For about the hundredth time tonight, my breath caught.Sweetheart.He’d given me a pet name?
The tears came harder until I couldn’t control the sobs anymore. “I feel so lonely. I know that God is with me, but I’m still hurting so bad.”
A strong arm came around me. When Kingsley pulled me into his side, I clawed my fingers into his habit over his chest. He started to chant, and I closed my eyes, relishing his embrace. His woodsy scent. The sound of his beautiful, deep voice. Although I didn’t understand Latin, God’s presence nearly overwhelmed me. How was this possible, if He was against what we were doing here?
After another song, I calmed down.
“How are you feeling?” Kingsley asked.
“Better.” I snuggled against him. “Thank you.”
He cupped my jaw and tilted my head towards him. Something brushed against my forehead.
His lips. He’d just kissed me.
He pressed another kiss to the tip of my nose. Then the corner of my mouth. Our breath mingled.
My heart went into overdrive.Do it. For real this time.
I slightly angled my head to the side, and our lips met. First only briefly, then longer. So much better than the first kiss. I let go of his habit and slid my fingers into his hair. Gripped it and deepened the kiss.
Kingsley grunted. He pulled back, his breath dusting my lips.
“Sorry,” I whispered. “I didn’t mean to cross any—”
He captured my mouth again, and this time, it was him who went for a deep kiss. His hand wandered down my side, stopping where my T-shirt had ridden up over the waistband of my shorts. Heat and ice alike rippled through me when his fingertips brushed my bare skin.
A whimper escaped me when he let me go.Please don’t stop. I need you.
Something clinked. The prayer beads. He was removing his belt.
Not even a beat later, his hand returned to my skin. My mind clouded by the second, his touch and kiss sucking me into a vacuum of ecstasy and passion.
Or maybe sin and perdition.
Chapter 16
Kingsley
I did it. I crossed that one line I never thought I would. I can’t believe I did that.
These same thoughts played the entire night in my mind as I lay in the grass outside the guesthouse, the woman I wasn’t supposed to love—wasn’t supposed to have any feelings forat all—bundled up in my habit and asleep in my arms. How could something feel so good yet so wrong at the same time? My dreams hadn’t even come remotely close to what Harley had done to me. How she’d made me feel.
I stared into the slowly dawning sky. The woods came alive with birdsong. We had to get up. Every minute we spent lying here together ramped up the risk of getting caught with the increasing daylight.
I’d give us two more minutes—and milk them for what they were. Savor Harley’s curves molded against me. Because this was the last time I got to hold her in my arms. We couldn’t repeat this.
Ever again.
I closed my eyes. Swallowed hard.“What did you do, Kingsley?”
Regina’s voice echoed in my head like I was eight years old again, when I’d broken one of her beloved paintings. I didn’t remember what it had portrayed or the artist. Just the cold look she’d given me. Her stern voice, then the weeks of being ignored. If I’d learned one thing early on in life it was that love was conditional. Make one mistake, and you’re cut off from the source that’s supposed to nurture you.
God wasn’t like that. In theory, I knew that. But in my heart?
“Harley.” I nudged her. “We have to get up.”
Her eyelids fluttered open. “What?”
