JACOB
Staying in the city for a full week had been a bad idea. I understood that Timothy needed time to find the music director and priest who’d abused Jericho, but it left me in a place I didn’t want to remember, surrounded by phantom voices from my past.
I’d spent the first night on the couch in my childhood home. Not able to force myself up the stairs to what had been my old bedroom, I’d laughed to myself to make a bed out in the formal living room, to think about how my mother would have screamed to know I’d mussed the room she kept so pristine just so she could pretend everything was perfect in her family and world.
After tossing and turning all night, with only small bursts of panicked sleep, I decided the following morning while I drank coffee at a small café that sleeping in the house would only be hazardous to my health. The next night, I’d rented a hotel room in some glitzy building down the street from the parish. It was the first night I’d slept solid after returning home, but the renewed energy only left me bored and idle – a man in search of something to occupy his time.
While staying with Alan, I’d allowed my desires and darkness to take me over. I’d played with those women, one right after the other, without so much as bothering to learn or remember their names. Much like when I’d been young, I used my looks to draw them in. I’d warned each and every one of them, but like most women, they’d laughed and believed I was only playing. They learned differently once climbing in my bed. I never hurt them enough to make them fear me when they left the next morning, but I gave them enough to make them think twice about climbing in my bed again. Most had been smart enough to stay away, some, however, found that they enjoyed being treated like a toy. Sure, they’d convinced themselves that it was only a game, but I knew in the backs of their heads they’d known that what I’d done to them had been wrong.
I never understood why some women believed they could change a man like me. Although I wasn’t as bad as some of the sick fucks out there, I had certain habits that any decent woman would know to avoid. But those women that wanted to fix me, the ones who’d convinced themselves that their pussy was magic enough to make me fall to my knees and beg them to be mine, they kept coming back for more regardless of the marks they carried when morning came and I showed them the door.
Some didn’t make it to morning. Many times, I couldn’t be convinced to share my bed for more than a few hours. Their body heat irritated me when I wanted to sleep. God forbid they wanted to snuggle. I was never in the game for companionship, love, or happy feelings. Women were a means to an end…
At least, until Cassandra.
She had been the first that I wanted to keep by my side. The first who didn’t cry or complain when I bruised her skin. The first who wore the marks I gave her as a badge of honor, a reminder of the type of man she was with. She hadn’t been ordinary, or the type who was easily disturbed. But in my passion for her – my love – I’d ended her life far too soon, and attempted to hide myself in the Church.
It would have worked. I could have lived the rest of my life hiding behind the misguided belief that a man like me could be saved.
Then Eve happened and my life was once again turned upside down – first with her temptation, and then with her untimely destruction at my hand.
Elijah had asked what kind of monster I am. He hadn’t been wrong to ask the question, he’d just phrased it poorly. Because, in truth, it wasn’t just me who was the monster – we both had been molded and shaped by the circumstances of our youth.
I could barely hold it against him for the manner in which he’d tormented me, but even knowing what I know about his secrets, I still needed to know precisely why I was the target of his rage.
Morning light streamed through my window on the seventeenth floor of the ridiculously glitzy hotel room in which I’d been staying. My eyes cracked open and narrowed against it, my body moving to stretch out the sore muscles from the position I’d held in sleep. Behind me, a woman mumbled in her sleep, my movement enough to rouse her as well.
I’d been too tired the night before to walk her to the door, too tired to hear her arguments or complaints when I told her she’d fulfilled the purpose I had for her. But rather than rolling over and beginning her day with the demand that she get dressed and let herself out, I glanced at the alarm clock on the bedside table and convinced myself that she would be a good distraction to pass the time, a toy to be played with until I had to leave and meet Father Timothy.
Erica…or Erin…I wasn’t sure of her name, wrapped her arm over my waist, her body scooting closer against my back as if to steal what heat I could generate. My teeth clenched together at the contact, but my cock was hard. I didn’t often let that part of me dictate my decisions, but in this instance, I gave in to the flow of blood that turned a sleeping appendage into turgid and throbbing flesh.
