Page 36 of Between

I found myself aching for him, for his touch, for his desires.

His hand reached around and found the front of my throat. His palm rested there for a moment, feeling the bare skin and the light pulse of my heart before moving up to my chin. He gently pushed my head up, forcing me to tilt back and into his territory. I scanned the rest of the pews and quickly noticed that no one was paying us any mind. There were a few people scattered throughout the sanctuary, but all were faced forward with their heads bowed. The priest entered the confessional, attending to someone on the other side.

Caius squeezed the bottom of my jaw, bringing my attention back to him. My eyes fell closed, succumbing to the fire in his touch.

His face rested along the side of my neck, his lungs breathing me in, his need for me unrelenting.

“You didn’t take your communion,Meum Caelum,”he whispered against my skin. I didn’t have time to think about what his foreign words meant before he directed my gaze to the communion in front of me. There was a small white cracker and a small cup of red wine. It remained on top of the Bible that was tucked away in the pew in front of me.

“Is there a reason why you don’t want it?”

After a moment passed, I tried to shake my head but struggled in his hold.

“Are you scared?”

I shook my head again.

“Do you believe in it?”

My body remained still.Do I?My whole life, I’ve taken communion without a second thought. Sometimes, I did it mindlessly, and sometimes, I acknowledged the weight of it. But no matter what, I’ve always taken it as truth.

What made today so different?

Leaning over my shoulder, Caius reached for the small, circular cracker. With his other hand, he squeezed the hollows of my cheeks, forcing my lips to part and my mouth to open slightly.

“Give me your tongue,” he began, his voice soft in volume but firm in tone.

I obeyed and dropped my tongue out of my mouth. Caius placed the wafer on the flat of my tongue, his grip still tight on my jaw, his skin brushing against mine in a heated desire.

“Corpus,”he muttered, his deep voice rumbling to my core. “The Body.”

Bringing my tongue back into my mouth, I let the soft wafer dissolve and swallowed it down.

“Good girl,” he whispered, and I instantly squeezed my eyes shut at his praise, my own yearning growing stronger by the second.

Next, he reached down and grabbed the small cup of wine. My eyes opened to see him lifting the clear plastic to his own gaze, his focus on the liquid as he swirled it around.

“Sanguis,”he said, and I could hear the slip of a smile through his tone. “The Blood.”

He was enjoying this.

But so was I.

He brought the cup to my lips, the lips that were still clutched in the tight grasp of his hand. I moved to take only a sip, but as he angled the cup up higher, I had no choice but to down it all. Drips of red wine spilled out from both corners of my mouth, streaming down my chin, neck, and over the tips of his fingers.

He dropped the empty cup, and the plastic clattered on the wooden pew. Thankfully, no one heard the sound, but if they did, everyone remained facing forward.

Caius removed his hand from my face, releasing his grip on my jaw. Moving his mouth to my chin, he kissed my skin, licking and sucking the excess wine that drew crimson-colored lines down my neck. The feel of him in an area so sensitive, so exposed, so vulnerable had me in the deepest vault of passion. I angled my throat to him more, allowing more access to his intimacy, letting him take me for all I was. With his hand still cradling the other side of my neck, his lips and tongue both caressed the wine off my skin, leaving no area untouched.

My breathing was rapid but steady as his actions took my body to higher places. I could feel my insides burning with a flame that only he could blaze.

My hands reached up and found his as he continued to drink me in, and my body shifted at the new, increasing fervor.Part of me wanted all of him, righthere,rightnow,but the other part of me knew this wasn’t the time or place.

Obviously.

His mouth trailed down to my collarbones in a line of licks and kisses. My fingers ran through his hair, gently gripping and pulling, eager to move him closer to me.

A hint of a moan escaped my lips between breaths.“Caius.”

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