Page 139 of Inflict

“Get up and take me,” Evelyn said over her shoulder, “or call someone to do it for me.”

Jesus.

There went his Sunday.

“Close the feckin’ door!” Connor shouted. “The wee one might walk in here, for feck sakes.”

Sometimes, the child was so quiet, Connor forgot she was even in the house. He wasn’t used to having a child living in the same vicinity as him, let alone in the next room.

“She’s already downstairs eating,” Evelyn called back, her voice growing fainter with every word. “You’re the only one still in bed, Connor.”

“There’s a goddamn reason for that!”

Like the fact it was feckin’ Sunday.

“Not today.”

• • •

Connor stared up at the church’s name, inscribed on a large plaque and hanging over the entrance door. He loosened his tie just enough to take a decent breath, and willed the sudden urge to bolt to die the hell down.

Just standing on the front steps made him feel as though he were going to burst into flames.

This was too much.

“Evelyn,” Connor muttered, trying to get his lover’s attention.

She was already doing her own thing, passing Ciara off—the wee lass was dressed in a pretty, pink dress—to the lady who apparently ran the Sunday school.

“She’ll be perfectly fine,” the woman said, “and the other children will be excited to have someone new attending.”

Evelyn nodded, and smiled. “Great, thank you.”

Connor could see she was still nervous about letting her daughter go off alone, somewhere without her and where she wouldn’t be able to keep her eye on her twenty-four-seven. Even Ciara looked back over her shoulder at her mother, and then quickly to Connor, before being led through the front doors and down a hall where they could no longer see her.

“She’ll be grand,” Connor assured Evelyn. “Maybe make a friend or two.”

Ciara could use that, he imagined.

Every kid needed a friend.

“I know.”

“You don’t sound like it, love.”

Evelyn frowned, and rubbed her hands together. “It’s a church. Everything is safe and fine at church, right?”

Well, he didn’t think he was the right person to answer that, given his non-history with attending service. Connor did have something else that might reassure Evelyn, though.

“One of my guys is waiting in a vehicle just across the way there,” Connor said, pointing to the gray sedan idling on the other side of the street from the church. “He won’t leave until we do, and he knows to keep watch, or let me know if something happens. All right?”

Evelyn relaxed a bit. “Okay.”

“Grand. Let’s get this shite over with, so I can get home, and salvage some of my afternoon in bed.”

“Connor!”

“What?’ he asked, fixing his jacket with one hand as he directed her toward the doors. “I don’t do church, or God.”