My fingers grasped over her wrist, the strength I used to squeeze the delicate bones a warning of what I wanted to do. A soft gasp filtered over her lips, but she didn’t complain, didn’t attempt to pull away and run. I felt her large breasts press against my back, felt the well trimmed hairs between her legs tickle the skin of my ass. Her legs brushed against mine as her foot slid down my calf, lower until her foot was pressed against mine.
“Good morning,” she said with a sleepy voice, a trace of flirtation edging the words. “Are you up for another round?”
Swallowing down the burst of violence that tore through me, I squeezed her wrist a touch harder, my lips twitching with humor when she gasped again. “Shouldn’t I be asking you that question?”
Soft laughter bubbled over her lips. It made me want to kick her out of the bed and shove her out the hotel room door. I refrained from reacting, and struggled not to think about what made me hate certain women so much.
It wasn’t until I returned to this town that I had the realization of why my sexual tastes were so violent – wasn’t until I’d been forced to face my past and stare into the memories of my youth. However, now that I knew, I couldn’t erase that understanding from my thoughts. Even considering it now had my cock deflating.
Erin … or Erica …whatever the hell her name was could fix that.
“You were a bit rough last night,” she cooed, “But that’s okay. I like a man who knows what he wants and is willing to take it. Any time you need a late night friend, you can certainly give me a call.”
I was drunk when I brought her back with me the night before, and because I hadn’t yet rolled over to look at her, I couldn’t tell you what she looked like. I knew my type, though, and I knew she would have long brown hair and green eyes – just like Cassandra and Eve – just like another woman who wouldn’t stick up for herself in life and spent her time cowering in a fucking corner. How sickening is it to discover that the mold for what I would eventually look for in a woman was my mother?
Not that I wanted to sleep with my mom or any sick thing like that, but I couldn’t deny I didn’t want to punish her for never coming to the defense of me or my brother. Perhaps it was the feeling of finally doing something about what was done to us, or perhaps it was something as simple as getting even for my mother’s complacency when we heard Jericho scream.
I didn’t know what she did when it was my turn down in that basement, but I assumed her blank expression and drink in her hand were just the same.
No. Fucking women who had the same features wasn’t what I was after. Nothing about my mom turned me on. But hurting them, the release that it gave me, had definitely sprung from the desire I’d had to hurt her.
Sitting up, I dropped my feet to the floor and scrubbed my face with my palms. With my bleary eyes only partially opened, I finally responded to what she’d said.
“Why don’t you come over here and kneel down in front of me? I have an idea of how you can wake me up.”
She purred in response, the mattress shifting beneath me as she inched away and slid her body from the bed. Without one question or word of protest, she rounded the end to walk toward me, making a point to add an obvious sway to her hips thinking that the movement would entice me.
It did nothing for me but irritate me, and I had half a mind to ask her to leave. But when she was standing before me in all her naked glory, when she sunk to her knees and licked her full lips, when she tilted her green eyes up to my face, I closed my eyes and let her do her best to seduce.
Her fingers were warm against my cock and I felt the familiar rush of blood pushing me fuller, longer. Once my erection was at its largest point, she flicked the tip of her tongue over the head, teasing me with the wet torment.
My hand slid down my thigh to find her hair and fist it, the muscles in my forearm tense as I struggled not to go too far. Despite how often I tried to convince myself that I wasn’t a monster, I couldn’t forget the death in both Cassandra and Eve’s eyes once I was done.
Letting go to the full scale of my desires was dangerous and I didn’t need another body lying in my path. Eventually those crimes would catch up to me, and jail would only stop me from finding and destroying the men who’d made a mess of Jericho’s and my life.
The Music Director.
The Priest.
Elijah.
All men who hid behind the disguise of pious men, but like me, hid a monster behind their soft eyes and practiced smiles.
It was too bad I knew certain ones were out of reach.
Lips wrapped around the head of my cock, another teasing flick of the tongue, a soft moan that vibrated against my skin. My hand fisted tighter in her hair as my head fell back. As my body came to life, so did the images.
It wasn’t this woman I saw as her lips slid down the length of my shaft, it was Cassandra or Eve, the two women who hadn’t been frightened of the man I hid behind the mask. They had known the real me and loved me regardless.
