Page 21 of Unholy Obsession

This feels like a sacrament.

The chill of her sock seeps into my fingertips as I peel it off, her skin cold against my palm. Too cold.

A deep, unrelenting rage coils in my chest. What happened before she got to the club? Who left that bruise?

I shove it down. She doesn’t need my fury. She needs warmth. Comfort.

I gently rub her foot between my hands, coaxing heat back into her body. She gasps at the contact, her breath hitching, and my stomach tightens.Fuck. Not now. Not like this.

“In the bath,” I say, my voice rougher than intended.

I risk a glance upward, but she isn’t looking at me. Arms locked tight around herself, her gaze is fixed firmly downward as if she can hold herself together through sheer will alone.

And then, in a whisper barely audible over the running water, I hear, “You’re… Father Blackwood. But you’re… you’re Bane.”

The name cracks through the air like a whip. I flinch.

I wish there was any denial I could make. But the truth is raw and rasping in my throat. “I am,” I admit. “I’m both.”

I look away as her accusing gaze flashes up at me.

I’ve tried to smother Bane for years, to starve that hunger out of me. But, in this moment, as her eyes rake over me, I feel him resurrecting.

I take a breath and steady myself.

“You’re freezing,” I say, pushing past the wreckage of my confession. “Let’s get you warm first. The rest can wait.”

She hesitates. I reach out but stop short, hovering just above her arm. “May I?”

She nods, barely, but it’s enough.

I slip my arms beneath her knees and back, lifting her effortlessly. She’s nearly weightless in my grasp, yet the moment feels impossibly heavy.

Now she knows. Now, there’s no more pretending and stalking safely from afar.

I ease her into the bath, clothes still on, my hands steadying her as the water rises to meet her skin. She gasps at the heat, fingers brushing my wrist before she lets go.

Her shivering slows. She sinks deeper. The steam swirls between us, a fragile veil.

“You’re… a priest,” she murmurs at last, eyes shadowed with something unreadable. “But that night, you weren’t…”

The accusation cuts deep. That night, I was Bane.

I swallow hard. “That night, I wasn’t wearing the collar. But it doesn’t change what I am.”

Her lips part, but no words come. Instead, she wraps her arms around herself again. A shield and a barrier.

Something in me fractures at the sight.

“I never wanted to hurt you.” The words escape before I can stop them. “That night, and every day since, I—” I clench my jaw and swallow the rest. She doesn’t need my turmoil. She clearly has enough of her own tonight.

She watches me, her gaze searching as if trying to see past the man in front of her to the truth beneath.

“Why didn’t you come back?” she asks finally.

I exhale sharply. “I had to stay away. For both of us.”

A flicker of something crosses her face—anger? Disbelief? Pain?

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