Sweetest Sin: A Forbidden Priest Romance (23 page)

“I thought I
frightened you away,” he said.

“I don’t think
that’s possible.”

He hummed, low.
“We’ll see, won’t we, my angel?”

It pained me to
hear the defeat in his voice. He carried a burden of sorrow, so secret inside
him. I wished he’d explain it, but that aspect of his life was truly forbidden.
It existed in his obsession with me—fierce and intense. Why did he punish
himself so much?

“You know you
didn’t hurt me, right?” I said. “Just the opposite.”

“Not all wounds
are physical.”

He released me,
and I couldn’t imagine what he saw with his stare. He looked at me as if I
really were an angel. He was wrong. I wasn’t even that good of a person.

But he told me I’d
be his salvation.

What was I saving
him from?

“Thank you,” he
said.

“For what?”

He averted his
eyes, studying the crucifix on his wall. “That night…you helped me to indulge
in something dark and dangerous. It was a terrible desire, and I let myself
fall. I explored a part of me I usually suppressed because I knew you wouldn’t
run away when I revealed it.” He sucked in a breath. “But you should have run,
Honor.”

Never. “It wasn’t
frightening, Father. Yes, it was very wrong, but it connected us—”

“It corrupted
you.”

“You didn’t.”

“I dominated you.”

“Yes,” I said.
“And I surrendered to you.”

He didn’t listen.
“I used you. I lost myself that night. When I thought I controlled my lust, I
suffered from pride. You tried to warn me, but I thought I could contain it.
Then…I faltered.”

“We both did.”

“I think I meant
to do it,” he admitted. “I sinned because I wanted to destroy myself.” His gaze
fell over me, just as stoic and strong as ever. “I won’t have you defend me or
any of the pain I caused you.”

“I’m not in pain,
Father,” I said. “Not physically. Not emotionally. I don’t know what to do
about my spirit, but that’s my sin to bear, not yours.”

“I was supposed to
protect you.”

“Stop—”

“The thoughts I
had of you…the things I wanted to do.” His smile turned cold. “I pinned you
beneath me and plunged into you, and if my body hadn’t betrayed me in
exhaustion, I’d still be rutting you. You wouldn’t have left that altar. I’d
have taken my fill of your innocence and left you…
broken
.”

“You can’t break
me.”

He snorted. “I
sacrificed your virtue.”

“I gave it
willingly.”

“I desecrated your
body.”

“We took our
pleasure
,
Father.”

“I
fucked
you like a whore!”

I flinched, but he
wouldn’t win this fight.

“That night meant
more to me than you realize,” I said. “Not all sin is born of hatred or because
we turned on the Lord. Sometimes we think we’re unforgiveable, but we’re forced
to look past the shame to see
why
we led ourselves into darkness.
You
taught me that, Father. You’ve preached that one simple truth. Look deeper.
Confess the
cause
, not just the sin.”

“I told you my
reasons,” he said.

“And they’re wrong.
We sinned together, but not because we wanted to fall from grace. We were
together because we’re looking for something beautiful.”

 “It wasn’t
beautiful, Honor. I see that now.”

He turned from me,
frustrated. His desk cleared of clutter, and that was good. The tension
straining his arms might have cast anything within arm’s reach to the floor.

He grunted. “What
I did to you was horrific. I made you kneel. I made you take me in your mouth.
I had you beneath me because, in my mind, that’s where you belonged. On your
knees. On your back. You were the object of my pleasure, and I meant to take
you that night in every way that would have satisfied
me
.”

“Good thing I
liked it then.”

“It wasn’t my
intent.”

He lied, and he
knew it. That was why he fell into silence. It must have been. He didn’t know
what he believed anymore, about his faith or about himself. It was the first
time I saw him truly frustrated.

Or was he
frightened?

“That night wasn’t
about desecrating my church,” he said. “I wanted to control you. That’s what
sex is. Not the pleasure we feel but the power we
take
from another’s
body. I took you because it made me feel
powerful
. Now do you
understand?”

The implication
hurt. “Was that all you think it was? Just a way for you to be cruel to me?”

“That’s the
world
,
Honor. I would have protected you from it…if I hadn’t proven how vile I could
be.”

“Stop it.” I met
his gaze, but I didn’t recognize the man behind the self-inflicted darkness.
“Father.
Rafe
. Don’t you understand what you’re saying? You didn’t hurt
me. You didn’t hurt yourself. Nothing is unforgivable. You preach that. You
taught
me that—”

“You don’t know
the thoughts in my mind.”

