Page 64 of Hotter 'N Hell

“Okay, I get it; she was perfect, and you loved her. Get on with it,” I snapped, tired of listening to how good she had been. Another Halo to make the males fall at her feet and worship.

“Our junior year, near Christmas, Delana started getting breathless. We would be walking in the halls to classes, and she’d get winded. It was concerning, but she would laugh it off and say she needed to get more exercise. Then, the sharp pains in her legs started, and her mom took her to the doctor. They listened to her symptoms and said it sounded like a viral infection, but if it didn’t get better in the next week, they’d run some tests.

“Four days later, she fainted while walking out to get in my car for school. Her dad picked her up, and they rushed her to the ER. I followed, and we stayed. They took blood tests, and we waited there for several hours. The doctors asked to speak to her parents, and I was left in the waiting room.” He paused and took a deep breath.

I did not want to feel anything, but I couldn’t help it. I wanted to go wrap my arms around him and hold him. Comfort him overthe loss of the girl he loved. Even if thinking about him loving someone like that killed me.

“She had acute myeloid leukemia; it was very advanced, and her blood platelets were dangerously low. I won’t go into details. It was bad, but she was a fighter. She was in the hospital for months. I went every day after school. When she was able to go to the chapel in the hospital, I’d go with her for Mass. We played card games. I read her books.

“That summer, she got to come home. She was in remission, and I’d thought we’d been given a miracle. Our senior year was perfect, and then two days before prom, she fainted.” He ran a hand through his hair and looked off toward the moon instead of at me for a moment.

“It was back, and she was gone within six months. In the end, when she accepted that she wasn’t going to beat it this time, she told me that she loved me. That she had been given the gift of being loved by someone as special as me and that she wanted me to live a life for both of us. Do something big. Leave a mark.

“The day they lowered her into the ground, I decided I wanted to go to seminary. That I would never love like that again. And if I became a priest, I would leave a mark she could be proud of. She had died a virgin, and I would too. My heart and body would remain faithful to her, even after her death.”

His eyes swung back to me, and I wasn’t sure how much of this I could listen to.

“Seminary is expensive. Money my parents didn’t have. Priests can’t have debt. Delana’s parents paid for it. They said it was what Delana would have wanted. That my decision to dedicate my life to God was my way of honoring their daughter and that they wanted to pay all my seminary costs to honor her as well.

“So, here I am. Ten years later. A priest. And in walks you.”

I took a step back and a deep breath. “So, I’m the problem. I’m the one getting in the way, messing things up. Ruining that planand your grand gesture to the girl you loved,” I said, hating the way my voice wavered. “You’ve still got that virginity, Father. Take it to the grave with you.

“Now, it’s my birthday, and since you’ve shown up to share a tragic story with me that I am, in fact, the villain in, I think I’ll go inside and drink. You can find your way out.” I turned and started for the door when his fingers wrapped around my upper arm.

I jerked, and his hold tightened.

“You aren’t and were never the villain, Saylor. You didn’t let me finish,” Jude said, his tone desperate, but not as desperate as I was to get away from him and drown myself in a bottle of vodka.

“Jude, please. I cannot listen to any more.”

“I have been empty for ten years. There is nothing that makes me feel real joy. I’d gotten so accustomed to the emptiness that I didn’t even realize there was anything else. Then, you came into my life, and all of it came rushing back in. The lightness, excitement, thrill, warmth—it hit me so hard that I was rattled. Terrified. Because I was a grown man and it was different. With you also came desire, need, an all-consuming heat that I was willing to do anything to have. That didn’t make you the villain. I’m a priest. I chose this path. So, yes, it made you the ultimate temptation.

“I sent you away for two reasons. The first was your being there was putting you in danger. That scared me. The second was because I had been minutes away from…” He stopped. His breathing hitched. “You had on a sundress with easy access. I almost broke. And you were sent away, but I can tell you that I was the one who was punished for it. Because I am once again plunged into the lifeless, dark hole of life, but now, I have you to miss. You to agonize over.”

I hadn’t moved a muscle since he’d started. My breathing was quick, and my heart was slowly breaking away into tiny pieces.

“You tempt me. More than anything or anyone will ever tempt me. But you also make my days worth waking up for. The cold existence I was living is frigid now that I know how your dimples can melt every hard layer of ice that encases me. I want you in my life, Saylor. I want to see that smile. Hear your laughter. And what you did—have done—at the clothes closet, we need that. The community needs it. We need you. Your ideas to expand it. My sending you away not only hurt me, but it also hurt everyone you’ve touched, helped, with all your work.”

I sniffled and quickly reached up to wipe a tear that broke free.

“And Sister Mena refuses to speak to me now.”

A small bubble of laughter I hadn’t expected escaped me.

Jude turned me around to face him. His gaze as he stared down at me made me see things I wanted so badly, but was afraid to believe. I’d been burned too many times.

“I can’t have you. Not like that. We can’t have that kind of relationship. But that doesn’t mean I don’t want what I can have. And that’s you being a part of my life. I want you there, just next door. I can’t call it a friendship because that’d be just another lie. I will never be able to see you as a friend. You are so much more. Say you’ll come back. Please. I was wrong.”

This was going to end up destroying me. I knew it. Yet I couldn’t stand here with him this close, his eyes full of desperation, hope, uncertainty because he didn’t know how he was going to do it either.

I wanted him in my life.

Six days without him had been miserable.

If I could just stay on the right side of the line…

For him…I would try.

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