The Parable of the Mustard Seed Read online

  The Parable of the Mustard Seed

  Lisa Henry

  The Parable of the Mustard Seed

  Written and published by Lisa Henry

  Cover by Natasha Snow Designs

  Edited by No Stone Unturned Editing Services

  Copyright © 2020 by Lisa Henry

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author or publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Kindle Edition.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. No persons, living or dead, were harmed by the writing of this book. Any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Contents

  The Parable of the Mustard Seed

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Afterword

  About When All the World Sleeps

  An excerpt from When All the World Sleeps

  Also By Lisa Henry

  About the Author

  The Parable of the Mustard Seed

  The past never stays buried forever.

  John Faimu is an Australian-Samoan police officer who deals with hurt kids every day. He loves what he does, but he’s tired of the grind of shift work, and of trying to find a balance between his job, his family, and the young man who straddles the increasingly blurry line between both.

  Caleb Fletcher was the teenager John saved from a cult eight long years ago, and he’s now the young man John wants in ways that neither of them should risk.

  Eight years after his rescue, Caleb is still struggling with PTSD and self-harm. John has always been his rock, but now Caleb wants more. Can he convince John to cross a line and love him the way they both crave? And when the monsters from Caleb’s past come back seeking to silence him for good, will John’s love be enough to save him?

  The Parable of the Mustard Seed is an mm gay romance featuring hurt/comfort, first times, found family, and angst with a happy ending.

  Acknowledgments

  Thanks to Sylvia and Kat, who pushed me to get this written even though I wanted to take a lot of naps instead. And thanks, as always, to everyone in the day job who served as inspiration for these characters whether they knew it or not.

  Chapter One

  John was in love with Caleb Fletcher.

  He had been since the day he’d met him.

  Caleb was fifteen and John was twenty-three. Caleb was covered in blood, delirious with pain, and when John unwound the rope from his wrists the first thing he did was try and punch him in the face.

  Holy fuck, John thought as he dodged it, this kid’s a fighter.

  So it was his spirit he fell in love with.

  All of the rest came later.

  The alarm sounded.

  John snaked his arm out and found it, thumped it into silence, and hauled himself upright. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and sat blinking in the darkness while his brain caught up. He squinted at the clock and waited until his bleary eyes translated the stark red digital lines into something tangible: 9:00.

  The sheet had twisted around his hips as he’d slept, so John tugged it free and rose to his feet. Nine p.m. That was good to know. The day of the week eluded him as he headed naked for the bathroom, but that was okay. It was either Thursday or Friday, and it would come to him sooner or later.

  He showered quickly, and shaved under the jets.

  When he came out of the bathroom, his towel wrapped loosely around his hips, he spotted his phone where he’d dropped it on the kitchen bench and checked it for messages while he dripped onto the tiles.

  A text from his sister Mary, warning him that Jessie was up to her usual tricks.

  A text from his mother, asking him to call about Jessie.

  Another text from David, telling him that Jessie was fine and staying at his house for the night.

  And three texts from Jessie, telling him that she’d run away from home because Ma was being a bitch and not letting her do what she wanted, and she meant it for real this time, and John better not come looking for her.

  John closed his eyes and willed the germ of his headache away.

  Jessie was a pain, a fucking pain. She was a teenage drama queen. She needed a kick up the backside, and the whole world knew it. She was sixteen, entitled, a smart-mouthed little bitch. She was also the baby of the family, and their father’s death had hit her the hardest.

  No, that wasn’t fair. Shit, even John couldn’t think of it without feeling crowded by a sense of unreality, but it had only been eight months and they were all still feeling their way through to the other side, to the new world none of them had been prepared for, and Jessie was still a kid. A frightened, heartbroken kid.

  John carried his phone with him into the bedroom and held it awkwardly while he dressed. He didn’t have time for this, but he also couldn’t ignore it. Otherwise his mother would stay awake all night worrying.

  “It’s me, Ma,” he said when she answered.

  He rummaged through his drawers searching for some clean underwear. The fact that he was down to a pair with dodgy elastic and a hole in the crotch meant that it was high time he threw on a load of washing.

  “John, I just don’t know what to do with that girl.” His mother’s voice was pitched higher with worry. “She won’t go to youth group, and last week her principal called and says she’s wagging school again, but she won’t talk to me! And she won’t talk to her teachers, or the guidance counsellor, or even Pastor Ian!”

  “Yes, Ma. I know.” He pulled the briefs on, only half-listening. They’d had this conversation a thousand times. John knew it by heart. So did his mother, but it didn’t stop her from worrying. John felt a stirring of guilt, and frowned. No, he was being sensible by not getting sucked into Jessie’s drama. He knew that.

