Mortal Sin (31 page)

Clancy considered skipping Cailie’s recital. Although he didn’t look quite like a refugee from
Night of the Living Dead
, his cuts and bruises were still noticeable enough to raise eyebrows and elicit questions. But Callie’d been so excited when he’d talked to her on the phone that he didn’t have the heart to disappoint her. She was expecting him to make an appearance. Besides, a couple hours of normalcy would provide him with a much-needed distraction. So he dressed in street clothes so he wouldn’t stand out from the crowd, put on a pair of fake Oakleys to cover the worst of the bruising around his eyes, and brazened it out.

He’d expected Swan Lake, so he was surprised—and delighted—to see instead a troupe of energetic, preteen flappers gleefully dancing the Charleston. Callie Adams, with her fair-haired good looks, was a standout in this group of awkward twelve-year-old girls. She’d inherited her coloring from Tom, her graceful, leggy elegance from Bess. But her smile, that heart-grabbing, ear-to-ear grin, was all her own.

“You did come!” she said the minute she saw him. “I knew you would!”

Backstage was utter chaos: a dozen young girls in sequins and beads in a multitude of colors, all of them excited, talking and giggling and bouncing around, flanked by proud parents and bored siblings, and for the most part oblivious to the shouted instructions of one extremely frazzied-looking dance instructor. “Of course I came,” he said. “You didn’t think I’d miss this, did you?”

He and Callie were special friends. The first time Tom had brought him home for dinner, Callie had been a freckle-faced, eight-year-old beanpole with a wide gap where her front teeth should have been. She’d talked Clancy’s ear off all the way through dinner, while her more reserved older sister had satisfied her curiosity by sneaking wide-eyed glances at this strange man dressed all in black and wearing a clerical collar. After dinner, Callie had entertained him with her impressive collection of baseball cards. When he’d told her about his own, more modest collection—including a Babe Ruth that had been his most treasured possession when he was nine years old—their friendship had been cemented.

“I know I look like a geek in this outfit,” she said. “I can’t believe people ever really dressed like this.” She did a quick pirouette, the fringed hem of the short red dress swaying merrily. With her face lit by a rosy flush and her hair curled in tiny wisps around her cheeks, he could see, somewhere beneath the tomboy he regarded with such great affection, a glimpse of the woman she would turn out to be. Tom and Bess were obviously doing something right.

“You look lovely,” he said. “Like a young lady.”

“Yes,” Tom seconded, “you do. Although I could live without the bright red lipstick and all that gunk around your eyes.”

“Oh, Daddy.” Callie rolled her eyes. “You know the makeup’s part of the costume.”

“I know. But you’re only twelve years old, baby. I’m not ready yet for you to look like a temptress.”

“Twelve isn’t so young. Half the girls in my class are dating already.”

“Ye gods,” Clancy said, clutching his heart dramatically.

“Don’t worry,” she said cheerfully. “There’s nobody I want to go out with, anyway. I’m not like Gen, sitting on the sofa playing kissy-face with Matt. They make me want to hurl.”

Geneva, standing quietly beside her mother, promptly turned the color of a ripe tomato. With the lofty disdain that only a fourteen-year-old girl could pull off, she said coolly, “At least I don’t run around in cleats and a baseball uniform, with mud all over my face.”

“I’d rather be playing baseball than draping myself all over some boy. Gross!”

“Your time will come,” Clancy predicted. “No need to rush it.”

“When she’s thirty,” Tom said firmly. “She can date when she’s thirty. Sound good to you, Father?”

“I think you’re severely deluded, my friend. And that’s all I’ll say on the matter.”

Callie giggled, then narrowed her eyes. “Geez,” she said, “what happened to your face, Father? You look like you ran headfirst into a Mack truck.”

Both Tom and Bess had looked at him oddly when they first saw him, but thanks to a lifetime of ingrained etiquette, neither had been willing to broach the topic. Count on Callie to get right to the heart of the matter. “It’s nothing,” he said. “Just a little work-related accident.”

“Maybe you need a new line of work,” she suggested.

“It’s not that serious. Just a little foolishness. Callie, sweetheart, I can’t stay, but I want you to know that you did a spectacular job. I’m proud of you.”

“Thanks for coming.” She gave him a quick, hard hug, a half-dozen plastic beaded rope necklaces rattling between them. “I gotta go talk to Heather now. Bye!” And she was gone, a whirlwind of red sequins, fringe, and colored beads.

