using the term people loosely, that’s saying something.” Kingsley narrowed his eyes at her. He’d met Maggie years
ago when he’d been sent on a long undercover assignment in
Manhattan. Older, rich, well-respected and powerful, Maggie was also a sexual submissive who loved nothing so much
as spending all night on her hands and knees for a man. He’d
taken great pleasure in giving her knees rug burn for two
months straight.
“You miss me, don’t you?” he asked her.
“No.”
“Do you think if I hadn’t gone back to France, we still
would be together?” he asked.
“Kingsley?” Maggie reached across the table and snapped
her fingers in his face. “Pay attention. Your club has been
closed for a month. Can we talk about how much money
you’re losing and why?”
“I have plenty of money.”
“Do you not care about the people who work for you who
lost their jobs?”
“I’m still paying them.”
“When did you become so altruistic?”
“I’m a very giving person. Orgasms, beatings, rug burn,”
he reminded her.
“I’m leaving. When you’re ready to discuss your legal situation, call my office.” She gathered her things and stood up. Kingsley took her by the wrist and pulled her back down to
her chair. As he expected, she didn’t put up a fight. “I’m sorry,” he said, moving his chair directly in front of
hers. “I am. This is my own fault, which is why I don’t want
to talk about it. But I need to. I need you.”
Maggie exhaled heavily. She took Kingsley’s hands in hers.
On her left hand she now sported a wedding band. His beautiful, servile, submissive Maggie, who had once spent twentyfour hours straight chained to his bed…was now married. And
to a librarian of all things.
“Tell me what’s going on. The truth,” she said. “I can’t help
you if you won’t tell me what’s happening.”
“I fell in love,” he said.
She smiled at him sympathetically. “The root of all evil.
Who is she? Or he?”
“She’s a hotel called The Renaissance.”
“Your strip club is closed. You’re being investigated for tax
code violations. And your friend Irina’s being deported. And
this is all about real estate?”
Kingsley nodded.
“Well,” she said. “That’s Manhattan for you.”
“I want to open a new club,” he began. “A club for us. For
our kind. The world’s largest S and M club. I found a place I
wanted, but it’s owned by Reverend James Fuller.” “Reverend Fuller? The Reverend Fuller? The Reverend
Fuller who opens legislative sessions with prayers, held the
Bible for the mayor when he was sworn in and baptized the
governor’s granddaughter? That Reverend Fuller?” “The same,” he said.
“Okay. Tell me everything.”
He told her. He told her about Sam and The Renaissance, about trying to buy it from Fuller and having his offer refused. He told her about the church, the camps and the teenage kids being tortured for being gay. He told her that while he could find another building for his club, he loathed Fuller so much
he refused to give up.
“Maggie,” he said, raising her hand and kissing it. “This is
my city now. This is my home. I can’t let Fuller bring his empire into my city. You know what I am. I was sleeping with
another boy when I was sixteen. Fuller would have sent me to
one of those fucking conversion therapy camps if he’d had the
chance. Me and him. And Fuller’s not sorry. He only closed
the camp because two of the campers made a suicide pact.” “Did they die?” she asked, horrified.
“One died. The other girl lived. Lived and worked for me
for a few months.”
“Sam?”
“She told me what happened to her at that camp. I spoke
to some others who’d gone to his camps. They confirmed
everything she said. There’s a thirty-two-year-old man in
Queens who still has the burn scars from the electrodes on
his testicles.”
Maggie winced. Once Kingsley had realized Sam had betrayed him, he’d begun doubting everything she’d told him.
But when it came to the camps, she’d been telling the truth.
The man with the burns hadn’t wanted to talk to him at first,
not until Kingsley promised him that he’d do everything he
could to keep Fuller from opening a church in the city. Kingsley had found him through a lawsuit he’d filed against Fuller
and the church seeking restitution for his massive therapy and
medical bills. The man hadn’t had sex in five years because
he couldn’t bear to let anyone see the burns on his genitals. “He’s not a man of God,” Kingsley said. “I know a man of
God, and that man of God makes me think God might be on our side. But Fuller, he’s a demagogue. And he’s dangerous.
And I don’t want him in my town.”
“I get it,” Maggie said. “I can’t say I want him or his church
in my town, either.”
“What about Irina?”
“They’ve ‘lost’ her paperwork. INS is as bad as the health
department. Someone deep in the works is throwing a wrench
into everything I try to do.”
“You got her out of jail. That was a good start.” “Getting the charges dropped again was easy. They don’t
have any evidence. Keeping her from being sent back to Russia will be the hard part. Especially since she’d been twice arrested. She doesn’t make a very sympathetic case.” “Her husband bought her, abused her, and she put eye drops
in his drink so he’d be too ill to rape her one night and that’s
not sympathetic?”
“He was never charged for anything. She was. You know
how the world works, King.”
“I know. I don’t want to know, but I know.” He made a
decision then and there, and he spoke it aloud before he lost
his courage. “I can’t let Irina be deported. I’ll call Fuller. I’ll
tell him I give up. He wins. I lose.”
“Are you sure?” Maggie asked.
He wasn’t, but he didn’t know what else to do. He could
survive without the Möbius. He would beat any charges
brought against him for tax code violations. But he’d made
Irina a promise to take care of her, and he would keep it. “I’m sure,” he said. He sat back and put his boot on the
chair across from him.
