bad her mother hated men so much. Her dad was right. At thirty-three her mother was still young looking and beautiful. At least she could have been beautiful if she tried at all. No makeup. She never did anything with her hair. She wore clothes as baggy as a nun’s habit. Elle might have liked a stepfather. It would be nice to have a man around who actually gave two shits about her.

“Mom? What are you doing?”

“Praying to Saint Monica.” Her mother’s eyes remained closed. She clutched her saint medal in her hand.

“Saint Monica? Was she a martyr or a mystic?”

“Neither. She was a mother.”

“Good. Hate the martyrs.” Stupid virgin martyrs. Between getting married and getting murdered they picked murder. She’d pick a dick over death any day. Why did no one ever offer her those sorts of choices?

“She was the mother of Saint Augustine. He, too, was a willful, disobedient child. He had a mistress and fathered a child out of wedlock. He partied and played and didn’t care at all for the things of God. But his mother—Monica—was a Christian and she prayed and prayed for him. Prayed with all her might her child would see the truth of the Gospel and convert. God granted her prayer and Saint Augustine is one of the doctors of the church now.”

“The church has doctors?”

“It does.”

“Why is it still so sick, then? They must be really crappy doctors.”

Her mother stopped talking again, stopped whispering, stopped praying. But still she didn’t leave.

“Elle …” Her mother’s tone was softer now, kinder, conversational. Not a good sign.

“What. Now. Mother?”

“Mary Rose told me the new priest is supposed to be very handsome.”

“Mom, he’s a priest. That’s gross.” The pillow was once more firmly planted on her face.

“And he rides a motorcycle.”

Elle pushed the pillow off her face.

“A motorcycle?”

“Yes.” Her mother smiled. “A motorcycle.”

“What kind? Not some no-thrust piece-of-crap crotch rocket from Japan, is it?”

Her mother shook her head.

“Something Italian.”

“A Vespa? Those are scooters, not motorcycles.” Elle giggled at the image of a priest in a collar on the back of a little Vespa scooter.

“No. Something that started with a D. Du-something.”

Elle’s eyes widened.

“A Ducati?”

“That was it.”

She knew about Ducatis but had never seen one up close. She’d kill to have a Ducati between her thighs. All that power. All that freedom. What she wouldn’t give …

Would it kill her to go to church one more day? One more hour? One more Mass? She could see the bike, maybe touch it, then get out again.

“Okay.” Elle threw off the covers. “I’m coming. But I’m doing it for the Ducati, not for God.”

Her mother slammed the door behind her and Elle got out of bed. Grabbing her uniform skirt off the floor, she headed to the bathroom. Mass or not, she would have had to get out of bed anyway. Her bladder had been about to explode while arguing with her mom.

She pressed her hand to the bathroom window and felt nothing but room-temperature glass. Good. A warm morning. She wouldn’t have to bother with tights under her skirt.

Her hair looked like it belonged on a crazy person since she’d fallen asleep with it wet. No amount of curling or brushing was going to tame it. She grabbed a bottle of tinted green hair gel and streaked it through her hair, taming the wild flyaways enough that she could pull it back into a high ponytail.

Elle shoved her feet into her black combat boots. Carefully she applied a thick swipe of black eyeliner around her eyes. She was short and her boobs were too big but at least she could pull off the makeup component of heroin chic.

In her bedroom she found her thickest flannel shirt and pulled it on over her Pearl Jam T-shirt. She layered her green army jacket on top of her flannel.

Elle jumped in the backseat of their old Ford and her mom barely let her shut the door before backing out of the driveway.

“I want you to say hello to the new priest if you get a chance. Father Greg had me doing the books since he couldn’t handle it. This younger priest might want to change things up.”

“I’ll say hi. And then I’ll steal his Duck and ride away into the sunset.”

“His what?”

“Ducks. Dukes. Ducatis. Never mind.”

“I’m attempting to be open-minded about the new priest. You could at least give him a chance,” her mother said.

“I’m going, right? But only for the motorcycle. I mentioned that part, right?”

Her mother gave a ragged sigh.

“You should be going to church for God, and no other reason.”

“I told you, I don’t even think I believe in God anymore.”

“God is everywhere. He’s in everyone. We’re all created in His image.”

“I haven’t met anybody who looks like God yet.”

“How many people would it take to get through to you? God told Abraham he would spare Sodom and Gomorrah if ten righteous men could be found in the city. Only ten.”

Elle thought about it, thought about the boys at school who were dicks in sneakers, the teachers who did nothing but punish, her father who couldn’t keep a promise to save his life, her mother who forced religion down her throat …

She saw God in none of them. Not even in herself.

“Ten? Mom, I swear I’d settle for one.”

If she met one single person who seemed holy, righteous, kind, self-sacrificing, smart and wise who kept his promises and gave a flying fuck about her? Maybe she’d believe then.

“Only one?” Her mother sounded incredulous.

“Well, one person and a little ‘St. Teresa and the angel’ action wouldn’t hurt, either.” Eleanor grinned and her mother shook her head in disgust.

“You know, all I ever wanted was a daughter who loves God, goes to church, respects her priest and maybe even respects her mother a little. You think that’s too much to ask?”

Elle thought about the question one whole entire second before answering.

“Yup.”

Once her mother pulled into the Sacred Heart parking lot, Elle jumped out of the car. Her mom could make her go to church, but she wasn’t about to sit with her at church.

Elle entered the sanctuary and took a seat on the Gospel side—the left side of the church facing the altar. A visiting priest had explained the difference between the Gospel side and the Epistle side, or right side, a long time ago. He was also the same priest who taught everyone that Amen was best translated as “so be it.” That had surprised her. Until him she’d always thought Amen meant “over and out.”

Her usual pew had already filled up by the time she got there so instead of sitting beneath her favorite stained-glass window, she had to sit on the aisle. That was okay. She’d be able to get a better look at the new priest from here. And if she didn’t like the looks of him, she could “accidentally” step on the train of his vestments. Oops.

She wormed her way out of her jacket, picked up her missal and turned to the day’s readings. From her backpack she pulled out her copy of The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty and slid it in between the pages. She’d heard some girls in her German class giggling over a copy of it. One of them had stolen it from her older sister. Gross, they said. Nasty, they said. So dirty. They couldn’t believe people actually did this, they said. So of course Elle stole a copy of it from the public library. Now on her third reading, she still hadn’t figured out why those girls in her class had called the book gross and nasty. Elle had fallen in love with the story of sexual slavery in a fairy-tale world of kings and queens. Even better, the main character—Beauty—was only fifteen, like her. Fifteen plus that one hundred years she’d been sleeping under the spell. Maybe Elle was also under a spell and didn’t know it. Maybe she’d fallen asleep and everything happening was a dream, a bad dream where her father was a thief and her mother wished she’d never had her daughter. Maybe someday a prince would come along and kiss her and make love to her, and she’d wake up to discover she’d been a queen all along.

As Elle turned a page the bells rang. She closed her books and rose to her feet.

A hymn began.

Elle looked back to the door of the sanctuary, and saw the new priest.

The dream ended. The spell was broken.

Elle woke up.

5

Eleanor

STRIDING DOWN THE AISLE BEHIND THE CRUCIFER and the deacon was a man—a man with blond hair and a god’s face. He looked forward with eyes so serious and solemn she followed his gaze to the altar to see if Jesus waited for him there.

As he stepped past her pew he turned his head and met her eyes for the briefest of eternities. The book within her missal fell from her hand and fluttered to the floor. She didn’t bend to pick it up. It lay there, forgotten, as forgotten as everyone and everything else in this world. Everyone and everything else but this man who now mounted the steps to the altar and stood before the church.

Underneath the collar of his vestments she saw the hint of black with the white square.

This man, this most beautiful man she’d ever seen in her life, this man who was the incarnation of her every hunger, every desire and every secret midnight dream … This man was her new priest?

“Oh, my God …” she breathed, but whether she addressed the God in Heaven or the God before her, she didn’t know.

She crossed herself when the church crossed themselves. She remained standing as they remained standing.

“In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit,” the new priest intoned, and together with the congregation Elle answered.

“Amen.”

His voice, rich and resonant, echoed out to the very edges of the church and back again. His words wrapped around her like a golden cord binding her to him. The sanctuary brightened with each word he spoke as if the sun itself drew closer to hear his voice. Once in winter she’d seen a man on a street corner playing an old cello for coins. A cello on a winter night in the midst of a frozen city—that was what his voice sounded like.

She sat when the congregation sat and even as she sat down, her heart rose.

A woman read from the Old Testament.

A man read from the New Testament.

The priest read from the Gospels.

She heard none of the words. She heard only music. Even when the hymns had been sung and ended, she still heard music.

She knelt when the church knelt and prayed when the church prayed. And when it came time to rise for the Eucharist, she rose again.

On feet she could no longer feel she made her way inexorably toward the altar. Although she walked of her own volition, she felt drawn. That golden cord had wrapped itself around her heart and she would go wherever it led her. It led her to him.

With every step closer to him, the cord tightened, and yet the tighter it bound her, the greater her joy.

Visions flashed through her mind. A fluttering of white wings. A burning arrow. Stained glass under her feet. His hands on her face. His mouth on her mouth. His mouth on her breasts. His skin against her skin. His body inside her body. His heart in her heart in his hands …

From the deacon she took the wafer, said her Amen and swallowed it whole.

From the priest, she took the cup of wine. As she raised the cup to her lips, the sleeve of her shirt fell back, baring her arm and the two red burns on her wrist. She met his eyes and saw something flash in them, something she couldn’t translate into words. It was as if he recognized her, as if he’d seen her before somewhere and now tried to remember where. She knew she’d never seen him before in her life. If she had, she would never have forgotten him.

The golden cord knotted itself tighter.

“The blood of Christ,” he whispered, softer than he’d spoken it to anyone else, so softly she leaned in closer to hear him better.

“Amen.”

Their fingers touched as she returned the cup to him, and she soared back to her seat. She picked her novel off the floor, closed it and stuffed it in her backpack.

The Mass ended. All were exhorted to go forth in peace. But Eleanor felt no peace and she would feel no peace until she’d spoken to him.

Him? Him who? When she reached the lobby of the church, Elle realized she had no idea what the new priest’s name was. She had to know. Now.

She saw her mother whispering to a group of older women by the annex door. Probably talking about how the new priest was too young, too inexperienced, too handsome. As if there could be such a thing.

“It’s a nice day. I’m walking home,” she said to her mother and beat a hasty retreat before her mother could even say a word in argument.

