Lessons in Sin

by Pam Godwin

  “Tinsley.” I held her on my lap and gripped the soggy cardboard. “Give me the box.”

  “No.” Her head shook rapidly, her gaze waterlogged and devastated. “I can’t.”

  “You can.” I injected steel in my voice. “Do as you’re told.”

  Her fingers sprung open, releasing the shoebox, and a sob tore from her throat.

  “Good girl.” I set it aside and pulled her against my chest.

  She was so small, her lissome limbs curled into a ball on my lap, her head tucked beneath my chin. We needed towels, dry clothes, but that would require going back out in the rain.

  So I gave her my body heat and removed the phone from my pocket. After sending off a few quick texts, I set the device aside. Then, under the guise of keeping her warm, I gave into the urge to touch her.

  Slowly, agonizingly, I circled my palm across the silky wet skin of her thigh, torturing myself. If I wandered a few inches higher, I would reach heaven.

  She’d gifted me a clear, unhampered view of her glistening slit this afternoon. With her bare ass perched in the air and the belt she’d so naughtily earned leaving stripes of angry red flesh, I applauded myself for not impaling her from end to end.

  But I wasn’t a saint. In fact, I was still reeling from the hungry, violent sensations that had thrashed through every nerve in my body. She’d left my classroom, but not my mind. Not for a single moment. And now, with her irresistible backside pressed against my swelling cock, I felt sex-crazed and out of control.

  I wanted to see her welts. I wanted to feel them, bite them, and add more.

  So rather than offering up prayers for her emotional pain, I offered up my hand beneath her skirt and fantasized about spreading her wide and spearing her virgin holes. She would beg me to stop, which would only make me fuck her harder, more viciously, until she begged me to make her come. If she took it like a good girl, I would—

  “Magnus?” She shifted, deliberately pressing down on my erection as she squinted at me, her lips a grim slash of accusation. “You’re not thinking about my opossums.”

  This gorgeous woman. Always calling me out on my shit. Even when she was grief-stricken.

  “No.” With a groan, I gripped her hips and dragged her against my hardness. “I’m a wretched man.”

  “The worst.” She dashed a hand against her wet cheek, her eyes swimming with pain.

  I stilled, and my toes flexed in my wet sneakers. I needed her off my lap so I could comfort her appropriately.

  “Oh, Magnus.” A sob escaped her. “It hurts so much.”

  She shivered in her wet clothes, watching me with hurt in her eyes. Making my chest implode. Christ Almighty, I would cut off both my arms if it would take her pain away.

  “What do you need, Tinsley?” I touched my thumb to her cheek and traced the path of her tears. “Tell me.”

  “I need…” Her throat worked as she bravely tried to contain her emotion. “Oh God, this is hard for me to admit.”

  She was a magnetic force, the pull to her unstoppable.

  My entire being drifted closer, my hands to the back of her head, my lips to her quivering jaw. “Trust me.”

  “I—”

  “Trust me.”

  “What I really need is…” She released a tremulous sigh, rested a palm on my chest, and met my gaze. “You. The way you are in this moment. I feel like it’s okay to be sad with you, like I can let down my guard in your arms.”

  Every intake of oxygen carried the scent of lemon from her skin. It scrambled all reasonable thought, leaving me unbalanced and aching for the one thing I couldn’t have.

  It was dangerous enough to crave the things I did. But to crave them with Tinsley? I couldn’t.

  She shouldn’t ever let her guard down with me. Especially not with those tears tracking down her face.

  Need shimmered through me, possessing me like a seductive demon. My lips gravitated to her cheek, sipping the salty moisture, tasting her grief, and offering the only comfort I knew how to give.

  My mouth didn’t usually deliver pleasure, but I knew how to kiss a woman into mindlessness.

  Angling my head, I grazed my breath across her cheekbone. Ran my tongue over the curve of her earlobe. Nipped along her graceful jaw. Lingered at the corner of her full pouty lips.

  “Whimper for me.” My command hovered on that almost-kiss, dancing from my tongue to hers.

  She swallowed, whimpered, and parted her lips a hair’s breadth from mine.

  Exhales chasing inhales, we breathed together, suspended in the space between a kiss and not-kiss. I only needed to ease a millimeter closer, and I could take her, devour her, and never let her come up for air.

  Her huge eyes watched me, her body canting, trying to claim my mouth.

  I gripped her hair, stalling her movements. Reminding her I was the one in control.

  She lifted her hand from my chest. With her mouth so close, I shut my eyes, willing her to touch me again, even the slightest, most innocent contact. I ached for it. But none came, and when I opened my eyes, she was staring at the shoebox.

  “Will you bury them?” Her gaze flitted to mine, seeking.

  “Yeah.” I couldn’t picture myself doing such a thing, but for her, I would do anything. “Yes.”

  “Thank you.” She cupped my face, her expression overflowing with gratefulness.

  As she leaned toward me again, I caught her throat in a warning grip, warding her off. Fighting with myself.

  “Tinsley.” I grasped the last threads of my sanity. “We can’t.”

  “I know.”

  The door opened, and we flew apart.

  She tumbled into the pew as I stood, turning toward the entrance. I knew we were going to have company. I’d texted the groundskeeper when I carried Tinsley in here.

  Then I’d lost all my brain cells.

  Felix lumbered in, wearing a heavy raincoat and carrying a duffel bag.

  He was one of those old men who lived in denim overalls and jumped at the chance to help anyone in need. He was the first person I’d hired nine years ago.