Tom and Bess exchanged glances, and Tom’s mouth thinned. “What?” Clancy said.

“I’ll walk you to your car,” Tom said.

“That’s not necessary. Bess, it was nice seeing you.”

He tried to make a graceful escape, winding his way through a noisy crowd of kids as colorful as a fruit salad, but Tom dogged his footsteps, and he reluctantly gave in to the inevitable. Outside the recital hall, the evening was balmy, with just the hint of a breeze. “Nice night,” Tom said, falling into step beside him.

“Beautiful,” he agreed.

Car doors slammed and engines revved as the parking lot rapidly emptied. “Do you intend to tell me,” Tom said, “or am I going to have to drag it out of you?”

Clancy tucked his hands into his pockets. “What?”

“Stop being obtuse. What’s this baloney about a work-related accident?”

“It’s nothing.” They paused to let a late-model gas-guzzler pull out from its parking space in front of them. “Like I told Callie, it was just—”

“Foolishness. Yes, I heard. Forgive me for being blunt, Clancy, but it’s pretty obvious that you didn’t walk into a wall. More likely somebody’s fist.” The gas-guzzler accelerated and pulled away, and they resumed walking. “Which leads to an obvious question—who would beat up a priest? And why?”

They reached his Saturn, and Clancy leaned casually against the driver’s door with his arms folded in front of him. “I stuck my nose someplace where it wasn’t wanted, and got a little too close for somebody’s comfort.”

“And they did this to you?” Tom said incredulously. “Good God! And if I know you at all, I imagine you conveniently forgot to call the police.”

“I don’t need any police. I can handle this on my own.”

“I can see that. The evidence on your face makes it painfully obvious. Who did this to you?”

He studied his thumbnail. “I’d rather not say. These people are mean. And serious. All I’m willing to tell you is that it’s connected with the missing girl I’m looking for.”

“Kit,” Tom said. “The girl on the flyer.”

Clancy nodded. “If you hear anything,” he said, “anything at all, bring it to me. Stay as far away from it as you can get. I don’t want to drag you, or your family—” he shot a quick glance at the recital hall “—into it.”

Tom ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t like this. I don’t like it at all. Is there anything I can do?”

“Just keep on doing what you do best. Win the election.” He patted Tom’s shoulder and turned to unlock his car door. “We need more people like you in Washington.” He paused with the door open. “Tougher anticrime legislation may not be the solution,” he said, “but it certainly can’t hurt. G’night.”

He leaned back in his chair, stretched out his legs, and thumbed listlessly through a month-old copy of
The Pilot
, the official publication of the Boston Archdiocese. He’d been waiting nearly an hour, and there were a half-dozen things he should be doing elsewhere. But when the Archbishop of Boston requested an audience with one of his priests, there was only one possible response. So here he sat, killing time reading outdated magazines and trying not to think about the hundred and one priorities waiting for him back in the real world.

“Father Donovan?”

He glanced in the direction of Bishop Halloran’s bulldog of a secretary, who had initially gaped at his appearance, then spent the last hour avoiding his eyes. “You can go in now,” she said stiffly.

“Thank you, Dora.” He dropped the newspaper, crossed the room and knocked on the door to the inner sanctum.

“Come in,” said a gravelly voice from the other side.

Clancy opened the door and stepped inside the bishop’s private office. “Your Excellency,” he said.

“Father. Close the door behind you.”

In his younger days, Bishop Gerald Halloran had been solid and muscular. But the intervening years, combined with a three-eclair-a-day addiction, had turned that brawny build to pudgy. His close-cropped steel-gray hair perfectly matched the eyes that studied Clancy now like an insect under a microscope. “Let’s take a look at you,” he said.

Clancy clasped his hands in front of him and silently, grudgingly, allowed his bishop to examine the healing cuts, the bruises, the still swollen nose. “From what I’ve heard,” the bishop said finally, “I’d thought it would be even worse than it is. What happened?”

“I’d rather not say.”

“You do realize this kind of thing should be reported to the proper authorities?”

Clancy cleared his throat. With his eyes focused on a point beyond the bishop’s head, he said, “What kind of thing?”

Bishop Halloran sighed. “Sit,” he said. “I don’t approve, and we’ll discuss this at some point, but I didn’t call you in here today to ask who used you for a punching bag. I have something else on my mind.”