The entire congregation surrounded their new priest. And yet she could still see him. He towered over most of them. He had to be six feet tall or more. Over the top of the crowd he met her eyes as if he’d been searching for her in the crowd. She mouthed, “I’ll wait for you.”

She slipped out the side door and watched the cars filing out. Soon nothing remained in the parking lot but a gleaming black motorcycle. Even on the opposite side of the parking lot she could make out the lines of it, the chrome detailing shining in the March sunlight. She’d never seen anything more beautiful in her life except for the man crossing the pavement toward it. Careful to make as little sound as possible, she stepped from the shadows and followed him to his motorcycle.

He’d abandoned the vestments for black clerics. Father Greg had always worn a plain black shirt and black jacket over it, usually without the white collar in place. But this priest had on a more formal looking and heavier black clerical shirt. It looked European to her. She’d never seen a priest who looked so … She couldn’t find the right word. Elegant, maybe?

As he reached his motorcycle, he paused but didn’t turn around.

“I was wondering where you went,” he said, taking his helmet off the handlebars. He turned around and faced her. “You said you’d wait for me.”

“You’re kind of an idiot. You know that, right?” she asked.

He raised his eyebrow at her. Elle dug her hands in her pocket and stared at him.

“Am I?”

He sat astride his motorcycle, and she stepped in front of it.

“Do you have any idea what it is you have between your legs?” she demanded.

“I’m well aware of what is between my legs.” He said the words without even breaking a smile. She narrowed her eyes at him and stepped closer, straddling the front wheel with her knees.

“Then you know that this is a Ducati. A 907 I.E.,” she said.

“Is it?”

“It’s in black. Never seen one in black before.” She walked a circuit around the bike. “Do you have any idea how much this Duck is worth?”

“A small fortune, I’d imagine.” He put the helmet back on the handlebars.

“Yeah. A small one. So where’s your lock?”

“Pardon?”

“Your disc lock. You can’t leave a Ducati sitting in a parking lot without a lock on it unless you’re criminal stupid or you want it to get stolen. Which one is it?”

“Criminally stupid.”

“So you admit it?”

“No, I’m correcting your grammar. And I didn’t realize suburban Connecticut was such a high-crime district. Should I be afraid?” He asked the question in a tone that implied he knew what fear was, but only in theory, not practice.

“If I had something that valuable, I’d lock it up.”

He smiled at her.

“I plan to.”

“That’s good. Okay, then.” She stood there not knowing what else to say. The few things that leaped to mind were a little too forward. Like “I love you” and “will you marry me?”

“Tell me your name.”

“Elle.”

“Is that short for …?”

“Eleanor. Eleanor Louise Schreiber, at your service.” She grasped the ends of her skirt and gave him her most sarcastic curtsy. “Now who the hell are you?”

“Try that again. More politely please.”

She tapped the toe of her boot on the ground.

“Well?”

“Fine. What is your name, Father?”

He studied her face for a moment and didn’t answer.

“Don’t you know your own name?”

“I’m deciding how to answer the question. In the meantime, allow me to say this. It is a pleasure to finally meet you, Eleanor.”

He reached out his left hand for her to shake. She had no choice but to give him her own left hand. As soon as her hand was in his, he gripped her fingers and pulled her toward him. He pushed at her sleeve and examined the two burns on her wrist.

“Hey, what the hell are you doing?” she demanded, trying to pull her arm back. He didn’t give an inch, merely held her in place with his impossible strength.

“You have two second-degree burns on your arm and large scrapes on your knees. Care to tell me how those came about?”

“It’s none of your business.”

The priest studied her through narrowed steel-colored eyes. He didn’t seem the least offended by her language.

“Eleanor,” he said. “Tell me who hurt you. And tell me right now.”

She felt the force of his will like a wall pressing against her.

“No. You won’t even tell me your name.”

“If I tell you my name, will you tell me about the burns?”

He let her hand go and she pulled her arm back and held it to her stomach. Her entire body fluttered from the touch of his hand on her hand, and the unrepentant way he studied her.

She stood still and silent while he stared at her face until she reluctantly met his eyes.

“Will you tell anybody what I tell you?” She wasn’t wild about telling anyone something so private about herself, but for some reason, a reason she couldn’t name, she trusted this man, this priest.

“Not a soul.”

“Okay. Fine. Name?”

He reached into the black leather saddlebag on his motorcycle and pulled out what appeared to be a Bible in some foreign language. He flipped opened the well-worn cover to a page where he’d written his name in thick black ink with strong legible handwriting.

Søren Magnussen.

She reached out and with the tip of her finger traced the letters in the name.

“Søren … Did I say that right?”

“You say it like an American.”

“How am I supposed to say it?”

“I like the way you say it. You should know, that’s not the name anyone here will ever call me. That’s what my mother named me. Unfortunately I’m forced to go by what my father named me—Marcus Stearns.”

“So no one here knows your real name?” That he wrote Søren Magnussen in his Bible seemed to hint that he considered Søren his real name, not Marcus.

“Only you. And now that you know it, I believe you owe me an answer to my question.”

“It’s not a big deal.”

“Eleanor—”

“I go by Elle, not Eleanor.”

“Eleanor is the name of queens. Elle is merely a French pronoun that means she or her. I will call you Eleanor. And now, Eleanor, tell me how you arrived at the burns on your wrist. Then we’ll discuss the knees.”

“Curling iron.”

“Self-inflicted or is someone in your home hurting you?”

“Self-inflicted.”

“Why did you do it?”

“For fun.”

“You enjoy hurting yourself?” He asked the question without shock or disgust. She heard nothing in his voice but curiosity.

She nodded.

“You think I’m crazy?”

“You seem quite sane to me. Apart from your clothes.”

“What? Not down with grunge?”

“Your hair is also a cause for concern.”

“What’s wrong with my hair?”

“It’s gone green.”

“It’s not moldy,” she said, laughing at the playful look of disapproval on his face. “That’s hair gel. I put green streaks in it.”

“How old are you?”

“Fifteen. But I’ll be sixteen in two weeks.” She felt the need to add that part at the end. “My mom says you’re too young to be a priest.”

“I’m twenty-nine. But I’ll try to age very quickly for her. I’m certain pastoring at a church you attend will age me considerably.”

“I’ll do my best.” She grinned broadly at him as she toyed with the cuffs of her jacket. Once more she fell into an awkward silence. He didn’t seem awkward at all. He seemed to be having the time of his life watching her be weird in front of him.

“Now for the knees. Those are impressive-looking wounds.”

“I fell,” she said. “Shit happens.”

“You don’t seem the clumsy sort. Perhaps I was mistaken.”

She pursed her lips. Her? Clumsy?

“I’m not clumsy. Ever. My gym teacher said I move like a trained dancer.”

“So then where did the injuries to your knees come from?”

“I got in a fight at school.”

“I hope she looks worse than you do.”

“He,” she said with pride. “He looks fine. But he’s still walking funny.”

Søren’s eyes widened slightly.

“You fought with a boy at your school?” He sounded mildly horrified.

“It’s not my fault. There’s this girl at school—Pepper Riley. And if her name wasn’t bad enough, she has huge boobs. She’s scared of her own shadow and won’t fight back. So this guy, Trey, he was being a prick to her on the bus saying all kinds of gross shit about her body. So I told him to shut up. And then he starts saying gross shit to me. He was all, ‘I want your body, Elle.’ So I said he could have my body. Then I gave him my foot. Right in the nuts. It was kind of amazing. When we got off the bus he pushed me so hard I landed on my knees and ripped them open. Whatever. Typical Wednesday at your local Catholic high school. Your tax dollars not at work.”

He continued to stare at her. His eyes had widened even farther.

“Father Stearns? Søren? Whoever you are?” She waved her hand.

“Forgive me. I was utterly riveted by your story. I might have entered a fugue state.”

“Lucky for me, it all happened at the back of the bus and the driver didn’t see it. Otherwise Vice Principal Wells would have my ass. He told me if I got sent to his office one more time I’d be publicly crucified as an example to the rest of the school. I think he was kidding?”

“Did you deserve such a threat?”

“Maybe. I said in class that St. Teresa didn’t have a mystical experience but was, in fact, having an orgasm. It’s not like I didn’t prove it. She said the angel ‘penetrated’ her with his ‘flaming arrow’ right to her ‘entrails’ and that it gave her ‘ecstasy.’” Elle used air quotes for emphasis. “That was not a mystical experience. That was a big O. V.P. Wells didn’t appreciate my theology.”

“I appreciate your theology.”

Eleanor opened her mouth and then closed it again. She had zero words. None. Nothing. She had no idea what to say to that.

“I’m going to go away now,” she said.

“Why?”

“You want me to stay?”

“I do.”

She looked at him askance.

“No one ever wants me to stay. You know, after I start talking.”

“I want you to stay,” he said. “And I’d like you to keep talking.”

“I’m not interrupting your golf game?”

“Golf?”

“All priests play golf, right?”

“Not this priest.”

“What do you play?”

“Other games.”

Something in the way he said the word games made Elle’s toes curl up inside her combat boots.

“Then I should let you get back to your other games.”

“Do one thing for me before I leave.”

“What?”

“Take your hair down.”

This time she didn’t even argue or ask why. She simply pulled the elastic out of her hair, ran her fingers through the messy waves and dropped her hands to her side.

“Give me your right hand.”

He held out his hand again and he took her unburned wrist in his fingers. From her left hand he took her ponytail holder and wrapped it around her wrist.

Slipping two fingers between the band and her wrist, he lifted it high and let it go, snapping the sensitive skin so hard she flinched.

“Fuck … Jesus, that hurt. What did you do that for?”

“Those burns on your wrist will take months to heal completely. There are other ways of inflicting pain on yourself that don’t leave scars. You should learn them.”

Elle looked down at her wrist. Her skin still reverberated with the pain of the vicious sting, but the redness had already started to fade.

“Did you … You just …”

“Your body is a temple, Eleanor. You should treat it like the priceless and holy vessel it is. I learned one thing and one thing only from watching my father’s wife. If you’re going to redecorate, either learn how to do it properly, or hire a professional.”

He took his helmet off the handlebars and started the motorcycle. Its impressive engine roared to life and Eleanor felt the vibrations from the ground up to her stomach.

“You’re not a normal priest, are you?”

He gave her a smile that hit her like a slap to the face and a kiss on the mouth all at once.

“My God, I hope not.”

With those final words, he put on his helmet and kicked out the stand with his heel. Eleanor took three giant steps back. He rode out of the parking lot and left her standing there alone.

She watched him until he disappeared from view. And then she listened until the sound of his engine retreated into silence.

