Beautiful Sinner: a standalone forbidden romance

by Sara Cate

  When I look back on my years as a priest now, it feels like that time of my life was my time in waiting. I don’t regret it. I mean how could I? If I hadn’t spent that time devoted to God and the service of others, I would have never been the kind of man Cadence deserves. I’m glad she didn’t know me in my twenties. I wasn’t right for her then, and it doesn’t matter now that I’m pushing fifty and my life feels like it’s just starting. I’ve never felt younger. I mean...look at how I get to spend my Saturdays.

  “Callum,” she gasps. She says my name every time I get my lips on her pussy. It’s a tradition and her gift to me. With a little more pressure, I anticipate the moment her body seizes and she explodes with pleasure.

  She doesn’t waste any time and barely gives herself a chance to recover before she’s reaching for me. And who am I to deny her what she wants?

  I pull her out of the confessional and carry her to the office that used to be mine. She attacks my lips with her mouth, tasting herself there, and I can’t move fast enough to get the damn pants undone as I place her on the soft chaise lounge. She helps me with the belt and as soon as my cock is free, she climbs onto my lap, straddling my hips and rides me like a horse.

  It doesn’t matter that we’re the only people in the building or that I’m not a priest anymore. We still muffle our cries and pretend this is our dirty little secret.

  Cadence loves to share our story, especially to the guests. Since Bridget got remarried and moved out with Daisy, Cadence made the B&B her own. Every single change she’s put in place has only helped the business flourish. We’ve added riding lessons with Misty and brought on an actual staff. Even with two small kids, she never looks overwhelmed. In fact, she looks perfectly satisfied with the chaos of our lives.

  Of course, finding alone time with kids and a business isn’t easy, so when Father Markus asks us to volunteer at the church, we never pass it up. Because it means moments like this, her riding my cock in my old office while that bronze statuette of the Virgin Mary watches with disapproval.

  When I feel her body tremble and shake, I take control and flip her onto her back. Taking her hands above her head, I growl in her ear.

  “You’ve been a bad girl.”

  She squirms, biting back her smile. “Forgive me, Father,” she moans in reply.

  I don't know how I ever got so lucky, finding this beautiful girl. God was no match for Cadence, and if loving her was ever a sin, then I would gladly burn.

  Slamming into her again, I come hard. She latches onto my body with her legs, squeezing me in place so I can’t pull out.

  “We have to lay here for a second. I don’t want it to all come out.”

  “You’re crazy, you know. Gabriel is only three and Noah’s barely a year. Are you sure you’re ready for another?”

  She responds with a smile, her cheeks red and her lips swollen. It’s a far cry from the girl who landed on my doorstep almost five years ago, lost and alone. She’s anything but now. I know God meant for her to fall into my arms that day. I know He brought us together with intention, and maybe our method was a little unorthodox, and some might call it a scandal, but I still hold onto my faith in providence. Our love is not a sin; it’s salvation.

  Thank you for reading Beautiful Sinner.

  This was a scary book to write. There was so much I wanted to get right, but I also wanted to create a world where love was inevitable, no matter what it had to overcome. Yes, there is heat and sex, but at the core of everything I write, there is love. Unbeatable, unstoppable, fearless, profound love. That is what I hope I conveyed in this story.

  If you loved Cadence and Callum, please consider leaving your opinion for future readers to see.

  There should really be a lot of names featured on the cover of this book because I could not do it alone.

  First and foremost, my sincere gratitude goes out to Adrian, who held my hand through the scariest writing I’ve ever committed to. Remember when I pitched this idea? You were scared, but you were a trooper. Thanks for sticking it out and for taking it rough. ;)

  My beta readers: Suzanne and Susan—true VIPs.

  My GLORIOUS assistant: Lori Alexander. Couldn’t do it without you. You have no idea.

  My dear friend, Rachel Leigh, for listening to every single idea. You’re a saint.