Live green eyes glistening with abandon and need.
Dead eyes accusing me of having gone too far.
Angry eyes judging me as I was accused of being a monster, both in my young life, my college years, and only a few months ago.
The accusations would always follow me. The anger and violence my constant companion. And despite the faith I’d given to a God who didn’t know me, I’d hoped that, with time, the monster would die.
He hadn’t. He still infected me with the memories of my father’s beatings, the fear I saw in women’s eyes. He still taunted me with thoughts of how I could use the woman on her knees in front of me and hurt her like I’d hurt so many others.
“Stop,” I growled out, the pain and memories too much for me to bear. The woman kept going, soft laughter a vibration against my dick because she believed I was playing.
“Fucking stop!” I roared, my hand jerking her head off me so hard that her teeth scraped against my skin. She fell backwards, her ass impacting the ground with an audible thud, her blue eyes darting up to me in shock and seething anger.
“What the fuck?”
“Get out,” I whispered, trying like hell not to scream the demand. It wasn’t difficult to figure out that I could only handle sex when I was shit faced and drunk. Too many whispers were filtering in my thoughts, too many memories flashing in my mind. Too much pain, anger and regret were bleeding out of my heart to pretend like anything would be normal again.
“You need to apologize,” she answered, her shoulders rounding back so that her tits stuck out from her chest.
My lips tilted in humor. “And you need to get your fucking clothes and get the fuck out before I open that fucking door and drag you there kicking and screaming. If you don’t think I’ll toss your whore ass out the door completely fucking naked, I dare you to say another word.”
She didn’t move except to widen her eyes.
I couldn’t help the volume of my voice. “GET THE FUCK OUT!”
The anger blazing behind her gaze transitioned into fear. Without another word, she scrambled away from me, gathered her things and quickly pulled on her clothes.
“You know what you are, you son of a bitch? You’re a fucking lunatic!”
The door slammed so hard the walls of the room shook when she exited, but I didn’t care anymore. Couldn’t care when everything I’d thought I knew about my life had been destroyed.
I wanted to pretend that my anger made me powerful, but it was only another symptom of my fear. Fear of my father’s fist pounding against me. Fear of the dark, dirt floored room that had been my cage. Fear of the torture I was forced to listen to when my father turned his anger against my brother.
Fear of taking another life just because I couldn’t control myself.
I could add it all together into one dark conclusion: I wasn’t afraid of all those individual memories and moments of desolation. I was afraid that I’d lost control and become no better than my father and mother.
Jericho had regained his control when he became Elijah, and now I feared him, too.
“Fuck!”
Pushing out of bed, I stormed into the bathroom to jump in the shower. The water scalded me where it rained down from the showerhead, the steam becoming a cloud that threatened to suffocate me in the warm moisture. Breathing in deeply, I pressed my forehead against the cool tiles, my hands fisting and releasing as I fought to get myself under control.
I needed to vent the frustration and anger before it consumed me, needed to find the answers I was desperately seeking so I could at least understand what Jericho had done.
And even though Father Timothy had asked that I meet him at one in the afternoon, I knew that I couldn’t sit around and wait any longer.
Slamming my hand down on the knob, I turned off the water, dried off and got dressed. With four hours to go before the time that Timothy told me to meet him, I was out the door and climbing into the elevator knowing that I was headed to the parish despite the early hour.
It only took me thirty minutes to walk there in the busy morning traffic. When I reached those imposing doors, I hesitated for just a second before throwing them open.
Timothy was in the sanctuary, blowing out candles and lighting others. Fortunately for me, there wasn’t another soul around to hear me when I walked in.
“You’re early,” he called out, his eyes cast up to look over at me. With a hand hovering over the candle he’d intended to light, he straightened his posture and turned to face me fully.
“I couldn’t wait much longer.” My voice didn’t give away the anger I was feeling. It sounded more dead than alive. “I need to get out of this city, and the only way I can leave is to know what you have to tell me. Were you able to find the two men?”
His mouth was a tight line, his shoulders slumping with resignation. “We should discuss this in private. I need to finish up some things here in the sanctuary before I can talk with you. Why don’t you take a seat on one of the pews while I do so?”
