Beautiful Sinner: a standalone forbidden romance (Beautiful Series)

BRIDGET CHOSE to come with me to take my mom to the airport in Shannon a week after she arrived. We never talked about what happened when she caught me with Callum that night after the pub. He also never came back to the house after that. Not even to eat. Not even to work.

I tried to put him out of my mind, but as I help my mom with her luggage at the airport, I feel her unspoken words in the last few minutes we have together. On one hand, I hate that her harsh conversation about my flippant decision to stay ruined most of her visit. I just haven’t felt like myself since. All I can think is that no matter what I choose will be the wrong decision. How do you follow your heart when you can’t trust it?

Bridget stays in the car while I walk my mother in. We have a few moments, so we sit down to have a quick cup of coffee, and I feel her hand reach for mine over the cafe table in the airport.

“Relax, baby.”

My eyes lift to find hers, and I shrug off her words like they have no impact. “I’m fine.”

“Cadence, I’ve known you for twenty-four years. I’ve never seen you so confused in my life.”

A heavy sigh releases in my chest. “I just feel like I can’t stop fucking up.”

She does something I don’t expect. She laughs. “Oh, Cadence. Everyone fucks up. Especially at twenty-four.”

“I don’t want to come home.” I force the words out because I’m afraid she’ll be disappointed by them.

“Then don’t.”

“Am I stupid for staying for him?” Tears start to prick around the edges of my eyes, and I have to clench my teeth to stop them from falling.

“No, but I want to see you do something for yourself, Cadence. You’re always doing so much for others. You spent your whole childhood taking care of me and your sister. Your relationship with men has always been about meeting their expectations, but what about yours? If you stay for him, what is he going to do for you?”

A few minutes pass in silence while I let her words sink in. Then, they make a call over the loudspeaker for her flight, and we both stand.

As I hug my mother goodbye, she squeezes me tighter than normal and whispers in my ear, “I love you.”

On the drive back to the house, my mind continues reeling, thinking about what my mother said, about taking what I want in life without thinking what other people want. When was the last time I took something for myself? I went on this trip in the first place for myself, didn’t I?

It was the first time in my life that my sister and my mother didn’t need me. Sunny was off in honeymoon bliss and Mom had just gotten out of rehab, finally standing on her own two feet. No one needed me. I remember the exact moment that I panicked and did the first insane thing I could think of. I booked a trip across Europe, and I was so desperate to be something to somebody, I was practically an open target for Clint and his friends. They made themselves rich on my insecurities, and now I’m afraid I’m doing the same thing all over again.

Is Callum taking advantage of me? Is this thing between us what he wants or what I want?

My heart answers with a deafening thump: this is what I want. I want him so bad, more than I’ve wanted anyone. So much sometimes I feel like I could die from this wanting.

I want that oozing confidence of his when he’s talking about God behind the altar, offering me a world I never thought was available to me. I want the deep tone and the sweet accent in his voice. I want those emerald eyes to be mine.

And I want his body. I want to live in the quiet world we create when we touch, finding pleasure in each other’s bodies. We haven’t even had sex, and I know that he has ruined me for other men. With one touch, he made me his.

For so long I’ve chased boys who seemed like the pretty package, and I never bothered to look deeper. It’s not about Callum’s looks; it’s the way he looks at me that makes my stomach flutter and my toes curl. He challenges me, gives me confidence, shows me what I can really do, and never doubts me. Not anymore.

I want him. There is no question, no doubt, not anymore.

When we get back to the house, I check for him again, but his room remains untouched and empty like the last six days. We didn’t have any check-ins today, but we have a full house tomorrow, so we both get to work prepping the rooms and the food. It’s a grueling work day, and neither of us talk much. I can tell that Callum’s absence is weighing on Bridget too, but she doesn’t dare ask me about it. Maybe it’s too uncomfortable. Maybe she’s mad at me. I can’t tell, and I don’t bother asking.

It’s past midnight by the time I call it a night and head upstairs. After a hot shower to wash off the sweat and weight of the day—hell, the whole week, I walk back to my room in my pajamas. I don’t even make it to my bed before I realize that I can’t do this anymore. There is no fucking way I’m going to crawl into my bed and wake up in another day without expressing the thoughts that have been screaming in my head.

Tonight, I feel the conviction, but tomorrow it could be gone. Slipping on my work boots, I tip-toe out of the house. Walking in the dead of night in nothing but my skimpy PJ shorts and tank top was a dumb idea. People spill out from the pubs as I walk, and I hear their calls, but I ignore them.

What the hell am I doing? How the fuck did I get here? Chasing after the man I love into a church and not a bar?