  My editor: Beth Hale of Magnolia Author Services

  My cover designer: Barb Hoeter of Coverinked Designs

  My graphic design artist: Amanda Shepard of Shepard Originals

  My PR company: Samantha de la Mar of Talk Nerdy 2 Me

  And last but not least, the BEAUTIFUL members of Sara’s Sweets, who are too many to name. Every day, I log in to that group because you lift me up. Thank you.

  *muah*

  Keep turning for a sneak peek of Delicate, the first book in the Wicked Hearts series…

  Don’t touch the rich girls.

  Those are the rules.

  They come to Wicked every Spring Break, and I make it a rule to never get attached.

  But this year everything’s changed.

  That doe-eyed little girl who used to watch me through the window of my tattoo shop is all grown up—and determined to make my life hell. What she doesn’t know is that beneath these tattoos is a seedy habit and a life of crime.

  Let’s face it, I’ve always had a hard time saying no.

  If I’m not careful, this girl will be my new addiction.

  And my ruin.

  Delicate is the first swoon-worthy installment in the Wicked Hearts series. Warning: this bad-boy romance might leave you breathless and a touch corrupted. Trigger warning: Delicate deals with the very real issues of coping and overcoming addiction. The highs, the lows, and in this case, the happy endings.

  Welcome to Wicked Beach…

  Sierra

  The buzzing sound is relentless. It’s like knives drilling into my head. How anyone could work here all day, I don’t know. It seems impossible.

  “So you think I should do the dolphin or the dragonfly?” Natalie says next to me, flipping through her phone. She has a Pinterest board pulled up with hundreds of girly tattoo images on the screen.

  “I don’t know,” I answer. “Which one has more meaning to you?”

  “Eh. I don’t really care about meaning. I just want something pretty back there, you know?” She winks as she points to her left shoulder blade.

  I laugh, although it’s a little forced. She’s the kind of girl with a perfect body, round hips, thin hourglass waist and big full breasts that make the most boring T-shirt look smoking hot. I’m a little jealous.

  “Natalie,” a man’s voice calls in a flat tone from the front desk. I recognize the big, burly man with the salt and pepper beard, dashing green eyes, and broad, hard shoulders.

  Natalie jumps up from her seat to greet him—with her boobs, of course. He doesn’t even notice. I have no doubt that Natalie is not above sleeping with him just because he’s a decade or more older.

  “Logan is gonna be right out to do your ink. Did you decide on anything?” he asks her.

  “Oh, you’re not doing it?” she asks, leaning over the glass. I roll my eyes at her display. Natalie and I have known each other for years, but we only hang out when our parents come up to Wickett Beach on holidays—or Wicked Beach, as it’s been unofficially renamed. I like Natalie, but she and I are two totally different people. She flaunts everything all the time and doesn’t even care that guys only want her for one thing. It just seems to take all of the fun out of it for me. When I do find the right guy, I want it to be special. Not just a quick romp for fun.

  She’s still trying to get the older guy to react to her tit display, but he does not seem impressed. I bet he sees girls like her all the time. Especially this week. Spring Break on Wicked is always so crazy, full to the brim with young, rich, trust fund babies in the prime of their first week of freedom. Bars are more relaxed with carding. Cops let the rules go because more people are spending money, and it’s
known for being a playground for the rich kids. Not as sleazy as Cancun, but just as wild.

  While we wait, I glance around the shop. It’s decorated like a mechanics garage with big red toolboxes and short black stools on wheels, which is clever and somehow sexy. The front desk is a glass case full of photos and piercing jewelry. It’s actually a pretty tasteful place and not what I expected. I was expecting something seedier. I’ve only ever seen it from the outside. My parents would freak if they knew I was in here, but just like every spring break on Wicked, they disappear and leave me be for the entire week. I’m an adult now anyway so it’s not like I need a chaperone anymore. But if they knew where I was, I bet they would disagree. I smile to myself thinking about their reaction.

