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ChapterForty-Four
CALEB
Night-blooming jasmine filled my senses as I turned yet another corner of the Blackthornes’ garden maze. This spot. So reckless. So dangerous a thing to have when security was of concern. Fecking royalty.
“What are you doing skulking about in my maze, Priest?”
“I thought you were hunting, Cashel.”
“And I thought you were celibate.”
What response could I make to that? I would own my sins, if nothing else.
“It’s only been an hour since you all left your charge unsupervised.”
Cashel stood at the mouth of the path I’d turned down, looking at me like something he scraped off the bottom of his boot. “She’s not unsupervised. She’s exactly where she’s supposed to be. Out of my hair and unable to make trouble. Besides, hermatesare with her.”
The disdain with which he spat the wordmateshad my lips twitching. “Can’t handle your son being a cuckold?”
“That would make one of you as well, wouldn’t it? Does Gabriel know you are so... involved with her?”
I shoved my hands in my pockets so he wouldn’t be able to make out my balled-up fists. “I have to assume so. He’s God’s Messenger, after all. I don’t imagine there’s much he isn’t privy to.”
“How cavalier. You claim to serve your God, but you are in bed with the devil. Whose side are you on?”
“Sunday is not the devil.”
“Isn’t she? The harbinger of the apocalypse is hardly one of the good guys.”
“That’s either a matter of semantics or philosophy, neither of which I’m inclined to debate with you, Cashel. As for my loyalties, I will keep my vow.”
Cashel let out a derisive snort. “Because you aresogood at that,Priest.”
I bit down on the inside of my cheek to keep from lashing out and doing something that would get me sent away from here. The metallic taste of my blood filled my mouth as I fought for control of my emotions.
“Struck a nerve, did I?”
“Sunday is my purpose, same as she’s always been.”
“So you’ll do your duty when the time comes.”
I stared hard into his eyes. “Aye.”
“Then she’s not your mate. I burned down my world to keep Olivia once I bonded with her.”
“Who says I won’t?”
“You can’t have it both ways. It’s her, or your soul.”
“Don’t you think I fecking know that?”
“And yet you fucked her anyway. Hardly the actions of a pious man.”
The words cut deep. I gave up everything I’d ever wanted to belong to Sunday.Fuckingwas something reserved for sordid encounters. It didn’t come close to expressing what had happened between us. It was a communion of souls. A way to touch the divine. To express the most perfect love two people could share. She was the closest I’d ever come to knowing God again.
“Fuck you, Blackthorne.”
He smirked. “Such a temper for a holy man.”
