Saint's Sacrament - Sins of the Father (57 page)

Feeling
sorry for herself, she watched men moving set props around in truck trailers. She never knew her mother or father, she’d grown up in foster homes and what Sinclair had said was right on the money—she
was
a trick’s baby and it still disturbed her how he found out such private information. She was born addicted to crack cocaine, and spent a great deal of her childhood with shrinks and school counselors. She rarely thought about that fact because she was a survivor, and her attitude once she hit fifteen was: ‘Fuck it. Shit happens.’ She’d made something out of nothing and she prided herself on not giving a shit, not feeling or caring, but something inside of her was changing. She observed Xenia from so many angles and the woman inspired her. Xenia shared some of her own personal beginnings. Life hadn’t been easy for her, either, yet, she remained positive and still tried to help people.

Why can’t I be like that? Why can’t I be…good?

For the first time in her entire life, Shianne felt guilt. It made her queasy, made her stomach knot up in a yarn ball, and shame was a cat, batting it around, turning it into a threadbare mess.

I’m not doing it! I won’t do it. Sinclair can’t make me. I’ll just say I did it…

She swallowed and walked back into the studio. She looked up and caught Xenia looking at her. Shianne marched over to her, ready to spill the beans, tell the woman everything Sinclair had been up to, but then…she realized she couldn’t. He’d destroy her and she’d never find work again. The more time passed, the more he seemed to come unhinged, like a man possessed, losing his mind. She now questioned everything he’d told her about Saint and Xenia. They didn’t seem like those types of people at all…and maybe, he’d brought their wrath on himself.

“Yes, Shianne? Did you want something?” Xenia asked
deprecatingly, interrupting her scattered, tormented thoughts.

“Uh, no…
just uh, watching.” Shianne backed away as she felt her iPhone vibrating against her hip. She found a spot away from listening ears and answered.

“Yes…”

“Did you take care of it yet?”

“Yes.”

Sinclair burst out laughing. “You lying bi—”

“Stop. Don’t call me
by that name again!” Her voice shook.

“Then don’t act like one! You do what I tell your ass to do. This is your last assignment, then you’re free, okay? I won’t call you
anymore; I won’t ask your ass for shit. Just remember though, Shianne, I made you! You’d still be shaking your ass for chump change if it weren’t for me. You’d still be only a C student in that rinky dink unaccredited college. Take care of this one last thing, and your car will be completely paid off as well as your rent for the rest of the year. You will also get a rather sizeable check, as we previously discussed. I will hold up my end of the bargain, you hold up yours.”

“Sinclair…what if
…what if this doesn’t turn out right? I mean, yeah, I’ve done some shit, but this is—”

“
It amazes me how suddenly you seem to have caught a care in the world. You were down, before. My ace. Now, you act like you are a nun or some shit. Anyway, that’s neither here nor there. Take care of it, or I will take care of
you
…” He hung up.

Shianne looked over at Xenia who was now talking to two of the stage hands, a big, relaxed smile on her beautiful face. She envied the woman, wishe
d that Xenia was her big sister, just as the woman pretended to be. She wished she had someone like her in her life, especially when she needed it most.
In her mind
, she apologized for what she was about to do.
In her mind
, she cursed the day she met Sinclair, but, she had bills to pay and this job was promised. She was a fighter, a product of the streets, and this was the code she lived by.

She walked back outside and looked around the parking lot.

I’m sorry, Xenia. I really am…

~***~

Xenia sat in her car and rubbed her forehead. It had been an exhausting day and after dodging Shianne most of the morning, she finally got close to her and picked her brain a bit. Nothing unusual came up; matter of fact, Shianne seemed a bit down in the dumps. Nevertheless, she hated when she doubted someone she really liked, but it came with the territory. Xenia knew about this affiliation. Sometimes you truly can take the person out the ghetto, but you can’t take the ghetto out of them. She was hoping to be a positive influence in the girl’s life, and the young woman was talented. She had a natural eye and was organized. If Saint was right, however, it would be squandered and though she believed her husband felt that most women wanted to jump his bones—his ego was truly that inflated—she couldn’t help but notice how she’d looked at Saint when they’d met. That was nothing but lust. She wanted to dismiss it, treat it as if the woman was possibly just star struck, but found it impossible.

