Veiled (35 page)

I don’t think he intended
to, but he stretched his hand and gently wiped her tear stained
face. As he did so something remarkable happened to them, both Leo
and I could sense it. It was almost palpable.

In that moment they fell in
love, or realized that they were in love. Both their hearts did it
at the same time and in the same way, it literally bloomed in an
instant. Their hearts filled to the brim with the love they had for
each other, and it just overflowed at that particular
moment.

Nothing could be done to
stop it, and they could no longer control it or conceal it. I could
even swear that for a moment, they had flashes of their
relationship before this life. A fleeting memory of what they were
to each other in another time—they didn’t understand this memory,
so their minds dismissed it, but their hearts did not.

They still remained silent,
gazing into each other’s eyes as if they were communicating in some
other way.

“
Well, we should
congratulate each other,” Leo boasted.

“
Yeah…we did well didn’t
we, although their troubles are far from over.” I pointed to the
window, the drapes were parted again, and Don Marco was witnessing
this scene along with us. The only difference was, he didn’t look
pleased.

Their long gaze was
interrupted by a purposeful, “Ahem.” They turned to see Doña Rosa
standing at the edge of the roses, looking down on them. Max got up
briskly, and unperturbed declared, “You will ruin her life if you
go on with your plans.”

“
Is that what you came
here for?” Doña Rosa asked stiffly.

“
I will make sure no
priest in the vicinity marries them,” Max said, angry for the first
time.

“
Then we’ll appeal to
Madrid,” Doña Rosa spat tartly.

“
You’ll be accountable for
this one day,” Max said, then brushed past her and briskly walked
away, leaving a disgruntled Doña Rosa.

Celeste grasped her
precious bud and hiding it in the palm of her hand, stormed up to
her room.

She locked herself
in—unnecessarily, because no one came to her room, not even at
supper time. This was the first true fight that she had had with
her parents, and she had no previous experience to go by, but the
fact that they were just letting her be, could only mean that they
had nothing to say to her.

Celeste first cried on her
bed for a few hours, then she laid there without so much as a
single thought. It was weird to see her laying there comatose, but
there she remained for another hour or so. Then the thoughts slowly
began to emerge, but they were not those of submission—she was
plotting her escape.

Downstairs, Don Marco
dispatched two letters. One was addressed to Ricardo, the other to
a priest in Madrid. Meanwhile, Celeste was filling a bag with her
belongings.

Unsure as to what I should
be doing to help, I flew to the church where Max’s quarters were. I
wanted to talk with Leo and find out what Max was thinking now.
Things seemed to be escalating to an inevitable climax, and the
events of tonight would undoubtedly decide their future for
ever.

“
Oh good, I’m so glad to
see you, Tess. I was just about to go get you. How is Celeste
doing?”

“
I left her packing her
bags.”

“
Oh...kay,” Leo answered,
his head was swarming with different plots and plans and every new
piece of information shaped a new course of action.

“
Listen, Leo…we might want
to sit this one out, let them make their choices without our
influence,” I suggested, feeling a bit nervous about their
situation.

“
No, no, no.” Leo shook
his head and began pacing in the same manner that Max was, the only
difference was that Leo was hovering a few inches from the ground
and moved through several pieces of furniture.

“
Now they need us more
than ever, we have to see this through.” He looked up at me with
eager eyes. “Listen, Tess, we haven’t made any choices for them. We
can only whisper and hope they hear us. Things are getting
confusing for them now, we need to be there to protect them and
guide them.”

“
You’re right, but what is
he so agitated about?” I asked. “I can’t read his mind. His
thoughts are scrambled and make no sense to me.”

Leo looked at Max with
pity. “It’s not an everyday occurrence for a priest to realize that
he has just fallen in love. Not that it’s never happened, but Max
never expected to be among those weak minded priests, so naturally
he feels disappointed in himself. He also came home to find a
letter from his superior, saying that he is being transferred to
another parish in the Brazilian-Argentine border, a town called…”
Leo peered into an open letter, “Iguazu Falls. He asked for a
transfer not too long ago wanting to prevent just this. He’s always
wanted to go to some remote jungle and learn some obscure language,
and this transfer is—no, was—what he’s always dreamed of,” Leo
said, looking at me significantly.

I was stunned. “You mean to tell me
he is leaving, now?”

* * * * *

Chapter 29

“
He is thinking about it,”
Leo explained, “but he is not sure he can leave her. He couldn’t
live with himself if he left her to marry Richard, and he also
loves her and wants her for himself…which makes him feel ashamed of
himself for even considering it…” He trailed off.

“
I get it,” I said,
finally understanding some of the jumble I was seeing in Max’s
head. “One thing is for sure, he can’t go, at least not without
Celeste. She wants to go to South America too, maybe…”

“
That’s it!” Leo jumped
into the air and slowly floated back down. “They can elope and
start fresh! No one needs to know that he was a priest, besides
there’s so many people immigrating there right now, they will be
sure to find a boat leaving soon, they wouldn’t even have to wait!”
Leo looked at me eagerly, hoping that I would match his
enthusiasm.

“
Don’t those boats charge
money? They don’t have any money,” I pointed out softly, trying to
not disappoint him too much.

“
Don’t worry, leave that
up to me,” he said exultantly.

“
But…”

“
Shhh.” He put one finger
to my mouth and looked suspiciously around. “I said, leave it up to
me. Have I ever let us down?” Leo added with confidence.