“I’m yours, Søren,” she said to no one but God, and didn’t know what she meant by it. She only knew it was true.

She was his whatever the consequences. She was his.

Amen. Amen.

So be it.

6

Eleanor

ON WEDNESDAY NIGHT, THE MIRACLE ELEANOR prayed for happened. Her mother had to go into work early. She’d be gone from five until midnight. Eleanor could leave the house for a couple of hours without anyone noticing.

She’d seen on the church bulletin that someone was holding a Lenten prayer service at six that night. Perfect excuse. For twenty minutes, she worked on her hair until it resembled human hair and not her usual lion’s mane. She put on clean clothes—tight jeans and a V-neck sweater. In all her life she’d never walked so fast to church.

When she arrived at Sacred Heart, she didn’t find anyone praying. She should probably ask someone where the service was. Maybe Søren would know?

Eleanor tiptoed up to the door and found it ajar. Inside the office she spied a lamp on the desk and shadows moving.

“Knock knock,” she said without actually knocking. The door opened all the way, and Eleanor took a step back.

Søren stood in the doorway clad in his clerics and collar. He didn’t seem displeased to see her.

“Hello, Eleanor. Nice to see you again.” He crossed his arms and leaned against the door frame.

She peeked around his shoulder and peered inside. Books sat stacked on the desk and chairs.

“You’re moving in?”

“Father Gregory’s sister has asked for his things.”

Eleanor took a step back. Standing so close to him meant she had to crane her neck to look up at him.

“He’s really not coming back?”

Søren slowly shook his head.

“You have to understand that a stroke is a serious condition. Once he’s out of the hospital he’ll be staying with his sister and her husband.”

“Are they nice people?”

He seemed momentarily taken aback by her question.

“His sister and her husband? I haven’t met them, but she and I spoke on the phone. She seemed very kind and concerned.”

“That’s good.”

Eleanor bit her bottom lip while trying to think of something else to say.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Oh, sorry. I was going to go to this prayer thing but I can’t find it. I saw—”

“I mean with your lip.”

“I don’t know. I bite it sometimes. Habit.”

“Stop it. The only girls I’ve ever seen doing that are either not very intelligent or are trying to look not very intelligent. I refuse to believe you’re either.”

“Really? You don’t even know me.”

He smiled and took a step back into the office.

“I know you.”

Eleanor started to enter the office.

“What do you mean you know me?” she asked, but when she crossed the threshold, he held up a hand.

“Out.”

“Out?”

“Out of my office.”

“Why?”

“Because I said so.”

Eleanor took a step back into the hallway.

“I’m not allowed in your office?”

“No one under the age of sixteen is allowed in my office without a parent present. No one over sixteen is allowed alone in my office unless the door is open. These are my rules.”

“That’s kind of strict.”

“I’m strict.”

He pulled a book off the shelf and added it to a pile on the desk.

“Why are you so strict?”

He paused while removing another book from the shelf and gave her a searching look.

“Can I talk to you like an adult?” he asked, shifting books on the shelf.

“I’d be pissed if you talked to me like a child.”

He glanced at her as he put an empty file box on the desk and one by one started piling books inside.

“Last year an exposé was released regarding child sex abuse by Catholic priests and the churchwide cover-up by the bishops, the archbishops and even the Curia.”

“Mom says those people, the victims, they’re after the church’s money.”

“Your mother is wrong.”

“So the sex abuse is as bad as they say?”

“Eleanor, do you know why I’m here?” Søren asked.

“I know Father Greg is retiring, and there’s a priest shortage in the diocese so they had to call the Jesuits for a loaner. You’re the loaner.”

“It isn’t as simple as that. Recently, I returned to my community after my ordination. Things were tense. A Jesuit in our province had recently been convicted on sex abuse charges stemming from his assignment at an inner-city school.”

A chill passed through her body.

“He was messing with kids?”

“Rumors circulated that one of the school officials, another Jesuit, was attempting to hide documents from the plaintiff’s attorney, who was suing the school and others in civil court.”

“What happened?”

“I called the attorney and told them everything I knew, everything I’d heard and everything to ask for during the discovery process.”

“You ratted out another Jesuit to lawyers? Jesus Christ, how big are your balls?” Her father had “friends” who got themselves killed talking to cops or lawyers.

Søren laughed softly.

“I believe those were the exact words my superior said to me. But he didn’t smile when he said it like you did. I’m not telling you this story to impress you or shock you. I’m telling you this so you know why I’m here. I was to spend two weeks in New York visiting friends and family before being sent to India. Instead I’m here at this tiny parish in a tiny town in Connecticut.”

“Oh, shit. You got in trouble.”

“Me being here is the Catholic equivalent of ‘go stand in the corner and think about what you’ve done.’”

“So you’re not letting kids in your office because—”

“Of St. Paul and First Thessalonians 5:22. ‘Abstain from every appearance of evil.’”

“I guess having kids in the office could look bad.”

Søren rearranged some books in the box to make room for two more.

“It could. I’m afraid Father Gregory was slightly lax in those areas. Of course, from everything I’ve heard of him, he was a good and gentle man.”

“He was.”

“I’m an unknown integer here, however. Being alone with a seventy-year-old priest and a twenty-nine-year-old priest give two entirely different appearances.”

“Doesn’t help that you’re like the hottest priest on the planet.”

Søren looked up sharply at her. Eleanor went pale.

“I said that out loud.”

“Should I pretend I didn’t hear it?”

Eleanor thought about his offer as the blush stared to fade from her cheeks.

“I said it. I’ll go say some Hail Marys.”

“Finding another person attractive isn’t a sin.”

“It isn’t?”

“Desire is not a sin,” Søren said, sitting on his desk and facing her. “Fantasy is not a sin. Sins are acts of commission or omission. Either you do some act you’re not supposed to do. For example, shooting someone. Or you fail to do an act you should do. For example, not giving alms to the poor. Finding someone attractive is no more a sin than standing on a balcony and enjoying a lovely view of the ocean.”

“What’s lust, then?”

“You ask excellent questions. These are the questions of a young woman who is not of the lip-biting variety.”

“I’m going to bite my lip out of spite from now on.”

“That is exactly what I knew you would do. Would you like me to answer your question?”

“About lust? Yeah.”

“Let’s go into the sanctuary. You can sit down there.”

“I don’t mind standing.”

“You’re wearing combat boots.”

“They’re comfy.”

“Where does a young lady in Wakefield, Connecticut, purchase combat boots?”

“Goodwill,” she said.

“You’re wearing Goodwill combat boots?”

“Yes.”

“Congratulations, Eleanor. Your footwear has achieved irony.”

Before she could ask him what he meant by that, he stepped past her. She spun around on the heel of her Goodwill combat boots and followed Søren to the sanctuary. He opened the doors, putting the stoppers down to keep them open.

“You’re really into this ‘avoiding any appearance of evil’ thing, aren’t you?”

“I am. I wouldn’t want either of us accused of anything we hadn’t done.”

“What if it’s something we have done?” she asked, kneeling backward on one of the pews to face Søren, who was seated in the row behind her.

“That’s an entirely different situation. But we’re talking lust.”

“I’m lusting for your answer.”

“You aren’t, actually.” He gave her a steady gaze with his unyielding eyes. “You’re simply desiring my answer. Lust is overwhelming or uncontrollable desire that leads to sin. A man might desire another man’s wife. It happens. The question he has to ask himself is, given the chance, will he act on his desires? Will he try to seduce her the first time they’re alone? Will he attack her? If she came on to him, would he give in? Or would he honor her marital state, politely tell her no and suggest she and her husband go to counseling?”

“So it’s a matter of how much you want something that’s the difference between love and lust?”

“Partly. But it’s not only a question of degree of desire, but what you do with it. If I were to find a young woman stunningly attractive, intriguing and intelligent, then I will not have committed a sin. I could take that to my confessor, and he’d laugh and tell me not to come back and see him until I had something worth confessing. Now, if I acted on my attraction to this young woman, then we might have a problem.”

“Or a really good evening.” She grinned at him. Søren cocked an eyebrow at her. “I mean, a really sinful evening.”

“Better.”

“So it’s okay to desire someone as long as you don’t act on it?”

“There are many situations when acting on one’s desires is not a sin.”

“Married couples, right? They can have sex all they want.”

“Married couples can certainly engage in sexual acts with each other.”

“And …” Eleanor waved her hand, hoping for more to the answer. “Nobody else? The rest of us are screwed? I mean, not screwed?”

“I believe that is a question for your own conscience. I’m not dogmatic when it comes to sexual behavior in the modern world. The church can proscribe anything and everything it wants to, but the church is still made up entirely of human beings. Heaping rule upon rule on our congregations isn’t going to make anyone holier. It’ll serve only to add to the guilt that is endemic in our churches.”

Eleanor pointed at the sanctuary doors.

“You said five minutes ago you were imposing new rules on the church.”

“The rules are not for the church. They are for me. If I were to allow you and I to be alone together in my office, I would be breaking the rule, not you.”

“So what are all these rules?”

“Nothing burdensome, I promise. Actually, you might be able to help me with one of them. I have a feeling it’s not going to go over well.”

“Oh, no. What are you doing?” Eleanor knew her church well enough to know any sort of big change would be met with fear, anger and confusion. She couldn’t wait to see everyone freak out.

“The rectory. I’m closing it off to parishioners.”

“Whoa. Wait. You’re closing the rectory?”

“No church members will be allowed inside it.”

Eleanor’s eyes nearly fell out of her skull.

“I take it from you look of wild-eyed horror that such a declaration will ruffle a few feathers?” Søren asked, a slight smile on his lips. He didn’t seem the least bothered by the prospect.

“If you turned the church into a McDonald’s, that would ruffle some feathers. This is going to ruffle the whole fucking turkey. Pardon my French.”

“Pardoned.”

“Why close the rectory? The church uses it all the time.”

“This church has a sanctuary, a chapel and a large annex. There’s no need to use the rectory for church services. I, however, will need a home. I’ll no more hear confessions in my bedroom than I’ll take a bath in my office.”

He said the words without a hint of flirtatiousness, but that didn’t stop Eleanor from mentally conjuring the image of Søren lying wet and naked in a bathtub. Or was it laying wet and naked?

“Eleanor?”

“Sorry. I was trying to remember when you’re supposed to use lay versus lie,” she lied.

“Lay requires a direct object and lie does not.”

“Oh, that makes perfect sense. Thank you. Also, no. You can’t close the rectory. You’re going to piss off the entire church.”