She kept thinking about it over and over
and Shianne’s reaction to Saint burned Xenia’s chaps. More importantly, the woman was not forthcoming. She’d been hiding personal information and with Xenia being the Queen of the Scoop, she could always tell when someone was holding back. She’d noticed that immediately about Shianne, figuring she just needed some time to warm up to her. But, it never changed. The girl stayed guarded every damned day, as if her life depended upon it. Hence, Xenia no longer felt comfortable with Shianne and she hated that it had come to this. Even if she hadn’t argued with Saint that late afternoon after he’d met her, this still would be taking place, right here, right now. He had to have known she was considering cutting the girl loose, and he went in for the kill, to ensure the line was severed for good. He was persuasive because this time, he was right.

She so desperately wanted him to be wrong, but she knew in her heart that something was amiss with Shianne
and damn it! Such wasted potential! The thought broke Xenia’s heart and before something they both regretted happened, she’d have to arrange to have the young lady sent somewhere else. She’d never leave her without a job, and she truly did want the woman to be successful. She just realized it wouldn’t be under her wing. She couldn’t deal with someone she couldn’t trust. She racked her brain on how to tell Shianne the news.

I’ll just have to be straight with her. I’ll tell her she is great and will go far as long as she stayed on a positive track, but I think I need to work with someone wh
o doesn’t make me feel this way. She makes my skin crawl. Oh hell, I need to go about this a different way…

She continued to drive and come up with various scenarios.

“Damn it!”

Xenia started her car and left the parking lot, thinking…thinking…thinking.

That’s it. I’m just going to have to lie. Shit. I hate that, but it’s for the best. I’ll say I think she is so good, that I want her promoted to another department for another show. I’ll even make sure I get all the paperwork taken care of this evening. Yeah, that will work. That way the poor girl won’t be out of a job; she won’t feel slighted and I won’t look stark raving mad. It’s just a hunch… The questions at lunch about my love life, her questioning me about Sinclair…it just felt awkward and weird. Yeah, this is for the best.

Just then, Xenia’s cell phone
rang; she looked down at it and saw Shianne’s number come up. She rolled her eyes.

“No way. I’m not picking that damn phone up right now
. She can leave a message…”

Xenia hit ignore and made her way
to the highway, relieved that she had a resolution to a nebulous problem by the name of Shianne…

~***~

She’d watched Xenia drive off in her car, then made a mad dash back into the studio and hid inside a bathroom stall. Her insides knotted up and she couldn’t stop crying, despairing. “Oh my God.” She banged on the closed door, the fresh scent of Pinesol still swirling in the toilet from the morning cleaning crew.

After a long while, s
he slowly got out and stood at the vast burgundy and vanilla swirled marble counter, looking herself pitifully in the mirror. Black mascara smeared and running, she turned on cold water and soaked a paper towel then meticulously went over her face, removing all traces of her earlier breakdown built on a bridge of remorse.

She had no idea why she
’d even called the woman. If Xenia answered, she wouldn’t have said a damn thing and she sure as hell wouldn’t be leaving a message.

“Look, it’s done.” She took a deep breath. “Just let it go, Shianne. You’re
through with Sinclair. You’ll get your money, and this will all be over. You can get through this.” She exhaled and exited the bathroom, her chin held high, her heart closed off for she was no longer able to face the magnitude of her actions…

~***~

Xenia gripped the steering wheel of her car. She sighed with relief as traffic appeared lighter than usual. The show had gone well and they’d given all the audience members free iPads. It felt like Christmas in the studio. Grinning, she turned up the music from Saint’s iPod. She’d snuck it out of the house, needing a little music therapy while wrestling with her thoughts on what to do with her assistant. Evelyn Champagne King belted, “I’m In Love.” Xenia snapped her fingers, bobbing her head back and forth to the 1981 classic.

