Chapter 54

“Tell me what part of you loves Liam and what part does not, even knowing all of this.”

“All of me loves him,” Frank uttered, still completely stunned. “All of me, damn it! To the depths of my soul.”

“Having seen it with my own eyes, I know it is allof him that loves you as well, beyond what I tried to create. He loves youto the depths of his soul, Franklin. And that is something no surgeon can create. No one can transplant a soul, certainly not I. That is the work of God. It is something the living have only. I asked you, as Liam lay in that bed, why you looked away. I said it then, that he had a soul, but I was wrong. It was not there yet, dear Franklin. He was a shell, until he had life, real life, and then his soul appeared. You know the difference. Think, son, you’ve seen it. You’ve felt it. When you put yourself upon him nearly naked, did you feel his soul? I venture to guess you did not. Yet even with distance between you, can you not feel it now?”