by Skyla Madi
I squeeze her thigh, snapping her out of her stupor. “Do you want to go in?”
“I’ve already tried. It’s closing soon,” she sighs, disappointed. “The security guard won’t let anyone else in.”
I frown. “There are people in there though, right?”
“Yeah.”
“What if we go in through the back and come out with the crowd? They’d never know.”
“In through the back?” Cassia looks at me like I’m crazy. “You’re not serious?”
“No one will know.” I push myself to my feet and walk toward the dark alley that lines the church. “Wait here in the light and don’t go anywhere. I’ll be right back.”
*Cassia*
I stare at the alley, hoping to see Caleb reemerge any second now. Occasionally, the burly guard strolls down the top stairs and onto the landing. He paces back and forth, turning away a rare straggling tourist every now and again, then waltzes back inside the church, closing the door behind him. On occasion, churchgoers and tourists trickle out from inside the beautiful, picturesque house of worship, smiling widely as they squeeze their thick winter coats tightly around them. I can always come back after work tomorrow to see the inside…
“You ready?”
I startle as Caleb swallows the last foot of distance between us. He’s smiling, his eyes dancing with excitement. “Where did you go?”
“I found us an entrance.”
I arch a brow. “Really?”
He extends a bare hand to me, and I shiver. His fingers must be freezing. Out of fear of him catching frostbite, I take his hand in mine and he pulls me to my feet. As quickly as he can, he escorts me down the alley and into complete darkness. The church is flanked by two flashy skyscrapers, but neither of them have their lights on below halfway. I’m thankful for that right now. Clenching his fingers, I tuck our hands inside my coat to warm his skin, and he brushes his thumb over the back of my hand in thanks.
The cathedral is so big, it takes us forever to reach halfway. When we do, Caleb frees his hand from mine and points at a small-ish window at the very bottom. On the floor beside it is a pile of broken glass.
“What did you do?” I gasp. “You broke the window?”
He crouches. “Well, yeah.”
Fear bubbles in my veins, and I glance over each shoulder, but I can’t see far. “What if someone heard you?”
“They didn’t.” He digs into his pocket and pulls out a wad of thick…plastic? “I used duct tape I bought from the 7-Eleven to keep the glass from falling in and smashing on the floor.”
I gape at him as he puts his legs inside the window and shimmies in, using his arms to lower himself down. “Caleb…”
“What? I’ll call the church tomorrow and tell them my son broke the window playing with his soccer ball in the alley. I’ll even offer to pay to fix it.” Darkness inside swallows him up, and unease runs rampant through my system. “Get in here, Cassia. It’s fucking freezing out there.”
I bend low and try to peer in. “I can’t see anything.”
“Your eyes will adjust.” He muffles a cough. “It’s a storage room of some kind. All junk, mostly. Here.” Caleb places his jacket along the edge of the window. “Just in case there’s glass left over. Your leggings aren’t as thick as real pants.”
I roll my eyes. “These are winter leggings. They’re thick.”
“Bet I could still rip them apart with my teeth. C’mon. Climb down.”
I glance over my shoulders a few more times. I bite my lip. “I don’t think I can…”
“Quick,” Caleb urges. “Before the homeless people come back.”
Homeless people? I crouch by the window and stick my legs in. Caleb takes my calves, then my thighs. I grab the bar on the top of the window and lower myself down as Caleb moves his grip to my hips and takes all my weight. Eventually, I’m all the way in, and Caleb eases me against the wall, his mouth an inch from mine, his grip still tight.
The room is stuffy, the air warm and thick with dust. I laugh nervously, and it’s louder than I anticipated. Cursing, Caleb presses a finger to my lips and shushes me.
“We just broke into a church,” I whisper into the darkness.
“Yeah, we did.”
“Why?”
He touches my top lip, then the bottom before I feel him reaching up to take his jacket down from the window. “Because you wanted to see inside and the guard wouldn’t let you in.”
“That excuse won’t hold up in court since this place is open seven days a week,” I point out. “I can’t go to prison, Caleb.”
