The Priest (The Original Sinners #9) - Tiffany Reisz Page 0,96
being blackmailed, only because it makes sense, not because it fits the evidence. Nothing fits the evidence except he had a secret something weighing on him, and he died keeping it.” Cyrus rubbed fresh sweat off his forehead again. “I’m thinking of going to Dunn and talking to him. He seems pretty convinced Ike was depressed. And they’re old friends.”
“I wouldn’t if I were you. Archbishop Dunn is more a politician than a pastor these days. He’ll simply hint that he knows more than he can say about Father Murran’s mental state, and he’ll pat you on the head and send you home.”
“You don’t trust him?”
“I don’t know trust most members of the clergy. Not because they’re clergy. Because they’re people.”
“We’re on the same page there.” Cyrus exhaled. “You got any other ideas?”
“I’m intrigued by the Rumi poem you found in his Bible.”
“The butterfly poem? Why is that?” Cyrus had wondered about that himself.
“I keep very personal notes in my Bible. Old notes from my high school love. Letters Eleanor sent me while I was in Rome working on my Ph.D. Photographs of my son. The sort of irreplaceable things I would save first in a fire. If Father Isaac and I have anything in common, the poem might be meaningful. You can pick up a copy of Rumi’s poetry in any used bookstore. Why write the poem out by hand on fine paper and slip it in your Bible like some sort of billet-doux?”
“A what?”
“A love letter.”
Cyrus wasn’t too sure about that, but he filed it away as a “maybe.”
“Well, you know priests and their shit better than I do.”
“True. And we have a lot of shit,” S?ren said. Cyrus laughed to himself.
“You do. Seriously. You sure you want to be a priest? Don’t take this the wrong way,” Cyrus said, glancing around to make sure they were alone. “But you got Nora. Now she’s not my type, but she’s your type. Why don’t you marry that girl? Hit it for the rest of your life without having to look over your shoulder to see if the archbishop’s watching.”
“The girl in question has little to no interest in marrying me. I ordered her to marry me once and didn’t see her again for a full year.”
“Damn. Most girls just say ‘No, thank you, let’s be friends.’”
S?ren laughed, though Cyrus had a feeling the man had not been laughing at the time.
“So you going back?” he asked. “Nora says you got until Friday to decide.”
“I have to decide by Friday if I want to go back to teach when the new school year starts. There are hoops galore I have to jump through before they’ll put me back in a classroom.”
“That long stride will help you jump those hoops.”
Now S?ren glared at him. Cyrus cackled to himself.
“You could be a professor without being a priest,” Cyrus said. “Right?”
“I wouldn’t be teaching pastoral studies at Loyola.”
“Then teach running at LSU. They got profs for that. Don’t know why, but they do.”
“I’m trying to picture myself as a Track & Field coach. It’s not working.”
“Just saying, you got options. It’s not ‘marry Nora’ or ‘be a Jesuit priest.’ There’s a range…” Cyrus held out both hands three feet apart. “Right hand, marry Nora. Left hand, be a priest. You see all that space in-between? That’s other shit you could be doing.”
“I’m well-aware of my options,” he said. “I just don’t like any of them. Professors, piano teachers, and track & field coaches don’t get to perform weddings and baptize babies, celebrate Mass, and perform Last Rites on the dying and bring a sense of comfort and peace to the family.”
“I get that. I do. I was a cop, then I was shot, now I’m a private detective. Even when I’m not a cop…I’m still a damn cop.”
“We are called to what we are called to,” he said, sounding just like a priest when he said it.
“I’m going to tell you something,” Cyrus said, “and it might come off as me getting back at you for running me ragged back there, but it’s not, okay?”
“Go on.”
“It’s what I tell the married men I talk to when I catch them cheating. You can’t keep your vows, you don’t get to keep your wife. It’s just that simple.”
“Simple,” he agreed. “Not easy.”
“Nobody’s saying it’s easy. I won’t even say it’s fair. I think you priests should be allowed to get married. Not easy. Not fair. But it is what it is and you knew that