“I had a feeling. Your prayer service you’re supposed to be at is meeting at the rectory right now. A sanctuary, a chapel, and for some reason neither of those will work.”

“The rectory is cozier. Father Greg always had snacks.”

Søren tapped his knee. “That’s unfortunate, but I’ve made up my mind. It’s important for a pastor to have strong boundaries with his church. I’ll do my best to explain my logic to them.”

“Logic? You’re going to use logic on Catholics?”

“Do you have a better idea?” From anyone else, the question would have sounded sarcastic or like a challenge. But instead from Søren it sounded like a genuine question. If she had a better idea, he wanted to know it.

“Look, I know these people. I grew up with them. They don’t really like outsiders. Everyone’s already freaking out that you’re a Jesuit instead of a regular priest.”

“They’re afraid of Jesuits?”

“They say Jesuits are really …” Eleanor waved her hand to beckon Søren forward. He leaned in and she put her mouth at his ear. “Liberal.”

Søren pulled back and looked her in the eyes.

“I have to tell you a secret.” She leaned in again toward Søren and inhaled. In that inhale she smelled winter, clean and cold, and briefly she wondered if someone had left a window open. “We are liberal.”

He sat back in the pew again and brought a finger to his lips.

“But you didn’t hear that from me,” he said and gave her a wink. Eleanor’s body temperature, already running a low-grade fever from being in the same room as him, shot up even higher. “But that’s beside the point. You were going to give me a better idea than logic.”

“Yeah … no. Logic won’t work. What might work is if you trick the church into thinking closing off the rectory was their idea.”

“How so?”

She shrugged and raised her hands. “I don’t know. Tell them you heard from concerned members of the church who want more rules and safety procedures or whatever?” They were always talking about safety procedures at school. “And you can say you heard the cry of the people and have decided to take their advice and add some new rules so you can keep everyone safe and avoid all appearance of evil. Nobody wants to be in a church with a scandal, right? You’re doing what they asked.”

Søren raised his fingers to his mouth and slowly stroked his bottom lip. It seemed an unconscious gesture, as unconscious as her lip-biting. But whereas her lip-biting apparently made her look like an idiot, his lip-caressing made her want to straddle his lap, wrap her arms around him and put her tongue down his throat.

“So you’re telling me I should manipulate the church into thinking that closing the rectory was a suggestion they made me?”

“Or just flat-out lie. Or lay. Whatever.”

“I could lie. That would be a sin, but I appreciate that suggestion.”

“You don’t sin?”

“I try not to.”

“I don’t.”

“You don’t sin?” Søren sounded so skeptical she would have been insulted if he weren’t entirely right to be that skeptical.

“No, I don’t try to not sin.”

Søren closed his eyes and shook his head.

“What?” she asked.

He held up his hand, indicating his need for silence.

“What?” she whispered.

“Do you hear that?”

She tilted her head and listened.

“No. I don’t hear anything. Do you hear something?” she asked Søren.

“I do.”

“What?”

“God laughing at me.”

Eleanor rested her chin on her hand. “You hear God laughing at you?”

“Loudly. I’m quite surprised you can’t hear it.”

“He’s laughing at you, not me,” she said.

“Excellent point. And you made another excellent point about handling the church. I’ll consider your suggestion.”

“You will?”

“It’s a wise and Machiavellian strategy.”

“Is that bad?”

“No. It’s biblical. Matthew 10:16. ‘Behold, I send you forth as a sheep among wolves—be therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.’”

“Sheep among wolves. That makes the church sound dangerous. You think we’re dangerous.”

“I think you’re dangerous.”

Eleanor sat back on her heels. They’d been joking the entire time they’d been in the sanctuary, but what he’d said and how he’d said it? That was no joke.

“Me? Dangerous?” she repeated.

“You. Very.”

“Why?”

“Because you want to be. That’s part of the reason.”

“I also want to be six feet tall and have straight blond hair, but wanting something doesn’t make it real. I’m not dangerous.”

“I’d explain my reasons for saying you are, but I have to get back to packing. I promised Father Gregory’s sister I would have all of his things ready to pick up tomorrow.”

“You know there are like a million old ladies in this church who would have packed up the office for you.”

“I know, but I said I would do it, and I feel only another priest should take care of his personal things for him.”

“That’s really nice of you.” She winced. Really nice of you? Could she sound like a bigger suck-up or idiot? “I should go home, I guess. Mom might call and wonder where I am.”

“Where is your mother?”

“Working.” Eleanor followed him out of the sanctuary.

“She works this late often?”

“This early. She works the late shift a lot. It pays more.”

“Does your father not help out financially?”

Eleanor stood in the doorway of the office again while Søren got back to work packing the boxes.

“Mom won’t take a cent from him even if he offered, which I doubt he would. He says he’s broke.”

“I take it the divorce was not entirely amicable.”

“She hates him.”

“Do you?”

“Hate Dad? No way. I love him.”

“Why does your mother hate him? If these questions are too personal you don’t have to answer them.”

“No, it’s okay.” She liked answering Søren’s questions. They were personal but not embarrassing. “Mom and Dad got married when she was eight months pregnant with me.”

“Eight? Talk about waiting until the last minute.”

Eleanor tried to smile but couldn’t.

“What is it?” Søren asked.

“She waited that long because she was hoping she’d have a miscarriage.”

Søren dropped the book on the desk with a loud thud.

“Surely not.”

“It’s true. I overheard her talking to my grandmother one night about some guy named Thomas Martin. She said she felt bad about thinking it, but she had once wished God would handle the pregnancy the way he handled Thomas Martin, whoever that is.”

“Thomas Merton,” Søren corrected.

“You know him?”

“He was a Trappist monk at the Abbey of Gethsemani in Bardstown, Kentucky. He’s arguably the most famous Catholic writer of the twentieth century. When he was a young man, he fathered a child out of wedlock, but the mother and child were both killed during an air raid in World War II, which allowed him to eventually become a monk without the familial obligations of fatherhood.”

“Makes sense, I guess. She was hoping God would kill me so she could be a nun.”

Søren gave her a look of such deep and profound sympathy she couldn’t stand to look at it.

“Eleanor … I’m so—”

“Sorry. I know. Don’t be. She loves me now. I think.” Eleanor laughed. “Anyway, it was young lust with Dad. She was seventeen. A year after she had me, she found out what my dad does for a living. They got divorced. She didn’t want any of his money because she said it’s all dirty.”

“Dirty money? What does your father do for a living?”

“He …” Eleanor paused and considered the best way to say it. “He’s a mechanic, sort of. Works with cars.”

“Nothing to be ashamed of.”

“They’re not always his cars.”

Søren nodded. “I see.”

“He’s been in prison a couple times.”

“Does that trouble you?”

“No,” she said. “Not too much anyway.”

They looked at each other a moment without speaking. It wasn’t an awkward silence, but a meaningful silence.

“Anyway, I’ll let you get back to packing.” Eleanor wanted to stay and keep talking to him. But she didn’t want to be a nuisance either, and wear out her welcome.

“I’ll see you Sunday?” he asked.

“What’s Sunday?”

“Mass? Church? Holy Day of Obligation?”

“Right. Sunday. I’ll check with my secretary,” she said. “You know, see if I’m free.”

“Do you have the office number here?”

“It’s on the fridge.”

“Call my number when you get home. I want to know you’ve arrived safely.”

She stared at him.

“Seriously?”

“How long does it take for you to walk home?”

“I don’t know. Twenty minutes?”

“Then I’ll expect to hear from you within the half hour. Please be safe.”

She gave him a wave and took a step back. It hurt walking away from him. That cord she felt last Sunday, she felt it again now, felt it in his presence, felt it even more when she moved to leave him.

“Three more things, Eleanor, before you go.”

“What?” She turned back to face him. Once more he stood in the doorway to his office.

“One.” He held up one finger. “Earlier you said you wished you to be six feet tall and have long straight hair. Don’t ever wish that again. God created you. Don’t argue aesthetics with the Creator. Do you understand?”

“Sure, I guess,” she said although she didn’t.

“Two.” He held up a second finger. “Don’t be troubled I said were you dangerous. It wasn’t an insult.”

“If you say so.”

“I do. And three.” He took a step back into the office. “I’ve been at Sacred Heart four days and already half the parish has made it abundantly clear to me that I am not wanted here. Father Gregory is much beloved. The parish is not ready to let him go and accept a new pastor. You aren’t the only one who knows what it’s like to feel unwanted.”

Eleanor felt something funny in her throat. It burned so she swallowed it. The burn remained.

“The church isn’t your own mother.”

“No, it isn’t. And I won’t minimize your pain by pretending the church’s distrust of me compares at all to your pregnant, terrified seventeen-year-old mother making a desperate wish that her problems would magically disappear and the dream she lost would be hers again. But I will say that it doesn’t matter anymore if your mother wanted you at the time or not. Nor does it matter if this church wants me here or not. We’re here, you and I. We’re not going away. We’re here, if for no other reason than God wants us here, and He gets the final say.”

“If it makes you feel any better, I want you here.”

Søren picked up one of Father Gregory’s books again.

“That does make me feel better.”

“Thank you … Søren.” She still couldn’t believe she was calling a priest by his first name, no “Father” attached.

“Good night.”

She turned and started to walk away from the office.

“Thirty minutes,” Søren called out, and Eleanor allowed herself to give free rein to the ear-to-ear grin she’d been holding back for the past hour.

The second she entered her kitchen, Eleanor picked up the phone. She had to stretch the cord all the way to the fridge so she could read off the office number to Sacred Heart.

Søren answered on the first ring.

“I’m home safe,” she said.

“Good.”

“Thanks for talking to me tonight.”

“I enjoyed our conversation, Eleanor.”

She smiled at the phone. Usually she hated being called Eleanor. Why did it sound so right coming from him? Eleanor … sounded so classy the way he said it, so adult.

“Can I ask you a quick question?”

“Of course,” Søren answered, and she heard the sound of books dropping into boxes.

“Are you dangerous, too?”

She held her breath waiting for his answer.

“Yes.”

“Thought so,” she said. Søren said no more.

“Good night, Søren. See you Sunday.”

“Try to avoid doing anything to prove I’m right about you being dangerous between now and Sunday, please.”

Eleanor would have laughed, but she knew he wasn’t joking. She wasn’t joking either, when she answered.

“No promises.”

7

Eleanor

FRIDAY NIGHT CAME AND ELEANOR STAKED OUT THE bathroom. Ever since meeting Søren she’d thought about him nonstop. She woke to him, fell asleep to him, wrote his name on scraps of paper and whispered it under her breath when no one was listening. Tonight she had to deal with these feelings. Thankfully her mom had already gone to bed.