  “Natalie?” Another man appears from behind the wall that divides the front waiting area and the back where the tattoos are taking place. I glance up when I hear his voice, smooth and deep like chocolate, and my jaw nearly hits the floor. I can’t take my eyes off of him. He’s covered from his hands to his neck in tattoos, but they’re not all black like the older guy’s. They’re beautiful, vibrant, and full of color like a mural on his skin. In fact, I don’t think there is any black in them at all. Like a watercolor.

  But it’s not his tattoos that keep my attention. It’s his familiarity. Every summer I come to the island, and I find him. I see him, and in the least creepy way possible, I watch him. Once or twice, I would gawk at him through the window as I passed on the boardwalk. More than once, I watched him eating at the diner down the street. Why I’ve been so drawn to him, I don’t know.

  It’s not just his looks, and I mean, he is gorgeous, with his rich brown hair that always falls in perfect waves over his forehead. And maybe that’s what caught my eye the first time I saw him back when I was just fourteen. But the fascination became something more than that. I could see the trouble in his eyes. Like he held secrets I wanted to know and wisdom I could never understand. He has to be no more than twenty-five, but I have a feeling his twenty-five years have seen a lot more than my nineteen.

  “That’s me!” Natalie squeals, and as soon as her eyes land on him, she seems to forget the guy behind the counter.

  But he’s not looking at her. He’s looking at me.

  I’m still sitting on the folded black chairs, and I feel a settling weight of remorse land in my gut. He’s changed since last year. Something about him is not the same. It’s not just the new tattoos or the way his shoulders don’t seem to fill out the T-shirt in the same way they did before. There’s a little less life behind his eyes.

  I stand and walk toward Natalie, trying to pull myself from the trance I fell into the second his crystal blues fell on me. “It’s her,” I say as I point to Natalie.

  “You don’t want a tattoo?” he says with a crooked smile. It’s contagious because I feel my own smile grow across my face. Without knowing why, I put my hand against my cheeks to hide the grin. The world’s worst flirter, right here.

  “N-no.” I stutter.

  He shows his pearly white teeth, and I swear my knees buckle.

  Natalie cackles as he smiles. “Her? Get a tattoo? Yeah right.” Then I realize that she’s teasing me, so I lose my smile and glare at her. I get that I look a little innocent, but I’m no saint.

  “Well, maybe one day,” he says, and he’s looking at me again. I’m under a spotlight in his stare.

  “I think I want a dolphin on my shoulder here,” Natalie says, pointing to her back. “To remind me of my time here. It’s special to me,” she says looking at Logan through heavy lids.

  He nods at her and takes a deep breath, an expression I can tell means he’s mentally preparing himself to deal with yet another bubbly young girl and her dolphin tattoo.

  I smile to myself as I follow them back to his station.

  Logan

  God, I fucking hate spring break. It’s nothing but drunk, rich kids and dolphin tattoos.

  But the business is good, so I guess I shouldn’t complain. Murph loves the girls this time of year, but I could live without them. They come to Wickett (I refuse to call it Wicked) once a year to get their kicks with the dirty locals and take off back to their lives of big houses and upstanding boyfriends. We are a proverbial bucket list for these girls.

  I lost a bet to Murph, hence why I’m stuck with the dolphin, and he gets to take the next walk-in. The shop was slow for a minute, and I bet him that the next customer to walk in would be a frat guy on a drunk dare. It’s past 8:00 p.m. on the first night of spring break. Getting a stupid tattoo is like a rite of passage. But when we heard the door bells ring, we both peaked our heads around to see two girls walk in. One looking like she was ready to fuck the coat stand if someone didn’t step up. And the other...was her.

  I never thought I’d live to see the day she’d actually walk into the shop. She spent the last five years watching from afar. Which made sense. She didn’t belong here. With her white chucks and a pink skirt that hung from her barely there hips, this girl couldn’t look more out of place if she tried.

  “Ha ha,” Murph teases. “You’re up.”

  “Okay, go get them signed in. Let me grab a smoke, and I’ll be right up.”