“You think you’d have a bad time?” He steps back and takes my hand. “I have blond hair, soft lips, and a virgin asshole. Prison would be a nightmare for me.”
I smack at him and he snickers before escorting me across the cluttered room at a snail’s pace. My eyes adjust shortly after, and I peer at the broken pews, dusty street banners, and rusted organs surrounding us. Unease trickles through me, and I shuffle closer to Caleb, my nose almost grazing his back.
“Wait,” I harshly whisper, digging my heels in. “What if the homeless people see the broken window?”
He snorts and pushes forward toward the huge double doors. “There are no homeless people.”
I lift my eyebrows. “Really?”
He laughs. “What? I knew you’d chicken out, so I had to light a fire under your ass.”
“Wow.” I try to take my hand back, but he doesn’t allow it.
“It got you in, didn’t it?”
“If we get caught, I’m telling the police you kidnapped m—oh my God, Caleb!”
“What?” He whips around, panicked, and grabs at me, touching my face, shoulder, then my waist “What? What is it?”
I touch my hands to my cheeks. “What if they get our fingerprints?”
Silence falls, but I swear I can almost hear him blinking at me like I’m an idiot.
“Seriously?” He throws his hands up. “I thought you were in trouble.”
“I will be if we get caught,” I shoot back, and he catches my lips between his fingers, pinching them together.
“If you close your mouth, we won’t get caught.” Releasing my lips, he takes my hand again and guides me to the door. This time he sets a faster, more impatient pace. “It’s the window of a church, Cassia, not a bank. They’re not going to dust for fingerprints, so you can relax.”
When we reach the door, Caleb turns the squeaky, round doorknob and peers into the hall. I hold my breath, expecting to get rushed by a priest, a pastor, and the New York City S.W.A.T. team. Nothing happens. Caleb glances over his shoulder at me and opens the door wider. The creak of the old hinges screams through the room, and I squint at the light that pours in.
“We’re good.” He takes me by the elbow and pulls me out of the room, closing the door behind us with a gentle click. “Only the main altar will be accessible right now. Let’s go there.”
He tries to tug me to the right, but my feet are cemented to the floor.
“It’s so beautiful,” I gasp, raking my wide stare over the most enormous, most immaculate painting I’ve ever seen on the wall in front of me.
It depicts a graphic story of stoic angels and their battles with the demons of hell. I marvel over every brush stroke, fawn over every shadow and highlight. Tingles wash over me and tears well in my eyes as my mother’s face is brought to the forefront of my mind. She’s always had an affinity for religious paintings and stained-glass windows. My heart stutters in its beat. I miss her so damn much, more than I’ve wanted to acknowledge since leaving Paradise Valley.
“Posuerunt Angelos et Daemones.” Caleb clears his throat. “That’s what it’s called. It’s an incredible piece of art.”
I look at him. His attention is cast down the hall somewhere, his shoulders are square, and his hands are clenched at his sides. I’m not an expert when it comes to body language, but his is definitely screaming that he doesn’t want to look at the painting. To ease hi
s apparent discomfort, I turn from the painting and walk beside him.
“You really do know a lot about this place, huh?”
He nods. “It’s my mother’s favorite building, save for the Vatican.” His slender nose twitches. “Was. It was her favorite.”
Sadness tinged with regret punches me into my gut, and I cringe. Why did I have to sit outside this church? I passed three smaller ones on the way here tonight, but no. I had to go to the big one, his mother’s favorite, of all places.
“And…” I shouldn’t even ask. “And the painting? Is it of significance?”
“Last time I saw it was on the underside of her casket lid before her burial. She loved it so much it made sense to bury her with it.”
My heart squeezes in my chest. I can’t bear to listen to him talk about his mother. When he does, I imagine him young and alone, not understanding what was happening, or why, and worst of all, blaming himself for it. I don’t try to stop a tear as it drips onto my cheek. I don’t think enough will ever be shed for little Caleb and the pain and trauma he went through. Sniffling, I take Caleb’s cold, long-fingered hand in mine and lift it to kiss his knuckles.