Elle cleaned the bathtub and pulled out two candles from her secret stash. They lived so close to the railroad tracks that the entire house shook when the train rumbled by. Her mother had banned candles after one near miss during Thanksgiving. Thank God turkeys weren’t flammable. Unfortunately, the tablecloth was. At least the firemen had been nice to her. But the next train tonight wasn’t due for an hour, so Elle lit the candles as she filled the bathtub with hot water. Once it was full and steaming, she stripped naked and sank into the bathwater. She needed her alone time in the water tonight. Over the past year her body had turned on her. Almost overnight she had developed breasts that felt huge to her and the spread of her hips made her feel fat most of the time. And she could have lived her entire life very happily without pubic hair. Floating in the bathtub made her feel weightless and buoyant. The water surrounded her body and cradled it like strong arms. Something about sinking into the water always turned her on. Being naked in the bath made her hyperaware of every inch of her body—what it did, what it could feel.

Elle lay back in the water and let it hold her up. The heat penetrated her skin, tickled her sensitive nipples and lapped between her legs. She let her mind wander to a thousand erotic fantasies. She’d love to take a bath with Søren. Maybe then it wouldn’t be bathwater licking her breasts or slipping through the folds between her legs.

She opened her eyes and picked up the nearest candle. Sitting up in the water, she lifted her left arm into the flickering light. Holding the candle steady in her hand she tilted it and let the wax drip onto the inside of her wrist. Søren had told her to find a new way to hurt herself. Candle wax seemed to work. It hurt, it stung but it never scarred. The wax hit her flesh and she winced as the heat seared the delicate skin that covered her veins. Another dollop of melted wax fell onto her forearm. She’d be sixteen this month. In honor of her impending birthday she adorned herself with sixteen wax burns from her wrist to her inner elbow. With each burn she felt herself growing more and more aroused. The fire and the light and the heat seemed to come as much from within her as without. She breathed through the pain, conquering it, mastering it. Taking the pain made her feel stronger, powerful even.

After the final burn, she dipped her arm into the bathtub and rinsed off the solidified candle wax. She stared at her skin, now raw and bright red from the burns. Lying back in the water, she slipped her right hand between her legs and found the tight knot of her clitoris. Clitoris. She loved that word. She’d been reading a magazine in the doctor’s office waiting room the first time she’d discovered it. It wasn’t a word she heard often or ever got to say out loud. Nobody used real words at school when talking about sex except during those embarrassing girls-only lectures in gym class. Even then it was menstruation and uteruses. No one ever talked about the clitoris, which seemed crazy to her. It was the most amazing thing. When hers got swollen like this she could rub it between her fingers and these incredible feelings would wash all over her. She couldn’t believe her own body could make her feel this good. Every time she touched herself she became aware of an emptiness inside her, a hollowness in her hips. That hollowness ached to be opened up, explored and filled.

Carefully she eased two fingers inside herself. Going inside always made her nervous, which added to the excitement. She felt resistance against her fingers, like something would rip if she pushed in too hard. But she had to go inside. Her body wanted it. The heat inside her vagina surprised her. Was it from the hot water in the bathtub, or did that fire come from within her? Maybe it came from Søren. With her eyes closed she could easily imagine lying on a bed, naked and waiting. And in her mind, Søren crawled over her, kissing her stomach, her hips, her breasts. In her mind she reached for him, wrapping her arms around his shoulders, pulling him to her. Had he had sex before? Or was he a virgin like she was? What would he be like in bed? Gentle? Careful? Rough? Did he talk or stay silent? Would he tell her he loved her or simply show her all night long?

She felt the pressure building in her lower back and stomach as she rubbed her clitoris again with her thumb. Her body rose in the water as muscles deep in her hips and her bottom started to contract and flutter. She felt like a taut cello string had been plucked inside her. Everything hummed and vibrated. At last the pressure reached its peak. The orgasm sent her clitoris pulsing hard between her fingers as if it had a heartbeat of its own. And within her, her vagina clenched over and over again, pressing against itself. In that final moment of pleasure, Eleanor imagined the moment Søren entered her body and buried himself deep in her, penetrating her like Teresa’s angel had, all the way into her entrails.

As the climax waned, Eleanor sat up in the water and washed her hands and arms with soap. She’d started sweating in the bath so she turned the tap on and ran cold water now, splashing her face with it.

Feeling relaxed and clean, Elle got out of the bath and wrapped a towel around herself. She drained the tub and hid the candles away. Friday night. Best night of the week.

Eleanor padded to her room and curled up in bed. She found her secret notebook she kept hidden behind her headboard. She had to write down all the thoughts she had about Søren. In her mind she could see his pulse throbbing in the hollow of his throat and his unusually dark eyelashes casting shadows on his face. She wanted to capture those images before they were gone. They lived and died quick deaths in her mind. Ink could preserve them long after her mind had moved onto new fantasies.

Søren thrust into her, she wrote. Thrust? She’d already used the word thrust twice in this scene. She got out her thesaurus and flipped to the entry for thrust.

“Ram, jab, prod, push, poke, drill,” it read.

Drill? He drilled into her?

“He’s fucking me, not installing new kitchen cabinets,” she said to her useless thesaurus. Whatever. Back to writing. She’d fix her thrust issue later.

Lost as she was in her writing, she at first ignored the tapping on her window. A branch, a bird, a burglar coming to rob them—she couldn’t give a damn about that now. Only when the tapping morphed into knocking did she turn her head toward the sound.

Eleanor peered through the dirty glass and spied a man’s face. She flung the window open.

“Dad, what the hell?” she whispered.

“Long story. I need you to get your things and come with me.” His face wore no smile. She saw fear in his dark green eyes.

“Dad, what’s—”

“Get your stuff right now,” he ordered.

“Okay, okay. I’ll be right back.” She started to pull away but her dad grabbed her hand.

“Put on your school uniform. I’ll be waiting in the car.”

He released her hand and stepped back into the darkness.

In the bathroom Eleanor stripped out of her pajama shorts and T-shirt and pulled on her abandoned school uniform—plaid skirt, white polo shirt, tights and boots. She’d put her hair in pigtails when she’d gotten home from school in a failed effort to tame the black waves. She looked like some kind of cartoon character with the pigtails, the combat boots and the Catholic-schoolgirl getup. But her dad had promised to explain so she grabbed her coat, grabbed her backpack and snuck out the window, shutting it behind her.

A beige Camry idled across the street. She’d never seen her father in a car so nondescript before. Bad sign.

“So what’s up?” she asked as she threw herself in the passenger seat and her dad took off at twice the speed limit.

“I’m in trouble,” he said.

“How bad?”

Her dad paused before answering.

“Bad.”

“Oh, fuck.”

“Yeah, I got into some money trouble a few months ago. I had to take out a loan. They called it in early. I either pay by morning or—”

Eleanor gripped her knees in fear. Her hands shook. Her stomach flip-flopped.

“Or I don’t.”

She leaned forward and breathed through her hands. “Or you don’t …”

Her dad tried to shield her from what really happened at his shop. And when he talked about his business partners, he never used the words mafia or mob—because he didn’t have to. She was young, not stupid. She’d seen enough gangster movies to know the score. If her father didn’t pay back his loan by dawn, he was in trouble. Bad trouble.

“What do you want from me?” she asked.

“We need quick money. Manhattan. I have the crew out and working. We need more.”

“Dad, I can’t—”

“You can. You’re faster than any of the guys on my crew.”

“That’s only in the garage. I’ve never done this on the street before.”

“It’ll be easy. No one will worry about a girl your age in a school uniform. They’ll think you’re some private-school snob wandering around after curfew.”

“What if I get caught?”

“You’re not going to get caught. It’ll take two hours. You’ll be in bed by morning.”

“No way. This is crazy. Take me home.” Eleanor shook her head and fought off a wave of nausea. Yeah, she knew how to steal a car. She’d known as long as she could remember. This way to bend the hanger. This wire to that wire. But that was a game she played in her dad’s garage in Queens, something to do to impress her dad and the guys he worked with. Look at me, I can do it faster than you. They’d pat her on her head, applaud, tell her she needed to work for them instead of wasting her time in school. Those were jokes, funny cracks, playtime.

“Honey. I need your help here. I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t life and death.”

Life and death. She closed her eyes and tried to ignore the visions of her father lying in casket that danced through her head. Casket? Probably not. If he didn’t pay off the mob, there wouldn’t be enough left of him for a casket.

“Don’t call me honey.”

They drove in silence the rest of the way to the city. Friday night in Manhattan, all the money had come out to play. Up ahead on the left Eleanor spotted a black Jaguar trying to parallel park in front of a bar.

“Elle—” her father began but she didn’t let him finish.

“How many?”

He shrugged. “Five?”

“Five. Fine. I’ll see you at the shop.” She opened the door and slammed it behind her.

Five cars. Home by dawn. No one would suspect her.

Eleanor walked down the sidewalk, not taking her eyes off the Jag. Finally the driver managed to worm the car into the spot. He opened the driver’s side door and Eleanor stood on the passenger side.

“Sir, I think you hit that car behind you,” she said over the roof.

“What?” He barely glanced at her. “No way.”

“Looks like it to me. Check the bumper.”

The driver, who looked half-drunk already, stumbled to the rear of the car and bent over.

“Nah, it’s good. You scared me there.” He pointed at her over the trunk and smiled.

“No problem. My mistake.”

He walked into the bar, barely giving her a second look. He didn’t seem to notice that while he’d examined the rear bumper, she’d unlatched the passenger side door. When she was certain no one on the street was paying her any attention, she dropped into the car and shut the door behind her.

Seconds later, she was on her way to Queens.

She’d snagged the Jag so fast she beat her father back to the garage.

Sitting on the hood of the car, she watched the shop at work. They’d known her since she was a baby; Jimmie, Jake, Levon and Kev had entertained her with card tricks and jokes and let her watch them working under the hoods of the cars anytime she’d come around. Now they barely glanced at her. In fact, in the past year whenever she’d stopped by they all treated her like a stranger.

“Nice Jag,” Oz, the oldest guy on her dad’s crew, said as he shuffled past her. He had so much grease and oil on his overalls she couldn’t tell what color they were supposed to be. “Yours?”

“Mine. I’m keeping it.”

“You got good taste, kiddo.”

“In cars only. I suck at picking parents.”

Oz raised his hands. “You know he wouldn’t have asked if he wasn’t desperate.”

“How desperate?”

Oz glanced around. He looked back at her and dropped his voice to a whisper.

“Told me five hundred.”