Surprised, Clancy sat, crossed his ankles, and waited.

The bishop clasped his hands on the desk in front of him. “I had a call yesterday from an old friend, Bishop Livingston of the Detroit Archdiocese. One of his parishes is about to lose its priest. Father Brezinski is seventy-two years old and he’s just been diagnosed with prostate cancer. He’s been there for forty-two years, and his retirement has been a shock to the diocese. They’re hoping to find a permanent replacement as quickly as possible. It’s a very needy inner-city parish, with all the accompanying joys and headaches. But a challenging opportunity for the right individual.” He paused, those gray eyes studying Clancy keenly. “Bishop Livingston is looking for somebody young and vital, somebody a little brash, somebody who’s tough enough and experienced enough to stand up to the teenage gangs who run the neighborhood. He asked if I knew anybody who fit that description.”

“And you thought immediately of me.”

“I thought immediately of you. Although, looking at you now—” the bishop leaned back in his chair, a pained expression on his face “—I suspect you may be guilty of turning the other cheek a bit too far. Is Detroit anything you might be interested in?”

Grimly, he said, “Do I have a choice? Or is this your way of telling me I’m your biggest headache and you’d just as soon pass me on to somebody else?”

A small smile played about the bishop’s mouth. “Yes and yes,” he said. “Certainly, I think you’re a headache. The truth is, you’ve been a thorn in my side since the day you were ordained. But you’re still here at Saint Bart’s because you have a gift, a gift valuable enough that I’ve managed thus far to overlook your failings.”

Clancy discreetly adjusted the leg of his trousers. “A gift,” he said cautiously.

“You have a way with people, Clancy. You may be a little too outspoken, a little too radical, a little too bullish. Blind obedience isn’t one of your strong points. But there’s an innate goodness to you, and people respond to that. Your parishioners, young and old, love you. Church attendance has doubled in the four years you’ve been here.” The bishop tapped his fingers idly against the desk. “And despite your full-speed-ahead-and-damn-the-torpedoes manner—or perhaps because of it—you manage to get things done quickly and effectively. I may not always agree with you.” The bishop actually allowed himself a genuine smile, the first one Clancy had ever seen from the man. “But I admire you. I think you’d be perfect for Detroit, but it’s your choice. And as much as it pains me to say this, if you should choose to leave, the Archdiocese of Boston would sorely regret the loss.”

Stunned, he sat back in his chair and said, “Thank you, Your Excellency.”

The bishop waved his hand, as though embarrassed by his admission. “So what do you think? Are you at all interested?”

He thought about the ennui he’d experienced over the last year, the boredom that had been relieved only by his search for Kit Connelly. Once Kit was found, he’d be left hanging once again. Maybe it was time to move on. It excited him, the thought of pulling together an ailing parish, of stretching out a hand to those inner-city gang members who so badly needed God in their lives. He would thrive on the challenge. And after being in the hands of an aging, old-school priest for so many years, the Detroit parish undoubtedly needed new blood, needed somebody with his expertise and his talents.

But what about his own parish? What about the people who’d come to depend on him? He had responsibilities he didn’t take lightly, responsibilities not only to the members of his congregation, but to the community at large. Not to mention lifelong friendships that would be difficult to leave behind.

And then, of course, there was Sarah.

“I’ll need time to think it over,” he said. “It’s a difficult decision.”

“I understand.” The bishop paused. “Correct me if I’m wrong, Father, but I’ve sensed, over the last year or so, that you’ve been a bit lost. Afloat.”

“That would be an accurate assessment.”

“You can come to me with your problems, you know. I’m really not the curmudgeon you think I am. I may be old, but not so old I don’t remember the difficulties that come with those first few years of priesthood.”

“Thank you, Your Excellency. I’ll get back to you about Detroit after the retreat.”

His mind churned as he drove back to South Boston. So much to process, so many people to consider. This wasn’t just about him. He impacted so many lives, had so many commitments. So many friends he would have to leave behind. Not to mention a woman who had become his greatest source of both joy and pain, a woman who shouldn’t even figure into the equation. On a whim, he pulled onto M Street and found a parking spot. He had an hour free before the neighborhood boys would descend on him for basketball practice. He’d already lost most of his afternoon. He might as well blow the rest of it.