Divine Temptation

by Nicki Elson

  His light brown hair had a golden cast and was neatly cropped around his ears and at his neck, but longer spikes fell across his forehead. Smooth skin stretched over his defined cheekbones and a thin, angular nose. In contrast to the straight lines of his other features was the curve of his full lips, currently pursed in concentration—or perhaps confusion. His pale eyes were earnest, and they opened wide when they landed on Maggie, as if surprised to see her looking at him.

  She chuckled. “It’s my dream. What did you expect?”

  Chapter 2

  MONSIGNOR SARTO’S FIRST MONTH IN TOWN brought more change to St. John’s than Maggie had seen at the place in the previous two years. He seemed to be getting his fingers into every aspect of the parish, and Maggie could hardly keep track of all the new initiatives swirling around the church, including the conversion of an alcove into an adoration chapel, extended hours for confession, and several revisions and additions to the parish website. She knew many people considered the parish to be lacking in its forward progress and recognized that these changes were probably a good thing, but she personally loved the church’s seeming imperviousness to the rapidly changing world around it. The steadiness of St. John’s had been an anchor for her in those tumultuous months following the divorce.

  While the monsignor’s overall purpose was still a bit vague, from all the extra work Maggie had been given, it appeared he was there to assure compliance with the bishop’s directives. The office staff had also learned that St. John’s was merely a home base for Sarto and that he’d soon begin visits to other parishes in the area.

  “Are you kidding me?” Maggie groaned one mid-February morning when she plopped herself into her office chair and read the Post-it stuck to her computer monitor. “Another new lecture?” The changes around St. John’s meant the “part” in Maggie’s part-time job wasn’t quite so meaningful anymore.

  Brenda chimed in. “I swear that man isn’t going to rest until he’s got every soul in the tri-cities area eating, living, and breathing their entire lives at church. Isn’t it enough he’s got the two of us chained here at all hours?”

  Maggie huffed out an ironic sigh. “God’s work, right?”

  “So he says.”

  The two parish priests walked into the office, and Father Tom headed straight to Maggie. “Did you get my note? Sorry I didn’t have many details for you. I just had the idea and got overly excited, I suppose.”

  Maggie looked back at the Post-it. “Oh, it’s from you. Biblical archeology sounds like an interesting topic.”

  “Thanks. Don’t worry, we won’t schedule it until after Easter, but it seems like a good way to appeal to the community, even those who haven’t been to church in a while. I’m considering hosting it at one of the park district meeting rooms to make it less intimidating.”

  “Will the monsignor allow that?” Father Dominic asked, not looking up from the papers he was rifling through at the filing cabinet.

  “I am still pastor, last time I checked,” Father Tom replied, a bit of the spark in his eyes dimming. “Though I suppose I should at least let him know my plans. Well, I’ll get back to you with potential dates and preferred location and then we can start setting everything up.”

  Maggie smiled. “Sounds great.”

  “I’m sorry to add more to your pile—I know you’ve already been putting in a lot of extra hours.”

  “It’s fine, really, Father. I’m happy to do my part.”

  Brenda tilted her head to look over the rim of her bifocals. “Me too. The sooner we satisfy Sir Stick-Up-His-Bum, the sooner we’ll get him on a plane back to Rome.”

  Father Tom placed his hands over his ears and stepped toward his office. “I didn’t hear a thing.”

  After Father Tom had closed his door, Father Dominic asked, “How are your families holding up with you two ladies spending so much more time here?”

  “My kids are all out of the house, and Joe’s used to it,” Brenda answered.

  “Kirstin and Liam are doing fine,” Maggie said. “Thank the Lord Carl’s current work schedule is flexible enough that he can step up and help with after-school duty though, or I don’t know what I’d do.”

  “Sheesh, he treats his ex-wife better than most men treat their wife-wives,” Brenda commented.

  Maggie laughed but couldn’t deny it. “I think we give each other more consideration and respect now than we ever did while married.” She smiled and returned to her work, feeling grateful that she and Carl had been able to get past the fighting and emerge at this friendlier place. For a long time she’d been convinced that the damage he’d done to the marriage was irreparable, but now that she actually liked him again, she’d begun to wonder if in time, given the second chance she’d refused him, he could’ve also regained her trust.

