Page 10 of Sin (Salvation #1)
Sin
Every Sunday, I don’t think this dog-and-pony show my father puts on can get any worse, but each week my dully photogenic and psychotically charismatic father dials the hate up a little bit higher and riles the crowd up a little bit more.
I once broke my arm in a mosh pit with less aggression than these pews.
The camera presence is especially heavy today, and they keep focusing on Cassidy and me for multiple close-ups.
I’m used to it. It always seems like I get as much screen time as my father during these tapings.
Even though I’m featured weekly on TMZ and the other gossip sites for my misbehavior, no matter how bad the scandal, my father insists on my presence every Sunday.
Sam, one of the church’s social media interns that I hooked up with a couple of times, told me it’s because I help the ratings in the younger demographics, and the streaming numbers skyrocket when I show up.
“Everybody loves a bad boy,” he’d told me right before he blew me in the choir pews and brought me closer to seeing God than I ever had before in my father’s church.
The focus on Cassidy worries me, though. I heard my father tell the camera man he wanted several close-ups of Cassidy. Maybe it’s just like my father said, and he’s trying to frame him as an angelic counterpoint to me in the media, but in my gut, I know my father is up to something.
Cassidy and I are both bolting for the door when my father stops me on my way out. My senses go on high alert at seeing him. His reddened face, his dead eyes. I know all too well how close he is to danger mode. “I need to talk to you,” he says, grabbing my arm in a punishing grip.
Not wanting Cassidy anywhere near my father when he’s this close to blowing, I turn toward him and tell him to get a ride home with his mother.
“Come with me,” my father drags me into the nearest empty room, forgetting that I’m bigger and stronger than he is now.
As much as I want to prove that to him, now that Cassidy is safely away from him, I’m curious to find out what has my father in such a state that he’s willing to let his still-lingering congregation see a glimpse of his true self.
Once the door is shut, he pushes me against the wall.
“My builder called me,” he grinds out, practically frothing at the mouth in frustration.
“The city won’t issue the permits to let me break ground on the new Gideon Brandt Worship Center in November because my conservancy runs out in October.
You need to extend the option for me to control the trust.”
I notice that not once in that sentence did he acknowledge that the trust was mine and not his to use as he pleased. It irks me, and I decide to have a little fun.
“Or,” I push him hard so he stumbles back a few steps, “on my birthday, I call a demolition crew and have them blow the Citadel sky high.” My hands spread out in an imitation of a big explosion. “Kaboom. No more big fancy church for the Reverend Gideon Brandt to preach at every Sunday.”
He goes redder in the face at my threat. “You wouldn’t do that,” he thunders.
“Wouldn’t I?” I lean back on my heel and rest against the wall. “No worries, though. I saw a For Lease sign on a space off I-65 the other day. It’s in a shopping center between a taxidermy and a locksmith. It will make a great new home for the Citadel.”
“I’ll have them prove you’re unfit,” he seethes. “I’ll have them lock you up.”
As much as I’m enjoying watching my father unravel in front of me, I know I’ve gone far enough. Any more threats to him and his precious Citadel, and he’ll become a wild cannon. One, I won’t have accidentally detonate in the direction of Cassidy.
“Relax,” I grab a flask out of my pocket and take a draw, “I don’t want to spend my time managing another boring old trust. I’d rather party.”
His rage deflates now that I’ve reverted back to the broken son that he thinks he has a reasonable amount of control over. “Then you’ll have my conservancy extended?”
“I’ll contact my lawyers about extending your control for another five years,” I lie, knowing I only have to string him along a few more months, and then he’ll be in jail.
He nods as if it’s his due. “See that it’s taken care of,” he orders. “God has plans for the Gideon Brandt Worship Center, and his will must be realized.”
Translation: my father wants another pointless ugly building named after him.
As much as Gideon’s a dangerous snake when he gives up his pretense of religiosity and lets his evil out plain and clear for me to see, I almost prefer it to the hypocrisy of couching his diabolically selfish needs as God’s will.
I tell him I’ll get it done, and satisfied he’s bent me to his will, he sweeps out of the room.
