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I rose from the pew, my legs shaking as I closed the distance between us. “You can lie to yourself all you want, Caleb, but please, don’t lie to me. Not here. Not after everything we’ve been through.”
“Leave me, Miss Fallon. The sanctuary is closed to students. Don’t make me send you to my office.”
“You always leave the church open.”
“Not to you.”
“You’re a real asshole, Father Gallagher.”
“I know. Now go. Tell your fiancé the happy news.”
That stopped me. I stared hard at him, searching his endlessly blue eyes. “Is that what this is about? Jealousy?”
A muscle fluttered in his jaw, but he didn’t answer me. He didn’t need to. I knew I had him figured out.
“You don’t need to be jealous, Daddy. You know how much you mean to me.”
Taking a chance, I lifted onto my toes and pressed my lips to his. He stood still as a statue for a full heartbeat before his breath washed over me and he clutched me to him, returning my kiss with a vigor I could only describe as desperate.
“Caleb,” I moaned, threading my fingers through the thickness of his hair.
His hands tightened on my arms as he pushed me away with a groan. “Enough. We have to stop this, Sunday. I can’t be your secret. It hurts too much.”
“I don’t want you to be a secret.”
“Being yours requires me to give up my post here, and I can’t do that. So I cannot be yours. Not the way I want to be. Not the way you deserve. Please, stop torturing me and let me go.”
The pain in his voice was the thing that broke us apart. It was the ache, the plea for mercy. I was ruining this man as surely as he had ruined me.
If I really loved him, I needed to give him space so he could see how our bond wasn’t just lust. It was fate.
Before I walked away from him, I looked into his eyes and whispered, “All right, Caleb. I’ll stay away—for now. But I’m never going to be able to let you go.”
