Bayou Bishops Box Set: Books 1-12

CHAPTER 4

“Who’s son?”

“Cherie’s.”

“She has a son,” he muttered, hurrying down the pier after Tully.

“Remember the one we were going to extract?”

“Raphael is her son?”

“Yes. He’d be between three or five, we guessed.”

“So where is she? Cherie?”

“Maggie didn’t know. She thought she was taking her to her dad. Said she wanted his help and promised not to do anything without talking to Samuel.”

Samuel. Revelator’s birth name, he remembered. “But she did.”

“She fucking did. What is she hoping to do is the question? I have to go, Seer is calling. I need you to meet us at the Main House. We’ll plan to leave from there.”

“What are we doing?”

“Forming a fucking rescue party, seems like.”

He let go a breath. “I’ll see if Madam Hag can stay with Tully.”

“What’s wrong?”

Was it that obvious? “Get The Seer”s call.”

“I”ll call him back. What happened?”

“I upset her. Told her I needed to marry her before we did…things and that I wasn’t ready for marriage and needed to discuss a suitable arrangement.”

“Christ,” Bishop muttered.

“She left sobbing.”

“You don’t fucking say. Did Madam Hag not teach you a damn thing about women?”

“No, she didn’t,” Lesion said, matter-of-factly. “As I didn’t want to know.”

“And now you do,” he assured, being a thousand percent right. “Beth will know what to do. Bring her with you, she can stay there and she’ll look out for her. Distract her till you get back and clean your stupid mess. And let me guess, you already did married things with her?”

“I don’t have a problem with commitment, I just…I wasn’t sure what she thought marriage was and… “ Tully’s sobs grew louder as he approached Madam Hag’s place. “I don’t know what the fuck I’m saying, I panicked. She’s a freight train of rainbows and sunshine and every time I turn around, she’s colliding into me. She loves me like a wife loves a husband, wants to grow old and die right here in this stupid hut, have tons of babies and live happily ever after, it’s a lot to fucking swallow down in a week.”

“Wow. Yeah, bring her. I’ll warn Beth so she’s aware you’ve fallen in love with a wonderful, stage five clinger.”

“Blame the fucking Seer, he saw it into existence.”

Bishop laughed big. “He doesn’t see anything into existence, he sees what would naturally happen. This is all you, podnuh. See you within the hour.”

“Fuck,” Lesion muttered, hanging up and climbing Madam Hag’s steps, ready to kill something. He banged on the door and waited, getting met with a wide-eyed pissed old lady.

“Boy,” she whispered, meeting him on the porch. “What in thehell happened to this chile?”

“I told her we needed to commit before doing married things but I wasn’t ready for marriage,” he whispered as her eyes popped. “I was trying to discuss an arrangement we were both content with.” Her head drew back. “I didn’t know she’d take it like this!” She took a whole step back, eying him like a sudden plague standing on her porch.

“I get it! I fucked up, I don’t know what I’m doing!”

“You need to figure it out before it gets to this. She’s different, Lee. She has an unbreakable spirit but not an unbreakable heart.”

He opened the door and barged in, finding her face down on the couch. “Tully, I need you to come with me.”

“No you don’t,” she quipped, face down.

“You’re right. I want you to.”

“You want me to go with you but you don’t want to marry me!” she barely squeaked, like there could be no greater oxymoron or offense, maybe fucking both.

“Tully, you’re in my care and I need…want you to come with me. I want to discuss this with you and come up with an arrangement you’re happy with.”

She shot off the couch and stared at him, the sight of her anguish as potent as her joy. “I will not be some arrangement! I’m not stupid! I know the difference between—”

Lesion covered her mouth with his, stopping her words and restraining her wrists. “You will come with me and we’ll talk about it like adults,” he swore, inches from her mouth. “I want you. I don’t know the words for this…strange science you cause in me. I just know that I want you, but I won’t make up words about things that are constantly changing and growing into… things I’ve never fathomed in my life. I’m not like you,” he whispered, kissing at her trembling soft mouth. “I’m a swamp creature, a beast that wants this impossible beauty but isn’t sure how to have it and especially how to keep it and protect it.”

He wasn’t sure which words did it and he didn’t care as she fought to kiss him now, her hands back to desperate and devouring.

He took hold of her face and pushed her back a little. “We have to go now.” He added soft kisses to her lips at seeing her worry. “You’re coming with me to the main house to stay with Beth. I have to go with The Twelve and help Cherie and Maggie.”

This sobered her. “What’s wrong with Cherie?”

He forgot their connection. “I’ll tell you everything on the way.”

He groaned when she latched her arms around him in a tight hug. He returned it, letting the chemicals run free until he sensed their reckless power. He’d never felt anything that wild, not even with killing. When he killed, there was a controlled science to it, one he felt comfortable moving in. This was different and he couldn’t begin to name or even measure it. And he needed to. Anything that powerful required reigns and a master holding them.

Back at the house, she packed and all he could think about was finding a way to say he was sorry and show her how much he wanted her. But everything he thought up required that arrangement they still needed to talk about. The idea of leaving her again while it was unresolved felt like an incomplete equation with detrimental consequences if not solved immediately. The kind of equation that could possibly change if he didn’t close it.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, when he stood in the middle of the floor, trapped by everything.

“I’m…trying to settle things. In my mind.”

She slowly approached. “Like what things?”

He looked at her, still at the same place of not knowing enough to speak about it. “New things.”

She gave a small nod. “Give it time. Some things take time. You’ll get it figured out.”

“You’ll wait,” he asked, realizing he worried she might not.

She nodded a lot. “Yes. For as long as you need. I’ll help you.”

