Page 1 of These Sinful Kingdoms

Chapter one

Aurora

“Forgiveme,Father,forI have sinned.” The words left my lips and instantly calmed me. It was ironic, I wasn’t exactly someone who believed in life after death, heaven, hell, and all that jazz, and yet ever since I was a child, I had stepped into a confessional every week, unburdening my soul.

My mother was a devout Catholic and the one request she had made to my father was that she had her own church, a family church and he had provided it to her, no questions asked.

In those days, I think my father still loved her, and still cared about the idea of family but it had been a simpler time then. His father was still the head of the mafia and Alonso held far less responsibility.

“What burdens your mind this week?” Father D’angelo said softly, bringing me back to the present.

I rubbed my fingers over the silver cross in my hand, the cross that had once belonged to my mother. It was a delicate item, a rose woven around the cross as a symbol of the Moretti line that my father had given to my mother on the first night, he courted her.

When she died, it had been handed to me to remember her by. My mother passed when I was still a young girl, but I never forgot her, this weekly ritual was my way of keeping her memory alive.

She wasn’t the wife of Alonso but his mistress, and that made me a bastard in the eyes of the Moretti successors. Yet I knew he loved her, perhaps more than his wife.

She had been with him almost as long as he was married, a controversial mistress like the days of old royalty, and some part of me still carried that shame.

My mother saw herself in the eyes of Mary Magdalene and looked at my father like he was Jesus himself, seeing it as her place to worship him for his greatness and never questioning her position at his side.

“I had immoral thoughts about another man. Lust for a man who was older than me and saw only his body and what it could provide me.” I whispered and Father D’angelo swallowed, clearing his throat.

“And what did you think it could provide you?” He asked and I glanced through the partition to see his silhouette. He was a strong man, with a well-defined jaw that held a hint of stubble and I was ashamed to say, he was my first crush as a girl.

He was fifteen years my senior, yet he barely looked forty-five. I knew he had made vows of celibacy when he became a priest and he had never strayed from them in the ten years I had known him.

“I imagined his hands touching my naked body, bringing me to the height of pleasure whilst I touched him.” It was a dangerous game, a game I had started long ago with him, telling him my fantasies.

I never once told him that those fantasies were about him and he never asked but he played along, listening to my descriptions in detail and encouraging them.

“Do you feel like you need to be punished for such impure thoughts?” He asked and I licked my lips, clenching my thighs as I imagined him punishing me, spanking me.

“Yes. I should be punished.” He hummed softly and my nipples hardened.

“You are a naughty girl. You will refrain from touching yourself in any way and spend time on your knees repenting tonight.” His voice was hoarse, breath harsh as a thrill of excitement washed through me.

“Yes, Father.” I replied before I stood, exiting the confessional.

Father Dangelo stepped out after me, his eyes dark and firm. I smiled, placing the silver cross over my neck, my skin on fire as I felt his eyes watch every move I made.

“How is your son?” He asked, the casual conversation at odds with what had just happened, our own dirty little secret that only God could see.

“He is doing well. His attitude is back in full force, and he is already giving me all the excuses as to why he shouldn’t go back to school.” I said and he chuckled.

“That boy has the same fire and attitude as his mother.” He said with amusement. Fabian had been kept from me, taken as a hostage as a deal my father had made before his death, and it had taken me months to find him again.

I was lucky to have help in the form of unlikely allies – the Mexican Cartel and the Irish Mafia families had stepped in and found my boy, bringing him home.

“Fabian definitely has fire in his heart.” I said with an eye roll. Father D’Angelo reached out to take my hand and squeezed.

“You can bring him to me if you think it will help. I have known him since he was a baby, and he may feel comfortable with me enough to open up and talk about his experience.” He said with a smile that warmed my heart.

“I might do that, Father. Thank you.” He nodded, his hands lingering on mine before he finally let go.

“I’ll see you next week, Aurora.” The way he said my name was like a caress and I shivered, pleasure and heat rolling through me as I left the church.

I was no good girl, that much was true in my son. I had accidentally fallen pregnant with him at eighteen. His dead-beat father had been a thrill at the time. He was associated with a motorcycle gang called the Forsaken but the minute I had told him I was pregnant, he ran.

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