Page 5 of Sinister Savior

This man undresses me with his gaze, but not in the way a woman enjoys. He’s not looking to expose my skin. He’s looking to peel back the layers that have callused around my heart, to expose me. I have to look away from him for a moment and collect myself. I don’t talk about Tom with anyone but my counselor, but Father Clemmons isn’t prying because he’s nosy. I get the feeling he wants to know me better.

“Well…” I don’t like admitting my failures, but if anyone can listen to them and not judge me, it’s a priest, right? “Tom and I didn’t have much of a marriage left. I had already asked him for a divorce, spoken to a lawyer.” I press my lips together, carefully selecting which facts I’ll share with him. “He had a drug problem, one he picked up while working for the Mafia. He, uh… Well, he got into some trouble with a fewgambling things, and before I knew it, he embezzled a lot of money to pay those debts. And the Mob didn’t like it. They came after him.”

“I see…”

I look up at the priest and see his non-judgmental expression, only sympathy. “Like I said, I was on my way out. Tom and I had lost our connection. We were going through the motions.” I sigh and stare down at the table again. “I told my therapist I wasn’t sad when he died. I was relieved. I loved him at one point, but lately, it had just become one argument after another. Until they came after me… Now I wish he were here to do something about this.”

Father Clemmons reaches across the table and takes my hand, and I don’t shy away. His hand is soft and supple, no calluses or rough spots from hard labor. He holds my hand tenderly and brushes his thumb over my knuckles.

“I’m here, and I will do something about this.”

I’m not sure what he means by the words “I’m here” or how he intends to do anything to these men who want to hunt me down and kill me. Or maybe they don’t want me dead, but they definitely aren’t afraid of killing me in order to get to what they really want—their money.

“What do you mean?” I don’t pull my hand away, but I do feel tense. How can a priest defend me against mobsters with guns? And why does he want to do this? His job stops at the confessional where he absolves my sins. He has no obligation to protect me or help me get away from these lowlifes.

“I want you to stay here for a while. No one has to know where you are. It will give us some time to formulate a plan.” He speaks with a calm tone, and for some reason, I feel safe. I trust this man to do what he says, to make good on his word. “These men are connected, and you’re right that they will likely have someone in the police station ontheir side. You’ll have to own up to the fact that you killed a man at some point, perhaps, but I won’t let them hurt you.”

When he says that, I believe him. It makes me want to stay here and be with him where I feel safe. I don’t want to be on the run for the rest of my life. I want shelter and security.

“Okay,” I say, nodding. “I’ll stay.” It goes against everything I’ve felt I needed to do for months, but I’m making the choice to stay here. “But I’ll need some of my things.” I don’t even want to think about walking back into that house again, but I have to. Hopefully, they’ve removed the body by now, and hopefully, I won’t run into any unwelcome guests.

“I’ll take you.” He stands, picking up his plate and mine. “And we’ll get what you need.”

None of this will be easy, but facing the music never is. I just hope God is on this man’s side. If not, we’re both in a lot of trouble.

4

MARIO

Alice is antsy, as I expected she’d be. Returning to the scene of a crime you committed is unnerving the first time. Once you’re entrenched in a life of crime, you grow accustomed to it. Numb. But she’s not a hardened criminal the way I was in my former life. She doesn’t carry the weight of a thousand memories, scars that are invisible to the naked eye. Had she been attacked by a bear, everyone would see the limp, feel her pain.

She trembles as we drive up and down the street a few times, making sure there aren’t any unmarked police cars watching the residence. If they suspect she’ll return for her things, they’ll be here waiting, but the coast is clear. The only cars on the block are residents who’ve parked their vehicles on the street instead of in their driveways. I think we can slip in and get what she needs and get out quickly. It’s a risk showing up here, but I want her to be comfortable.

“Let’s park on the backside of the block and walk up the alley. Do you have a key for the door in back?” I ask her, turning the corner to round the block one last time.

“I… uh.” She shakes, reaching into her purse to sort through it. “Yes. I have it.” Her keys jingle in hand as she pulls them from her purse, and I see the apprehension in her eyes. She is terrified, and I want to comfort her.

“It will be alright,” I tell her, taking her hand. I pull into the first parking spot available on the street and shut the van off. Father Grieshop was nice enough to let us borrow the church van, though I took the magnets off the panels so no one would know it was the church van.

We’re more than sixty miles away from St. Rose in Barstow, now on the northeastern outskirts of LA. Barstow being such a small little burg, I don’t think anyone would even recognize the sign for the church, but I know my brother and I’m not taking any chances. I’m not stupid, and I didn’t free myself from his clutches by making poor choices.

“Father Clemmons, I…”

“Enough with the formalities, Alice. Call me Mario. I insist.”

Alice tries to smile at me but she’s too scared. “Mario, I feel like I’m dragging you into a war that’s not yours to fight.”

She’s all too wrong. This fight is in my blood. It’s what I was born to do, whether she knows it or not. At one moment in my life, I was sold to this, harnessed by a power greater than myself and helpless to do anything but follow the path in front of me. But not anymore. I had to break free. I can’t live my life as a soulless killer the way my family intends for me to do. I’m more than that. And while I may not be cut out for living as a member of the cloth, I’m not the criminal my brother is.

“You let me worry about that. Okay?” I slip out of the van and round the front to open her door. Every step she takes seems deliberate, like she has to focus on how to move one foot in front of the other to walk.

With my hand on the small of her back, we head up the alley between houses. Her house, three down from the alley junction, beckons us. I have no idea what we’ll see when we arrive. If it is as she says and she killed a man, there is a chance the body will still be here. If police were called after she fired the shots, they’ll have removed it. Given that there isn’t a police presence swarming this block, I’d say maybe they never came, or if they did, maybe they were crooked cops.

“This one,” she says, nodding at the small Craftsman. It’s so tiny it appears to be a one- or two-bedroom unit. The garage is narrow, only one car could fit, and the backyard is a strip of grass so narrow she could cut it with hedge trimmers.

“Let’s go.” I take the keys from her, but as we approach the house I notice right away that something is off. The window in back is open, curtain blowing in the breeze. The screen lay on the ground below, torn in a few places. Alice moves closer to me, tucking into my side like I’m her anchor, and I don’t mind that.

I attempt to insert my key into the back door, but instead of sliding into the keyhole, the movement pushes the door open. Not only is the back door not locked, but someone left it ajar. I glance at Alice, and she grimaces, tears welling up in her eyes. So I hold a finger to my lips as if to shush her and use an arm to tuck her behind my back.

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