I looked at him through
narrowed eyes, but agreed. “Leo, don’t—”

“
Shhh.” He motioned again,
this time with a cynical smile. “I have my ways.”

“
How?” I asked, but he was
already flying out the window.

It was dark now and being
alone in Max’s chambers felt odd, like I was intruding, so I
decided to go back to Celeste’s room. But as I was going through
the door, I passed through Celeste’s body, which happened to be on
the other side.

She shivered and looked a
bit shaken, but she closed her eyes and tried to pull herself back
together; then knocked.

Max answered quickly, but
froze the moment he realized who it was.

“
Can I come in?” Celeste
asked.

Max stared at her, then
looked down at her bag. He swallowed a lump in his throat, but
didn’t find his voice.

“
Please…” she begged. “I
don’t want anyone to see me.”

Understanding this, Max
let her in and stuck his head out, to see if anyone
had
seen her. Feeling
satisfied that no one seemed to be out at this hour, he shut the
door.

They looked at each other
for a long time, neither one saying anything.

“
I’m leaving, so…I wanted
you to know, just in case…” Celeste said, breaking the
silence.

“
Just in case what?” Max
asked, not really sure of what he was asking, or what she was
saying.

“
Just in case you wanted
to come,” she said looking down at her shoes.

Max’s mouth opened, and
then shut again.

“
Or… just in case you
wanted to know what happened to me.” Her eyes were welling up with
tears now.

This Max could not resist,
and in two steps he was at her side wiping them away.

She buried her face in his
chest and his mind was screaming,
What do I
do? What do I do? Please, God tell me!

“
Tell him!”
the order came to my mind from the link, loud and
clear. This gave me great satisfaction, because this meant They
approved of what Leo and I were doing.

“
What should I tell him?”
I asked, now wondering what the right course of action should
be.

“
Go to Padre
Fernández.”
Then the link was
severed.

I wasted no time in
whispering the message to Max who upon hearing my words smiled and
slowly started to relax—drawing Celeste closer to him in the
process. His thoughts were also slowing down, and his guilt over
his vows to the church was disappearing.

He held her close to him
for a long time, her sobs slowly subsiding to a mere whimper.
Gently he pulled her away from him and got down on one knee. She
looked down at him, her eyes were red but brilliant.

“
Celeste, will you marry
me?” Max asked with a pleading look.

“
Really, you mean it? You
are not just saying that out of pity, are you?” Celeste’s whole
face brightened and she was trying to reign in her excitement.
“What are you laughing at?” she asked, her tone turning from
pleading to belligerent.

“
Not you, that’s for sure.
I do mean it, Celeste—would you be the wife of a poor ex-priest?”
As soon as he said these words, his smile faded and he looked
crestfallen.

Celeste didn’t seem to
notice, because she was bouncing up and down and saying, “I do! I
do want to be your wife!” But then she noticed, and seemed to know
what had him so worried, so she knelt in front of him
too.

“
I would love to be a poor
ex-priest’s wife more than anything in the world,” she assured
him.

He smiled a weak smile and
drew her to him. “Oh…” he groaned, “I have nothing to give you,
nothing at all.”

“
You are wrong,” she
whispered. “You are all I want and need. You forget that I have
made that choice already. And if I wanted money and comfort I would
not be here.”

“
But, Celeste!” He put her
at arm’s length. “I honestly have nothing, no money, no
ring…nothing.”

A wide grin crossed
Celeste’s face—and for a moment she reminded me of Leo. “That’s OK,
here. Choose a ring from the ones I brought with me, and put it on
my finger. That’ll be the ring I’ll wear for the rest of my life.”
She said this as she spilled the contents of a silk bag on the tile
floor.

“
Where did you get these
rings from, Celeste?” Max looked worried.

“
They are mine,” she
assured him. “They have been given to me, some are family
heirlooms, and some have been given to me as part of my future
dowry. I hated them all until tonight, when I got the idea of using
them to run away with—you know, to exchange for money.”

Max had a pained look on
his face, but said nothing.

“
See…look at all the rings
I have. Then I have necklaces and earrings and hair combs, and
fans, and…well lots of pretty useless things that I’d love to use
to buy our freedom.”

Max froze at those last
words. “Wait a minute, Celeste, why are you here exactly? Is it
freedom that you want? Because you shouldn’t…”

“
Oh stop it, will you? I
want to marry you, that is why I came here. If I had wanted freedom
I would’ve gone off by myself, but life without you…I just can’t
imagine it.”

Max looked steadily into
her eyes, then shook his head with a smile and gently touched her
face with his fingertips. This seemed to give her chills, because
she shuddered slightly.

“
I want our freedom, yours
and mine, together,” she added.

“
What made you think I
needed to be freed?” he asked as he continued to brush the tips of
his fingers along her jawline.

Celeste looked like she was
having a hard time breathing.

“
You are a priest in love.
What could be more confining than that?” she said with another
shiver and her eyes closed slightly.

“
And how did you know I
was in love with you?” he asked with a new kind of look, one that I
had never seen him wear—a smirk. To which she promptly responded by
shoving him backward.

“
What did I miss?” Leo
asked as he flew through the window.

“
They are engaged,” I said
looking down on the two of them.

“
Good! But they have to
leave right now if this is going to work out. Don Marco sent for
Ricardo and a new priest. As soon as they find out that Celeste is
gone…”

“
OK, let’s go, let’s go!”
I urged Max and Celeste. “You have to get out of here!”

“
What are they doing?” Leo
asked once he saw a sack full of jewelry scattered on the
ground.