It surprised her to feel so comfortable inviting Jay into that bed, with all its history and joyous memories. She was eager to inscribe his name in its annals, to have him take his place on the continuum of its life. Leah felt no reproof from Walter's spirit. On the contrary, he cheered them on, delighted her life could be restored, since his could not.
Soft fingertips introduced themselves, self-consciously at first. Tentative fingers entwined, seeking multiplied strength and warmth in their coupling. Miraculously, Leah's weariness passed. The inner radiance and joy of being a sensual woman deserted her so long ago that she had forgotten their power to energize her. Draping her coat over a chair, she stepped out of her heels with a long, slow "Ah-h-h."
"I forgot how petite you are," Jay said, "but never how beautiful."
Leah unbuttoned his shirt and ran the tips of her fingers through the dark curls on his chest. Her lips pressed into his flesh. "I didn't expect this to happen. I suppose I knew it would eventually, if we were together long enough. Not this soon. Not tonight."
"Convenient of you to send the children to Sandy's."
"That's not why I did it!" When Jay raised a skeptical eyebrow, she added, "You know I didn't."
"Okay," he conceded. "But, here we are. Alone at last, which we hardly ever were in Santa Teresita."
"Except--"
"That once."
"At the waterfall."
"I've fed on that memory ever since," he said.
"I memorized every detail of those few hours." Leah didn't add that she had kept her secret alive and nurtured it, even during the good years of her marriage. It was the closest she ever came to being unfaithful to her husband, but she refused to let the memory die.
Leah and Jay approached each other as if celebrating a solemn ritual. Her lips, wanting more of him than any kiss could encompass, explored the contours of his face. Her kisses seared every inch of exposed flesh. The taste of him nourished her for the uncertain journey ahead. Her hands roamed freely. She stroked his penis with her fingertips and thrilled at his inflamed desire.
Jay remembered the secret, sensitive places that sent lightning bolts through her body. His passion transformed into a craving, driven by starvation. All the dammed-up love that filled him cried out for release, as if to make up for all the years he had lived without intimate loving.
Leah pledged to help him reclaim every second of that lost time. Her excitement was already at such a pitch, she could scarcely endure any heightening of its intensity. Yet, each time he touched her, grazed his hand along the responsive flesh of her inner thigh, her desire reached an even higher pitch. Feathery touches and moist flicks of his tongue circled her charged nipples. Every movement gave her pleasure and soothed the anxiety that had been the day's unwelcome companion.
Easing back, Jay slipped his hands under her buttocks and raised her up, nudging apart her thighs. "How did I ever let you get away?"
"It had to be . . . . I don't know why." Leah welcomed him when he entered her. As she clung to him, tears of contentment wet the corners of her eyes and slipped across her temples. "It was our karma."
"The years of hoping, the nightmare dreams," he wept. "My beautiful one! I want us to be like this always. Oh, Leah, say you'll marry me."
In a final triumphant explosion, Leah's heart reclaimed control of her life. Muting the voice of reason, she cried, "Yes!" and invited him into her life. She would never be without him again. "Yes, my dearest. Even if heaven and hell conspire to drive us apart."
Which well they might.
* * *
In the aftermath of their embrace, Leah lay awake in silence, languid, wondrously satisfied, quiet and peaceful inside. She felt a contentment she hadn't known in longer than she cared to remember. There was plenty of time to look and touch, to explore the universe of their love, which contained such stores of treasure that only a lifetime together could reveal them in full. There was none of the fear she had experienced whenever they were fortunate enough to be alone in Santa Teresita, fear that someone might barge into the room and assume more than was actually happening between them. There was none of the hurried feeling she had known with Walt the last couple of years of their marriage, with Teddy and Monica in nearby bedrooms, old enough to be aware of curious sounds emanating from their parents' room in the late-night or pre-dawn hours. Left behind in Janet Wishard's office were the countless dark, hostile faces she had seen too many of through the anxious, now distant, afternoon.
