Michael Gresham: Secrets Girls Keep Part 35

EPILOGUE.

Two months pa.s.s by. At last, an answer. There will be a new baby.

When we meet for coffee in his diocesan office, Father Bjorn is looking like a man who has spent too many nights waiting up for the adolescent who's stayed out beyond curfew. Having a son who has been thrice-convicted for first degree murder will do that times one thousand. Under the best conditions, parenting an adolescent is an exercise guaranteed to exhaust and drain even the toughest player. Parenting a serial killer while serving in loco parentis to an entire parish must be somewhere on the road to sainthood for Roman Catholics. We'll see what the Pope decides to do for Father Bjorn-whether he'll recognize the merit and grit of our priest and commence the search for two miracles or whether his sainthood will be the other kind, the kind that isn't celebrated, the kind that happens once a month through prison Plexiglas. Time will tell, I am thinking as my priest pours our coffee.

"This time I called you," I mention to him. "I called you because in my heart of hearts I am struggling with a personal problem involving us both."

"Both, meaning you and I?"

"Yes. You see, Father, your son impregnated my wife, Danny, when he a.s.saulted her."

Father Bjorn slumps in his chair, closes his eyes, and mutters a long prayer. Then he looks up at me, meeting my eyes again.

"How can I make this right, Michael?"

"Father, it isn't your wrong to make right. So you can't."

"But still-"

"No, let me tell you why I'm here. It's not about guilt or responsibility or sin or repentance-none of that. The simple fact is, your son has made you a grandfather. A grandfather to my wife's son."

"Sweet Jesus!"

"Yes. I will be the stepfather to my wife's son. I don't know how else to conceive of this except by the common terms we all use in our everyday language."

"Oh, oh, oh!" he exclaims, tears in his eyes. He produces a folded handkerchief and wipes at his eyes.

"But we are going to want this child christened. And we will dedicate him to the Church. And we will want you to perform the service. Would you be able to do this thing for us?"

He shuffles his feet uncomfortably as he struggles to right himself in a world that must be swaying on all four corners for him. I am struck: it is too much at once for this dear man. His personal tragedy continues to lap at him, his youthful sin refusing to extinguish.

"Of course I will do it. The only reservation being that I first go to the Church and seek its guidance."

"How long will that take?"

"Months. Maybe a year."

"We wanted to have him christened sometime in his first ninety days."

"Maybe you should select a different priest."

"Maybe we should."

We both sit there, watching the cloud of motes dance between us in the morning shafts of sunlight separating his chair from my own.

"But here's the saving grace for us all. We are going to list me on the birth certificate as the child's father. He will take my name, Michael Gresham. He will grow up as my son because I will not see him suffer even a jot or a t.i.ttle of shame for what his biological father has done. That slate will be wiped clean. There will no longer be any reason for you to be known as the child's grandfather and there will be no reason for the child to know you as his grandfather. The thread will be severed along with his umbilical cord and it will be concluded."

"That would be the best thing."

"We'll be lying on his birth certificate. And you will forgive the perjury of his mother and I in making this choice?"

"Consider it forgiven."

"There's a world of theology at work in this."

"More than I can comprehend," says my priest. "It overwhelms me and leaves me shaken, unable to contend."

"Then I'm doing the right thing by claiming biological fatherhood."

Again we study the dust floating across the light.

"One thing," he begins slowly. "How are you sure the child really isn't your own offspring?"

"You've seen those ads on TV? The ads for erectile dysfunction?"

"ED?"

"Yep. That's me. And my prescription was awaiting refill at the time this child must have been conceived. Which was the exact day your son raped my wife."

"Sweet Jesus! Why did I ask?"

"Because you're a good man and you would have guided me free of all this if you could have. But you can't and I can't. What's done is done. It's our work now to confirm and protect innocence no matter the price."

"Then I join you in that. I will have no claim on your boy."

"That's what I really came here to know."

"Well, you have my joinder in this."

"Your lineage will end with you, Father."

"So be it. As it turns out, it's a win for the world."

Now it's my turn to sit uncomfortably, my mission concluded, my son's genetic code interrupted and changed by my will.

A peace spreads over me, then, and I am calm as I visualize the double helix of a DNA chromosome morphing into something it was not.

Rebirth.

It always begins with us.

THE END.

ALSO BY JOHN ELLSWORTH.

THADDEUS MURFEE SERIES.

The Defendants.

Beyond a Reasonable Death Attorney at Large.

Chase, the Bad Baby Defending Turquoise The Mental Case.

Unspeakable Prayers.

The Girl Who Wrote The New York Times Bestseller.

The Trial Lawyer (A Small Death).

The Near Death Experience.

SISTERS IN LAW SERIES.

Frat Party: Sisters In Law (June 2015).

h.e.l.lfire: Sisters In Law (July 2015).

MICHAEL GRESHAM SERIES.

Michael Gresham.

Michael Gresham: Secrets Girls Keep.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR.

John Ellsworth practiced law while based in Chicago.

For thirty years John defended criminal clients across the United States. He has defended cases ranging from shoplifting to First Degree Murder to RICO to Tax Evasion, and has gone to jury trial on hundreds. His first book, The Defendants, was published in January, 2014. John is presently at work on his fourteenth legal thriller, which, it is hoped, will be published before May, 2016.

Reception to John's books has been phenomenal; more than 500,000 have been downloaded in 24 months. All are Amazon best-sellers.

John Ellsworth lives in Arizona in the mountains and in California on the beach. He has two dogs that ignore him and worship his wife.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.

First off, thanks to Terry Cheryl Hopton, my editor, for an incredible job this time out. She makes me a better writer and for that I owe a huge debt of grat.i.tude. Thank you, Cheryl.

Thanks to the Chicago Police Department and CSI teams for their knowledge, willingness to help, and cooperation. There is no greater help to a writer than the source itself.

Thanks to the physicians and medical examiners who guided me in the medical aspects of death by garroting and interruption of carotid blood flow, especially Robert Corish, M.D., and Roger Torres, M.D.

Special thanks to my wife, Debra Ellsworth, for her reading, comments, re-reading and an endless supply of coffee while the fingers are flying and the keyboard is melting down.

Special thanks to my daughter Adriane for all the pictures and videos of our grandchildren and to her husband John for his ministry and love. It all keeps me going.

Special thanks to my daughter RJ for her Deadwood alb.u.m and the incredible lead vocals that had me listening again and again while these words met the page.

To all my incredible readers and those who reach out to me with their kindness and comments, thank you, especially.

It is my hope you all enjoy this book.

I loved writing it.

EMAIL SIGNUP.

If you would like to be notified of new book publications, please sign up for my email list. You will receive news of new books, newsletters, and occasional drawings for prizes.

- John Ellsworth (March 2016).

end.