Eleanor couldn’t wrap her mind around the number.

“Five hundred … thousand?”

Oz nodded. “Had to borrow to pay off an old debt. Swapped an old debt for a new one.”

“Jesus H. Christ.” Eleanor sighed. Someone had loaned her dad five hundred thousand dollars? Wonder what he’d spent it on. She’d gotten nothing for Christmas from him.

Oz patted her knee and started to shuffle away again.

“Hey, Oz?”

“Yeah, toots?”

“Do Kev and Jake hate me for some reason?” Even now Kev and Jake eyed her from their various posts. Both of them were in their mid-twenties, her dad’s two best guys.

Oz burst into peals of big-bellied laughter.

“Hate you, toots? Hell, no.”

“Then what’s their problem?”

“They don’t wanna piss off your papa by getting caught staring at his baby. You’re getting too pretty for your own good. Stop that, now. And get rid of those pigtails. That only makes it worse.” He slapped the side of her leg in a fatherly sort of way and headed back to work. Eleanor couldn’t believe these guys she’d known since she was a tiny seven-year-old, and they were zit-faced teenagers, now couldn’t even talk to her because she had boobs. She yanked her ponytail holders out of her hair.

Eleanor glanced around the garage while she waited. Bad night. Everybody working like demons. She’d never seen the garage looking so dismal or so frenzied. A great furnace boiled with flames in one corner casting heat but no light. The whole place smelled of smoke and sulfur. She couldn’t wait to get the hell out of here.

Finally her father pulled in the back entrance and got out of the Camry.

“One down,” Eleanor said as he glanced first at the car and then at her. “Four to go.”

A convertible driven by her dad’s friend Tony pulled up outside the back entrance to the garage. Eleanor threw herself inside.

“Where to?” Tony asked as he peeled out and onto the street.

“Find me some rich bitches. They keep their cars cleaner.”

“Gramercy Park it is then, ma’am.”

On 23rd Street, she nabbed a Mercedes. Too easy. They hadn’t even locked the fucking thing.

Canal Street netted them one BMW, silver. It handled like a dream. Such a pretty car it broke Eleanor’s heart to scratch the window with the coat hanger. She didn’t want to think about the thousand different parts it would be chopped up into by tomorrow morning.

On Union Street she spotted a high-end Acura, bright red, parked outside a restaurant. The owner had probably tipped the hostess to keep an eye on it. The hostess was probably off getting stoned in the kitchen.

“Four down, one to go,” she said to her dad as she tossed him the Acura’s spare keys. The genius owner had left the set in the visor. She didn’t even have to wire this one.

“Be careful,” he called out as she headed back to the street.

She flipped him off on her way out the door.

One more car and it would be done. One more and she could go home to bed. With all the adrenaline surging through her body, she knew she’d crash hard the second she got home and wouldn’t wake up until noon.

As Tony drove her into SoHo, Eleanor kept her eye out for a nice American car. American manufacturers were arrogant, and that made them shit at security. No Ford or Dodge had ever put up much of a fight.

“Nice …” Tony purred as he spotted a car in tiny ten-space paid-parking lot.

She saw what he saw the second after he saw it. A Shelby Mustang. Looked like a 1966 to her, not that she’d bet her life on that. She knew make and model on sight, but she wasn’t enough of a nerd to bother with all the years. She’d leave that to her dad.

“It’s mine,” she said. Tony wolf whistled his agreement.

“Go for it. See you back at the shop.”

Eleanor hopped out of the car and sidled over to the lot. She saw a few people milling around but no one seemed to notice her. She probably looked like some drunk preppy waiting for her friends to come out of a bar.

Let them think that. Let them think anything they wanted as long as they didn’t notice her standing with her back to the driver’s side window, a bent coat hanger behind her back. She dug under the latch and lifted up, popping the lock with ease.

Ten seconds later she and her new friend Shelby were already on the street.

Done. She’d jacked five high-dollar cars in one night. One night? She’d done it in four hours. A sense of relief flooded her. In no time she’d be back in her bed at home dreaming of Søren. Good thing she’d finished her job early. The skies had opened up and rain exploded from the clouds. The temperature, unusually warm the past week, turned frigid in minutes. The rain fractured the city lights and set everything in her rearview mirror alight with a blue glow.

Blue?

“Fuck.” In a panic Eleanor glanced behind her. A police car, blue lights ablaze, nestled in behind her. It hadn’t turned on its sirens and the silence of the car menaced her far more than sound.

She knew she had about two seconds to decide what to do. She could gun it and run. The second she lost the cop car she could dump the Mustang and disappear. But this wasn’t the highway or the interstate. This was Manhattan after midnight. Narrow streets. Pedestrians. Her foot hovered over the pedals. Accelerator on her right, brake on her left. Eleanor looked around for an escape route. She saw no alleys. No easy exits. And up on her right loomed a church, its ancient spire casting a cross-shaped shadow onto the shining streets.

Eleanor hit the brakes and prayed for a miracle.

8

Eleanor

FOR TWO HOURS THE COPS KEPT HER IN THE BACK of the squad car while they asked her questions and talked on their shoulder-mounted walkie-talkies. She did her best to stick to her story. I’m sorry. I wanted to drive it around the block. You know—joyriding. But for some reason the cops didn’t quite buy it. Apparently joyriders usually borrowed cars they had the keys to, not cars that had to have their locks popped and their ignitions hot-wired.

The two cops—one white, one black, both young—seemed way too excited about having pulled her over. Mobsters and murderers and rapists were running all over town and Officer Ferrell and Officer Hampton couldn’t stop patting themselves on the back for bringing down a fifteen-year-old car thief.

“We called your mom,” Officer Hampton said, giving her a wink.

“Oh, no, not my mom.”

“She’ll meet us at the station,” Officer Ferrell said.

“Station? We have to go to the station?”

“Sure we do.” Officer Hampton waved his hand, motioning at her to stand up. She stepped out of the back of the squad car and into the driving rain. “That’s where we take everybody we arrest.”

“Arrest?”

Ferrell and Hampton laughed as they pulled her arms gently behind her back and placed handcuffs on her wrists. The cold metal bit into her skin. She’d never worn handcuffs before. The heft of them surprised her. She’d never dreamed they’d feel so heavy and cold.

The white cop, Ferrell, placed a hand on the back of her head as he maneuvered her into the back of the squad car.

“You, little girl,” began Officer Hampton, “have the right to remain silent.”

“Take that advice, little girl,” Officer Ferrell said as she pulled her feet into the car.

Eleanor glared up at his wide, plain and arrogant face.

“Don’t call me little girl.”

Her bravado lasted until the door slammed behind her. Alone in the backseat of the squad car, she started to shake. The temperature had dropped. Rain had soaked her clothes and hair. Her skin felt clammy and cold. But that wasn’t why she couldn’t stop shaking.

Once at the station the two officers pulled around to the police entrance. Officer Ferrell opened the door and ordered her out. As they headed toward the door, she saw two figures ten yards away at the main entrance standing in the rain both holding umbrellas. One was her mother. She’d recognize that shabby pink umbrella with the ruffles anywhere. Her mother stood watching her, her face as wet with tears as Eleanor’s was wet with rain. Behind her under a black umbrella loomed someone else. Tall, stern and watchful, he followed her every step with his eyes. She raised her head, not wanting him to see her fear and her shame. Something about the sight of her must have amused him because his gaze darted once to her handcuffed wrists before meeting her eyes with the subtlest of smiles on his lips. Officer Hampton ushered her inside and put her in a plastic chair.

“Can I see my mom?” she asked him as the officer at the desk took her mug shot, and another starting typing on a computer behind the high desk.

“Soon. We’re gonna get you in a room. Somebody’s coming to talk to you.”

“Do I need a lawyer?” she asked, having learned long ago from her father that in their world the L word had magic powers.

“You can talk to your mom about that later,” Officer Hampton said as he scribbled on a clipboard. She wondered if he was drawing dinosaur doodles the way his hand flew all over the page. All the files and the forms and the pictures were intimidation tactics. They’d asked her fifteen times in the car on the way over where she’d planned on taking the car. She knew they wanted her father and his shop, and they weren’t about to get that information from her.

“How long do I have to keep wearing the handcuffs?” The metal cuffs kept hitting the back of her plastic chair and making a scraping sound like nails on a chalkboard.

“We’ll get those off in a minute,” Officer Ferrell said. “Once I remember where I put the keys.”

“Come on, Speed Racer.” Officer Hampton snapped his fingers in her face. “We got a room for you.”

He took her gently by the upper arm and escorted her down a dingy beige hallway to a room with nothing but a table in the center and two chairs.

“You’re going to interrogate me?” Eleanor asked as she sat down in the chair.

“Nothing but a friendly conversation. Someone will be in soon.”

He shut the door and left her alone in the room with nothing but her fears. Calm down, she ordered herself. It’ll be okay. Dad will find out and he’ll come straight down here and tell them it was his fault, his doing, that he asked me to help him because he owed the mob a lot of money. He’d never let her take the fall for him. Not his own daughter, his only child. Right?

But deep down she knew he wasn’t coming for her.

Time dripped by as slowly as frozen honey from a bottle. The adrenaline drained from her body and soon Eleanor felt the exhaustion under the fear. Her head throbbed; her arms ached. She’d give anything to get out of these handcuffs and stretch.

Eventually her chin dropped to her chest. For a few minutes she even slept.

The sound of a door opening alerted her to the presence of someone entering the room. She kept her head down, her eyes closed.

Something touched her cuffed hands behind her back. Fingers brushed her palm, caressed her wrists. She heard a click and the cuffs came off. In any other room under any other circumstances she might have enjoyed the sensation of large warm hands on her cold skin. Some cop touching her in such a personal way made her stomach turn.

She heard the rasp of a chair on the floor and the sound of the metal handcuffs landing on the table.

If she opened her eyes and raised her head, it would start. The whole ugly mess would start. Interrogation, investigation, accusations … Her eyelids were a wall, and until she opened them the world would stay behind that wall. But she couldn’t hide forever.

She opened her eyes expecting to see a cop or a lawyer or maybe even her mom.

But no, it was her priest. He didn’t speak, not a word. She brought her arms around in front of her and started to rub her wrists. It had been him touching her fingers and chafing her skin as he’d removed the handcuffs, not some creepy cop.

Eleanor hated that he’d been dragged into this mess. Her mother had probably called him in a panic the second after the cops had called her. Anytime anything bad ever happened, her mother’s first call was to Father Greg. Had it been Father Greg she’d called, the old priest would have prayed on the phone with her, offered her words of advice and comfort. He never would have dragged himself out of bed in the middle of the night to go to a police station in the city. But Søren had. Why?

