THIRTY-THREE
Bastien
It was more than two hours later before Tressa confessed the thoughts running through her mind as we soaked in the small bathtub, bodies pressed damp and close. When she finally breathed the words, her eyes were as round as the communion wafers I prepared before each Mass. She looked like she’d seen a ghost.
Turns out, she had.
“What’s God’s take on unrepentant sinners…?”
“What?” The faraway tone of her voice didn’t sit well with me.
“Sinners who just keep sinning. What of those in His flock who flat out deny redemption?”
“Redemption is cultivated through love.” I slipped an errant fingertip up the underside of her arm, soft tremors of arousal coursing from her to me and back again.
“But what about the ones who—”
“Pray or worry, but don’t do both, Tressa. My belief has taught me to see God in people and service. And the real challenge is to see God in the people who trigger me.”
“I’m not triggered.” Her lips formed a little pout.
“I didn’t say you were.” I moved closer. “Forgiveness is the key to wholeness. Love is like oxygen—the more you give, the more you get. Don’t suffocate yourself by choice. It’s already in God’s hands. A path to redemption exists for everyone. It’s up to each of us to search for it.”
“But you have the patience of Job. I’m utterly average in every way.”
The pad of my thumb dusted the space along her breastbone. “When I feel disconnected, I find someone to help, someone to connect with. Another soul to share a face-to-face conversation. Whose soul are you worried about this time, my dove?”
Her rich brown eyes clung to mine before her lips finally parted. “I think it’s him.”
“Who’s him?” I asked.
“Him. Him.”
I pushed a hand through my hair, a thousand different options running through my mind.
“Father Martin,” she whispered. “I haven’t seen him since I was eight. He’s older, definitely way crazier, his skin is a darker shade of brown, the wrinkles and lines more prevalent, but it’s him. I’m as sure as I ever could be. I didn’t think I’d really ever find him. Honestly, I thought he was probably dead by now. But sure as shit, that’s him, Bastien.”
“Uh.” My words hung suspended in my throat. “So…Padre Juan is Father Martin? Are you sure?” My thoughts swirled with all the ramifications of this latest confession. “I didn’t see that coming, and forgive my asking, but what’s the big deal about that anyway?”
“Father Martin had been at St. Mike’s since before I was born. Father Martin, your Padre Juan, is the same pastor Casey would have written about in that letter. The same man who, according to you, is Santiago’s father.”
“Okay…” The pieces took their time clicking into place.
“I never knew his name,” she continued. “Not his first name. And I was eight by the time my mom stopped going to church. It didn’t even cross my mind until now. Not until, well, just sitting across from him, there was this weird,familiarfeeling I couldn’t shake. His eyes, Bastien. The way he purses his lips and tilts his head when he’s thinking.” Tressa gnawed on her bottom lip. “The way my mom used to get so mad when he ignored her after every Mass. I didn’t get it then but, Bastien, she acted like a woman…in love.”
I shook my head, still not understanding why she seemed so troubled. “Tressa, I’m not sure I’m following…”
She turned, eyes laced with profound worry.
“I think that man is my father, Bastien.”