“And there ain
’t no doubt about it, I’m in looooove!” she sang. “My baby has something on here besides rap music. He gets an A plus!” she teased, smiling as she approached her exit. Drawing closer, she stepped on the brakes and heard a screeching, grinding noise. The car barely slowed…

“What the?!” Xenia tried again, pressing as hard as she could, cars
zooming a mere twenty feet away from her. “Oh my God!” she screamed out in horror when she spotted a small child in the back of the car she barreled toward. Her eyes watered as she made a split second decision, veering to the right to miss the traffic. Suddenly, she heard a loud crash, like metal splitting the Earth open with a razor blade tongue. She rolled and rolled, her mind a blur as if her life were a movie, passing before her at rapid speed. The car tumbled, turned and continued on its rocky, out-of-control path. She yelled as loudly as she could, a primal yell from the gut, one she hoped God himself heard loud and clear. Her tongue was thick with the taste of her blood pooling in her mouth as she clawed at the car roof, her metal prisoner and possibly her protector from whatever she was rolling toward and within.

“My babies!!!” she
shrieked, her tears mixing with more blood and a burning sensation throughout her body, as if she were being stuck with red hot needles.

“My babies! My God! Please let me live for my babies!!!”
she cried out.

Then
, as if it were some horrific nightmare, everything went black—she could feel or see, and she drifted away, not knowing anything, or anyone, any longer…

~***~

“Yeah, I know.” Saint waved goodbye to Ned as he walked out of his office, leaving only him, Lawrence and Jagger in the room. Mostly everyone else was gone for the day. He peered out the window at the setting sun then turned back toward his friends, leisurely thumping his finger against the armrest of his black leather chair.

“I need to know who is working with
him. Ned will take care of the legalities, just like he is dealing with my other charges, but it is going to be time consuming, costly and stressful and no one is to know about this. I’ve alerted all staff to keep quiet. Don’t answer any questions from
anyone
regarding the matter. You can’t speak to your friends about it either,” Saint stressed. He just realized he hadn’t had a bite to eat all day. His nerves were shattered.

“Saint,
since your wife’s ex-boyfriend is doing these things, you do realize that I now believe timing is even more essential than ever. You wanted to hurt him? Well, he will have to suffer some consequences that will surpass your initial intentions when this all first began.” Lawrence crossed his ankles and leaned back leisurely in his seat.

“Oh, we are waaaaay beyond having an issue with that.” Saint’s eyes narrowed, and the heat change let him know that they’d changed colors, and changed again.

“Good. Because now, he is no longer a hazard to just you and Xenia, he is a danger to everyone here and will have to be treated as a threat. He is a menace to the company, to our livelihoods, to the secrecy of the Rainbeau Knights, to your message and to our longevity. Don’t go and do anything crazy just yet though, Saint. Believe in me, listen to me,” Lawrence said calmly. “We need something else from him, I am assuming it is additional information, but once we have it, we can proceed.”

Saint sighed, tucked his bottom lip and sucked it as he
mulled things over. “Guys, I actually have a suspect.”

“
The person you think is working with Sinclair?” Jagger questioned.

“Yes. Her name is Shianne, and she is Xenia’s personal assistant. I had the displeasure of meeting her
not too long ago. When you see her, pick up on her energy, you will know exactly what I mean. She is not what I would classify as a leader; she is a follower, but she is heinous and devoid of empathy. Her emotional development is stunted due to past trauma and her materialistic nature makes her prone to trying to turn men into sugar daddies. She is a narcissist, a young viper. However, ironically, she developed quite an attachment to my wife.” He clicked his tongue and smirked. “She seems to see Xenia as some sort of mother figure.”

“Well then
, why would she help Sinclair do anything?” Jagger questioned.

“Because she is
driven by her primal core, versus her spirit. She is a follower, Jagger, and a user. She will put her needs before others, even at her own detriment. She does know the difference between right and wrong, however. Regardless, she is on auto-pilot. She plays out her role and has trouble breaking free. I thing
she
believes that she cares about Xenia but due to the imbalance I picked up, she is a morpher.”

“She changes when expectations change…” Lawrence whispered.