“How?” he wondered, needing knowledge about it.

“By giving you time to learn what’s happening to you. And I’m protecting meforyou till you know you won’t spit me out after you devour me whole.”

“How will you protect you?”

“Well,” she said, considering with grave sincerity. “You can’t spit out what you don’t have in your mouth and you can’t eat what you don’t have in your hands.”

It was the soundest logic he’d ever heard, coming from a girl he’d considered inexperienced and na?ve just a second before. It was like the diamond had shifted, showing him a new facet of curious beauty. So why did he want to strike down her idea like one of those human demons? “Thank you,” he made himself say, knowing it was the only right answer even if it caused him pain just to utter it.

****

Every minute that passed since Lesion said all the wrong words to Tully caused something in him to grow. Something dark and unfamiliar. And he was sure it was directly connected to her change in behavior. She’d gone from all over him with every bit of herself to holding it all back, only allowing small portions. He found himself measuring all of it, examining every word, expression, and sound she made, determining their intention and purpose. The hyper-awareness was familiar, he experienced it when studying anything potentially deadly in proximity. Why would his mind interpret this as that? What was happening to his sharp observation and keen deduction skills? The self-control he prided himself for was hardly even remembered as he fought to conceal touch, smell, and taste reflexes.

He wanted to put her in a glass room and watch her live. Study and learn and understand everything about her. But she wasn’t that kind of creature. He didn’t have that right. Unless…it was just a kind of surveillance. That was harmless and reasonable.

“Where is your beautiful mind now?” she asked after he answered all her Cherie questions and got back to pondering his Tully ones.

“It’s on a beautiful woman,” he dared after many seconds.

“Oh,” she said, her sad tone getting his glance. Did she not know she was that woman? Was he supposed to tell her? She was keeping things from him and it made him wonder if he should do the same. If yes, how much. If no, how much to give?

“So which beautiful woman?” she finally asked, like he had a plethora.

“Her name is Tully.”

He saw her smile out the corner of his eye and the tiny victory wrecked his gut. “I know a man in the swamp who might like her,” she said.

“So do I.” He liked the cryptic conversation about the thing he wanted to talk about but didn’t know how.

“He’s a very sexy man,” she went on. “Has a super long snake tattooed on his body. Starting at his cock,” she whispered.

“And how do you know that?” he asked, said cock throbbing.

“Because I saw it with my own eyes.”

“And what did you think about it?”

“That it was…”

He regarded her, suddenly worried with her pause. “It was what?”

She shook her head. “I shouldn’t say things like that.”

He bit his tongue on why not, knowing already. It wasn’t anything that should be in a conversation where abstinence was required.

“I understand that you’re obsessed,” he muttered, getting a laugh of pure light.

“You understand because you share that obsession?”

“For my snake, yes.”

More laughter and a shove that triggered his reflex urge to touch. He shoved her back with his shoulder, getting her giggle.

“You’re obsessed with her, don’t try and hide it.”

He shrugged, allowing himself to look at her, immediately drawn in by that innocent mischief in her eyes. “I have to hide it,” he murmured, holding her stare now gradually heating up.

“Why?” she whispered, swallowing after the genuinely cutting question.

He gave his attention to the dark swamp before them when his blood began to fill with her mystery essence. Why. The trickiest question of late. “Because I don’t want to hurt her.”

She was quiet and he realized he didn’t like that. “Why would that hurt her?” she finally asked.

And there it was, it was a trap word now. You answered it and it didn’t solve problems, it created more, and bigger ones. “Because he’s an idiot and doesn’t know anything about…angels visiting his swamp.”

Her smile returned along with his hope. “A very cute idiot, though,” she said, sliding her arm in his and leaning her head on his shoulder. “I do hope Cherie is okay,” she mumbled softly.

“So do I. Especially for the Seer’s sake.”

“Is he…heavy in love with her?”

He smiled at the term. “Very heavy, I think.”

“She’s a lucky woman.”

Lesion felt little snakes in his blood at the implication. He visited again what was so heavy about the love word, trying to work it into some discernable equation. It was heavy because…it was forever. Were his feelings for her the forever kind? How would he know such a thing? How did she? He didn’t think she did, she only thought she did.

Time was the only test. And as much as he hated it, for this heavy thing, it was required of him. He shouldn’t commit to this forever love unless he was sure he had it to give her. And she him. Then he realized the Seer’s current situation. “He has visions. The Seer. And he sees her leave him and…the very idea of it seems to kill him.”

Her breath sucked in. “You mean…breaks his heart?”

“I don’t know. But whatever it is seems like a death. Whether literal or a living one, I don’t know. And that…is the heavy in love I think of.”

“I think…I think she has a good reason,” she said, sounding half sure.

“I hope so. But I can’t think of one on this earth good enough to endure that death he speaks of.” It meant he couldn’t live without her is what it meant.

He realized that must be a component of marriage love and followed the idea, imagining life without Tully. Would that feel like death? Like he couldn’t live without it? Would he become catatonic or slip into some coma? Why should parts of him die with her? They were distinctly separate beings.

Maybe his scientific brain lacked the ability to imagine such a thing because as he tried, he got nothing. No pain, no sadness. No peace. Like the void of information and experience blocked even the ability to project or hypothesize. And he couldn’t exactly test it without risking it. There had to be a way to set up a kind of trial. Like the Gauntlet Trials. But it wasn’t that simple with this. He’d already touched and tasted. And how did he even present this without wrecking the subject?

He returned to the death aspect, looking for something to link it to. Madam Hag. What would it feel like if she left? Or died? Lesion paced in the void of his mind for many seconds, finding only a serenity in that ocean of nothing.