by Logan Fox
“Why didn’t you attend Father Quinn’s counseling session?” Gabriel asks.
I had just brought the glass to my lips, but I snatch it away again. “He told you?”
Father Quinn replaced Gabriel when he’d left Redmond. I’d never liked him—he stank of Fisherman’s Friend sweets because he somehow thought it would cover up his halitosis.
I don’t remember much about the week after my parents were killed. I do remember hearing words like “shock” and “therapy” bandied around everywhere I went.
I’d also forgotten that he’d offered counseling. More than once.
“I couldn’t talk to him,” I say truthfully.
“Can you talk to me?”
I look up. He’s watching me with a most familiar look in his warm, brown eyes.
Patience.
Sympathy.
And with the wholehearted belief that whatever sins I had committed, we could overcome them together.
How the hell can a man like this possibly be involved with Ghosts and Keepers?
I almost want to tell him everything, just so we can have a good laugh about it and the world can go back to normal.
But I know my life will never be the same again, so does it matter what degree of fucked up I land on?
We’re all mad here.
No, we’re all fucked up crazy here.
“Trinity?”
My eyes snap back into focus. I take a tiny sip of wine, and then another because I barely tasted the first. It’s not as brutally sour as the one the Brotherhood poured for me.
“I don’t know how much you can help,” I say hesitantly before taking another sip. “You weren’t there at the end.”
Gabriel looks down, and shadows darken his eyes. For a heart-wrenching moment, I think I’ve already blown my cover and pissed him off. I fully expect him to toss me out of his room. Instead, he lights himself another cigarette.
“You don’t smoke, do you?” he asks.
“No.”
“You’re right to sound disgusted,” he says through a faint laugh. “It’s a disgusting habit.” A thick plume of smoke jettisons from his lips. He sips from his glass, and then sits back in his seat, his eyes on the fire.
“I often wonder if they would still be alive if I’d stayed at Redmond,” Gabriel says.
The wine glass clicks against my teeth as I turn to face him. I hurriedly lower it into my lap. “Why would you say that?”
“The same reason you wonder if you’d be dead had you been in the car with them.” He drags hard at his cigarette, his voice tight as he speaks without expelling any more smoke. “One of Satan’s many games, keeping us fixated on the past.” Finally, he empties his lungs and then takes another sip of wine. “So easy for him to slip in without you noticing when you’re so busy replaying events over and over to see if there ever would have been a different outcome. Like a spider crawling in under the door.”
The longer he speaks, the tighter my chests grows. I’ve never heard him talk like this. His sermons are dry—all repetition and loosely connected anecdotes taken out of context—but this?
If this is how his conversations went with my parents, then no wonder they’d stay downstairs for hours after I’d been sent to bed. Our house had thick doors. Even with my ear pressed to the wood, all I heard was the murmur of low voices.
“Your parents are dead, Trinity. That’s not something you can change or control. What you can control is how you feel about it.”
“I’m angry,” I say, without waiting for him to ask.
“At them, or yourself?”
I squirm in my seat. “Both.” Then I shake my head. “No. Just myself.”
“Because you didn’t go with them to church?”
I nod.
“And why is that? Why did you stay at home that night?”
I run my finger around the rim of my glass. It’s practically empty, but there wasn’t much of it to begin with. I don’t dare ask for more. I need Gabriel to see me as the same girl I was when he left Redmond—sweet and innocent and naive. Definitely not the undercover spy I turned into.
“We had a fight. They left without me.”
“What did you fight about?”
My cheeks warm-up, and I know it’s not from the heat of the fire, or the sip of wine.
“Something stupid. Something really, really stupid.”
Silence settles between us. The fire pops, shooting a spark onto the hearth. It pulses like a dying heart before it fades to nothing.
There’s a distant rumble. Is it starting to rain?
“No one alive is a good person, Trinity.”
My eyes snap to him.
He smiles faintly, but without looking at me. “You asked if your parents were good people.”
Suddenly I don’t want to know the answer. Instead, I absently sip at my wine before remembering it’s empty.
Gabriel holds out his hand. I give him the glass. This time, he fills it. But when he passes it over, he doesn’t let it go straight away.
We lock eyes over that forbidden wine, and I can see his hesitation from the way he frowns at me.
“It’s probably better if I don’t—” I begin, releasing the glass.
“They shouldn’t have treated you like that,” Gabriel says. His warm brown eyes are cold now, a muscle in his jaw ticking.
My heart claws its way up my throat.
Oh my God.
He knows.
He fucking knows.
I only realize I’ve gulped down a mouthful of wine when it scorches the back of my throat. I blurt out a hoarse, “How did—?”
But Gabriel doesn’t let me finish. “The way they confined you?” He glances away as he shakes his head. “Keeping you from the world like you were a sin?”
What the hell is he talking about?
His gaze touches me again, hot and livid, before jumping back to the fire. “I never wanted that for you, child. I told them time and time again that you had every right to lead your own life, but they refused to listen.”
“My…parents?”
“An immune system must be exposed to bacteria and viruses for it to build a resistance against them.” He waves a hand in my direction but without taking his eyes from the flames. “They left you defenseless.”