The last place I wanted to be was in a parish pew staring up at God’s altar, but I had no choice, it appeared. By the tone of his voice, I knew it would be impossible to push Timothy to tend to his duties any faster.
The room fell into sanctimonious silence as I walked to a nearby pew and sat down on the hard wood. Leaning forward, I buried my face in my palms. I tried to convince myself I was just tired, but I knew myself well enough to know that I was hiding.
Even though I’d once been a priest with the same duties and responsibilities of the man I was waiting on, even though I’d spent countless hours in a sanctuary less dramatic and glamorous than this once, I found it difficult to be surrounded by the religious symbols and relics that were now staring me down. I wasn’t a different man just because I’d removed the clerical collar, but with each new memory of my life that surfaced, with each new secret that was unburied, I found myself becoming more jaded and angry at the concept of God.
I couldn’t even refer to that heavenly being as if he actually existed, not now and never again after realizing just how horrible he’d allowed my life to become.
There was no telling how much time passed before I felt a hand land on my shoulder, before I heard the soft susurration of cloth against wood as Timothy sat down.
“Is it really so hard to look up at the altar? You’ve been sitting like that for at least an hour now.”
Without moving or looking over, I answered, “It’s all a lie told to appease the masses, a pretty veil pulled over the truth that we are on our own.”
“Can I ask you something, Jacob? Just out of idle curiosity.”
Finally ripping my hands away from my face, I looked up, my gaze locking on a large gold cross positioned in the center of God’s altar. Beside it was a small, carved box, the jewels embedded in the wood glimmering beneath the soft lighting of the sanctuary. I wasn’t sure what religious relic was contained in that ornate box, but what I did know was that it was most likely priceless. The bones of a Saint. A remnant of some perfectly pious man. A lie covered as easily as a shroud that is draped over the face of a tortured Savior. I had been part of that lie when I chose to swallow it down, but now I found it difficult to stare it in the face.
“What do you want to ask?” A knot in my throat made my voice hoarse and deeper. Clearing it several times, I was able to speak again, but still I felt strangled.
Timothy allowed several seconds of silence to float between us before building the courage to ask a question I wished he had left alone.
“What happened in your life to cause you to lose faith in God?”
On any other day, I would have brushed off the question and reacted with contempt. This morning I was weaker, somehow, more willing to lay out the answers to that question only because I couldn’t make sense of them myself.
“Are you asking this as a priest would a parishioner? Can we consider this my confession?”
Timothy shifted in his seat to lean forward. With his elbows resting on his knees, he looked toward the altar while speaking to me. “If that’s what you need in order to talk. This conversation will never go beyond you or me.”
A bark of humorless laughter shook my shoulders. “Did you promise the same thing to my father when he showed you all the skeletons in his closet?”
Silence again before, “I deserve that. But in my defense, I didn’t spill his secrets openly. I only hinted to where you could find them. I never understood why he told me about burying the confession in a place where you would know to look for it. I think, secretly, he hoped I’d break my oath and tell you where it could be found.” Pausing for a brief moment, he added, “And if I had to be completely honest, I’ll admit that I wanted that information out in the open. I’ve never agreed with the politics in the Church that have allowed for the destruction of so many people.”
Glancing at his expression, I saw that he was being truthful. His lips were turned down and his jaw was tight. I wondered if he felt the same chains and trappings of his profession as I’d felt in mine. For me, it was financial, but for him, it had to be more. The larger the parish, the more politics took over, and the easier it was for the wicked to invade and prey on those who believed them divine.
Turning my focus back down to where my hands were clasped together over my lap, I watched my thumb idly rub over my skin, the lines stretching until absent, only to return when my thumb released the tension and allowed the flesh to snap back in place. I watched the blood pool beneath, turning white when I increased the pressure of my hold until the skin was absent of life.
“When I was a kid, our lives were built around the Catholic Faith. I was too young to understand the guilt, the shame of being alive and making stupid mistakes that are inherently human. Up until I was six or seven, I truly believed there was a God who existed to love me, that truth could be found in the happy songs they taught us in Sunday School, that it was truly a miracle every Christmas when we remembered the virgin birth of Jesus in the manger. Life was seemingly magical when I was a kid.”