“And you don’t
know what I feel in my heart. What does yours say, Father? What do you feel in
your soul?”

“I’ve lost my soul.
I’ve destroyed myself. I’ve destroyed everything I loved. My faith. My
willpower. My
honor
. And what remains is a demon of a man who wants
nothing more than to violate you again, prove my power with every groan of my
name upon your lips.”

I wished he had
told me the night meant nothing to him. That I was an excuse for a man to
explore his sexuality and
get off,
easy and quick.

But Father Rafael had
done all he could to make that night something dark and beautiful. The candles.
The altar. The oils. The gifted rosaries. He meant to explore that wicked sin
with me.

And I had felt
something then.
Him
. The real Raphael. A man, gentle and loving and
hurting
.
Hurting so much. Hiding that pain and struggling every day with the reality of
the burdens he carried. Something happened to him that perverted his view of
sex and desire. Something that prevented him from understanding why I offered
my body and soul.

I would have
helped him. I would have healed him.

But he didn’t want
that redemption.

He didn’t even
try
.

“You aren’t a
monster, Father,” I whispered. “You’re broken. Let me in, and I’ll help you.”

He shook his head.
“I wouldn’t ask for your help or forgiveness.”

“Ever?”

“No.”

But I would have
given it if he would have let me care for him.

I turned without a
word. I never thought anything would hurt more than the fear of losing my soul.

This was worse.

I lost him. And I
couldn’t save us both.

I couldn’t save us
at all.

Father Raphael
didn’t try to stop me as I left his office, and he didn’t emerge during the
festival preparations. Hours passed in useless discussion about foods, vendors,
and setting the stage for the choirs, but I didn’t remember a word that was
spoken. After night fell, and after a quick choir practice with Alyssa and
Samantha that I requested just so I didn’t have to return home, I finally left.

I drove slowly and
cleared Mom’s recent call from my phone. I’d have to face her tonight. She
deserved an explanation. I had no idea how to begin or if it was worth opening
old wounds, but sitting outside the apartment wouldn’t help. The prayer didn’t
work either, but I gripped Father Raphael’s rosaries anyway.

My key stuck in
the apartment door, and I groaned. I jiggled the handle. It didn’t move. I
knocked. Twice. Three times. Mom didn’t answer. I knew she went to bed early
these days, but it wasn’t even ten.

I pounded louder.
Nothing. I gritted my teeth, slamming a hand against the key lodged in the
knob. The door finally yielded. The lights were out, and I groped my way
inside.

“Mom?” My voice
echoed, even in the small space. “I’m back.”

She didn’t answer.
Probably asleep. I turned the corner and tripped over her slipper.

My mother lay
collapsed upon the hallway floor.

Benjamin died at
seven-thirty in the evening.

I made it to the
hospice at seven forty-five.

His skin wasn’t
even cold when I’d kissed his forehead. The nurses said it happened quickly.
That was a lie. The cancer had been eating through him for the past six months.

Now he was gone.
Welcomed into Heaven and into the loving embrace of our Lord.

I had come to
confess to Benjamin, but I arrived too late to say goodbye.

And my sins would
die with him.

No other man would
understand what I had done. No one would see through the sins and recognize the
pain beneath. Only Benjamin would know I hadn’t acted in defiance. I fell
because I had no other way to rationalize the darkness inside me.

A darkness that
split, cracked, and faded in the light of Honor’s touch.

She’d kissed me,
and I’d felt whole.

She’d touched me,
and I’d felt healed.

She’d offered
herself to me, and I’d felt…

Something more
damning to a priest than just the temptation of lust. Something that would ruin
us both. I could confess away the filth of sex, but what stirred deep in me
wasn’t so easily cleansed.

My first, only,
and primary concern had to be to the church. To Christ. To my parish.

Anything more, even
something as pure and natural as the wrong feeling for the right woman, was a
greater betrayal to my collar than what happened on that altar.

Even Benjamin
would have warned against those feelings.

I stayed with him
for a while, but without his voice, without his guidance, it only pained me. I’d
lost my mentor. My spiritual and surrogate father.

The only man I’d
trusted with the truth of my past.

I left the hospice
and let the nurses and funeral directors handle him. The diocese would arrange
the funeral Mass. At least I’d be there. I couldn’t let him go without offering
my own final prayer. Benjamin deserved that.

He’d tried so hard
to help me.

It wasn’t his
failure. It was mine.