Jay snuggled close to Leah's back and tucked her warm bottom against his abdomen. She thrilled at the pulsing of his reawakened passion. As he fondled her breasts, her thoughts took flight in wonderment at the miracle of their unexpected reunion.
Suddenly, Jay's body tensed, calling Leah back from safe harbors and laughing children. He touched her lips to silence and drew back the sheet that covered them. Slipping out of bed, he crept naked along the floor to the unshaded window that looked across Lyon Street to the empty second floor apartment.
"Someone's taking pictures of us from that apartment across the street! I'm sure of it. I caught the reflection of a headlight on a telephoto lens. It just dawned on me what was happening." Slowly, Jay pulled the draw cord to block the bedroom from outside view, hoping not to alarm the snoop. He stepped into his pants and pulled on his shirt. Flying down the stairs, he left Leah to answer her own question.
* * *
Without turning on the downstairs lights, Jay made his way carefully to the outside kitchen door and exited into the narrow back yard. He didn't want to scare the voyeur off.
"I should have left the drape open," he said, second-guessing himself.
Too late. He moved along the unlit side of the house, bumping into hedges that scratched his hands and face. He made his way out the gate and toward the partially lighted street. There was little traffic at this late hour. If the snoop still watched the front of Leah's house, he--or she--was sure to spot him, as he crossed the street. It was a chance Jay had to take. The need to be the hunter, not the hunted, possessed him.
Until this moment, he had given no thought to what he'd do if he encountered the person behind the camera. What if it's Angel? What match am I for a professional assassin?
The voice of sanity urged him to return to Leah, to their bed of pleasure. He couldn't go back. Instead, he shouted to the open apartment window, "Kill me, if you want, you miserable coward, but spare the Bartons!" His cry echoed through the sleeping neighborhood, causing a light to turn on here and there in the adjacent buildings. Have you lost you mind? Who do you think you are? You'll get yourself and the Bartons killed.
Whatever drove him to play the aggressor refused to recede. An irrational need to end the ordeal right here, right now, took charge of his faculties. He needed to finish the fight Montenegro and Angel had started. They had reduced his life to a primal instinct to defend his turf, which now included Leah, Teddy, and Monica Barton. Let's fight it out, winner take all, man to man, if you are a man!
Waiting in the shadows near the front of the house, Jay watched the upstairs window where he had seen the lens. Nothing. Closing the drapes had alerted the snoop and ended the photo session. The intruder might still be in the apartment. At least, no one had come out the front door. The spy must have used a rear exit to escape. With that thought, Jay concluded it must be safe by now to explore the scene. Maybe that person--Angel--left evidence behind, some clue to his identity. Maybe, but not likely.
Jay stood up and crossed the street, making no effort to conceal himself. To his surprise, the front door of the building yielded to his pressure. Lousy security, unless someone's tampered with the locking mechanism. Since solving that secondary mystery was unimportant, he edged cautiously in the direction of the unlighted stairway.
He paused at the first step and peered up at the landing. No lights above either. He felt along the wall for a switch and found one.
Click. Nothing!
Jay ascended on the ch
ance his prey might still be inside. The first self-doubt washed through him when a middle step creaked beneath the worn carpeting. No sound from the darkness ahead. The remaining steps were more solid, except for the last one, which groaned under his weight. At the landing, he made a U-turn and started upward again.
Number 201, the supposedly unoccupied apartment facing the street--and Leah's bedroom--lay directly in front of Jay, its numerals barely visible in the unlit corridor. He was about to climb the second flight of stairs, when a massive flying object broadsided him from the left. The unexpected blow drove the wind from his lungs in an exploding gasp. Surrendering the stairway, he landed in a rolling heap near the outside door. He lay there writhing and gulping for air.
A hulking figure hovered above him like a satanic specter. Jay closed his eyes and prepared for an ear-splitting, flesh-ripping assault. He had a ghostly vision of himself dying alone in this musty entryway. What does a bullet feel like, when it enters your body. What's it be like to be dead? Were the "eternal truths" he had believed in all his life really true? What would become of Leah and Teddy and Monica without him to protect them? Protect them? What a laugh! He uttered a silent prayer. Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.