  Except for the part of his brain that was sure he’d be struggling to recall this entire conversation one day for the missing person’s report, he knew that.

  “…even listening to me?”

  John shrugged his shirt on, sandwiching the phone between his shoulder and his ear. “Yes, I’m listening, Ma.”

  And now you’re going to hell for lying to your mother.

  John fumbled with the buttons of his shirt. “Did David call you? She’s with David.”

  “Yes, David called me!” his mother said, and followed up with a predictable request to go and fetch Jessie. His mother had a licence but didn’t drive, not that John would have wanted her to. Not even the short hop from Woodridge to Yeronga. At night, without her glasses.

  God, he must have been eight or nine that time she’d tried to drive to the shops. She’d loaded David, John and Mary into the back of the station wagon, screwed her courage up as she turned on the ignition, and, flustered by the three kids bouncing excitedly in the back seat, reversed straight into the rubbish bin.

  “Well, we needed a new bin anyway,” their dad had said when he got home. He hadn’t commented abo
ut the broken taillight or the ruined paintwork, just made the repairs quietly over the next few days.

  John closed his eyes for a moment. His quiet, patient dad.

  “No,” he said. “I can’t go and get her tonight. I’m on nightshift. I start at ten.”

  His mother’s quiet sigh worked better than any plea. John heard the truth in that sigh: she was worried, worn out, and, just like all of them, lost.

  “John, will you go and see her, please? And come and see me too?”

  “I’ll see if I can stop in, Ma,” John said. “I can’t promise. If it’s not too busy I will.”

  “Thank you, baby.”

  Her gratitude made him flinch with guilt.

  “If you can’t, will you at least call David?”

  “Yes, I’ll call David.” He stepped into his pants. “And, Ma, you know you can’t force her to go to youth group with Pastor Ian if she doesn’t want to. I know it would help her, but she’s sixteen.”

  Sixteen was still a baby to his mother.

  The shit she didn’t know… Sometimes John resented her naivety. Sometimes it embarrassed him. Other times he wanted to move mountains to preserve it.

  “John, can’t you make her come home? You’re a policeman!”

  John made a face. “No, if she’s sixteen the police can’t force her to come home.”

  “But she’s your sister! Of course you can!”

  “I can’t, Ma. I already told you that.” He shook his head “Jesus!”

  He had to hold the phone away from his ear before she reached through and ripped it off for blaspheming.

  “I’m sorry, Ma!” he said, when he could get a word in. “I have to go. I’ll call you from work. Bye.”

  John’s headache was definitely anchored in his brain now, throbbing gently.

  His bedside clock told him it was 9:28.

  John put on his shoes and socks, shoved his tie into his jacket pocket, and was out of the front door in under a minute.

  John didn’t mind working nights, but he didn’t have a partner or kids. He could sleep for eight hours a day without interruption. Most of his colleagues didn’t have that…was it a luxury? The single life was feeling less like a luxury and more like loneliness lately. Maybe that was because of his dad’s death. Maybe it was because he was staring down the barrel of his thirty-first birthday. Thirty hadn’t bothered him, but thirty-one felt a lot bigger than thirty, more than twelve months’ difference. Thirty-one felt like if he hadn’t found someone yet, then maybe it wasn’t going to happen for him.

  And shift work sure as hell didn’t help.

  Friday night, for fuck’s sake. The rest of the world was busy getting laid, and John Faimu was walking into work with a takeaway coffee in one hand and his phone in the other.

  A text from David: J is very upset you haven’t replied.

  And another one a few minutes later: J thinks you don’t care. Text her pls.

  A text from Mary: I want to wring her neck! Call me. I need to vent.

  John made a face. He and Mary were usually on the same page when it came to Jessie, but that wasn’t always a good thing. Often it meant they just went around and around in circles.

  On nights. Talk soon. He sent the same text to both of them and shoved his phone into his pocket. He might have guilted Mary and David into leaving him alone, but Jessie wouldn’t be as easily dissuaded. She hated to be ignored.

  John sighed as he swiped his security pass at the back door.

  He had absolutely no idea what to say to Jess. He dealt with messed-up kids on a daily fucking basis, and didn’t know what to tell his own sixteen-year-old sister.

  Maybe that was the problem. John had dealt with so many kids in so many horrible situations that all he could feel for Jessie was frustration. Their dad was gone, and that sucked, but didn’t she know how good she had it? Didn’t she realise how fucking lucky she was?

  He headed up the stairs to the office.

  He hated that she made him this angry. It wasn’t her fault that other kids had it worse. It wasn’t her fault that other kids didn’t break under the same pressure. And it wasn’t her fault that John couldn’t separate her from every other kid who walked through his office door. Or was hauled through in cuffs.