“Exactly. She becomes the person she needs to be in order to get what she wants. She is very slick and due to the fact that she is young and quite attractive, well,”—he smirked—“she uses that to her advantage. I don’t know if she and Sinclair had anything but a business relationship or not, but I do know he hired her and basically gave her to Xenia. This young woman, by Xenia’s account, presented herself to my wife as a quiet type of nerd when in actuality, she is a wild party child. Now, Xenia would probably say I was exaggerating about the party child, but she is definitely not innocent. And unfortunately, being the woman she is, Xenia tried to help this young lady and it caused some problems in our home.” Saint screwed the top off of a bottle of water and took a slow swig.

“
So, here is what I need. Pay attention to this woman. Her energy is wide open; it will take little to no effort at all. Find out if she helped Sinclair with this tax evasion bullshit and the embezzlement charges against me and if she did, then we will know without a shadow of a doubt that he is responsible for everything going on right now. There is no way he could’ve done this on his own. The thing that perplexes me though is that this took some brains. I don’t take this chick as stupid, but she isn’t exactly academic excellence, either. There are probably more players, but she is the weakest link, so she will be the fastest to fall and rat others out. I’ll bet everything I own, she is the key to this bullshit.”

“We’re on it.” Jagger stood and grabbed his jacket, with Lawrence right behind him.

“Hey,” Saint called out as he swiveled to face the window, his back to his friends. “Lawrence, Donna should go on bed rest if she can. I had a dream last night. Don’t want you to worry, but just take my advice. Tell her to give her boss notice. This should be her last week at work and if she goes to the doctor, he should confirm it. Her blood pressure is sky high… I’ll see you two tomorrow…”

He could feel the worry in Lawrence and the man opened his mouth to speak again. Saint put his hand up
. “Please. We don’t need to discuss it. I’m being on the up and up with you. She
needs
to get off her feet and stay at home for the duration of the pregnancy and she needs to go on a low-fat diet. It isn’t that she is eating badly; her body is just not processing the food correctly between her and the child. This will help. Everything will be fine, man. I promise…”

“Thank you…”
Lawrence responded telepathically.

“You’re welcome.”

He heard the door close and continued to stare out the window and then, he tasted it—the tangy, metallic flavor he’d sampled too many times to count. The taste of blood in his mouth…

He ran his finger along his
inner jaw, perplexed, but felt no cuts. The taste got stronger. His head began to throb and he squeezed it with both hands, gripping his temples, the pain growing from negligible to unbearable in moments.

This is the mother of all headaches! Whe
re the hell did this come from?

Oh…oh shit!

He clawed at his chest. His heart pounded, beating fast, as if a rabbit’s feet were thumping hard and furious inside of it.

Xenia…

Confusion swam inside of him; his wife preoccupied his thoughts and he felt panicky. He reached for his phone to touch base with her, even though his physical state of distress was making it difficult to even form a coherent thought.

Before he could
do anything, his cell phone rang. He snatched it up, not recognizing the number.

“
Saint!” Pam cried. “Oh my God, Sweet Jesus!” Her voice faded in and out, as if she were in some sort of scuffle. He swallowed, trying his damndest to get past the pain so he could hear and understand what the hell was happening.

“What’s wrong, Mama Pam? What’s going on?”

“Saint, this is Porsche. Mama is too upset to talk so I took the phone. You need to get down here to the hospital right away. I called Xenia and the police answered her phone and…and…Please come here as fast as you can. We’re at Cedars—Sinai. Xenia has been in a bad car accident…”

Saint heard nothing else
as the phone slipped from his trembling hand, and landed on the floor in a thud that echoed twenty times over. He felt like he was drowning, and soon, a trickle of blood trailed out his mouth.

He fell from his chair
and started to crawl over the carpet.

I…have to get…to her…before…it’s…too late!!!

The more he tried to scream out, the heavier his body seemed to become. He finally got his strength and stumbled out the office. Everything was a blur and colors, furniture and windows all looked the same. Shaking his head, trying to regain some semblance of normalcy, he ran his fingers along the wall, attempting to keep his balance and stay afloat. He realized what was happening. Xenia’s physical state was hampering him, blending into his own body, causing him near paralysis. A cruel side effect of the soulmate connection had rendered him physically impaired once harm had grabbed her and mashed her into bits. He tried to push past it, to get to her, but his body was failing him. Nevertheless, he kept on, and he wouldn’t stop, couldn’t stop. His psychic abilities seemed to be short-circuiting. He couldn’t ‘dial-out’ for assistance from Jagger or Lawrence, his body and sixth sense were betraying him.