“I assume your father had something to do with that changing,” Timothy supposed.
“You assume right,” I admitted, my jaw ticking with the tension of clenched teeth. “The punishments started after he discovered Jericho and I looking at a book on female anatomy. We were only curious boys trying to understand the differences between women and men. But my father, in all his glorious wisdom, believed that our curiosity was the worst form of sin.” Sad laughter rushed over my lips. “Why is sex worse than murder in this particular religion?”
Timothy’s burst of soft laughter joined mine. “It seems that way, doesn’t it? Even if the act is so natural that even animals have to accomplish it in order to prevent extinction. I had a priest explain to me once that sex isn’t a bad thing if it occurs between a married couple – as long as it was performed in the missionary position and for the sole purpose of creating a child.”
“So, we’re not allowed to enjoy it. Is that where the sin exists?” Growing quiet, I flicked my thumb against my skin once more, watched the blood push away and come back to color the flesh. “Are we allowed to enjoy anything?”
“We can enjoy our relationship with God,” he offered.
Nodding my head, I raised my focus back to the golden cross on the altar. “You mean the God who allowed a grown man to beat on two innocent boys just because they’d grown old enough to know there was a difference between the male and female body?”
His voice was remorseful when he answered, “I’m not sure God can be blamed for that.”
“Can He be blamed for anything?” I pondered aloud, more to myself than to Timothy.
“You know as well as I that God gave us free will to make a choice. We can choose good or evil, can act in accord with Grace or devastation. Just because one person chooses to commit mistakes in blatant disregard for the welfare of other people doesn’t mean God doesn’t care. How often have many of those mistakes led to something good and decent?”
I knew what he was getting at. I’d learned many of the same answers while in seminary school. The only problem was that I had difficulty believing them. Nothing good came from my darkness. At first I’d believed that my mistake with Cassandra led to me saving Eve from my twin brother. But, in the end, it only led to me having the opportunity to destroy Eve as well.
“You haven’t finished telling me what happen to lead you to where you are now.”
It was funny how his prodding question perfectly fit the thoughts I was rolling over in my head.
“After years of abuse at my father’s hand, I found myself questioning his Faith. I often wondered if the Church wasn’t evil for creating men so delusional they felt the need to torture their own children in order to save their eternal soul. I also wondered how the bruises were never noticed by my Sunday School teachers, how something so open and obvious could be missed by the very people who were the hand and mouth of God. I never understood how an entire body of people could remain silent.”
Taking a breath, I released it slowly. “So, when I turned eighteen, I decided to abandon Faith for science, for something that could be seen, touched, weighed and measured. I figured if the answers to my questions weren’t found in the Bible, surely they could be located in a school of intellectuals.”
When my voice trailed off, Timothy filled the silence. “What happened then? Obviously, you returned to the Faith in order to become a priest. Did something happen that showed you God could exist, after all?”
I shook my head. “No. I made a mistake, one that cost a beautiful woman her life.”
Timothy turned to look at me and for the first time since we started talking, I turned as well to meet his gaze. “It wasn’t murder or anything like that. Just a sexual game that went too far. The medical examiner told me a blood clot had been loosened in her veins, that it had traveled to her brain and caused a stroke. He said it could have happened at any time and I spent the next couple of months wondering if I hadn’t sped the process along. I considered myself a monster. I believed that my father may have been right. That my sexual deviance had led to the destruction of a woman who was kind, who was beautiful in every way, who would have never hurt a fly, if it could be helped.”
Pain shot through me to think of how gentle Cassandra had been. The woman cared so much about all life that she wouldn’t let me kill a bug if it got in our apartment. She always demanded I trap it first and release it unharmed back outside.
I killed someone that gentle.
I destroyed her.
I did that, just like my father had always warned me I would.
“So,” I said, clearing my throat and wrestling to untangle myself from the memory, “I decided that maybe my father was right. Maybe the world would be better off if I never had sex, if I never had the opportunity to kill a woman again. It seemed that I’d enjoyed sex a little too much and it led to the worst of crimes. The utter destruction of someone far more beautiful than I deserved to know in my life.”
