Beautiful Sinner: a standalone forbidden romance

by Sara Cate

  He may look like a priest, but I’ve seen a different side of him. The man behind the collar. It may have been a long time since he’s been with a woman, but he’s definitely been with enough to know what he’s doing, and he may be committed to those vows, but he has some serious desires he can’t deny.

  I grip the edge of my dress and squeeze it tightly over my thighs. I admire how handsome he is up there. The lights above catch the blond in his waves and bring out the golden tint to his skin. I would have never stopped and had a second look at Callum if he were in Pineridge and we were just two regular people. But now, he’s all I can think about. I crave the comfort I feel when I’m around him. The familiarity we’ve built. The way he makes me think, looks at me when I say something bold, treats me like I belong to him.

  Which I realize is a stupid thing to think, but I want him to do more than break those vows. I want him to break them for me. Not just for sex. I want him to break them and make new ones.

  Heat pulses in my chest as he continues speaking, and his homily goes past my ears without registering a word he’s saying. I’m distracted by the fact that I’m admitting to myself some very serious feelings.

  And it’s not just that I’m falling for Callum—I fall for men all the time. What’s throwing me off about this one is that it feels so different, so consuming, so real.

  When I look up at him again, our eyes lock. The intensity that burns between us is too powerful to be ignored.

  Suddenly, everyone in the pews stands and starts a line toward the front. For a moment, I almost bolt out of the church. I want to run away with all of these crazy feelings swirling around in my brain, but he catches me with his gaze and gestures for me to come up.

  I don’t even know what I’m getting in line for when I stand behind two young women. They are both fair and beautiful, and I almost get jealous of how long they’ve probably been coming to this service and hearing his voice.

  I watch as each person in the line steps up to Callum, kneels on the bench in front of him and opens their mouths. He places something on each of their tongues and then an altar boy next to him hands each person a small cup of red liquid.

  The girls in front of me stare up in adoration as they receive their cracker, and I start to feel incredibly nervous about it when it’s my turn.

  “Kneel,” he says in a low whisper, and my spine tingles with this command. It’s something just between us that no one else can hear because no one else knows what it is we have.

  “Open.” It’s the smallest sound out of his mouth, and I almost doubt I heard him say it. Nevertheless, my nipples harden under my dress as I do as he says, holding my mouth open like I saw the others do. I hear him exhale so subtly as he places the cracker on my tongue. My eyes stay locked on his the entire time, and only I can see his pulse quicken.

  He mutters a prayer I don’t understand and everyone can hear. I don’t want to stand from this bench. I want to stay in this spot and stare up at him, doing exactly as he orders me to do. My mind reels with the possibilities, and my body reacts.

  I stagger back to my seat and after a few more chanted prayers, the congregation stands and starts to file out of the church. They mingle around the door, and I spot Callum talking to an older couple. He’s wringing his hands in a way I’ve never seen him do before.

  His eyes lock with mine, and I hear him excuse himself from the conversation. People seem to be leaving pretty quickly, and I consider leaving too. I hope he sleeps in the house tonight and not here at the rectory.

  Suddenly he’s at my side, his hand on my elbow. He’s ushering me silently out of the main section of the church and toward the hallway where I know his office is. My heart is racing, and it almost feels like I’m in trouble, being marched off to the principal’s office.

  A moment later we’re in his office, and the door behind us is closed. Then I’m in his arms, pressed between his body and the heavy wooden door. We don’t speak before his mouth is on mine and his hands are on my hips.

  I pour every wild thought in my head into that kiss. Being in this church did things to me, brought out a clarity that is unsettling, and I send every ounce of it out of me through this physical connection between us. He presses his tongue into my mouth, invading me, and I break away long enough to take his lower lip between my teeth. It’s like we’re at war, each of using these forbidden desires as our weapons.

  Then his hands are on my thighs, lifting my dress up and squeezing my ass so tight, I can’t hold in the moan, which he quickly covers with his other hand.

