Page 29 of The Sinner and the Priest: Part Two

I don’t get a chance to answer. Doors burst open up and down the crypt. Robed staff, guards, even a balding old canonist. Everyone bolts for the exits as if the devil’s on their tail, except I know I’m standing right here . . . watching, battling my control to save their lives. They push and curse, crashing into each other, trampling papers and coffee cups. Some try the staircase; others double back to side corridors, shouting in ten different languages.

It’s chaos.

“They know.” Sweat prickles my brow.

Mercy’s eyes narrow, and she does the thing that obliterates the cold void in my body . . . she becomes the calm in my storm, sharp eyes cataloging the commotion, assessing the threat so I don’t have to.

I rest my head against a wall and focus on controlling my breath. I don’t deserve her. She’s too good for me. Too beautiful, too smart, too perfect. What was going through God’s head the day He decided to put her in my life, someone who would watch out for me when I needed it the most? Someone who wouldn’t persecute me based on the thing living inside me.

Pain twists my insides as the urges try to bypass my will. I drop the bag and double over.

“Black suits at the far end,” she mutters, hand slipping beneath her habit’s veil to release her broken sword.

Break their necks.

The voice rattles inside my skull. I follow Mercy’s gaze to where two men gather by an emergency exit. Each has an ear-wire and hard little eyes. The tall one aims his torch around, mainly at the ceiling. The stocky one is already pawing at his phone, calling for backup, maybe.

Mercy’s robes rustle as she moves.

“Stay close,” I mutter, grabbing a handful of her habit and yanking her back. “If anyone touches you⁠—”

“I’ll handle it.” She jerks her chin at the plain-clothed guards, who now nod and point at the phones, their faces more relaxed. “I don’t think this is our fault. Maybe a fire drill, or faulty device.”

Nevertheless, I pick up my bag, and we keep moving. Fast. We round a corner and nearly collide with a gaggle of terrified academics. They clutch portfolios and rosaries, faces white, veins standing out. I bulldoze through them, shoulder first, forging a path for Mercy. She follows in my slipstream, and it makes the void inside me purr.

Beneath the sirens, there’s another sound. The scraping, buzzing crawl of flies, far away but growing louder. Or maybe it’s just in my head. We pass tombs, shelves of relics, nameless crypts. The deeper we go, the more we’re alone.

Alone . . . just you and her.

No one to kill. Just a woman to fuck.

The curse shivers up my spine. I see myself grabbing Mercy’s waist, slamming her into stone, lifting her robes, and taking what I need until the whole world vanishes.

I blink, shoving the vision away with a grunt as we take the last turn and see St. Peter’s tomb dead ahead, lit with a single overhead bulb.

A hand clamps my shoulder and drags me backward. I spin in a blur of black cloth and shadow, my hand already a vice around a man’s throat. I slam him into the ancient brick wall. Air bursts from his lungs. My other hand is back, fist clenched, the cross on my finger aimed at the soft bridge of his nose.

“Francesco. Basta.”

I blink. The red haze recedes enough for me to see wild, silver hair and the steady ice-blue eyes of Monsignor Bianchi.

“Monsignor,” I snarl.

He looks at my raised fist, then up at the hollowed out monster reflected in my eyes. “You always were more wolf than shepherd, Francesco, but I must catch your suora before she is too far.” I don’t release him. “You can’t trust anyone else.”

My fingers remain buried in the flesh of his neck, feeling the frantic leap of his pulse against my palm.

“Why should I trust you?”

“Because you saved my life once.”

I slowly uncurl my fingers and nod.

While he goes after her, I find my bearings. I’m in a dark, dank, excavated room covered in peeling frescoes and pagan carvings. My bag is a few steps away, where I must have dropped it. I grab it just as Bianchi returns with Mercy.

“This is a good way to lose my collar, Francesco.” Bianchi keeps his voice pitched low, gesturing to the evacuating scavi.

“The alarm?” I ask.