Shifting in his seat again, Timothy must have struggled to find something to say. Eventually he found the words, but they did nothing to appease the painful beat of my heart.
“You could have become celibate without the need of becoming a priest. I think if you dig deeper, you’ll find that there was still a small spark of Faith inside you, even when you left home and had convinced yourself it no longer existed.”
I didn’t answer and he didn’t press the topic. Instead, he threw out another question I wasn’t sure how to answer.
“What forced you out of the Church a second time? What led you to this particular moment?”
Well, you see, my brother is now a cult leader named Elijah and he brainwashed a woman into being the perfect toy. After dropping her off at my door, he waited long enough for me to fuck her as much as I damn well pleased, and unfortunately, I killed her, too.
No. I wouldn’t be giving him that answer. In an effort to be honest without dishing out the dirty details, I responded, “Another woman.”
“Ah,” he replied, his head nodding in understanding. I only caught the movement out of the corner of my eye. “You broke your vow of celibacy, I assume.”
“Yeah, you can say that.”
Another silent beat passed between us. “It doesn’t mean you have to leave the Faith completely behind. Men weren’t all created to be champions for God. There isn’t a single one of us who can claim to have lived a life completely devoid of sin. All we can do is remember the beauty of the Faith that God has given us and use it to do our best and set the wrongs back to right.”
I was growing frustrated with the conversation, so much so that I ended this moment of confession to talk about what I’d come here to find out.
“Did you find the music director and priest who molested my brother?”
He waited several seconds before answering, “I did. But I’m afraid they are no longer around to answer for their crimes.”
So, it was true…
My head snapped up at the answer. Turning to face him, I waited for his gaze to meet mine. “They died?”
Nodding, he confirmed that those two bastards were firmly out of reach. “From what I’m told, both of them died in mysterious accidents. The music director passed very shortly after being transferred, and the priest a few years after that.”
“How? How exactly did they die?”
He rubbed his lips together and visibly swallowed. “The music director was trapped in a fire in his small apartment, but there was some question as to how he became trapped in the first place. Apparently, he had several broken bones in his legs that prevented him from escaping the inferno.” His gaze darted away to something behind me. When he raised his hand to wave at a person who’d walked in, he lowered his voice and suggested, “We should discuss the rest in my office. Parishioners are starting to come in.”
I stood as soon as he finished speaking. I was far too impatient to move slowly. Once he was also on his feet, he said, “You know where my office is. Go ahead and wait for me. I’ll see to the people who just walked in and make sure they’re settled before joining you.”
Quietly leaving, I moved through the hallways toward his office, my body tense and shaking, my mind racing over the possibilities of how, exactly, the music director died. The timeline fit for what I knew. Not only was there the means and the opportunity to kill someone so blatantly, there had been motive as well.
Letting myself into Timothy’s office, I made a point to turn my head toward the desk in order to prevent staring at the large crucifix on his wall. The last thing I needed was to be reminded of the sacrifice a perfect man had man in order to save a wretch like me.
Wretch.
Hell, I was sure if you looked up the definition, a picture of me would be pasted beside it.
Taking my seat, I bowed my head and continued thinking over the ever deepening belief that I didn’t need to take revenge on the men who’d hurt my brother. I would have bet every cent I had that Jericho had been responsible for their demise.
The door creaked open behind me and within a few seconds, Timothy was seated at his desk staring back at me.
“How did the priest die?”
I didn’t have time for small talk regarding faith or religion, all I wanted was the details of what I assumed had been done.
“Don’t you know?”
When my head snapped up, I found Timothy watching me with intense and probing eyes. “How the hell would I know that?”
Rolling his shoulders back, he settled in his chair before folding his hands together over the desk. “The priest died in an auto accident. It seems his car careened off the side of a cliff into a lake at the base of it. When he was found and his body was extracted, they found drugs in his system and a plastic baggie in his clothes with photographs of other boys he’d molested. Photographs that matched the ones given to your father.”
Anger burned me from the inside out, but I played along. “And let me guess…the Church covered up those crimes as well.”
Timothy eyed me closely. I didn’t know why his demeanor had changed so drastically between the sanctuary and now, but he resembled a man who didn’t believe the person sitting across from him.