I watch him go, and I dream of when he realizes that I’m not as broken as he thinks I am. The day I deliver my mother’s revenge on him.
I stop at the house to change into boardshorts and a tank top. I’m planning on heading to Sea Side, the exclusive, hot new hangout that’s built on a manmade beach, has a wave pool, and flies their DJs in straight from Ibiza. Their Sunday Funday rivals spring break in Cancún.
After the run-in with my father, I need to blow off some steam. It’s not only that. A few weeks in close proximity to Cassidy, and I need to get laid. Every moment around him is a temptation, and I’m desperately in need of a distraction.
“Sin,” I hear my name, and turn around to be totally knocked sideways by Cassidy standing there in faded cutoffs and an old red t-shirt with the sleeves cut off. My mouth goes dry at his trim, long-legged build.
“I’ve got something to show you,” he says. His eyes are sparkling and he’s smiling from ear to ear. His happiness hits me hard, stirring a curious emotional reaction—a mix between joy and longing. I want to be part of it. I want to be the cause of it.
He notices the keys in my hand. “I’m sorry. Were you going out? I didn’t mean to stop you.” He moves to turn away from me. “This can keep.”
“No,” I practically yell. All thoughts of Sea Side and finding a warm body or two to douse my obsession with Cassidy are gone in an instant. The need to be within the radius of his smile is overwhelming.
He looks back at me, curious at my outburst. “My plans were just canceled,” I tell him, and rush to his side. “What did you need?”
“I found the car. The one I want to claim from our bet.”
Good. He’d tried several times to welch on our bet, but I’d told him he was honor bound to go through with choosing one of my cars, knowing that playing his conscience would make him see it through.
“Which one?” I ask, knowing that there’s not a car in my collection I won’t happily hand over if it makes him this happy.
“I pick the truck. If that’s okay?”
“Truck?” I question. I have a couple of SUVs and a Jeep, but I don’t have a truck.
“It’s back here,” he calls, and I follow him to the far end of the garage. There in the corner is an old blue Ford not used since my father fired the full-time gardener and hired a landscaping service.
“Cassidy, I’m not sure it even runs.”
“It does,” he cheerily assures me. “Someone left the key inside. I turned the ignition, and after a few coughs and sputters, Betty Jo started right up for me.”
“Betty Jo?”
“Yep,” he puts his hand on the truck’s hood and gives it a loving caress. He looks up at me with huge, hopeful eyes. “Can I have her?”
I look at the old, beat-up truck, and then I look at Cassidy, who’s practically bouncing on his toes in anticipation.
“I’ll call my mechanic, and if Betty Jo ,” I look to him for confirmation of the name, “checks out safety-wise, and you’re really sure you wouldn’t prefer one of my other cars, then it’s yours. ”
“Really?” Cassidy says.
“Really,” I nod. “I’ll have Hal clean it for you. He maintains all the family cars.”
“She’s my truck, I’ll take care of her,” he insists. “I’m gonna go find a bucket and some towels to give her a wash.”
“No need,” I tell him, pointing to the ceiling of the garage where there is a complicated system of pipes, bars, and pulleys that allow for each vehicle to be spray-washed and rinsed.
“Rich people,” Cassidy mutters with a grin, and grabs the nozzle and depresses the handle to begin rinsing down the truck. The water pressure must be stronger than he expected because the nozzle gets away from him, and it ends up spraying me in a hard blast of ice-cold water.
“Oh, shit,” he says, and drops the nozzle, causing it to hang from the bar it’s suspended from. “I’m so sorry.”
I push my dripping wet hair back and look at Cassidy, who’s standing there frozen.
“You should be,” I tell him, slowly advancing on him to give him time to wonder just what I’m about to do to him, “because payback’s a bitch.
” I pounce on him and grab the nozzle at the same time.
Holding him still, I aim the hose and shoot him with a soapy blast of water.
He screams and, with a quick move, grabs the nozzle back from me.
Not about to let him win, I twist us around so we are both in the blast radius.
“Mutual destruction,” I warn him, pretty sure the quiet, well-behaved Cassidy will call this off.
