Page 23 of Praise Me: Priest

That is being made obvious to me right now.

Without Rune…Father McDaniel…they’ll be left with this hateful hypocrite.

This town needs Rune’s goodness. His authenticity.

I can’t be the one who takes him away from the church—or the church away from him. And I can’t let this man win.

“You have until the hour is up to leave the rectory,” Monsignor Hannibal says. “Get back to where you belong, girl. And thanks for nothing.”

My aunt. She’s probably starving by now. On the verge of being cast out of the shelter. “You’re really not going to pay me the money you promised?”

He takes a menacing step in my direction. “What are you going to do about it?”

Nothing. I have zero recourse. I can’t very well approach the law officers in town and relay the events of the last few days. Not only would they condemn me as a strumpet, but they probably wouldn’t believe the Monsignor is capable of such depravity.

Unfortunately, not getting the promised coin means…my aunt and I are now truly destitute. We have no funds whatsoever. No money to eat or pay the pittance required by the shelter to recure a bed. Without any job prospects for me and myaunt unable to work because of her illness, we’re at the end of our rope.

I’ll have no choice but to marry Mr. Tandy or we’ll be left vulnerable in the street.

“Maybe you should have tried a little harder to corrupt Father McDaniel, hmm?” he says, with a nasty smile, as if he’s read my thoughts. “Be gone with you, girl. By the end of the hour and no more.”

I choke on my request toplease, pleasesee Rune before I go.

Surely, he wouldn’t want me to leave without saying goodbye.

But once I’m dressed and my sparse possessions are packed, my time expires…and that’s exactly what I do. I leave without saying goodbye to Rune…

And I prepare to face my fate.

I never could have expected my fate to find me at the gates, demanding my soul.

Rune

I kneel at the altar with my head bowed, a rosary dangling from my fingers.

But I haven’t come to pray. I’ve come to say goodbye to this part of my faith.

I’m choosing her. I wasalwaysgoing to choose her.

Having Farrah or not having Farrah is a choice with as much gravity as life or death.

And lord almighty, do I love her. I’ve known since the marketplace, when my entire world shifted around me andstarting spinning in a new direction. She’s the sun. She’smysun. I ache to be her lifelong protector. I ache to see her every day, every night. To make her laugh, dry her tears and raise children together.

I ache for her cunt.

I ache. And ache. And ache.

These thoughts of mine have no place at the foot of an altar. Thoughts of her spread thighs, her hitching breaths, the sleek grind of her pussy when she climaxes. I’ve lost the battle with lust…but my lust, my need, is not some disgusting sin as I always imagined it would be. No. Because my passion for Farrah runs deeper than skin. It descends to the bottom of the fucking ocean. She makes me feelfound.

She makes me feel more righteous and good than the church, as blasphemous as that is to admit. And love…should be celebrated. This love cannot be hidden or ignored. It’s too consuming. Too huge. Too urgent. The surety and joy in my chest are real. They’re something I had no idea I was missing.

“Until Farrah,” I breathe into hands locked in prayer.

My entire being sighs at the mention of her name.

There is no way I could ever give her up. My will to live would be nonexistent. And if I can feel this devoted to one single person, I will never become my father. I reach up and finger my collar, removing it with a tweak of my wrist, settling it down on the altar in front of me—

“Does that mean what I think it means?” asks Monsignor Hannibal from the front row of the church, catching me off guard. How long has he been sitting there? “You are forsaking the church for a brazen hussy?”

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