  “Senior Constable Faimu,” Liz said in a too-serious-to-be-real tone.

  John fought down a smile. He snapped out a salute instead. “Acting Senior Sergeant Grant, good evening.”

  Liz laughed. “Very respectful. I could get used to that.”

  “You’d better not,” John said. “It won’t last. I can feel it slipping away already.”

  Liz’s laugh ended with a snort.

  John headed for his desk and sat down. He sipped his coffee, ignored the newest message notifications on his phone, and logged into his computer. He had three statements he’d intended to get typed up, but it was unlikely he’d get a chance to do those on a Friday night. Liz had said something last night about trying to get a few plainclothes crews together to execute a warrant, but they’d ended up with a rape instead. The investigation was a nightmare. A house full of underage kids, no supervision, a shitload of alcohol, and a couple of boys who thought that passed-out-drunk equated to consent.

  John scrolled through his emails.

  It felt vaguely parasitic sometimes, like living off other people’s misery. That feeling was symptomatic of night shift, a side effect of fatigue. John fed it with coffee, sugar, and takeaway food. He wasn’t like Aaron, the office gym junkie, with his wheatgrass-detox-no-sugar-spirulina-wholefoods-protein-shakes bullshit. Or whatever.

  “I cycle nineteen kilometres to work every day,” Aaron always said. He said it every day as well, until Liz had threatened to take his bike pump and shove it somewhere that would make sitting in the saddle a physical impossibility.

  “I love you,” John had told her. “Marry me.”

  John craned his neck to peer over his computer monitor. Clare was packing up her bag to leave and Aaron was still working over at his desk. Liz hadn’t mentioned any big jobs, so John doubted it was official overtime. He was probably finishing up a few things in his own time. They all did that. Asking for overtime was like asking for the boss’s firstborn child. It wasn’t worth the lecture on budgetary restraints, time management, and personal responsibility. Sometimes it was just easier to work on that court brief after your shift ended and hope to get an early mark further down the track.

  Aaron glanced up and caught John’s gaze.

  “Hey,” John said. “How’s the training going?”

  It was a broad target. Aaron was always training for something.

  “Great thanks, mate,” Aaron beamed. “Only six weeks to go!”

  “Cool.” John ducked back down behind his monitor. Six weeks until what? John might have asked, except Aaron didn’t know the difference between polite conversation and unbridled enthusiasm. Ask him if those were new running shoes and before you knew it you’d be signed up into doing the Bridge to the Bay marathon. Or the Kokoda Track.

  “You ought to come with me one morning,” Aaron said, right on cue.

  “That’d be good,” John lied.

  Running. Bullshit. Who would do that for shits and giggles?

  Aaron rose from his desk and crossed the office as the printer began to whir. Hopefully, he’d leave before they locked in a time, a date, and a comprehensive training schedule and diet plan.

  John stared at the screen and tapped the mouse. Delete. Delete. Delete. Most of his emails were crap anyway. So-and-so was retiring, someone else was running a charity auction, someone who’d last served in 1992 had passed away, and if anyone wanted to order any lamingtons they had to have their money to Judy downstairs by Friday.

  His phone buzzed as it received another message and John frowned at it.

  “Everything okay?”

  He looked up to find Liz leaning on the corner of his desk.

  “Family,” he muttered.

  “Want to talk abou
t it or is it none of my business?”

  That’s what he liked most about Liz. No bullshit.

  “None of your business.” Except they both knew that Liz would be fully appraised by the end of the shift.

  “Okay.” She flashed him a smile. “In that case, do you want to kit up and go for a drive?”

  “Hell, yes.”

  “And then he told me that he’d read it was hard for women to get back their pre-pregnancy bodies, but since Harry is eight months old now, shouldn’t I at least be trying?”

  “Wait, what?” John was driving, and had been distracted by a white Ford Falcon whose driver thought the sign read Stoptional. Idiot deserved a ticket, except John didn’t even know if they had a ticket book with them, and he sure as shit couldn’t remember the code or penalty. “Craig said that?”

  “God, no! If Craig said that I’d smack him in the head.” Liz made a face. “Aaron said that.”

  “Aaron?” John shook his head. “Fucking Aaron?”

  “I know!” Liz wrinkled her nose. “What a cunt!”

  John burst out laughing.

  “What?”

  “You just lost all your insulted new mother credibility right there. Right there.”

  “‘Insulted new mother credibility’,” Liz muttered. “You talk shit, Faimu.”

  John turned into Lyndale Street. There were a few parks around the area that usually attracted kids on a Friday night. Drunk and stupid, and likely to get themselves into all sorts of shit.