A slow, mischievous spark enters his eyes, and I’m so transfixed by it that I’m completely surprised by another blast of cold, sudsy water blasting us both.
“You little shit!” I yell. Cassidy lets out a giggle in response that rocks me. I can’t help joining him with a deep, rumbly laugh that makes me feel younger and lighter somehow.
Then Cassidy decides to start trash talking. “Thought you were tough, huh? Guess I showed you,” he says, making a fatal error and forgetting I’m the cocky one in this relationship.
I let go of the hose. “Take that back.”
He looks at me, sizing me up. “No,” he says brattily, putting both hands on his hips, almost as a sassy exclamation point.
My eyes narrow on him. “Oh, you’re going down,” I promise, and start to tickle him mercilessly.
He squeals and tries to retreat, but ends up with his precious truck cutting off his escape.
“You think you’re clever?” I ask him, being sure to tickle the spot by his ribs where he seems especially sensitive.
“Nooo,” he giggles as he tries to escape my grasp.
“All you gotta do is tell me I’m tougher than you and it all ends.”
“Never,” he refuses, and I double my attack.
“I give up. I give up. You’re tougher than me,” he finally calls out in a fit of laughter. I let my fingers still.
He collapses into me with relief. Instead of pulling back, I leave my hands splayed across his soft skin.
Though soaking wet, suddenly I’m burning up at every point our bodies touch, my nerves igniting with a heat that spreads through my veins like a wildfire ready to engulf me.
Cassidy inhales in surprise, and I know he can’t miss my cock steel hard against him. I don’t move, only shift my upper body back slightly so I can see Cassidy’s face. His full, pink lips are slightly open, and the blue flecks in his hazel eyes almost glow. Is that desire I see there?
The question consumes me. I have to know. Slowly, I lean down, my lips a whisper away from his?—
“What in the hell are you two up to?” A shrill voice cuts through my brain. Reluctantly, I take a step back from Cassidy and turn around to see Sheila standing there dressed in her designer Sunday best, vibrating like a nervous poodle. “You’re brothers,” she screeches, “you’re disgusting.”
Says the lady whose background check revealed a lengthy employment stint at a brothel. No judgment. Sex work is an honest living, but being a hypocritical bitch is not.
“I’m ashamed to be your mother.” Sheila points to Cassidy, and I see his shoulders droop and his head hang down. Cut to the core by the woman who has done nothing but disappoint him his entire life.
I turn toward her. “I’m not sure what your Ativan-addled brain thinks you saw here today,” I say with an icy menace, “but it couldn’t be any worse than any of the things you took part in at the Bunny Ranch.”
At the mention of her former employer, her eyes bulge and her mouth gapes unattractively.
“And if you keep on your blathering about things you think you saw, just because you’re bored and want to stir things up, I might just have to call up my good friend at TMZ and ask if they want the footage of a preacher wife and those parties she worked when the insurance convention came to Lexington.
” I raise my eyebrows, “It shocked me and I thought I’d seen everything. ”
“I-I-I—” she sputters.
I roll my eyes. No one has fucking time for this . “Just tell your son you’re sorry, Sheila.”
“I’m sorry,” she dutifully says to Cassidy without even an ounce of sincerity.
I can’t stand it. I pull the hose down and, with a rapturous glee, aim the nozzle at Sheila and hose the bitch down.
When she resembles a drowned poodle, I finally stop, leaving her staring at me in shock and blessedly silent. “Come on.” I hold out my hand to Cassidy, whose mouth is hanging open at the sight in front of him. “Let’s take your new wheels for a ride.”
For a minute, his head swivels between his mother and me, but once again that mischievous spark comes into his eyes, and after only a second of hesitation, I feel his palm against mine as he takes my hand.
We climb into the old truck, and I turn the ignition.
It coughs and shakes, but, sure enough, it starts.
I look at the gauges. The tank is almost full, so I back up, avoiding Sheila, who has recovered enough to start wailing, and pull out of the back entrance of the garage and take good Ol’ Betty Jo for a joy ride.