The only explosion was the ripping of paper. Jay's attacker stuffed something inside his shirt, lumbered towards the door, and disappeared. Ever so slowly, a wisp current of air seeped into his lungs. He wasn't going to die, not yet, at least, not there in the dark in some strange building, not--thank God--alone.
25
Leah peered through the living room curtains, watching the front of the apartment house across the street. When the figure of a man emerged, she thought it was Jay, but he ran down the street, turned a corner, and vanished. Jay stumbled out the front door and down to the sidewalk where he fell in a heap to the curb, obviously in pain.
She rushed outside to meet him. His olive complexion had paled and already a bright reddish lump had formed on his right cheekbone. A trickle of blood seeped from a gash inside his eyebrow. He winced in pain when she touched him.
"I'm getting you to a hospital!"
In shock and close to fainting, he said, "No! I'll be . . . all right."
"You could have internal injuries."
Rising, he leaned on her for support. "Just . . . help me . . . get upstairs."
In the master bathroom, Leah ministered to Jay's wounds with first-aid remedies. After patching him up the best she could, she led him to her bed to keep him warm, close beside her. Eventually, he recovered sufficiently to tell his story and translate the crude note his attacker had left on him. "You are out of control, priest! Go home now or YOU TOO WILL DIE!" Heavy black lines underscored "YOU TOO."
Leah lay beside him, mentally thrashing to find some sense and solution to it all. "Do what he says," she said, sharing the conclusion of her meditation. "All the cards are in his hand."
"No! As soon as I leave, you know what will happen to your son. Perhaps to you and Monica too. Besides, I think I know what's waiting for me in Santo Sangre."
Leah's personal terror isolated her. With all of Jay's concern for her and the children, how could a man who had spent his entire adult life as a celibate priest possibly understand her heart? Accompanying terror was an abiding, unresolved anger that he had let himself get involved in Montenegro's butchery. At the same time, his presence in her bed comforted her beyond imagining.
As her mind thrashed for solutions, she shut him out, making plans on her own. "The children," she said aloud. "They should be here with me. I'll call Janet and demand police protection."
"There's no protection from terrorism!" Jay writhed in pain from the effort to speak. "How many times do you Americans have to be taught that lesson?"
"All right then, Mr. CIA!" Leah snapped. Was this her tender lover of less than an hour ago? "You tell me what we're going to do."
"I'm sorry, Leah. I'm frustrated too. Just don't ask me to walk away and leave you to face this . . . face him, alone."
Leah raised her body over Jay and brushed his battered cheek with her lips. "All right," she whispered, allowing love to make a comeback. "Whatever we do, we do it together. If we have to die, I hope we all die together."
"We're not going to die." Jay sounded resolute, if unconvincing.
In the best of worlds, Leah would marry Jay, have Teddy and Monica safely with her, perhaps even have more children. How she wanted that life! In their imperfect, dangerous world, she and Jay had to make clear-minded and ultimately right decisions about their future. "What will Angel's next move be?" she wondered out loud.
Jay reflected a moment. "He'll watch to see if I obey instructions. When I don't, he'll take action. If he hasn't already sought new instructions from home, he'll probably do that first. Then, he'll carry out his orders, whatever they are."
"Why the photos?" she asked.
"I've puzzled over that myself." He paused to reflect on the mystery. "What if killing Teddy isn't enough punishment any more?"
Leah's intelligent eyes widened with the effort to solve his riddle. "I give up."
"To get you off his back and, through you, POCI/USA, Montenegro may have decided to discredit your organization."
She completed the mental link. "Create a scandal."
"Exactly. 'POCI DIRECTOR BEDS PRIEST.' Wouldn't your daily papers and news media love a lead story like that?"
Leah looked away. A crimson blotch colored her cheeks as the implications fell into place. "Poor Teddy, Monica." She'd have a hard time living with a scandal. So would Jay. Both the right- and left-wing presses in Santa Catalina would have a lurid time playing out such a juicy story. The revelation would ruin her here, and his family and religion would be exposed to ridicule in both countries.