  “Am I hurting you?” His bright green eyes stare into my soul.

  “Yes,” I gasp, and he almost loosens his grip as I pull his ear to my lips. “Do it harder.”

  He lets out a low growl.

  I’m not playing fair. I realize that, but I’m competing against God here, and I’ll use whatever I have to win him over. I want Callum in ways I’ve never wanted anyone before, and I’m willing to fight dirty to get him.

  “Did you like seeing me on my knees?” I whisper.

  He tenses. Then without looking me in the eye, he responds. “You fucking know I did.”

  With my back still against the door, I let my body slide down to the floor.

  “Cadence, what are you doing?” His voice is strained, and I know it’s taking a lot to hold himself back.

  “What do you think I’m doing?” I answer playfully. “I’m praying.” My hands slide to his hips. The look on his face is a mixture of torture and desire. I stare up at him like I did on the bench out in the church, and I know it’s breaking his resolve.

  Slowly, I start to move the zipper down on his pants. In a rush, he grabs my wrists. “I can’t.”

  I feel momentarily deflated until his hand finds my jaw and tilts it up to see his eyes. “I want to. God, you should know how much I want to.”

  “Just hearing you say that turns me on,” I reply, and suddenly it’s his hands on his zipper and I swallow in anticipation. When his cock springs free, my jaw drops. I was not anticipating this, but a man this size should have never been allowed to join the clergy. He’s thick and throbbing, like a dick that hasn’t seen a pair of lips in almost a decade would throb.

  He strokes it a couple times, and I lean forward to place a kiss on the pink head. He pulls away, and I’m afraid he’s about to deny me again.

  “Look at me.”

  My eyes drift up to meet his as he presses it against my lips. The moment his cock touches me, I take control, hungry to taste him. To please him.

  I take the base in my hands and run my tongue along the bottom to the top.

  “Oh fuck,” he moans as he places a hand on the door behind me, caging me in. As my tongue reaches the tip, I stare back up at him as I pull his length into my mouth.

  “No. I can’t.” As fast as it was between my lips it’s gone. He pulls away, holding himself in his fist, and I can see him squeezing so tight it looks painful. His face is resting in anguish against his arm, and my heart breaks.

  “Callum, it’s okay,” I whisper, reaching for his hand.

  “You could have been stranded at any hotel in Ireland, Cadence. Why did you land at mine? Why did He send you to me if He knew how this would end?”

  “Maybe it was providence?”

  Still on my knees, I stare up at him, no longer with lust in my eyes, but compassion. I hate this feeling that I’m torturing him. I want to fight for Callum, but I’m not willing to split him in two to do it.

  After a moment, he slowly leans his hips back toward me. “Kiss it again.”

  Eagerly, I oblige, tasting the saltiness of his arousal on my lips. When he relaxes his grip, I take over, holding him in my hand and letting him slide past my tongue.

  Every vein in his body pops as he struggles with the pleasure. After coating his dick until it’s dripping, I pick up speed, stroking my hand along with my lips. And with my eyes on his, I think about providence. How God sent me here, brought me to this church, to th
is man, and I try to find an ounce of that doubt I felt before, but it’s fading fast.

  Callum’s breathing stops, and I hear him mumble something unintelligible, ending it with a curse word that definitely takes the Lord’s name in vain.

  One of his hands holds my hair then drifts down to my cheek as I work his shaft, feeling it tighten as it races closer to climax, and I’m absolutely obsessed with this moment. I want to see him drown in this pleasure, and I want him to stare at me when he comes.

  He should know I’m the only one who can make him feel this way.

  The hand on my cheek moves to the back of my head as his face grows more pained. I want him to lose control. Fuck me like he wants to. Shove his cock down my throat, but he’s holding back.

  Just then, his body tenses, and he finally jerks forward, reaching the back of my mouth, and I let out a moan of pleasure. I feel him coating my throat, and I swallow down to see his reaction.