“There was no prosecution, if that’s what you’re asking. I assume his death was good enough for the Church. They didn’t bother to seek answers to the odd circumstances of his death, either. I believe they agreed that he was a monster who needed to be stopped. Since the photos were never mentioned in the news, the entire situation was written off as handled.”
My face must have been blazing crimson for how hot I was. My anger had transitioned to naked fury, a truth I was sure was written all over my face. “How can you continue working for an organization that allows such travesties to take place? How do you reconcile your part in this, knowing how many people have been hurt and swept under the rug by a group of people who are supposed to be helping mankind?”
His expression hardened. “My allegiance isn’t to the Church. It’s to the Faith. And before you tell me there isn’t a difference, I’ll insist that there is. However, it’s hard to stand on a street corner and lead people to God. So, I’ve resigned myself to working within the confines of the Church to help the people I can. I don’t subscribe to the politics, and I’m never silent on issues that hurt people. I can promise you that nothing like what happened with those two monsters has happened again since I’ve taken over the parish.”
Searching his face for any sign that he was lying, I came away empty. Timothy was a truly good man, the type of priest that I’d never been able to be. If every person who’d worked in the parish when I’d grown up had been like him, I may have never lost my belief in God. He was the type of man who would have noticed the bruises, and I was sure he was the type of man who would have pulled my father aside and explained that the abuse wasn’t what God would have condoned. Based on that realization alone, I had to curb my anger because Father Timothy wasn’t the type of man who deserved it.
“Why did you think I would know how the priest died?”
Maybe he did know, after all…
The question had been floating in my head since the moment he mentioned I would know anything about the man’s death, and the lull in our conversation had given me the perfect opportunity to ask it.
So still that I wondered if he’d heard the question at all, Timothy stared across the expanse of his desk studying me. His eyes searched mine, eventually shifting down to search my face, my neck, the manner in which I held my shoulders. The silence between us was deafening and I could have sworn he was taking his time counting the beats of my breath as my chest pushed in and out in an unsteady rhythm. Finally, after several tense seconds had passed, Timothy opened his mouth to explain.
“While making a few calls and researching online about the location of the music director and priest, I also took a few minutes to look into a smaller parish in the Appalachian Mountains, a parish called Our Lady of Serenity.”
My brows pulled together in confusion, my mouth opening and closing again without voicing my question. Why in the hell was this man looking up the parish I’d once led? Why did it matter where I’d come from, where I’d lived before giving up the life of a priest?
“You seem a little stunned by the fact that I’d made the inquiry into your former parish. Or should I say your twin brother’s current parish…Jericho.”
My body flinched at the way he’d spoken my brother’s name, thoughts racing so hard that it took me a minute at least to decipher what he’d meant by the name.
But more than that, the realization that I was still named the priest of the parish in that small rural town stunned me so thoroughly that I was frozen in place, caught beneath the weight of the question as to why I hadn’t yet been replaced.
Ignoring his pointed accusation that I was pretending to be someone I wasn’t, that I was Jericho pretending to be Jacob Hayle, I worried about what his discovery meant for a parish located in the center of a sleepy town in the Appalachians.
“Did you call the Diocese to confirm the name of the priest at my former parish, or did you just look it up on the Internet?”
The corner of his lips tipped up. “I looked it up first and came to the conclusion that perhaps the website hadn’t yet been updated. I then called the parish to confirm, but nobody answered. I tried for two days before finally giving up and called the Diocese. It appears there was nothing to update because Father Jacob Hayle had never left the parish as you have claimed. That leaves me with one conclusion: You’re not Jacob, like you claim. You are Jericho Hayle, coming here and talking to me under the guise of being your twin brother.”
Shock and anger filtered through me, mixing and churning until it was a toxic solution spreading from the center of my chest, up into my head, out into my arms and to the tips of my fingers, down until it soured my stomach and trickled lower into my legs.
“Father Jacob Hayle,” I repeated slowly, “is still the priest at Lady of Serenity? You’re sure of this?”
