Page 28 of Priestly Sins

“I don’t know who did this, but I don’t have anything to hide, so I might let it go. Want to think about it. But, in case, I’d like to know how.”

“But...”

“Not forever. But on my terms. Wouldn’t it be fun to screw around with them? Have it transmit sometimes and not others? Besides, who could’ve done this?”

But as soon as I say it, I know. My wait at the police station two nights ago with a bullshit excuse, after Henry had been dismissed. Someone knew where I was, how long I’d been there. But why slash my tires?

Leroy shakes his head. “No clue. It’s basic and not for recon or anything. See this?” He points to the box. “It slides off like an old matchbox or those old hide-a-keys.” He pulls it off gently. Underneath there’s a little switch.

“All you do is flip that and it’s off. Flip it back and it’s on.”

“Is it hard-wired in?

“No.” His answer comes out like a question.

“So, I can keep this in my glovebox or put it somewhere and it’ll transmit from anywhere?”

“Yeah.” Again, it sounds like a question. “It holds with only a strong magnet. Whoever put it here did it because they could get a good hold.”

I nod, grabbing the matchbox-sized device, and turn it around in my hand.

“You ever want to go for a joyride, let me know. I’ll send it on a trip with you.”

He looks shocked, but I just laugh. “Might as well give them what they paid for.”

“You’re funny, Padre. I like that.”

He lowers my car, and we head to the office. I pay, and we shake hands.

“Appreciate you, Leroy.” I leave him a tip and thank him again.

I drive home with a fucking tracker in its current location, trying to decide what I want to do with it. I do not go by Petites Fleurs since someone is watching me.

Does Enzo have dirty cops working for him? Is that why death after death surrounding his operation never turns up as anything other than natural causes? Is the coroner in his pocket too?

When I park at the rectory, I grab the tracker and toss it into a sliding compartment under the radio panel and leave it there. The red button flashes a steady beacon.

I seethe as I wonder if I’ve been made.

Sixteen

My eighteenth birthday brought several things—only one of them good.

I stood in my father’s house the night before that birthday and stared at myself—truly stared at myself—in the mirror, hating I shared the same DNA as the man… hating that daily, my reflection took on more and more of him, at least physically.

Ma had been gone almost three years and the pieces of her in me were starting to fade. No, that wasn’t true — they were being overwhelmed. Her goodness and kindness could never be dampened, but the other stuff, his stuff, seemed to be coming to the fore. Not his cruelty, or his ruthlessness, but the chilly demeaner, how removed he was. How removed I was becoming.

I could see how it could happen. One couldn’t screw people over, ruin their families and their businesses—kill, steal, and destroy—without hating themselves or going numb.

Except a sadist.

Or a narcissist.

I could be convinced my father was both. It wouldn’t have taken much.

But when I overheard him tell his attorney, Hal Staunchley, thirty minutes before, that he did what he must to bring me back into the fold, I knew. I listened, holding my breath and biting the insides of my mouth to keep from screaming.

And I knew.