  I wait for his smile and a warm look of affection, but he nearly collapses against the door, looking more pained and broken than I expected. He pulls himself out of my mouth and zips up in a hurry, leaving me waiting on the floor. He passes me a tissue and quickly moves to make me stand. Then, he fixes my hair and dotes on me like he owes me something.

  “Stop it,” I mumble.

  “I don’t know what came over me.”

  Before he can turn away again, I grab his face and pull him toward me. “You didn’t do anything wrong. I know exactly what came over you, and it’s the same thing that’s come over me since I got here. We can deny it all we want and pretend we don’t know exactly where this is going, or we can accept it. It can’t be wrong. It feels too good to be wrong.”

  There’s a look of surprise on his face just before he snatches me up by the waist and pulls me against him. Then he kisses me, no longer invading my mouth, but savoring my lips softly.

  Everything about this feels wildly out of control, and I know it should scare me, but I’ve never been more excited about anything in my life.

  Twenty

  Callum

  “Are you okay?” she asks, trying to keep up with me, but I can’t slow down. My mind is racing. My heart is still trying to beat itself out of my fucking chest, and my legs are just keeping up with the pace. I’m afraid if I stop moving, I’ll realize what just happened. As if I could deny it.

  Her soft hand hooks around my arm and pulls me back. “What is wrong with you?”

  “What do you mean, what’s wrong with me?” A couple passes us on the opposite side of the street, and I wave politely before turning Cadence down a quiet alley where they can’t hear us. “You think I do stuff like that everyday? You think I’m just going to go on with my life like I didn’t just fuck up so royally I could have ruined everything I’ve worked for?”

  She scoffs. “Are the priest police coming for you? What about last night? Was that more okay? You were knuckle-deep in my—”

  I press my hand over her mouth and corner her against the brick wall. “Don’t you fucking say it.” Her eyes are round and full of surprise, but then I feel her relax in my arms, and suddenly I want to relax too. Touching her body has that effect on me.

  It softens my resolve. It hardens other things.

  My fingers are over her lips, and I try to memorize the way they feel. They were just wrapped around my cock like it was the most normal thing in the world. It definitely was not. It shattered the earth under my feet.

  Quickly, I let her go. I have no clue where things could go, so I need to be more careful. “Don’t you do that again, you hear me?”

  Her eyes widen again, and just as I turn back to resume walking home, she grabs my arm again. “You think this is my fault?”

  “I wasn’t exactly shoving my dick in your mouth, Cadence.”

  A loud, offended gasp echoes against the narrow alleyway. I wait for her to slap me, but she doesn’t have to. Her hurt expression pains me enough.

  “I thought you liked it.”

  “Of course I fucking liked it, Cadence, but is that what you want from me? Blowjobs behind closed doors? You want to be someone’s dirty fucking secret? What happened to the girl who pushed me away last night? You knew then that this could not go anywhere. Remember that?”

  “I thought you wanted me,” she snaps back, her voice full of more charge than before. I feel myself breaking, my temper rising. Pushing her back against the wall, watching for passersby, I grasp her chin between my fingers. “Of course, I fucking want you, but how long are you going to lure in men with a blowjob and a piece of ass, huh? How long will that last? You think they’ll love you after that?”

  She shoves against me, and I spot the moisture in her eyes. “Let go of me.”

  It only makes me more desperate to get through to her, so I hold her tighter, pinning her body against the wall. If anyone saw us, we’d definitely be the talk of the town, and word travels fast around here.

  “No,” I answer, forcing her to look me in the eye. “Listen to what I’m telling you.” Still she doesn’t stop with her struggle, so I lay my body against hers, my ear just a breath away from hers. “Yes, I want you, Cadence. I want to fuck you three ways to Sunday. I could lift this pretty dress of yours and have you screaming so loud, the Pope himself would hear you.” Finally, she stops fighting me, and I hear the struggle in her breathing.

  “I want to tell you every filthy fucking thing I want to do to you, but you’re not hearing my point.”