  “Fine,” he bellowed. Then his hand lands firmly on my shoulder. “A smoke.” He narrows his eyes into mine, and I nod back. I know he’s just worried about me, but I hate being treated like I need to be babysat. Whatever I want to do behind the shop is my business.

  Although I am working in his business, so maybe I will just wait until after my shift to do anything other than smoke. The little plastic bag in my pocket feels like it’s burning a hole through my pants and into my skin. I wish it would.

  He says I have no self-discipline, but look at me. Waiting until after my shift to get high.

  The girl up front is being obnoxious. I can hear her through the back door. When I come back in, I do the usual routine. Wash my hands, sanitize the seat and everything in my station. I have to appreciate how clean and righteous Murph runs things here. I wouldn’t work anywhere else.

  When I come back around to the front to greet the customer, I stop in the lobby when I see the girl again. But this time, my eyes aren’t on her squeaky-clean sneakers or pastel pink skirt. I’m drawn to her eyes, nearly as blue as mine. Why haven’t I ever really looked into those doe-eyes? They are round, bright, and there isn’t much sign of makeup, not that she would need it. Every line of her face is delicate.

  I have to snap out of it before I make a fool of myself staring at this beautiful mystery girl.

  After I call the girls up, the client, Natalie, is babbling on about a dolphin, and it takes every ounce of resolve in my body not to groan.

  I don’t know why I tease the blonde about getting a tattoo. I think I want to see her smile, and it’s perfect. This girl is not my type, but I still want to look at her, hear her voice, swim in those perfect blue eyes.

  Natalie straddles the chair and immediately pulls down her shirt where she wants the dolphin. I make small talk while I clean the area and draw the design onto her skin. She chatters on about coming to Wicked every spring and how she loves getting down with the locals. I fake my laughter through her story, and then my eyes slide up toward the quiet girl sitting in a chair in the corner.

  “What about you?” I ask.

  She lifts her eyes expectantly.

  “Do you love to get down with the locals?” I tease her. Natalie giggles until I remind her to hold still.

  “She’s not really the get-down type,” Natalie whispers.

  “That’s okay.”

  “I love coming here. Not to get down with the locals,” she answers, mimicking our tone, “but just because people are nicer, and I can breathe here.”

  Glancing up again, I smile because I know exactly what she means. Wickett has always been like that for me. Quiet. Comfortable. Every other week of the year.

  “Boring,” Natalie mumbles against the seat as I hold a mirror up to show her the sketch on her b
ack. “Yes, I love it,” she says. I ready the ink and listen to the girls talk about their plans after the tattoo. They’re going down to the bonfire which is a spring break guarantee. They do it every year, and it’s always packed down there with tons of rich college kids. A real kickoff to the week.

  I don’t like the idea of this girl going down to the bonfire. It’s notorious for heavy drinking and rowdiness. Every year some douchebags end up going a little far, and it becomes town gossip quick. The cops don’t do much with the pressures from the investors. A little insider scoop I get from my brother’s best friend on the force, who hates this week even more than I do.

  They let the kids have their fun but try to keep it under control.

  And they usually do. Until I show up.

  When I press my foot on the pedal, Natalie jumps from the sound of the gun. I can already tell this is going to suck. She will cry and squirm, and it will turn out like shit. And I fucking hate when it’s not perfect.

  “Is this going to hurt?” she whines.

  “No, it tickles.” I answer dryly.

  Two seconds into the tattoo, she’s crying. I didn’t even get a full outline before she turns stark white, and her skin goes cold.

  “I’m going to throw up,” she says.

  “You need fresh air.”

  “We can help you to the door. Can you walk?” the girl asks.

  “I think so,” Natalie mumbles.

  God, I fucking hate fainters. Every once in a while, I get the pukers and the fainters. I pull off my gloves and help Natalie to the back door. Never out the front. Bad for business. She sits on one of the chairs we have back there for this exact reason.