Defeated my temptation.
Overcame my desire.
And the pride surged through me as my own release.
But Honor tumbled to the floor. Quivering. Weeping.
She gripped the hem of my cassock and shuddered.
“Please. Please. Please.” Her words rasped into broken begging. “Father…I can’t…it’s too much. Please.”
“My angel—”
“Just once.” Her voice hardened. “If you don’t, I will.”
Three times I had denied her. Was I cruel enough for a fourth?
Why did the sight of a naked woman, stricken with lust, so please me? It was as if I knew she would fail this test. Somehow, in my own wicked sin, I’d planned to wrench this submission from her.
And that was my sin. Not lust. Not adultery.
I hardened because she submitted to me. I made her submit to me. I drove her into sin, and I used her weakness to strengthen my own resolve.
It wasn’t fair to leave the poor creature in pain.
I pulled her to her feet, pinned between the counter and my body. Her nudity pressed against the black robes, the eternal and ever vigilant armor I wore to protect me from moments like these, temptations like her.
She cried in relief as my fingers snaked back to her slit. I touched her again.
Her wetness guided me, and I used a single finger to tease before finally sinking into her heated core.
Honor immediately clenched around me.
Nothing prepared me for that singular bliss. Her tightness yielded to my finger and brought such pleasure from her breathless form. She arched into me, crying out as my thumb struck her swollen, desperate nub. There was a temptation, the way it so secretly and lovingly tucked within her folds. It was a lure, a bait. My lips had captured it, and she rewarded me with a sweet cream.
If only I had tasted more—where my finger now buried.
If only I might have come with her.
“Once, Honor,” I ordered. “Just once. And then you will repent for it.”
Honor came in sobbing relief. She gripped my body, my cassock, anything and everything which grounded her to earth and not the heavens above or the hells below.
Her core clenched my finger, pulsing with sensual, painful contractions of her body as the sin imprisoned her within desire.
Or maybe it wasn’t sin.
Honor surrendered to something beautiful. The gratitude she uttered, her shudders, and the sobbing pleasure didn’t create anything dark and unholy.
She came, and the curves of her skin bathed in a rich heat. Her silken delight pulsed and wetted as a halo of comfort cradled her.
Beautiful.
Was that how it would feel?
Heaven on earth? A quiet peace between two people?
Or was it a dark shame of submission, aggression, and conquering?
I didn’t trust her to stand on her own. I set her upon the counter once more, covering her shivering body with the dress I so carelessly tossed away. She swallowed, her eyes glassy and relaxed.
“Forgive me, Father.” She tugged the hem low. “I…”
“This is why you were sent to me.” I didn’t let her speak, wouldn’t let her feel ashamed of that most wondrous and amazing moment that transformed her before me. “I am meant to care for you, Honor. I will teach you to control this desire…and you will help to defeat mine.”
“How?”
I had no idea. I could think no farther, no deeper, than my own lust. My cock strained, envious of my hand for bringing her to that angelic peak.
“We pray,” I whispered. “So that we go no further than this.”
“And if we can’t resist?”
“Then I will resist for us, my angel.”
Because I could. Because I had no choice.
Because our souls depended on me.
And that responsibility, that pride, hardened me as much as my name whispered upon her lips.
Chapter Eleven – Honor
The confessional was both a loathsome and amazing place.
Most people misunderstood its purpose—here was where we confessed our sins to a priest, a man afforded the same blessings as Christ offered his disciples. With his help and guidance, we were forgiven and our souls cleansed.
But I still never liked it. Not when I was a child confessing to simple annoyances, and not when I became a woman and first admitted my desires for an untouchable man.
What should have been a cherished moment of spirituality was tarnished with the mortal complication of shame.
But I understood why Father Raphael wanted to meet in the safety of the confessional. It was a good place to talk. Private.
Father Raphael had extended the reconciliation hours, but no one came to take advantage of the sacrament. I waited in the vestibule until I was certain we’d be alone. This was not a conversation others needed to hear.
I nudged the sanctuary door closed as I passed. It clattered shut; the hinges squealing as the lumbering door groaned against the frame.