He continued to stare at her in silence and Eleanor felt like she’d unwittingly entered into a staring contest. Fine. Staring contest it was then. She knew how to get him to blink.

“So,” she began, “since our last talk about rules and priests and sex and stuff, I’ve been meaning to ask you a question. Are you one of those priests who likes to fuck the kids in the congregation?”

She waited.

He didn’t blink.

“No.”

Okay, so he was good at this game. She was better.

She raised her chin and gave him the sort of smile she’d dreamed of giving a handsome older man but never had the guts or the chance to try it.

“Too bad.”

“Eleanor, we need to discuss the predicament you’re in at the moment.”

She nodded her agreement.

“I’m in a real pickle.”

Smile? Laugh? Withering glare? Nothing.

“You were arrested on suspicion of grand theft auto. Several luxury vehicles with a combined value of a quarter of a million dollars were stolen tonight. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”

“I take the Fifth,” she said, proud of her legal knowledge. “That’s what I’m supposed to say, right?”

Now she received the withering glare she’d been hoping for.

“To the courts, yes. To me, never. To me, you will tell the truth always.”

“I don’t think you want to know the truth about me, Søren.” She dropped her voice to a whisper at the moment she said his name. It seemed like a magic word to her, his name. Like knowing his name meant something special like it did in fairy tales.

“Eleanor, there is nothing I don’t want to know about you. Nothing you tell me will shock or disgust me. Nothing will cause me to change my mind about you.”

“Change your mind? You’ve already made up your mind about me? What’s the verdict?” She braced herself, not wanting the answer. They had nothing in common, she and her priest. He looked like money, talked like money. He had the whitest fingernails she’d ever seen on a man. White fingernails, perfect hands like a marble sculpture of a Greek god. And her? She was a fucking train wreck. Chipped black nail polish, soaked clothes, dripping wet hair and her entire life over in one night.

“The verdict is this—I am willing and capable of helping you out of this mess you’ve gotten yourself into tonight.”

“Can we call it a pickle? Pickle sounds less scary than mess.”

“It’s a disaster, young lady. The car they caught you stealing belongs to a very powerful man. He’s already demanding the police try you as an adult and put you away for the maximum sentence. You could spend years in juvenile detention, or worse—an adult facility. At the very least, this man doesn’t want you seeing sunlight until you’re twenty-one years old. Blessedly, I have some connections in this area. Or, more accurately, I have someone who has some connections in this area.”

For the first time since they started speaking, he broke eye contact with her. He glanced away into the corner of the room. His face wore the strangest expression. Whoever this powerful person was, Søren didn’t seem all that excited about asking him. In fact, if she had to guess, she’d say he was dreading it.

“You’re going to go through all this trouble for me, why?”

Søren looked back at her and gave her a smile that stripped her soul naked and put it on its knees.

“Because there is nothing I wouldn’t do to protect you, Eleanor. Nothing I wouldn’t do to help you and nothing I wouldn’t do to save you. Nothing.”

The way he spoke the final “nothing” sent a chill through her body. It scared her instead of comforting her. He meant it. That was why it scared her.

“That’s not an answer. You’re saying you’re helping me because you’re helping me.”

“I am.”

“There’s no other reason?”

“There is, but I can’t tell what it is yet.”

“But you will?”

“In time. But first, Eleanor, there is something you should know.”

Eleanor sat up straight in her chair and gave him her full attention.

“What?”

“There is a price you will have to pay.”

“Oh, goodie,” she said, and gave him a wide smile. “Now we get back to my first question about the fucking of the kids at church. Well, if you insist.”

“Do you value your worth as a child of God so little that you presume I would only help in exchange for sex?”

He asked the question calmly and with only curiosity in his tone, but the words still hit as hard as a fist in her stomach.

“So that’s a no?”

Søren raised an eyebrow at her and Eleanor was overcome with a fit of laughter. She was beginning to like this guy. She’d fallen in love with him the moment she first saw him, and she would love him now until the end of world. But she’d never dreamed she’d like him so much.

“That would be a no,” he said. “I will, however, require something from you.”

“Do you always talk like this?”

“You mean articulately?”

“Yes.”

“Yes.”

“Weird. So what am I paying you for your help? I hope it’s not my firstborn child or anything. Don’t want kids.” She wasn’t sure about that last part but it sounded kind of tough.

“My price is simply this—in exchange for my assistance, I ask that you do what I tell you to do from now on.”

“Do what you tell me to do?”

“Yes. I want you to obey me.”

“From now on?” She couldn’t believe she’d heard him right. “Like, for how long?”

Søren looked at her again, looked at her without smiling, without blinking, without jesting, without joking. He looked at her like the next word he said would be the most important word he ever spoke and the most important word she ever heard.

“Forever.”

The word hung in the air between them before falling into her lap and seeping into her skin.

“Forever,” she repeated. “You want me to obey your every order forever?”

“Yes.”

“What are you going to order me to do?”

“As soon as you agree to my terms, you will learn your first order.”

“You know forever is a really long time. It’s the longest time, actually. You don’t get longer than forever.”

“I am aware of this.”

“I could be in juvie until I’m twenty-one. Forever’s longer than six years.”

“It is.”

“I’ll take juvie, then.” A foolish boast, but one she meant.

“You would rather go to prison than obey me?” Søren sounded horrified. Maybe even scared. His fear made her afraid. But not so afraid she would give in, not yet.

“If I’m going to give you forever,” she said, raising her chin higher, “I want something in return.”

“I already offered to help you out of your mess. What else do you want?”

Eleanor considered her demands. He sounded open to suggestion, which was good because she had a suggestion.

“Everything.”

“Everything?” he repeated. “As in …?”

“Every. Thing.” She stared at him across the desk, and this time it was her turn not to blink. “I give you forever, the least you can give me is everything.”

“I believe I know what you’re asking, and you should know that’s problematic where I’m concerned.”

“Because you’re a Catholic priest, and you’re older than I am?”

“That would be two of the three reasons.”

“What’s the third?”

“I will tell you the third reason at the same time I tell you the second reason I’m offering to help you.”

“Jesus H. Christ, so many questions. Do I need to write this shit down?”

Søren reached into his coat pocket and pulled out his battered leather-bound Bible, the one that had his real name in it.

He flipped through the pages and glanced at the scraps of paper inside. They all appeared to have writing on them but not in English. Finally he flipped to the very back, ripped out a blank end page and slid it across the table to her. From inside his coat he produced a pen, a heavy black one.

“Write.”

Eleanor eyed the pen and paper. She looked at Søren.

“I will answer your questions,” he said. “Eventually. In the meantime I wouldn’t want either of us to forget any of them.”

On the end page she wrote What’s the third reason that being with me is problematic? and What’s the second reason you’re helping me? She furrowed her brow as she studied the paper.

“Something wrong?” Søren asked.

“I think I misspelled problematic.” She held up the note and Søren narrowed his eyes at it.

“One m.”

“Can I answer your two objections?” she asked, rewriting the word problematic with only one m this time. “I don’t care if you’re a Catholic priest. Forcing priests to be celibate is the stupidest rule ever. Why would God invent sex and then tell people not to have it? And second, so what? You’re older than I am. I’ll be sixteen in a couple days.”

“I can’t believe I’m even discussing this with you, Eleanor,” Søren said.

She smiled at him.

“I can.”

Søren turned his head and stared at nothing for a moment. He smiled a little and turned back to her.

“Very well, then.”

“Very well what?”

He held out his hand, waiting for her to shake it.

She stared at his hand, his perfect hand.

“You’re kidding, right?”

“I want you to obey me forever. It is a high price, and I realize that. If we have to negotiate, then we have to negotiate. I accept your terms. Can you accept mine?”

Eleanor slowly raised her hand off the desk and put her fingers into his.

“Okay,” she said. “You got me. I’m yours.”

He wrapped his much larger hand around hers. She expected his hand to be cold for some reason. He had such cold eyes, such an icy demeanor, but no, his skin was warm and she couldn’t help but imagine him touching her in far more intimate places than her hand.

“Forever,” she said.

And he said, “Everything.”

The deal was done. They released each other’s hands and Søren stood up.

“I’ll leave you now. Do not answer any questions until you speak to an attorney. The church will pay your legal fees. Rest assured you will pay us back for them in time.”

“Okay.” The fear had returned. She didn’t want him to leave her. Not now. Not ever.

“When your lawyer arrives, tell her the entire truth and leave nothing out. Your father was involved, no doubt. You need to tell the lawyer the level of his involvement.”

“Rat out my dad? No way.”

“Eleanor, less than one minute ago you promised to obey me forever. These are your orders. Your father is the reason you are here in this police station in the middle of the night with your entire future hanging in the balance. You are here. He isn’t. You will tell the lawyer and the court everything you know about your father and his illegal enterprises. You should be able to parlay that into a plea agreement or a very reduced sentence. In the meantime, I’ll meet with my friend who has useful connections. I will leave nothing to chance where you are concerned.”

He took two steps toward the door.

“Eleanor?”

“Yeah?”

He gave her a smile, this one showing his kindness and concern.

“I will take care of you. Forever.”

She returned his smile as best she could.

“This friend of yours, he’ll really help me?”

“He will.”

“How come?”

“Add that question to your list.”

Eleanor rolled her eyes and exhaled heavily as she wrote Why will your friend help me?

“I’m gonna need legal-size paper for this freaking list. Anything else?”

“Yes. You’re missing a question on your list.”

“I got them all. What am I missing?”

Søren returned to the table, took the pen and paper from her and wrote nine words. And without a word, he slapped the cuffs back on her wrists and left her alone in the room.

Eleanor looked down at the paper and read the question he’d written in his elegant, masculine handwriting.

Why would a priest have his own handcuff key?

9

Nora

NICO DROPPED HIS HEAD AND LAUGHED, RUBBING the back of his neck in consternation and amusement. Nora put her toe under his chin and lifted it.

Nora put on her best dominant face.

“Young man, do you think it’s hilarious that I stole cars for my father and got arrested? I promise you I didn’t find it funny.”

“That’s not funny. You at fifteen forcing your priest to agree to sleep with you is funny.”

“I admit I was pretty damn proud of myself for my negotiating skills.”

“More like hostage taking. If you hadn’t obeyed him …”

“Bye, bye, Catholic high school. Hello, juvie.”

“Didn’t he scare you? You were fifteen. He was twenty-nine.”