Why is he so upset? Did bringing up my parents hit a nerve? I know he was close to them, but—
“If no one’s good, does that mean everyone’s bad?” I ask.
He turns to me, blinking as he focuses on my face. “We are all born into sin. Only through confession and penance can we cleanse our souls.”
“I haven’t confessed in a long time.”
“Not since your thirteenth birthday.”
I swallow hard, and wish I could look away. Mom made me do it. She made me climb into that cubicle and confess my sins to Father Gabriel.
“Don’t let such silly things plague you,” he murmurs, a ghost of a smile coming back to his mouth. “There are worse things in the world.”
Worse than having to admit you’d been discovered touching yourself? Worse than feeling such overwhelming shame at your changing body that you swore never ever to even look down there again? And you’ve kept that promise ever since.
So worse, maybe, but not for me. Not back then.
Except, quite possibly, this moment. Because all that shame just came crashing back like a fucking tsunami.
“I should go,” I mumble, wine sloshing up the side of the glass as I push to my feet. “You’re busy, and—”
He’s on his feet next. He grasps my wrist, and gently takes away my wine. “I’ll never be too busy for you, Trinity. Please. Sit.”
But my body feels like it’s constructed from rusted metal.
He urges me down, but instead of taking his seat again, he goes to stand in front of the fire. His body blocks the heat, and for that I’m grateful. But it also blocks the warm light. I feel lost in his shadow.
“There’s something you should know, chil
d,” Gabriel murmurs. “Something I’ve been meaning to tell you since you got here. I probably should have told you a long time ago.”
Gabriel turns to face me. With his face in shadow, I can’t make out anything in his eyes. But his voice is low and deep when he speaks again, filled with…what? Regret? Shame?
“It’s about your father. I—”
A cell phone rings. I yelp at the unexpected sound, and Gabriel lets out a soft chuckle that sounds forced. “Sorry, dear. Let me just take this.”
The fuck? No!
I whip my head around to stare at him as he walks away, already putting his cell phone to his ear.
My eyes latch onto the big wall clock hanging beside his window.
Eight o’clock.
Right on time.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Zach
“I’m starting to think you don’t like me anymore.” The mischievous gleam in Cass’s eyes belies the questioning tone in his voice.
“What tipped you off?” I pull the rope tight and give it a yank for good measure.
Cass gags theatrically before slipping the noose off his head. “I’d say forcing me to fake my own suicide, but we both know it goes back further than that.”
We laugh. It’s sad that we both sound genuinely unfazed.
I sent Reuben and Apollo to watch Gabriel’s hallway. They’ll message me as soon as he leaves his room. Then they’ll keep an eye on both stairwells to make sure Trinity isn’t surprised half-way through her scavenger hunt.
“Ready?”
“To die? Yeah, I guess. I mean, I’d hoped for another few years or so, but fuck it.” Cass sends a toothy grin my way and climbs up on the chair. “Tell Mom I love her and Dad that he’s a cunt.”
We chose to stage this shit show in his English class. He hates Sister Sharon anyway, and I don’t agree with her disciplinary methods, so it’s a win for both of us. It’s been difficult doing all of this with nothing more than the glow of a cell phone screen to work with, but we didn’t want anyone to happen to look out a window and see a fluorescent lamp shining in a classroom that should only have souls in it tomorrow morning.
“May I state again, for the record, that there were easier, less lethal ways to create a diversion?”
“Cass—”
“I mean, we could have pulled the fire alarm—”
“Dorm doesn’t have one,” I cut in.
“Or flooded the bathroom—”
“Then I’d have to phone Miriam, not the provost. Keep up, Cass. It’s this or broke. Why the fuck else would I be calling him, and not one of the other staff?”
“I could snap my neck, you know.”
I snort at him. “I doubt it. But just in case—” I hold out my hand, and he glares at me before clasping it. “I can’t say it was a pleasure knowing you, but at least we both know you’ll be happier in hell.”
“Damn straight I will,” he says, showing me his teeth as he holds onto the rope and rocks the chair back on its legs. “Lucifer had me at succubus.”
I check the time on my cell phone. “Thirty seconds.”
“Jesus, just make the call,” he grumbles as he slips the noose around his neck again. “Gonna take the old geezer like a century to get down here, and that’s if he doesn’t break a hip on the way.”
I hop onto a nearby desk and peer out one of the small windows set into the top of the wall. “Fucking storm’s turning the lawn into a swimming pool.”
“Hope fuck face can swim.”
“Making the call,” I say, ignoring Cass’s bored voice behind me.
I time his answer with my feet landing on the floor. “Gabriel! F-Father. Please, hurry!”
“Zachary? What’s—?”
Cass starts making gagging noises. I whirl around, waving at him to stop.
“It’s Santos!” I yell. “He said he’s going to, to—shit, father, he says he’s going to kill himself!”
Cass starts choking again. This time, he mimics sucking a giant dick to accompany the suggestive gagging sounds.
I wave him away and hurry out the door before Gabriel can overhear.