I returned home to
sit in the dark and quiet. I’d cleaned the house, but I still smelled candied
apples. Still saw her outline in my sheets. Imagined her in my kitchen. The
forbidden fruit that conquered me wasn’t plucked from a tree, it had been baked
in the oven. And before I tossed the chocolate cake away, I had a piece.

It was the best
cake I’d ever had.

And in another
world, another time, another life, I might have been able to enjoy it. That
slice. More slices. Maybe we always would have had cake after dinner.

I had whiskey to
drink, but the glass stayed half full as the ice melted. My phone rang after a
few hours, close to midnight.

The damn phone
tree. I imagined they heard the news. Except the phone number wasn’t Judy
heralding a charge.

It was the
hospital.

I answered with a
rasped greeting. The nurse chattered quickly, the usual for a page to someone
in dangerous need.

“Father Raphael,
we had an admission tonight from your parish.”

Not good news, but
it rarely was. “Do you need me?”

“She’s stabilized
now, but it might be good of you to come and give a bit of comfort. Her
daughter is here now.”

“Who?”

“I’m sorry,
Father. I’m only relaying the message. The patient was admitted by ambulance.
Drug overdose.”

My blood drained,
cold and useless.

Drug overdose
?

Honor’s mother.
Donna.

I swore, grabbing
my car keys. “I’ll be right there.”

I sped to the
hospital. Fortunately, it was late, traffic was light, and the police were without
their radar detectors. But nothing would have kept me from reaching Honor.

My poor angel.
She’d confessed more than just her reservations about her mother. She’d
whispered her fears without words. Relapses. Debts. Sicknesses. The loss of her
father. Everything wound within her mother’s former addiction, and even a woman
as bright and good as Honor couldn’t see past the darkness to forgive what had
happened.

I rushed into the
hospital, and the staff directed me to the ICU’s waiting room. They didn’t know
Donna’s condition, but they didn’t call me into her room. That was good news.
At least I could deliver that to Honor.

I found her
sitting alone on a bench in the back of the waiting room, her purse at her
left, an uneaten candy bar to her right, and a bottle of Coke at her feet. She
hugged her legs to her chest and rested her head on her knees. Tiny. Waiting.

Not broken yet.

But close.

“Honor.”

She looked up, her
eyes widening as she saw me. Shock stiffened her movements, but she shed her
fears and scrambled from the chair.

I took her in my
arms, clutching her close as her fists twisted in my cassock.

Her words muffled
in my shoulder. “If you’re here—is she…?”

“It’s okay,” I
murmured. “I was called because it was a member of my parish, not…”

I needed to
educate the congregation on when it was appropriate to anoint the sick, but now
wasn’t the time. I stroked her hair, held her close, and let her lean against
me as her nightmares came to life.

“She was on the
floor,” Honor whispered. “I walked in. I don’t know how long she had been
there. I didn’t answer the phone when she called.”

“It’s okay. It’s
not your fault.”

“She needed me.”

“And you got her
help.”

A page rang over
the hospital. Honor still held me, burrowing her face against my chest. Her
hair bundled over her shoulders, and my rosaries still hung over her neck. She
was warm but trembling. Tense but soft. She fit so perfectly against my body,
it was like she was created specifically to nestle within my arms.

She tensed,
speaking so softly I didn’t know if was her voice or my conscience.

“Are you allowed
to hold me like this?”

I clenched my jaw.
“It doesn’t matter. I’m not letting you go.”

In more ways than
one.

Nothing was wrong
with holding her like this unless it meant more to me than a moment of comfort.
Maybe that’s what I did. Maybe I rubbed her back to ease the strain in her
shoulders. Maybe I leaned down to shelter her from the harsh lights and
screeching pages. Maybe I hated to see a member of my congregation in pain.

Or maybe I held
her because Honor’s fear and sorrow struck through me like a spear to my side.

Maybe I held her
because I’d do anything to spare her this pain.

Just as I’d do
anything to see her happy.

Smiling.

Laughing.

I had taken her.
Kissed her. Lost myself inside her. But I had nothing to make her
happy
.
That urge endangered us both.

Another page. A
nurse hurried down the hall.

Honor pulled away.

At least she had
the strength to do it.

“Sit,” I said. It
came out as an order, another command. I gentled my voice. “Is there anything I
can get for you? Are you hungry?”

“I can’t eat.”

She curled her
legs back under her. Shivering.

For any other
woman, any other parishioner, I wouldn’t have compromised myself. For Honor, my
lost and frightened angel, I’d have sacrificed anything. I wrapped an arm over
her shoulders and let her rest her head against my shoulder.