Then he kicked the chair so hard it f lew ten feet across
the f loor.
“Kingsley.”
He raised his hand to silence her. Maggie looked at him
with compassion but said nothing.
“The club, it would have been something special, Mags.
You would have loved it there. The Renaissance, it was perfect for it. I’ve never wanted a place so much in my life. That
club was my baby.”
“You can still build it. We’ll find somewhere else for you.
I’ll help you any way I can.”
Kingsley gave her a tired smile. It was a relief in a way, letting his dream die. He had all the money he’d ever need, all
the lovers any man could want… It was fine. Time to move
on. Sam had turned on him and he’d been too hurt to even
ask her why. Whatever her reasons, he wasn’t going to start a
fight with her over it. No more causalit
ies. The war was over. And yet…
“I’m sorry, King,” Maggie said, squeezing his hands. “I
know surrender isn’t your forte.”
“If it was only me, I’d fight to the bitter end.”
“I know you would. And I think a few years ago you would
have kept fighting anyway, collateral damage be damned.
You’re getting noble in your old age.”
“I’m twenty-eight. Same age as your boy-toy.” “Daniel’s not my toy. I’m his.” Maggie f lashed him a seductive grin as she gathered her things again.
“I’ll never forgive you for getting married.”
“I didn’t ask for your forgiveness.” She stood up, bent over
and gave him the quickest of kisses on the lips. “I’ll contact
Fuller’s attorney for you. You stay away from the man. No
more antagonizing him.”
“You’re enjoying telling me what to do, aren’t you?” “Remember that night you made me suck your cock for
two straight hours?”
“That was as much work for me as it was for you.” “Go home,” Maggie said. “I’ll call you when it’s all taken
care of.”
“I don’t want to go home,” Kingsley said, leaning his head
back and running his fingers through his hair in exhaustion. “Last call,” Maggie said at the door. She pointed to the
closed sign. “You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay
here.”
She gave him a wink and walked out. He hadn’t been kidding. As much as he loved Chez Kingsley, he was far too restless and worried to go home and sit waiting for Maggie to call
him. He didn’t want to go home. And he didn’t want to be
alone. And he didn’t want to be sober another second. He reached behind the bar and grabbed a bottle of Jack
Daniel’s. He sat it on the counter in front of him. If he closed
his eyes he could picture Sam standing behind the bar, the
bottle in her hand, f lipping and catching it. He didn’t want
to drink the Jack. He wanted to inhale it, every drop until his
heart stopped beating and his brain stopped thinking. And yet
in the back of his mind he could hear Søren’s voice. Drinking is for celebrating, not for suicide.
Too bad he didn’t have anything to celebrate.
Maybe it was a Catholic feast day or something. He pushed
the bottle aside, picked up the phone behind the bar and dialed a number.
“What day is this?” Kingsley asked.
“It’s Sunday,” Søren said, “which means it’s still been eleven
years.”
“Is it a saint’s day or a feast day?”
“It’s always a saint’s day. It’s also Clergy Appreciation Day,
according to Diane. Seems to be the only explanation for why
my desk is covered in baked goods,” Søren said, sounding utterly bewildered.
“Clergy Appreciation Day. That will work. On my way.” “On your way?”
“Yes. I need to get drunk. I’m depressed and miserable
and angry. And you said I can’t drink unless I’m celebrating something. You and I can celebrate Clergy Appreciation
Day together. And you owe me. I destroyed First Presbyterian for you.”
“I owe you?”
“Oui.”
Søren paused. Kingsley waited.
“The rectory at nine,” Søren said.
“You want to celebrate, too?”
“I’m a priest in love with a sixteen-year-old girl. Bring a
big bottle. We’ll both crawl inside it.”
36
KINGSLEY LAY ON THE FLOOR WITH AN ALMOST empty bottle of pinot noir in his hand and a full glass in the other. Søren sat at his piano playing a familiar song. He wore jeans and a black T-shirt, and if Kingsley could ignore the crosses on the wall and the Bible on the table, he could almost forget Søren was a priest. The lamp-lit room throbbed in time with the music. The piece ended, and Søren turned around on the piano bench.
“That’s a good song,” Kingsley said, raising his glass in a salute.
“No idea what it is,” Søren said. “I heard it while making hospital visits. I’ve spent the last week trying to work out the melody. You know it?”
“Is called ‘Purple Rain.’” Sam had that CD. She had a huge music collection, and he’d come home one day to Prince, the next day to Nine Inch Nails. He’d caught her and Blaise dancing to something called The Humpty Hump one rainy Thursday. “I’ll buy you a copy.”
“‘Purple Rain?’ Who’s the composer?”
“A man named Prince.”
“Prince? Is he an actual prince?”
“I don’t think so. But am I an actual king?” Kingsley asked with a disdainful shrug. “Pfft.”
“Pfft?” Søren repeated. “Pfft? Is that French for something?”
“Is French for pfft,” Kingsley said. “Where did you get the piano? You are a priest with no money.”
Søren picked up his wineglass. “I told my sister Elizabeth how our dear father tried to bribe me into quitting seminary with a Ducati. She said she’d buy me a Steinway if I did get ordained. I thought she was joking. The piano showed up in June.”