He shook his head in disbelief, but rather than his expression denoting anger, it withered into soft sympathy instead. “Of course, I’m sure. I confirmed it with the Diocese, like I said. What I would like to know is why you’re here pretending to be somebody you’re not? I would have spoken to you regardless, Jericho. Would have given you the same information I gave when you claimed to be Jacob. I’m as angry as you are about what happened to you as a child in this parish, and I’m not concerned with the accidents both the music director and priest had later in life. That’s between you and God, and I’m in no position to cast judgment.” He relaxed against his seat even more, the leather creaking on the armrests as he pulled his arms down to his sides. “Hell,” he admitted on a resolute voice, “I probably would have done the same.”
I had to get out of there, had to jump online and look for myself to see that he wasn’t lying. The only problem was that now Timothy knew something wasn’t right in that small parish, that there was a possibility that more attention should be given to the small, rural town. The only way I could knock him off course without killing him and hiding his body was to go along with the assumption that I was someone else.
“I didn’t kill anybody,” I admitted honestly. Well, not intentionally, at least. Cassandra and Eve both were no longer breathing because of me.
Shifting my position on the cushion of my chair, I slouched like a man who’d been caught in a lie, a man who was giving up the pretenses of being someone he was not.
“Fine, you caught me. And I’ll admit that I’m here because I wanted to know what happened to the people who’d abused me for many years of my life. Unlike what you suspect, I didn’t kill them. Not my father, not the priest or the music director. I-“
Intentionally letting my voice trail off, I played the part of a shamed man, of a person who was giving up the lie and who wanted nothing more than to abandon it entirely.
“I should go.”
Timothy sat up, his movement urgent and sudden. “No. You don’t need to leave. I might be able to help you, Jericho.”
The sound of my brother’s name was a spear piercing my side. If what Timothy was saying was true, than Jericho was impersonating me, acting like the friendly Catholic priest in a town that wouldn’t know any better. What the fuck was that sick bastard doing to a town full of people who wouldn’t recognize the monster behind the starched white clerical collar?
“I’m sorry I bothered you,” I stuttered, “I shouldn’t have come here. Please forgive me.”
Standing up from my seat, I’d made it three steps toward the door before Timothy was on his feet racing toward me. His hand gripped my bicep and spun me around, his eyes meeting mine with sympathy. “I can help you, Jericho. I can give you the peace of mind you’re seeking.”
With the amount of anger and concern that was flooding through me for my former parish, I highly doubted he’d give me even a fraction of peace. I knew I needed to leave this city, knew I’d have to face my brother at some point to confront him about the games he played. Learning about what happened to him as a child had softened my heart toward him, but now that I knew he’d stepped into my parish to take my place, I felt only fury and worry for the game he was apparently still playing.
Why would he do such a thing? What did he stand to gain?
Shrugging out of Timothy’s hold, I bowed my head in feigned embarrassment. My voice was low and morose when I lied just to have an excuse to leave. “I didn’t want you to know I’m Jericho. Didn’t want you to look at me and know what was done to me. I need to process the fact that you figured it out and I can come back once I get over my embarrassment and shock. Give me a few days to deal with this. And I hope you can accept my apology for having lied.”
Timothy breathed out a heavy breath, but his expression softened again before he inclined his head. “Take all the time you need, Jericho. But it’s my hope you return. I’m sure I can help you find peace, that I can help you understand and forgive the evil that was committed against you. It wasn’t God who allowed those men to do evil things, and I don’t want you wandering lost in this world because you aren’t able to see that. Men have free will, they have the ability to prey on people that are weaker than them. But God also has a way of healing the people who have been hurt. Please allow me to help you see that. Not every priest is a bad man.”
I knew he was honest in his offer, knew he was one of the good men who truly wanted to help the lost. For that alone, I couldn’t give an answer that would hurt him.
“I’ll return,” I promised despite knowing I’d never come back. The look in his eyes told me he knew I was lying, but that he still hoped I’d change my mind.
Inclining his head again, he reached out a hand to shake mine. When I accepted, he placed his free hand on my shoulder. “Walk with God, Jericho. And when you’re ready to come back and let me help, I’ll be waiting.”
Without thanking him or saying another word, I released his hold and practically ran from his office.