“Did he tell you where he was?”
“English. Sharon’s class. Uh, room 2C.”
“Are you nearby?” Gabriel’s voice rises several octaves. I hear a door slam and his voice grows choppy, as if he’s started running. “Can you see him?”
“No! I’m in the garage. I just got his text. Father, I’m not going to make it!” I tamper down a near-hysterical urge to start laughing. I’ve never pulled a prank before, but I understand why kids do it. The adrenaline rush is insane. My heart’s hammering so hard it feels like it’s denting my ribs.
“Call Brother Timothy! Tell him what’s happened. I’m on my way.” I hear his feet hitting the ground, and it feels like he’s stomping over my chest.
I end the call with a trembling thumb.
It’s now or never, Trinity.
Now or never.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Trinity
I watch open-mouthed as Gabriel disappears around the corner. I called out to him a few times, but I might as well have been mute.
Eight o’clock.
15 minutes.
Good luck.
Shit. What the hell just happened? I could barely make out anything from just hearing Gabriel’s side of the call. But I know it was Zachary who phoned. The thought makes my hair stand on end.
There’s no time for this shit. Start looking, Trinity.
I hurriedly close the door and race back into Gabriel’s apartment. I don’t bother with the kitchen or study area. If this laptop is filled with as much incriminating evidence as the Brotherhood says it is, he’d hide it somewhere a quick search wouldn’t locate.
Damn it.
I throw open his closet and flick through his clothes. I search the bottom by his shoes and then I move onto his shelves. The scent of his fabric softener fills my nose as I worm my fingers all the way behind his sweaters.
Nothing.
I climb up on the shelves and burrow my arms between his luggage bags. I gag at the stink of mothballs coming off of them.
Nothing.
The clock back in the living area seems to have doubled in size. All I hear is that watch hand clanging through each second like a death knell.
Closet is a bust.
I haul open the drawer in his nightstand. A bible, a spiral-bound notebook, hand lotion, condoms—
I freeze.
Condoms.
Condoms?
What the fuck—?
There’s no time, Trinity!
I slam the drawer shut, and try to will the sight of that black-and-gold packaging from my mind. I shove my hands under his mattress and shuffle all the way around the edge, grunting at how heavy it is.
Nothing.
I stick my head under his bed, and then crawl under when I realize it’s too dark for me to see.
I try not to imagine that there’s someone already under here, all the way at the back, reaching for me like I’m reaching for them.
Condoms?
Fuck it, concentrate!
Nothing. Bed’s a bust.
I’m about to crawl out again when my hand brushes against something.
A thousand spiders burrow into my hair. I let out a strangled scream and have to force myself not to cannon out from under the bed, yelling.
It’s just a bag, Trinity.
A bag hidden under his bed.
Jackpot!
I ruthlessly suppress the part of me that wants to wet itself and grab a fistful of the cloth bag, dragging it out with me as I crawl backward.
The closer I get to getting out, the more convinced I am that Gabriel is already standing in the room, waiting for me.
My heart is seconds away from exploding. I clear the last few inches and throw myself onto my back, clutching the bag to my chest like a shield in case Father Gabriel decides to pounce on me.
The room is empty.
<
br /> No spiders in my hair.
Just condoms in the drawer.
I shove away the thought as I roll onto my knees and zip open the bag.
Gloves. A soft hat. A carton of cigarettes. A moleskin journal. Rolled up cables. A laptop.
A laptop.
I rip it out and flip it open. It doesn’t look new, but since I’ve only ever used the library’s clunky old desktop computers before, I wouldn’t wager anything on my knowledge of this shit. But to compare it to the sleek, black machine Apollo was setting up yesterday? Yeah, this thing is ancient.
The screen is blank. I hunt around the machine, finger raised, until I spot the power button.
I stab it.
The machine remains dead.
Tick-fucking-tock, Trinity.
I drag my fingers down my face and stab the button again.
Nothing.
Dad had a laptop too. Never used it, but heard him swearing at it all the time.
Dead battery.
Battery died.
Gotta plug it in.
Cables.
The cables!
My hands are shaking so hard that I drop the bundle of cables twice as I scramble over the floor to the nightstand.
There’s a lamp on it—has to be a power outlet nearby.
Tick. Fucking. Tock.
I yank the nightstand away from the wall, rip out the lamp’s plug, and shove in the laptop’s charger.
What time is it? How long has this all taken?
Don’t look at the time, it’ll only slow you down. They always get it wrong in the movies. Always looking back to see how far they’ve run, then—BAM! Dead.
Don’t die, Trinity.
I fumble with the other end of the charger, but I can’t get that tiny plug in that teeny little hole.
Stop.
Breathe.
Calm down.
Now try the fuck again.
It clicks into place.
“Fucking hallelujah.” My voice sounds hoarse and broken.
I stab the power button. The screen switches from black to gray.
“Oh God, please. Please.” I hike up the side of my dress and fumble in my underwear for the drive.
It’s not there.
I spin around, my eyes going wide. No. No! Did I drop it? Did it fall out while I was wriggling around under the bed?