When I reach the church, shivering from the chilly night air, I realize that I have no fucking clue where his rectory is. I’ve only ever been in the front entrance and his office in the back. I figure there’s no better place to go than in, so I pull open the heavy doors and am suddenly greeted by dim candlelight and eerie silence.

My heavy boots scuff against the floor echoing through the church as I walk down the aisle toward the empty pews. There’s something about this place and the feeling I get whenever I’m inside. It’s an overwhelming feeling of being alone and not alone at the same time. At peace, safe, comfortable.

This is my competition. This is what Callum loves about this place, about God, about everything he’s willing to give me up for. How can I possibly compete with this? Me? The girl with a body count too embarrassing to even utter, the queen of mistakes, the girl who was once so popular for all the wrong reasons. I’ve committed sins Callum doesn’t even know about, sins he may never be able to overlook. How could I possibly ask him to give any of this up for me?

Suddenly, I find myself sitting in the pew, and before I know it, I’m praying. I’ve never prayed before, so I’m probably not even doing it right, but I whisper to God as if he can hear me.

“How do I compete with You? If providence is real, then You brought me here for a reason. Am I being punished? Is this my penance for what I did? Even if it is, I’m not going to just give up. I know what I’m up against, and I’m willing to fight for him. I thought I loved so many men before, but it never felt like this. And now I think he feels the same about me, and what if he’s the only one who ever will. You can’t blame me for fighting for this.”

I don’t know how long I sit there before a light comes on from down the hallway.

“Cadence?” He’s standing on the other side of the room in a black T-shirt and black pants. His hair is disheveled, and there are heavy bags under his eyes. He looks like shit, and for some reason it makes me happy to see it. My heart nearly bursts at the sight of him.

Quickly, I stand. All of the words that I had prepared for this moment have vaporized in his presence. Judging by the look on his face, he doesn’t want to speak either.

In just a few long strides, he’s standing right in front of me, and I barely have a moment to register anything before his lips are on mine. The kiss is ravenous and desperate. It’s vindication. It’s everything we’ve been hiding and torturing ourselves with for so long.

His lips devour me, trailing down to my neck, my shoulder. His moans are hungry and soon they turn into words. “I’m sorry,” he mutters over and over as he worships my body with his mouth.

Instead of melting under his touch, I meet his passion, and kiss him back with every ounce of fight I have in me. I can hardly breathe as he picks me up, wrapping my legs around his waist. The world tips and turns and I don’t know which way is up until I see the ceiling and realize I’m on my back on the stone floor. It would be cold if my body wasn’t suddenly made of fire.

Every fiber of my being needs him, and I recognize the same need in him. Desperately, I pull up the fabric of his shirt and he shrugs out of it quickly. His soft skin in my hands makes me want to weep. My fingers cascade across the muscles in his arms and around his shoulders.

“I need you,” I whisper to him as I lift my mouth to his chest.

“I’m here,” he answers, taking my lips with his.

My shirt comes off and next my shorts so that I am bare on the floor for him. The only thing between us are his pants, so I break the kiss and look him in the eyes. I don’t need to say a word because he knows. I won’t reach for his pants. I won’t be the one who makes that move. It has to be his choice, and he does not hesitate.

The sound of his buckle clinking in the silence of this midnight mass will be a sound stored in my memory forever. It is the moment he lets himself go in the current pulling us both away. It tore me from shore a long time ago, but now it’s his turn.

He sits up to pull his pants down, and then it’s just us. Our naked bodies on the floor, no longer guided by lust but by something stronger.

I feel the head of him against my core, and I hold my breath, my eyes not leaving his. He enters me with a force that makes me gasp and want to scream. Once he’s buried inside of me, we melt together. My legs wrap around him and his spine curls around me, his head buried in my neck. For a moment we stay still, enjoying this first bonding our bodies, like it’s some ancient ritual.

He groans into my skin, and I know the Callum that holds back and plays it safe is gone. The Callum I know, the one who takes and commands and doesn’t apologize is about to take over, and my body pulses in anticipation.

Sitting up he looks down at me, pressing one long kiss on my lips just before he rears back and slams into me again. This time I can’t hold back the cry that slips out.

He does it again and again, keeping his eyes on me the whole time. I don’t bother keeping it quiet anymore. When he pulls my leg over his shoulder, I almost fall apart. My moans of pleasure vibrate across the walls of this church set to the perfect rhythm of his heavy grunts.

His hands grab my hips as he rockets his body against me, building speed and momentum. My back slides against the floor, and he yanks me back, slamming himself even deeper.

I grab helplessly onto his arms as my body teases me with a climax. It’s like I’m overwhelmed with every sensation that when his fingers find my clit through the frenzy of it all, it breaks down the wall between us.

