Chapter 13: Forgive me father 3

They never meant to let it go this far.

At first, it was just a kiss. A slip. A single sin ignited in a moment of weakness.

But now, it’s a ritual.

Mara is drunk on him—the way his hands tremble when they trace the outline of her hips, the way his voice fractures when he breathes her name like a sacred curse. She craves the crack in his composure, the flicker of fire in a man sworn to water. The more he tries to drown it, the more it burns.

She’s high on the scent of him lingering on her skin long after he’s gone. On the sting of his stubble against her inner thighs. On the weight of him kneeling between her legs in the confessional booth, rosary beads digging into his palms as his tongue delivers salvation in the form of sin.

She’s lost count of how many times it’s happened. How many times he’s buried himself in her with eyes clenched shut, as if pretending not to see would somehow make it less real. They’ve done it everywhere now—recklessly, desperately. In the rectory. The sacristy. Once, in the back pews with her legs over his shoulders and his collar still on, while the candlelight flickered like trembling witnesses too afraid to snuff them out.

Each time, Elijah tells her it’s the last.

Each time, he’s lying.

⸻

The more he resists, the more she presses.

“You need to stop coming,” he whispers one morning, hands shaking as he buttons his collar after another frantic session on his knees, tongue still slick with her taste.

Mara only smiles. She takes his hand, brings his fingers to her lips, and slides them inside her mouth—slow, shameless. She moans softly as she tastes herself on his skin.

“Then stop calling me back,” she murmurs.

But he doesn’t.

He can’t.

He tells her she’s a test. A temptation.

She thinks she’s his truth.

⸻

But one night, he finally snaps.

“I can’t do this anymore,” Elijah says, pacing the rectory like a man unraveling from the inside. “I’ve submitted a request for transfer. I leave in two weeks.”

The words crash into her like a stone to the chest.

“No.”

“Mara—”

“No,” she hisses, stepping toward him, eyes blazing. “You don’t get to walk away. Not after everything. Not after this.”

“I’m supposed to save souls, not dmn them.”

She laughs—sharp, bitter. “Then maybe your soul was never yours to save. Maybe I was meant to dmn you. And maybe you were meant to like it.”

His jaw clenches. His fists tighten at his sides. But his eyes—God, his eyes betray him.

They keep dragging back to her lips. Her breasts. Her presence.

He wants to leave. He really does.

But he never even reaches the door.

That night, Mara returns to the church alone.

The sanctuary is bathed in a dusky orange glow, the candles swaying like old ghosts, shadows painting the stained glass in twisted halos.

She walks down the aisle slowly, each step echoing in the cavernous silence like a drumbeat to something darker.

At the altar, she finds him.

Not robed. Not composed.

But shirtless.

Sweating.

On his knees, fists clenched in prayer, as if begging for the strength to remain who he was before she walked into his world and set fire to it.

Mara approaches without a word.

Her black dress slips from her shoulders, sliding down her body in a whisper. She stands before him bare—skin glowing in the candlelight, her eyes unrepentant.

She speaks softly, commandingly.

“Confess to me this time.”

He looks up. His eyes—glassy, haunted, burning—drag slowly up her body. His breath catches. And something inside him snaps like a bowstring pulled too tight.

“I dream of you,” he whispers. “Every night. I wake up soaked in sweat, aching, throbbing for you. I pray, but it does nothing. You’re in my veins now. I want to take you here. On this altar. I want to fck you until my vows are nothing but ash.”

Mara smiles—quiet, dangerous. Like the storm that comes after the church bells stop ringing.

She climbs onto the altar, knees parting, candlelight flickering against her inner thighs.

“Then take me.”

Elijah lunges.

Their mouths crash together, desperate and brutal. He bites her lower lip hard enough to draw blood. She arches into him with a gasp, nails raking down his back, dragging him on top of her.

He thrusts into her with one savage motion, and she cries out, the sound echoing off ancient walls.

The altar groans beneath them, the holy table now defiled, baptized in sweat and sin.

There is no rhythm. Only frenzy.

No control. Only need.

He pounds into her as if trying to fck the thoughts out of his own head. She wraps her legs around him, her head thrown back, moaning his name like a hymn corrupted.

“Harder,” she begs. “Show me how much you want to fall.”

He gives her everything. His body. His ruin. His soul.

And still, it isn’t enough.

He flips her over, taking her from behind as she clings to the altar edge. Her back arches, her cries sharper now—half pain, half ecstasy. She sobs his name and he curses hers, over and over, like they’re the only prayers that matter anymore.

They sin. Over and over.

Again.

And again.

And again.

Until their bodies are shaking. Until sweat drips to the floor like holy water turned sour. Until they collapse in a tangled heap of limbs and labored breath, the only sound left in the church their shared, broken panting.

Later, Elijah lies beside her on the cold stone floor, one arm flung over her waist, eyes closed.

Tears leak from the corners of his eyes.

But they aren’t from shame.

They’re from surrender.

He’s not fighting anymore.

He belongs to her now.

Mara rolls onto her side, brushing her fingers gently over his cheek, her touch almost tender. She kisses him—soft, slow. The kind of kiss you give to someone you don’t intend to let go.

“You’re mine now,” she whispers.

He doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t argue.

He turns to her fully, lips swollen, eyes bloodshot, and gives her the only answer left in him.

“Amen.”