“How is your sister?” I ask as we walk the colossal hall.
I chance a peek at him, and his lips quirk. “Penelope’s good. She’s…I’m glad to have her back.”
“What’s she like?”
“Amazing, actually. Intelligent, funny, and—if you can believe it—prettier than me.” He smiles as I laugh and brushes his thumb over my hand. Immediately, I notice a happy lift in his shoulders. “She’s sassy too, and a lot more sarcastic than I was expecting her to be.”
“She’s your sister. It’d be weird if she wasn’t.”
“Different fathers, though.”
I frown. “What do you mean?”
Exhaling, his vibrant smile fades. “My mother had an affair with some jacked-up biker while on a business trip in New Orleans. That’s who took Penelope, her father.”
I stare at him, waiting for him to tell me he’s kidding. He doesn’t. “Are you serious?”
He nods. “I guess the fear of my father, me, and the community finding out what she did was too much for her, so she took her own life instead of facing the music.” He licks his lower lip. “I never say suicide is the easy way out, but with her…it kinda feels like it, you know?”
My body hurts, it aches for him, and I’m riddled with guilt. I hate I wasn’t there for him during the most devastating moment of his adult life. When he showed up in New York, I was so hellbent on keeping him at arm’s length, like an enemy, I forgot to ask him how he was holding up, like a friend would. I don’t know if we’ve ever been friends, but I’m the only one that knows him through and through.
I swallow the lump in my throat. “I’m so sorry. It must’ve been really hard for you to find that out about your mom…”
He shrugs his broad shoulders. “I focused on the positives. I was glad to have Penelope back happy and unharmed. I hate her biological father for ruining my life, but he gave her a good one, you know? I can’t hate him for that.”
I nod. “How’s your dad handling it?”
Caleb’s brow furrows. “He’s been…off since Penelope showed up. She says it’s a lot better, but things are still tense between them.”
“He’s not happy she’s back?”
“Unbelievably happy, but at the same time, he’s still grieving a lost daughter.”
I purse my lips. I can’t imagine myself in Father Andrews’ shoes. Losing a daughter, and mourning that daughter, only for her to show up on your doorstep years later and announce she was never yours to begin with? Devastating.
“How did he take the news about your mother’s affair?”
Caleb ponders my question with a tight jaw, then speaks. “He’s ignoring it. He spends more time at church than at home these days.”
He clears his throat and forces a smile, but the pain remains in his eyes. I drop my gaze to the floor. Father Andrews isn’t coping, and I’ve lured his son away to New York when he needs him the most…
“Anyway,” Caleb announces, drawing my stare to his handsome face. “We’re here for you. Look around, take it in, and pray to God there aren’t any surveillance cameras.”
My eyes go wide. “What?”
*Caleb*
At the main altar, after Cassia finishes gushing about the architecture and the stained-glass windows and manages to rein in her tsunami of tears, we light a candle and bow our heads in prayer. I don’t know what she prays for, but I use the time to cover my own ass because as she sits beside me, smelling so damn good, her thigh against mine, my thoughts are far from pure.
Cassia’s prayer goes forever, and I sit silently beside her, eyeing the security guard who enters and exits the main hall every few minutes, looking at us impatiently. There’s still a large handful of people here, but they trickle out every now and then, one or two people at a time.
“I liked it better when we were alone,” Cassia utters, apparently finished, and places her hand on my thigh.
I glance down at it, then at her face. Her pretty irises dance. Her intent is clear to me and, hell, I’ve already pre-warned the man upstairs. I snatch her hand, pull her to her feet, and escort her back the way we came, careful to time it perfectly with the security guard’s exit.
I'm all over her by the time we reach a different altar, kissing her so hard and constant, my lungs burn with lack of oxygen, but I put everything I have into the kiss.
My frustration with going to Paradise Valley without her.
My hatred for Nick.
My need for Cassia.
My love for her.
