Page 59 of Dark Side of the Cloth

Yasmine opened her mouth to argue and then closed it.

Was there no other choice than to trust him? Fine. There wasn’t. Maybe she could figure out how to escape?

Dean placed an arm around her waist, and in one swift movement, she was on her feet and immediately sucked in a sharp breath as a stabbing pain lanced up her leg. Dean didn’t bother to ask. He just scooped her up into his arms and walked the way he’d come. She figured he was taking her back to where that other man was, probably planning to string them up together to die. But if she was going to die, she wanted to know why.

“Are you going to kill me?” She shivered as she asked, not wanting to know the answer.

“No, I already told you I wouldn’t hurt you.” He stopped walked and stared at her, his eyes softer. “I’d never hurt you, Yasmine. I’m not my father.”

She had no idea what that meant, but she could ask on that another time. She also noticed he had some sort of contraption over his left eye. It was like something she’d see in an Army movie. She’d known he was in the Army, but she’d never inquired what he’d done. It had seemed inappropriate to ask, but now she very much wished she had.

“Then…what? Why?” Yasmine paused, collecting her thoughts. “You were cutting that guy up like some slab of meat hanging at the butchers.”

“That man is not a good man. I don’t kill innocents, Yasmine. My mission is to find and provide the appropriate punishment to sinners of all kinds, but I mostly target abusers, rapists, and serial killers. Especially those that target the vulnerable: children, women, and elderly. They are the worst kind of predator.”

She stared at the side of his face, the hard set of his jaw, and knew he was serious.

A priest that hunted people?

Her mind was reeling.

“Mission for who? Are you still in the service?”

“No and yes. It’s complicated. The organization I’m part of has a mission that I follow.”

Yasmine’s mind was racing as she thought about all their interactions over the last year, especially their recent intimacy, when a thought suddenly occurred to her.

“Wait a minute, are you even a priest?”

For the briefest of moments, she saw guilt in his eyes, but then it was gone, masked by a blank stare. “No, I’m not.”

“Oh, my God!” She smacked her hand to her forehead. “I’m a fool. I’m such an idiot. How did I not see this?” She covered her eyes as humiliation took the place of fear.

“Yasmine, you saw what I wanted you to see, just how the rest of the town sees what I want them to see.”

“All those people that come to you for advice and to bare their souls, you take advantage of them. How is that not a sin?”

“I give them exactly what they need and exactly what any real priest can offer. Comfort for those mourning, forgiveness when they ask, answers in time of need, and punishment when it’s deserved. What more can a priest offer?”

“It’s not the same thing!”

“Why not? Because I didn’t have some other man in a long robe say I’m worthy? I have seen more death, tasted true forgiveness, and understand the pain of loss better than any one of those so-called representations of God. Something that doesn’t even exist. Trust me, Yasmine, if there was a God, I should’ve seen him by now.”

When he looked at her this time, all she saw was pain. Something terrible had happened to him. His pain mirrored her own, and although she didn’t want to be affected by it, it gripped her heart in a vice.

She sighed softly. “Was Father O’Sullivan ever a real person?”

“Yes, but I killed him.”

Yasmine gasped, her mouth falling open at his easy admission.

“He wasn’t a good man.” Dean stopped her objection before it started. “He was committing fraud, cheating innocent people out of thousands, and that was before he forced impressionable young people in the church to perform sexual acts, Yasmine. I told you I don’t kill the innocent. That’s not my mission.”

“Aren’t I considered a sinner?” she asked quietly. “I mean, after all, I thought I was actively corrupting a priest.”

Yasmine crossed her arms. There were too many emotions to wade through. She didn’t even know where to start—fear at what he would do to her when he was done with this man, humiliation for not seeing what was so plain before her eyes, anger over being so easily duped, and betrayal. The last one hurt the most. It felt like he’d taken advantage of her feelings. She’d felt so terrible for loving him, for taking advantage of him, and all the while, it was he taking advantage of her.

Dean stopped walking, and her pulse thumped loudly in her ears as she waited to hear her verdict.