  When it was time for Liam’s class to head to church, Maggie’s eyes flicked toward the glass doors. She always missed her children on Wednesday mornings after they’d spent the night at their dad’s, but with time together so sparse over the last month, the ache was more pronounced. At the first sign of his teacher, Maggie made an impulsive move and broke protocol.

  She hopped up from her desk and ran through the door, pulling Liam out of line and giving him a big smooch. Liam wasn’t the kind of kid who was too cool for public kisses from his mother, and he threw his arms around her. Maggie squeezed him back and glanced over to the scowling teacher, who’d stopped the line.

  “Sorry, Miss Danner. I promise not to make a habit of this. Could Liam spend his lunch hour with me in the office?”

  “Sure. I’ll send him down. Now, back in line, Liam.”

  “Thanks.” Maggie waved at the line of third graders as they resumed their march. When she returned to her desk, she buzzed her daughter’s classroom and asked the teacher to send Kirsten down to the office during lunch hour as well.

  At twelve twenty-five, Liam strutted into the office and made himself comfortable in the conference room where he always ate when he joined his mom. Maggie heated her Lean Cuisine in the kitchenette microwave and watched for her daughter. She had to remind herself to look for the figure of a young woman rather than the skinny kid Kirsten had been when she’d first started school here.

  “Where’s your lunch?” Maggie asked when Kirsten arrived. “Want to grab another one of these from the freezer?”

  “Gross. I’m going to eat with my friends when they come in from hanging out.” Maggie hadn’t heard Kirsten utter the word “recess” since fifth grade.

  “Okay. Well, come join us in the meeting room and tell me what you’ve been up to since Monday night. Remember, your dad’s taking you to piano today.”

  “Uh huh.” Kirsten nodded, her long, straight hair dancing aside her face. “And then we’re meeting Missy over at the new burger place for dinner.” Her eyes went wide just before her smile disappeared.

  “Kirsten, we’ve talked about this. It’s okay. I know my initial reaction to the news of your father’s new girlfriend wasn’t the best, but that was four months ago. Now that I’ve had time to process, I’m good with it. Promise. And here’s an even bigger surprise—I like Melissa. She’s nice and seems to be good for your father. So can you please, please, please stop flinching every time her name gets mentioned around me?”

  “Yeah, Mom. I know. It’s just…weird.”

  “I know, sweetie. But it’ll all get less weird as time goes on. So tell me what you’ve been doing. How did that history test go yesterday?”

  Maggie let Kirsten do most of the talking—about school, about a friend’s birthday party coming up, about a new song she was going to ask to learn on piano—while Liam wolfed down his sandwich and Goldfish crackers. When it came time for Kirsten to join her classmates in the cafeteria, she seemed almost reluctant to go.

  Maggie pulled her into a hug and kissed the top of her head. “I’ll see you after dinner tonight. Tell your dad I said thanks and Melissa I said hello.”

  Liam took the stage for the nex
t twenty minutes and spent it trying to explain why, in real life, the Mario Bros. would be able to defeat Donkey Kong Jr.

  Maggie left work in time to get home before Carl dropped off the kids. After the financial realities of being a single parent had sunk in, near the end of the kids’ first school year at St. John’s, Maggie decided it would be best to move to a townhouse. What the new place lacked in comparative size, it made up for with convenience—the townhouse association took care of the yard work, and the smaller interior was easier to clean, thus freeing up time as well as money. After repainting a few rooms in warm, neutral tones and hanging her favorite pieces of artwork—mostly florals and landscapes, and wrought iron wall décor—the three-bedroom, two story unit had become a pleasant sanctuary.

  Upon arriving home that evening, Maggie immediately threw on her most cozy—if far from most flattering—sweats and waited for Carl to bring the kids home. She regretted her wardrobe choice the moment she heard car doors slam and looked out the window to see a perfectly coiffed Melissa get out of Carl’s Lexus sedan. The woman was only a couple of years younger than Maggie, but with no kids, she had more time and money to spend at the spa and gym, and it showed from her French-tipped fingernails to the ends of her highlighted blond hair. What made it worse was the way her polished beauty complemented Carl’s darker and more rugged good looks. Somehow his receding hairline and ever-more-apparent flecks of white only added to his magnetism.