And the heaviness in my heart from being in my mother’s most beloved place.
It’s almost morbid, what I plan on doing right here, only twenty feet from the painting my father had painted on the lid of her casket.
Cassia breaks the kiss with a loud gasp. “Maybe we shouldn’t.”
She rakes her fingers through my hair, pulling my face closer.
“We’re here now.”
I kiss her hard against the door, and she reaches behind her for the handle, fumbling before she finds it. Like the other door, the old hinges scream as it opens, and Cassia startles against me, cursing into my mouth. I rush her into the room, kicking the door closed with a slam behind me.
“Caleb!” she hisses. “The guard would’ve heard that.”
Probably. I nod, but I’m too aroused, my blood too hot for me to care. I press my mouth to hers again. And again.
And again.
Until we’ve haphazardly made our way down the dark, wide aisle. We circle the bronze altar and I sit her ass against the table, placing her back to the door so no one can see her beautiful body in the off chance we get caught. I slip between her thighs and, sighing, Cassia pulls away from the kiss. I open my eyes.
“Wait,” she speaks on exhale, taking deep breaths. “What’d you pray for?”
I blink at her. She wants to know now? When we could get caught at any second? My eyes adjust as lights from the surrounding skyscrapers flick on, their glow illuminating the large, stained glass windows behind her head.
“Forgiveness,” I tell her, shrugging out of my jacket.
I drop it to the floor.
“Forgiveness?” she asks, her breath hitching as I grab her hips and pull them against mine. “What do you need to be forgiven for?”
“This.” I kiss her deeply, and our tongues intertwine.
Cassia moans into my mouth and arches her back, pressing her firm breasts against my chest. I grab at her dress and tug the fabric up to sit on her hips, then I curl my fingers around the hem of her leggings and underwear and shove them down her legs. My body vibrates against hers, like it always has, and I place my palm on the stone altar behind her back, slipping the other between her legs. Cassia opens her thighs a little wider for me, allowing me to slip effortlessly into her wetness. And damn, is she wet. I drag her slick ar
ousal from her opening to her clit and gently circle it, making her shiver. I kiss my way from her mouth, along her jaw, to the pulse in her neck and bite down on it.
“Ah,” she hisses, snatching my wrist in her tiny hand. “This is wrong. We have to stop.”
I pause for a beat, analyzing her body language, wondering if I missed something. She holds my wrist tighter and rubs her pussy against my fingers. What she’s doing doesn’t match her words at all.
Mixed.
Fucking.
Signals.
I release a low growl in my chest. “We’re not stopping. Not until you come.”
Cassia grabs at my belt with needy hands, then my button, and lastly, the fly of my jeans. She pants in my ear as I continue to taste her neck and rub the fuck out of her clit, until she’s grinding her hips violently, and she’s grabbed my cock out, jerking it with so much enthusiasm it’s enough to make me want to come. Without warning, Cassia pulls her pussy away, crouches low, and wraps her lips around my length.
“Shit.” I hunch forward, bracing myself against the altar, both my hands flat on the surface. “Fuck, yes.”
I quiver, letting my head fall forward so I can watch her suck me in the dim light. As she gently mouths my tip, she smooths her hands over my scarred thighs, touching them, showing them love too. Then she wraps her delicate fingers around my cock and opens her mouth to run her tongue from the base to the tip. I moan and flex my hips, and she watches my face, never taking her eyes from mine as she does it over and over. Until I can’t stand not being buried deep inside her. I snatch her wrist and she sucks in a sharp breath as I yank her to her feet. Hooking her leg around my hip, she grabs my cock and lines it up to her sweet, tight entrance.
So. Damn. Close.
“Put me in,” I groan, thrusting forward, but she keeps me out with a wicked grin and moves the head of my length to her clit. Building herself up, she makes a mess all over me. Soaking her hand, my cock, my damn pants. I can’t take anymore! Shuddering, she rubs it against herself and gasps in my face. Her warm breath skitters along my skin, mesmerizing me as she uses me to get herself off.