And the touch
damned my heart.

“What happened?” I
asked.

She shook her
head. Not yet then. I understood. I had waited with enough anxious families
during these types of problems.

I loved the church
and my role within in it, but I could do only so much. In the moments after
quiet prayer, I was just the same as anyone else waiting for the mercy of the Lord.

After ten minutes—and
eight hundred and fifteen pounding beats of my heart—she finally spoke. Softly.
Pained.

“The women at the
church saw her taking something the other day.”

No one had come to
me with that information. “Did they say what it was?”

“A pill.”

My heart ached.
Honor shifted. She nestled closer to me. I allowed her to rest, and she heaved
a reluctant breath.

“I was at choir
practice when they told me. The night…”

“In the Mary
garden.”

“Yeah.”

I gritted my teeth.
That was the night I let the darkness corrupt me. Maybe if I had fought my
desire, I might have seen a woman in pain. One who needed me, her priest and
her…

Nothing else. Just
a priest.

“I should have
been at home more.” Honor sighed. “I just couldn’t be there with her.
Everything’s changed. I lost my home. I left college. I came back to this, and
she was so…different.”

“I understand.”

“We fought this
morning. She pulled almost two hundred dollars in cash from the bank account,
money we can’t afford to be without.”

I recognized those
signs. She didn’t need to say anything else. I rubbed her shoulder, and her
shudder tore through me.

“I came back
tonight, and I was upset. I was mad at her. I was mad at myself.” Her voice
lowered. “I was mad at you, Father.”

That I also
understood.

“She was passed
out on the floor. I couldn’t wake her up. It was just like the times when I was
a kid. I’d find her sick. Unresponsive.” She swallowed. “So selfish.”

She twisted from
me, her eyes wide.

“I’m sorry,
Father. I didn’t mean to say it. Not while she’s sick.”

“It’s okay.” I
cupped her cheek. “This was a fear of yours.”

“Can…
doubt
make things happen?”

She asked so
sincerely, so desperately, I didn’t know how to respond. “Doubt?”

“I never believed
that she’d stay clean. I always thought this would happen again. I didn’t
believe in her, and now I’m just thinking…what if it was a self-fulfilling
prophecy?”

“It’s not your
fault.”

“What if it is?”

“We want to feel
powerful,” I said. “We look for reason and meaning in all things, but you know
as well as I do, we have no control over others.”

If only I had
learned that weeks ago.

Honor shrugged.
“It’s God’s will?”

“I was talking
about our own influence. How much we can guide and help another person. We want
to protect them. We want to live up to their expectations, and them ours.” I
brushed her soft cheek. “Sometimes it can feel like the greatest success or the
worst failure, but every person is their own. We can’t control them, but, the
lucky ones get to stay with them, support them, love them in whatever decision
they make.”

She stared at me,
shaking her head. “You’re such a mystery, Father Rafe.”

“I don’t try to
be.”

“You have a good
soul.”

“I doubt that.”

“I don’t. I can
feel it.” She touched my hand. “And I’m grateful for it.”

That innocent
touch would heal a thousand wounds to my heart and still cause the final slice
that would end it all.

Footsteps shuffled
into the waiting room. Honor stood, facing the pot-bellied doctor carrying his
stethoscope, lab coat, and cup of coffee.

“Miss Thomas?” He
asked. “I’m Doctor Bartlett. Let’s take a seat.”

I whispered to her,
leaning close. “I’ll wait just down the hall. Come get me when you need.”

“No.” She spoke
quickly. “Please. Can you stay?”

It wasn’t the
first time a family asked me to stay while the doctor delivered news—good or
bad. Whether it was an ill parent, a spouse in a car accident, a child in
surgery, or the widowed wife of a soldier delivering their child alone, I had
often stayed to help.

So why did I feel
relieved
to know Honor wanted me to stay? She wanted me to help her.

To be with her.

Doctor Bartlett
exhaled as he sat at the nearby table, rubbing his hip as Honor clamored to her
seat. He sipped his coffee as if it were his first break all evening.

“Well, your mother
is a very lucky woman,” he said.

Honor didn’t
believe him, and she wasted no time. “Was it Oxy or something else? I always
knew she’d find a knock-off or something more dangerous.”

“Oxy?” Doctor
Bartlett tapped the chart in his hand. “I know your mother has an extensive
history of substance abuse, but it wasn’t painkillers tonight.”

Honor sat back.
“Oh God. Please, tell me it wasn’t heroin.”