A
faint, familiar voice called to him…

“
Is someone there?!” he said in a panic, still blind, still trying, still tasting blood that was not his own…

“Saint!” the man screamed. A Rainbeau was still on the premises….

He knew that voice, and felt a sense of relief as soon as the hand landed on his shoulder.
George.
The old man was supposed to be enjoying his half days of partial retirement, but he’d come into the office late that evening to take care of a few odds and ends. The tall, lanky man grabbed Saint with strength that surprised him.

“Lean on me
,” George said in his comforting British accent. “By God, you’re bleeding, Saint. Your mouth must be cut.”

“I’m fine…please
…” Saint winced, pissed his legs wouldn’t do what he commanded them to do. “Drive me to the hospital, George. Xenia is hurt… She’s hurt bad…”

“Okay, son. Everything will be okay, alright? Just keep your wits about you.”

A tear cascaded down Saint’s cheek as George took him by the waist and marched him to the elevator doors to do as he requested…

~***~

Lawrence watched Donna come through the front door carrying an armful of black three-ring binders from work, and a large corrugated box of files. That meant she was planning on working through the night on some project that had exploded out of control. He turned off the living room television and greeted her with open arms.

“Well
, you’re home late.” He smiled as he gave her a kiss on the cheek while she brushed past.

“I know, sorry.” She huffed. “
There was a meeting running late and I brought some stuff to work on. I swear these people act like everything is some sort of crisis.”

Just then Lawrence’s
cell phone rang. He looked down at the caller- ID.

“Hey Jagger,” he answered, turning away from Donna. He heard her walk into the kitchen
, set her belongings down and open the refrigerator door.

“Hey. Have you found anything out about this Shianne person? I went by her place and tapped into her
the best I could. I feel like I’m watching some teen show on Nickelodeon or some shit! This woman is a basket case, man. She’s actually screaming in her damn apartment, and cursing and running back and forth, but she’s alone! What a damn nut. I’m convinced she had nothing to do with this IRS or embezzlement crap, Lawrence. I want to be certain before I call Saint though.”

“Um, okay
, can we talk about that later? Is it okay if I call you back? I need to talk to Donna about a few things.”

“Oh, yeah, of course, man.”

Lawrence hung up the phone and walked into the kitchen, smiling at his wife who was drinking a glass of orange juice.

“Hey, honey, I need to talk to you about something.”

“Is something wrong?” she asked as she sat down at their kitchen table.

“No, not really.” He joined her and held her hand.

“It sure does seem like it. Look how you’re looking at me.” She reached out and gingerly wiped a crumb from his top lip.

“
Look, I’ll just get right to it. Saint told me that your blood pressure is high, honey and…even though he didn’t say it, he is worried about the baby. He suggested bed rest.” He gripped her hand a bit tighter.

“Well, you don’t have to tell me twice!” She laughed. “That’s amazing actually, because at the doctor appointment yesterday, he said my pressure was a little high
again and he’d monitor it. I guess it was more serious than I imagined.”

“Oh, thank God
.” Lawrence sighed. “I thought you were going to go off on the deep end and tell me how—”

“Now why would I do that?”

Lawrence grimaced. “Because the information is coming from Saint. We all know how you feel about him.”

“But this is about
our baby, and he’s been right about everything thus far. I will get a note from the doctor and turn it into work. I’ll go in Thursday and Friday to train a temp, and that will be it.” She leaned over and kissed her husband’s forehead then stood and placed her glass inside the sink.

“I think I could use some
bed rest as well.” He focused on her swaying hips as she moved to and fro washing and drying the glass.

“Oh,
you’re sleepy or you just want to lie down? If you just want to chill out, let’s go on up and watch a movie together. I’ve got some Netflix picks I think… Ahhh!” She jumped when Lawrence slid up against her and caressed her hips.