  I pull her face away and press her nose to mine so our eyes are locked. “Fucking you is the least of what I want to do. Your body is not what makes me want to break my vows.”

  Silence grows between us, and when I pull away, her mouth is hanging open.

  Turning away, I start walking again. I have to adjust myself in my pants from the effect of being so close to her body.

  “Callum…” I don’t turn around. Eventually, I hear her footsteps as she keeps up her pace next to me.

  “I have a lot to think about, Cadence.”

  “Okay.”

  “I think it’s best we keep our hands to ourselves for now.”

  I shove my hands in my pockets and feel like a real asshole for what feels like dumping her after she just swallowed down what I unloaded in her mouth.

  “I understand.”

  There’s an awkwardness in the air after I just admitted what I admitted, and it’s true. Yes, Cadence is beautiful, but it’s not her beauty that has me laying in bed sleepless every night.

  The rest of the walk is silent, but I feel her calm presence next to me. I want to put my arm around her. Touch her hand, intertwine our fingers, hold her close and talk about our day. My heart is aching for this relationship we can’t have.

  Glancing over at Cadence as we turn the last corner to the street that leads to the house, I curse myself for what I’ve started. The wind blows strands of her dark hair into her eyes, and I watch as she lifts her pink-painted fingernails to pull it off of her face. When she misses a strand, I reach over to fix it, and her eyes find mine again.

  How the fuck did this happen? How did a girl almost twenty years younger than me convince herself that I was worth her time? How long will this last? I could put her on a plane tomorrow, and she’d find a million guys better suited for her. She’d forget all about me and this crazy moment in her life where she almost convinced a priest to break his vows.

  “What now?” she says breathlessly.

  “Nothing, Cadence. There is nothing now. We have to walk back into the house and be exactly as we were a month ago.”

  “What if I can’t?” The setting sun catches the hints of green in her dark eyes, flecks I never noticed before.

  “That’s something you have to decide. If you can’t do it, then…”

  “Then I have to leave.”

  A pain stabs me in the chest at those words. The thought of her leaving feels like suffocating, someone robbing me of my oxygen and making me live like that.

  But she’
s right. It’s the only option. So I swallow down the burning in my throat and nod.

  “Yes.”

  There is the most subtle flinch in her eyes at my response. But a second later, she straightens her spine. “Okay. I’ll think about it.”

  Then, she turns and walks toward the house. I’m almost proud of her, my headstrong girl. Too beautiful for her own good. Too fucking tempting for mine.

  I follow two steps behind and feel a sense of confidence I shouldn’t be feeling. Somehow I know she’ll choose to stay, even if it means we can never do what we just did.

  Then it hits me...what if I can’t. I asked her to decide, assuming that she’s the only one who will struggle, but what if she does stay, sleeping next door to me everyday. Is having her voice, her laugh, her smile in my life every day worth the pain it will cause me to never be able to touch her again? Can I live like that?

  These are the thoughts that drill my ego as we step into the house, and I'm so distracted that I almost don’t hear the new voice in the house. It’s a woman’s voice. An American woman.

  And I wouldn’t think much of it if it wasn’t for Cadence’s gasp as soon as the door closes behind us.

  “Oh my God!” she shrieks. My heart hammers in my chest as I stare at the beautiful woman, looking no older than me, standing next to Bridget at the front counter. The two of them are wearing smiles and talking like old friends.

  I don’t get a chance to ask what the fuck is going on when Cadence runs to the woman’s arms. The lady is staring at me with a smile like she knows me but I don’t know her.

  Cadence pulls away and notices me standing there staring in shock. “Callum, this is my mom!”

  I can barely react so I move out of habit, reaching my hand to shake hers when Cadence’s mom pulls me in for a hug. “I've heard so much about you!” The embrace is longer than I expect, and when I pull away, she’s staring at me affectionately. I don’t know what the fuck to say. All the things Cadence and I just said to each other are spinning around in my brain.