“Come for me, baby,” he growls, and I do. I am shattered into pieces on the floor, in more bliss than I ever thought possible. My cries are muffled by his mouth as he crashes his body onto mine, losing himself in his own orgasm, his cock pulsing inside me.

I don’t stop kissing him, and he doesn’t stop kissing me.

When he finally does pull out, it feels like the first time my body has been without his in a lifetime. Like him fucking me was the most natural thing in the world.

“Let’s not speak yet, okay?” he whispers against my mouth, and I nod. I know exactly what he’s asking, and I feel the same way. Tonight we just want to be together. We don’t have to work through anything or worry. We can just be us, as we are.

I wake up to his movements in the bed before the sunrise. He’s sitting up with his feet on the floor, and I can barely make out his form in the darkness.

A nervous feeling slides through my body as I wake. What if he regrets what we did? He’s already retreating away from me. I reach for him, my fingers a breeze on his back.

When he turns toward me, I can make out the familiar cold expression on his face. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“Where are you going?” When I hear myself, all of my internal cautions start going off at the same time. Don’t be needy, Cadence. Don’t start acting like you do with all the guys. This one is different.

He quiets my worries when he lays back down and presses his lips to my forehead. “I thought I could sneak back to the house and get you some clothes so you don’t have to go home in whatever that was.”

“They’re called pajamas.” I cuddle my body against his as his arms envelope me.

“I think I’d call them knickers and certainly not something you should have been walking around town in at one o’clock in the morning.”

I laugh with my face pressed against his chest. “Knickers.”

“You think that’s funny?” He gently pinches my side and I squirm, laughing harder until our limbs are tangled, and I feel him growing more and more aroused against my body.

We did it two more times last night after running back to his rectory, which to my surprise, looks a lot like a bachelor pad. No decorations, no fancy furniture. There’s not even a TV. Just a small kitchen, an even smaller bathroom, and a bed.

Before I know it, our gentle laughter turns into heavy breathing and I’m on my stomach. I hum into his pillow as he kisses every vertebrae down my back. When he lifts my hips, I’m already wet for him and he slides in easily. We groan in unison.

This feeling of being one with him is enough for me. Before Callum, sex was something I did to please whoever I was with. It was what they wanted of me. But with Callum, it’s so much more. It’s pleasure and connection. It’s rough and beautiful.

My hands grip the bed sheets as I wait for him to take over. I’ve already memorized his rhythm.

With a tight hold of my hips, he fucks me hard until I’m practically lifted off the bed and coming with the force. Just as my climax hits, he lifts my body so I’m flush against him and he pinches my clit until I’m splintered in two, undone with ecstasy.

We collapse together on the mattress. He pulls me onto his chest as the morning sun starts to creep into the space through the two small windows. It gently illuminates the golden cross hanging on the wall across the room.

“Do you feel bad?” I whisper. We haven’t spoken much at all since I showed up last night, and with the new day dawning outside, it feels impossible to avoid the difficult conversations.

He shifts uncomfortably. “No. Do you?”

I laugh. “Why would I feel bad? I’m not married to God.”

With a scoff, he shakes his head. “It’s not like that, Cadence.”

I love hearing his voice again, our stubborn conversations, and mostly I just want this back, this friendly back and forth we used to enjoy before everything got so heavy.

“What’s it like then?”

“It’s more like a commitment to serve my congregation. I’m bound to this church because it’s my calling. It’s not about sex, really. It’s about devotion. I can’t devote myself to anything or anyone else because this is my duty.”

When he describes it, I find myself even more attracted to him. Callum doesn’t do anything with half of his heart. He serves with everything he has, and knowing I get a sliver of that passion fulfills me.

But that one part doesn’t sit well with me. He can’t devote himself to anything or anyone else. It stings.

“I’m not asking you to devote yourself to me.” It hurts to say it, but it’s true. I want any part of him, even if it’s not all of him.

His eyes find mine, and there’s a hint of remorse in them. His lips flinch like he’s holding back something he wants to say.

“It’s not fair of me to ask for your devotion, Cadence. I can’t ask you to stay.”

“I’m staying.” Even as my answer comes out, I realize it’s the most sure I’ve ever been. “No one meant for this to happen, Callum. You have a responsibility here, and I don’t want to take that away from you, so I’ll stay. I’ll take as much of you as you have to spare, but my heart won’t let me go back to Pineridge.”

His fingers softly brush the hair out of my face as he pulls his face down to mine. When his lips brush against mine, I feel like my heart is about to burst out of my chest.

What my mom said was true; I do give too much to others, but she doesn’t understand that this is what I want. More than anything in the world, I want to give myself to someone who makes me feel loved. Callum does that. I’ve made mistakes in the past, and I know what they feel like. This doesn’t feel like a mistake. It feels like providence.