“Had it been any other man it probably would have scared me. But with Søren, everything felt like destiny. When we met he said, ‘It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.’ We’d both been waiting for each other, like it was meant to be that we would find and love each other. We belonged together—me, Søren, Kingsley. Getting arrested brought all three of us together.”

“So it was Kingsley your priest was talking about?” Nico held out his hand to her and helped her out of the chair. She could have done it herself. But she wasn’t about to turn down a chance to let Nico touch her any way he wanted.

“It was. The friend Søren said had connections and could help get my ass out of the hot seat? That was your father.”

Nico grabbed their glasses and the wine bottle and led her up the stairs. Despite the fire, the downstairs had grown colder as midnight neared, and it was hard to think and speak of the past with the silver box on the fireplace mantel in front of her, its contents so precious and so terrifying.

“Kingsley has interesting friends,” Nico said as they entered the bedroom. He set the wine and glasses down on the bedside table and went to work building the fire back up.

“And even more interesting enemies. Kingsley and I share something in common—we’re both fascinated by other people,” Nora said, pulling the covers back. “Where we differ is that when I’m fascinated by someone, I fuck him. When Kingsley is fascinated by someone, he fucks with him.”

Nico laughed and walked back to the bed. He kissed her neck and nipped lightly at her shoulder.

“Is that why you let me inside you?” he whispered in her ear. “You’re fascinated by me?”

“That’s part of it, yes. You’re my first farmer.” She pulled away and smiled up at him.

“You’re my first dominatrix.”

“But not your first shamefully older woman?” she asked as she slid into bed and propped herself up on the pillows. Nico pulled off his shirt. Such an exquisite male form. Where was her camera when she needed it?

“My last girlfriend was forty-three,” he said.

“Forty-three? Jesus, you do have a Mrs. Robinson complex, don’t you?”

“It’s a choice, not a complex,” he said. “Life is short. I don’t want to spend it with someone my age who doesn’t know anything more about life than I do. I have a friend, she’s my age. She’s funny, beautiful, smart. Everyone thinks we should be together. But she always has money trouble, always has a crisis. She’s forever calling her father for help. She doesn’t know what to do with her life. I love her, but I couldn’t be with someone like that. I own a successful vineyard. I have employees, people who depend on me. My last girlfriend owned a château and had a staff of ten people working for her. Even with the age difference we had more in common than my friend who’s my age who changes jobs and boyfriends every six months.”

“I don’t have a château, only a house. A big damn house, but no one works for me. I did have an intern once, though. Unpaid.” She conjured one little memory and held it in the palm of her hand. She smiled at it, loved it a moment and then let it go.

“Women and wine always get better with age,” Nico said.

“I want to think that. I get richer with age anyway. I’m at the point where I have more money than I know what to do with.”

“Buy more time to spend with me, maybe?”

Nora narrowed her eyes at him.

“Did an older woman teach you how to talk like that? Because, if so, I need her name and address to send her a thank-you note.”

Nico grinned down at her.

“Every woman I’ve been with has taught me something about women. How to kiss, how to fuck, how to dress. My first lover told me women are always watching. If you’re rude to the waiter, she sees and files that away.” Nico tapped his temple.

“You had a good education.”

“I want to learn everything from you, too. And everything about you.”

“Everything?”

“Everything.” He straddled her thighs and wrapped his hand around the back of her neck. “How you like being touched. How you like being fucked. How you like your eggs in the morning. How you like your tea at night. How you love to be kissed.”

She raised her mouth to his, eager for more of his drugging kisses. When he kissed her and touched her, she could almost make herself believe he was the reason she’d run away to Europe and hidden herself in the middle of the Black Forest, where no one but Nico could find her.

“I like being touched the way you touch me,” she said. “I like being fucked the way you fuck me. I like my eggs scrambled and covered in cheese. I like my tea like I like my men—hot, ready and in my hand. And I love the way you kiss me because it helps me forget why I’m here.” Her voice broke at the final words and Nico took her by the shoulders.

“Can you forget?”

“No,” she said, shivering. “I want to. I’m so angry it happened that I can’t even … I can’t breathe when I think about it.”

“I was angry, too. Angry at everyone. Especially my mother. She moved to Paris five days after Papa’s funeral. Then I realized she was grieving, too. Being near his vines, his life’s work, reminded her too much of him. I never thought she really loved him. But then I knew. She couldn’t breathe, either.”

“Help me breathe,” she said, feeling the anger like a vise around her lungs.

He pulled her close and put her head on his shoulder.

“Breathe with me,” he said. “Do what I do.”

He inhaled deeply and pushed on her back with both hands. She forced air into her nose and held the breath.

“Now push it out,” Nico said. Nora forced herself to exhale. “Good. Again.”

With his hands on her back, he guided her breathing. In and out. Deep and long. A push against her back meant “breathe in.” A gentle slide of his fingers down her spine meant “breathe out.” After a few minutes she felt the fury and the panic subsiding.

She felt dizzy with gratitude for Nico’s presence. She clung to his arms as he held her and kissed his neck.

“Do you want me to make you come again?” he asked softly in her ear.

“Yes,” she said without shame. “It will distract me, and that’s as much as I can ask for now.”

Nico pulled the straps of gown down again, lowered his head and took a nipple into his mouth. Nora sighed and relaxed into the pillow. His tongue circled her areola while his hands held and warmed both breasts. She reached down to stroke him but he grabbed her hand by the wrist and pressed her hand over her head into the pillow.

“My kind of game,” she teased as he pressed her down into the bed.

“No games. I’m taking care of you tonight.” Nico kissed along the edge of her collarbone. “All night if you’ll let me.”

“I’ll let you.” She sighed, surrendering to him. It felt good to let go, to relax a little, to let him pleasure her without needing to give him anything in return. He resumed kissing her breasts and she did nothing but lie there underneath him. He pinched her nipples and bit them gently until they were swollen and sore—the way she liked them.

Nico slipped his hand between her legs and found the ring that pierced her clitoral hood.

“Decoration?” Nico asked.

“Mostly,” she admitted. “But it can be useful if you know what you’re doing.”

“I don’t know what I’m doing, but you can teach me.” Nico gave her a roguish grin.

With everything that had happened to her, with everything she’d been through and with everything she’d lost, she shouldn’t even be in bed with Nico, much less loving every second of his company. Had what she’d lost created such a vacuum that she needed to fill it with Kingsley’s son in her bed? Apparently so.

“There’s a bag in the bathroom,” she said. “Black silk.”

Nico raised his eyebrow.

“Trust me,” she said.

Nora straightened her gown and adjusted her pillows as Nico went into the bathroom to retrieve her bag. She gave him a wink before untying the cord and opening it. It contained nothing but a few pieces of jewelry she always traveled with—two pairs of earrings, a bracelet and the rings Søren had given her for Christmas. She’d taken the rings off two weeks ago, but she didn’t leave them behind. She could never leave them behind.

From the bag she selected an eighteen-inch silver beaded chain. She removed the camphor glass fleur-de-lis pendant, a birthday gift from Kingsley, and laid the bag aside.

“Are you getting the idea?” she asked, holding up the chain and running it through her fingers.

Nico took the chain from her hand.

“Lie back,” he said. “Open your legs.”

“The five best words in the English language.”

“Couche-toi. Écarte les cuisses,” Nico said.

“The five best words in the French language.”

Nora lay back as instructed and opened her legs wide for Nico. He tried and failed to unclasp the chain. She took it from him and opened it.

“Smaller fingers,” she said. He took the chain from her and threaded it through the ring. This time he managed to lock the clasp. He pulled the chain taut, and Nora flinched with the pleasure of the gentle tugging.

“Now pull the chain through.”

Nico did as instructed. The beads of the silver chain rattled the ring. Nora shivered at the sensation it created—like a vibrator but much more intimate and concentrated. She dug her fingers into the bed as Nico spun the chain through the ring over and over again, slowly at first and then faster as her breathing quickened.

With the chain in his left hand, he tugged and teased her clitoral ring. With his right hand, he pressed three and then four fingers into her. Nora spread wide for Nico as his hand explored her vagina. He massaged her G-spot, went deeper and pushed against the high back wall near her cervix. Her inner muscles twitched and tightened around his fingers. She gasped when he pushed into a soft corner of her, the pleasure so intense she flinched.

Nico laughed as he moved the chain back and forth. Her clitoris pulsed and her stomach tightened. Her hips rose of their own accord as she moved in time with the muscles clenching and releasing around Nico’s fingers.

She came with a sudden shiver that she felt from her shoulders to her knees before collapsing back on the bed with a spent laugh.

“Now that,” Nico said as he pulled out his hand and unclasped the chain, “is a good trick.”

“One of many up my sleeve,” Nora said, as she took the chain from him and put it back in her jewelry case. Nico ran his hand over her thighs and stomach.

“Where did you learn all these tricks?” he asked, kissing her mouth.

“You don’t want to know.”

“Kingsley?”

“And Søren. And my own wicked imagination.”

She pulled back from the kiss to wink at him.

“You amaze me.”

“That’s your erection talking.”

“And my heart,” he said.

She laid her hand on the side of his face. Such a young, handsome face. But he didn’t have an ounce of innocence in him. He worked too hard, lived too hard, had seen too much of the world to have stars in his eyes. Good. She liked his eyes the way they were right now—warm and hungry. He had none of his father’s cynicism and all of his secrets. But Nico’s secrets never scared her like Kingsley’s did. She knew one secret he kept from her for her own sake.

“I know you’re in love with me,” she said, caressing the arch of his cheekbone with her fingertips.

“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “My feelings are my own. They shouldn’t concern you.”

“God, you’re so French.”

Nico laughed and buried his head against her chest.

“I can’t help it,” he said. “I get it from my father.”

“Which father?” she asked.

“The one who raised me. My real father. Not Kingsley.”

“Kingsley would have raised you and loved you if he’d known about you.”

“Let me love you since I can’t love him,” Nico said.

She ran her fingers through the dark waves of his hair. In her younger days she would never have appreciated a man like Nico—quiet, industrious, low-key. He had presence and intelligence but he made no spectacle of himself. He didn’t need to own every room he walked into. He was so self-possessed he felt no need to possess anyone or anything else.

“Nico, look at me.” He raised his head and gazed into her eyes, the smile long gone from his face. “I’ve known your father twenty years. Twenty. Think about that.”

“If I can accept that, why can’t you?”

“It’s not that I’ve known him for a long time. It’s how I know him, what we are to each other, what we’ve been through together.”

“Then tell me. Please.”

“Are you sure you want to hear this story?” Nora asked as she settled into the pillows. Nico lay next to her, his arm draped over her stomach.

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