  Maggie gulped back her pride and opened the door. “How were the burgers?”

  “Awesome!” Liam shouted.

  “Expensive,” Carl added.

  Maggie laughed. “It’s nice to see you again, Melissa. Thanks for taking the kids tonight. I really appreciate it.” She turned to her children. “You two better go drop your bags in your rooms and wash up. It’s getting late.”

  “Sorry about that,” Carl said as the kids ran up the stairs. “But I think you’ll forgive me when you find out what we did after dinner. I’ve been keeping an eye out for a good deal on a laptop for you, and Best Buy is running a special this week on a pretty decent model. So I went to check it out, and it looks good. I put one on hold for you, if you want it.”

  “That’s great!” Now Maggie would be able to do more of her work at home and the kids could have free reign over the desktop. “You know I have no idea about electronics, so if you think it looks good, I’m sure it is. I’ll go pick it up tomorrow, but…”

  “You’d like me to get it all set up for you.” Carl winked, and Maggie’s eyes inadvertently wandered toward Melissa, wondering if it was awkward for her to witness this kind of familiar interaction between her boyfriend and his ex-wife. Recollecting herself, Maggie jerked her head toward the stairwell. “Hey, guys! Come say goodbye.”

  Two heads appeared over the railing at the upstairs landing.

  “Bye, Dad. Bye, Missy!” Kirsten said.

  “Thanks for the chup chup!” Liam called.

  Carl and Melissa laughed, and Maggie turned to cock her eyebrow at them.

  “Inside joke,” Melissa explained. “’Night, Linus. ’Night, Lucy.”

  Maggie tried not to wince at the playful nicknames. She accepted that her husband had moved on romantically, and she had no right to expect him not to, but this sudden realization that her children would form relationships with this person…that was new. As Kirsten had so eloquently put it, it was just weird.

  Later that night, Maggie fell into an exhausted sleep and dreamed. Melissa was with the kids at a park or a carnival, some place with swirling colors, and the three of them were having fun. Maggie watched them, and she had a choice to make: either let them be or stop them. Even her subconscious mind knew the right thing to do. But she couldn’t make herself look away, and the more she watched, the angrier she became. The fury consumed her and she grew and grew until she towered above them with her head perched on a serpentine neck and her mouth laden with razor-sharp teeth. She roared and watched as the three of them burst into flames.

  Her body jerked and she was instantly transported to her bed. Back to her normal size and coated in a layer of cool sweat, it seemed she was awake until the tendrils of an unearthly sensation poked at her. It was him. Pressing the palm of her hand over her sleep mask, she held it fast. She didn’t want to look. She just wanted to lie there and get swallowed up by her misery—the misery she’d brought on herself. The misery she hadn’t even known she’d felt during her waking hours.

  The tendrils didn’t let up. They poked and sank beneath the surface of her flesh. They pushed the sadness into a concentrated mass at her center so that it was no longer free to roam and spread throughout her. They asked her to open her eyes.

  She pushed the mask to her forehead and sat up. He stood in the same corner of her room, but this time he met her gaze straight on, showing more curiosity than surprise. Maggie wasn’t sure how long they stared at each other before she became overwhelmed with the need to get closer. But she was hesitant, wary of this man who stalked her within her dreams. She gradually leaned forward until she was on her hands and knees and crawled to the end of the king-sized bed, keeping her eyes fixed on him. Once there, she lowered to sit on her ankles, dipping her chin to indicate that it was his turn.

  He returned her slight nod and stepped gingerly forward. He was being cautious too, stopping half an arm’s length from her. He seemed much taller from this perspective and thinner. From this close she could see that his eyes were a pale gray, and there was something familiar in them. Something she automatically trusted.

  Her breath caught. It frightened her that she would trust anything so blindly. She had an instinct to race back to the head of her bed and crawl under the covers, but stiffened when he lifted his arm, as if to touch her. Her heart beat wildly, and she stayed in place, staring up at him with wide eyes. She wanted him to touch her. In that moment, she wanted it more than anything.