"I may be leaving the priesthood," Jay said, "but I have no desire to bring shame to anyone because of it."
Leah rested on his bare chest, with the top of her head tucked under his chin. After several minutes, during which neither spoke, she raised herself slowly and stuffed a pillow behind her back for support. "This ordeal has given me a new understanding of my commitment to POCI. I've never felt the least bit endangered by my involvement in the organization, any more than Willie Vander Hoorst and Carlo Pontieri did." Jay winced as he drew himself up to sit alongside her. "In the future--if I have a future--I'll feel obligated to warn new members. They'll have to know that, in opposing tyrants, they're forfeiting the safety of their comfortable, middle class cocoons. Your ignoble leader has changed the rules of the moral outrage game. From now on, anyone who decides to call the Montenegros of the world to accountability better be willing to put their life and their children's lives on the line."
Jay listened intently to Leah's declaration. "What about you? Will you keep speaking out? Will you continue to put Teddy's life and Monica's on the line to condemn injustice?" He searched her face for the gut-level truth her reasoned response might deny.
"That's the bottom line, isn't it?" Leah said. "Now that I know what the stakes are, will I do it again?" She filled her lungs with the air she would convert into her life's defining statement. "If I don't, the bad guys win by forfeit."
Jay took her in his arms. "That's what I wanted to hear. I'm with you a hundred percent. Now, let's make sure we all live to carry on that fight."
* * *
In the hours that followed, Leah and Jay reviewed every step in every plan they could think of. The most tempting course was to call Janet Wishard again. Let her convince the police to take over the case. In the end, the wheels of the law might not turn fast enough. Their enemy had the advantage of invisibility.
In the end, they decided on the strategy they liked the least. Separation. This was a variation on the plan Jay had devised in the early morning hours of Saturday, when he battled his demons alone in his hotel room. Adding Leah's reasoned input, they worked out the details to implement it.
The scenario called for Leah to pack up the children today, Sunday, inst
ead of Wednesday and take them to their mountain home in Heavenly Valley near South Lake Tahoe. Skiing season was off to an early start, and Teddy and Monica would be delighted to get to the slopes ahead of everyone else. She would call their schools first thing Monday and give an excuse for their absence. Each day through Wednesday, she would call them in sick again, not revealing they were anywhere, but at home in bed with the flu. At the office, only Sandy and Phil were to know where she had gone.
Jay would rent a car and drive to Los Angeles to visit a seminary classmate overnight. Monday, he would go to the Franciscan Retreat House in Pasadena, presumably to rest and make a private retreat before returning to Santo Sangre. Their reasoning? The ploy might temporarily confuse Angel. They had made it too easy for him to spy on them.
"If we split up, put a few hundred miles between us, who do you think he's likely to follow?" Jay said.
"My guess? He'll follow you south." It gave Leah no consolation to know her family might be safe, at least for a while. Jay was now part of that family. The thought of losing him sent tremors through her body.
"That's mine, too." He held her close in a fruitless effort to quiet her fears--and his. "That will take the heat off you and the children. Hopefully, Angel won't know where you've gone. I'll have time to think of a way to stop him."
"If there is one." Leah's inflection made it clear she lacked confidence that any of their amateurish plans could prevent the ultimate, inevitable tragedy.
"No if's, Leah. We must keep a positive attitude, or we're done for."
"You're right, but I don't mind telling you I'm scared out of my mind."
"Hold on to your fear. It'll make you more cautious." Jay's voice faded. The need to sleep pulled him away from her.
A soft, measured snore told Leah he had done all the worrying, fighting, and plotting he could for this day. How will I know when this ordeal is over? The stark truth was clear, and she trembled again. It can only end, when someone is dead. The odds-on favorite in that category is Teddy, followed closely by Jay, then Monica . . . and me. This time Jay was unable to hold her and reassure her their ordeal would end well.