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The people laughed. Some clapped at the absurdity.
A reporter shoved a microphone in his face. “It’s been almost two weeks. Time to look for a body, Mr. LeClaire?”
Cecil hadn’t left his house in the two weeks she had been missing.
“Were you fucking her?” someone asked. “Was Annabelle Leigh your girlfriend? Were you sleeping with the chauffeur’s daughter?”
“She disappeared outside your house, dumbass. How did you not see it?”
A large camera came so close to Cecil’s face that his nose smudged the scope with oil and sweat. It flashed bright white into his eyes. The people in the crowd seemed to laugh in slow motion, faces disgustingly contorting.
Cecil fell to the ground, holding his arms over his head to shield himself from the blows.
Armed security guards pushed through the mob and shoved the reporters and tourists away. The tall men formed a circle around Cecil.
“Perdonna! Perdonna! Oh my God, it’s Tazia Perdonna,” peo- ple shrieked. The line outside Visage went wild, crying at the sheer sight of her.
Security ushered Cecil into a Mercedes-Maybach. Perdonna joined after signing autographs, her eyes carefully watching Cecil as he gave a despondent stare out of the car window.
“Bellino, what were you thinking? Times Square?” she asked, pulling him close and kissing his head.
The mob banged on their car, eyes glaring down at them, trying to see through the tinted glass. Thunderous hits smashed against the windows, and it felt as if the blows went straight to the skin.
All he could do to escape was look into her eyes.
He wanted her now. As he stood outside St. Joseph’s Abbey, his new home, entirely alone.
“You’re just hiding here, right?” one reporter asked. “This monk thing is an act.”
Abbot Joseph swung open the chapel doors. “I can assure you