  He seemed to take her stationary position as permission, and his hand moved gradually but deliberately forward until his fingertips tickled Maggie’s jawline. She closed her eyes at the sensation. His fingers glided across her flesh, and he cupped the side of her face. The feeling was like no other. His skin seemed to seep into hers, yet it maintained its integrity, as if he had sunken into part of her, and she into part of him.

  His touch felt watery, yet solid, and it extended further into her in the form of a warm, soothing emotion. He was calming her, washing away her troubles and stabilizing her psyche. Everything was okay. She had no need to worry or be agitated. She had only to trust.

  A loud crack sounded, and Maggie whipped her head toward her bedroom doorway. Liam stood there, clutching his blanket. She wasn’t dreaming anymore. The overwhelming feeling of peace and safety receded, but remnants remained, successfully pushing out the hopelessness from her earlier dream. She was slightly disturbed, though, to discover that she was perched at the end of the bed. Apparently she’d gotten a little too into the angel portion of her dream. But she couldn’t worry about that—she had a little boy fresh off a nightmare to comfort.

  “Come here, baby,” she said and scooted back to the head of the bed, unfolding more covers for him.

  He crawled in beside her and seemed to fall immediately to sleep once secure in her embrace. Maggie nuzzled in close and kissed the top of his head. Keeping her arm wrapped around him, she tried to impart at least a fraction of the sanctuary she’d felt with the angel.

  Chapter 3

  APRIL BROUGHT BLANKETS OF COLOR to Midwest suburbia. Bright green lawns provided a fresh backdrop for bursts of color as various bulbs and shrubs blossomed in the opening act for three seasons of carefully orchestrated landscaping. Carl had set Maggie up with all the programs she’d need on her new laptop, and by the end of Lent, her new work duties were organized and running smoothly, allowing her to return to normal office hours. Her world fell into a steady, controllable pace.

  “Anything I buy now is just going to die in the pot waiting for me to plant it,” Sh
aron commented as she perused rows and rows of plastic containers filled with various annuals and perennials.

  The Easter lilies had been cleared off the altar at St. John’s, and Maggie was responsible for purchasing new spring flowers for the upcoming Sunday, so she’d called her friend for an afternoon of lunch and flower shopping. After munching down Mexican tapas, they’d driven a few towns over to Somme Park, which was hosting its annual flower show and fundraiser. Maggie had already selected several potted hostas and geraniums and asked the garden’s florist to make two large floral arrangements.

  “They said it would take about half an hour for the vases,” Maggie informed Sharon. “So do you want to go for a walk around the grounds while we wait?”

  “Sure, why not.”

  Maggie parked her trolley to the side of the checkout desk, and the two women stepped out of the greenhouse into the cool but sunny spring day. Somme Park was formerly the estate of a wealthy Chicago investor. Upon his death, the property had been turned over to the care of a board of directors to use as a public garden. He wanted to leave as his legacy a serene piece of Earth open to all, a place where people could come to admire God’s goodness and feel a sense of quiet and harmony. Satisfaction.

  The plants being sold in the greenhouse had been cultivated by the same horticulturists who designed and nurtured the extensive gardens. As Maggie and Sharon crunched through the pea gravel path around the circular pool, they took a moment to admire the elegant layout of the rose garden with its Greek statues and topiaries. The roses wouldn’t make their grand entrance for months, but even without them the plot had stature.

  Maggie continued to her favorite setting at the park—the prairie garden. Even though she was surrounded by pockets of prairie in her everyday life, she was fascinated by it. It wasn’t just tall grasses and weeds, as Carl had often teased her; it was a kaleidoscope of hidden treasures that changed every time she looked at it. The women veered onto a narrow trail that snaked among the fading stalks of last year’s prairie grasses, which were being swiftly replaced by new greenery and the beginnings of what would soon be a sea of yellow ragwort. Occasional dots of white and purple punctuated the scene as phlox and violets preened for attention. A wind whipped up, carrying sweet scents from the blooms and causing Maggie to close her cardigan and Sharon to zip up her hoodie.