  Over the past six weeks, he’d kept an eye on Tinsley and her wild companions, watching the opossums for signs of rabies and other diseases.

  In my text, I’d given him a heads-up on the shoebox and asked that he collect it and bring blankets or towels.

  “Father Magnus,” he said in greeting and gave Tinsley a soft smile. “Miss Constantine.” He set the bag down beside the front row and lifted the lid on the box, peeking inside. “Oh, dear. This must’ve been an awful thing to find. I’m sorry for that.”

  Nodding jerkily, she pressed a hand to her mouth and looked away.

  “Here’s the thing, Miss Constantine.” Felix unzipped the duffel and removed a wooden box. “I found these out in the rain near the north wall.”

  He lifted a hinged door on the top, and two white faces instantly popped out.

  My chin jerked back.

  She gasped and flew off the pew as the young opossums scurried from the box. Swooping them up in her arms, she laughed, a gloriously musical sound that coursed warmth through my chest.

  The opossums climbed to her shoulders and clung from her wet hair, leaving no doubt that these were the critters she called Jaden and Willow.

  A shocking amount of relief settled over me as I met Felix’s cloudy eyes.

  “I have a theory, Father.” He handed over the duffel bag and grabbed the shoebox, tucking it under his arm. “But you’re not going to like it.”

  “I’m listening.” I removed a blanket from the bag and draped it over Tinsley’s shoulders.

  Her gaze stayed with the opossums, but I knew she was listening, too.

  “There’s been a lot of roadkill between here and the neighboring towns. Lots of opossums.” He stared at his wet boots and grimaced. “Seeing how it’s Monday and the students had visitors over the weekend, it’s an easy assumption that someone collected what’s in this shoebox and brought it onto the campu
s. Looks to me like these”—he tapped the shoebox—“were hit by a car.”

  “I know who put it in my room.” Tinsley growled in her throat. Hot-tempered without being vindictive. Soft and fierce and elfish. Enchanting.

  “We’ll talk about it when I do a full investigation.” I turned to Felix. “You found her opossums near the north wall?”

  “Yeah. They’re trying to get out but don’t know how to breach the electric fence. Opossums are travelers, never sticking around the same place too long. I know you’ve grown attached, Miss Constantine, but we can’t keep them here.”

  “I know.” She gently stroked the creatures, smiling.

  I’d never seen her demeanor in such a state of calm serenity. I didn’t want to chance another death with those animals and watch her go through what she’d suffered tonight.

  “Do you think they’d be safe in Cypress Lake State Park?” I asked Felix.

  “That’s where I would take them. It’s far enough away from the main roads. They’ll head into the mountains.”

  “Thanks for your help, Felix.”

  He wished us goodnight and left the church with the shoebox.

  I met Tinsley’s eyes. “You up for a drive?”

  She returned a look of surprise.

  I’d never taken a student off the property. Her mother expressly forbade it, and the rulebook stated that no student could leave without approval.

  Since I was that approval and Caroline had put her in my charge, all else was moot.

  “Yes.” She grinned mischievously. “I’d love that.”

  CHAPTER 18

  MAGNUS

  By the time we stepped outside, the storm had moved on, leaving a frigid chill in the air that would work well to clear my head.

  Carrying the blankets, I led Tinsley to my car. An old base-model sedan. No options. The lowest of the low. Nothing like the luxury cars I’d owned in New York.

  The tin box was perfect for me.

  She didn’t spare it a glance as she slid into the front seat. The opossums absorbed her full attention.

  During the drive, she petted and played with their ears and tails. I left her to it, knowing these were her final moments with them.

  Twenty minutes later, I parked along the gravel path that led to the entrance of the state park.

  “Ready?” I twisted in the dark to face her.

  She stared down at the animals on her lap. Her chest lifted with a heavy inhale, but she didn’t cry. Instead, she nodded, and a tiny smile twitched at the corner of her mouth.

  Wrapped in blankets and escorted by the moonlight, we stepped onto the path in our soggy shoes and icy clothes. My breath formed puffs of white vapor, and my fingers were so cold they’d gone numb. But I was at ease. Unburdened. Peaceful.

  This deep, genuine sense of happiness was new to me. I couldn’t remember ever feeling so content.

  It had everything to do with her.

  In the space of six weeks, she’d become a coveted presence. I eagerly awaited every word from her mouth. Looked forward to seeing the ferocity in her eyes. Counted down the seconds until she punched back with another witty retort.

  As she lowered the opossums to the ground and coaxed them into the woods, I realized this was the side of her I cherished the most.

  With her guard down and her soft underbelly exposed, she was an angel beyond her astral form. Her power came from her inner grace and compassion. When she wasn’t trying to raise hell in my classroom, she was innately, wholly, profoundly pure of heart.

  Where I was a cold and empty house of bones, she was a vast meadow aglow with lemon-scented blooms and honeybees.

  She was everything I wasn’t.

  I’d never been so taken with a woman, and it unnerved the hell out of me. She was smart and strong and willful enough to pierce my exterior. Hell, she was the only woman who might understand me and accept me for who I was.

  I feared that for her.

  I meant what I’d told her. I wouldn’t be able to stop this. But to protect her from me, I was going to damn well fucking try.

  As the opossums set off into the darkness, she stood beside me, watching them fade away. She blew a kiss, a little wave, and tilting her face to the night sky, she released a joyous laugh.

  A much better send-off than a shoebox and burial mound.

  I gave her the time she needed, standing silently at her side and absorbing her beauty in my periphery. We hugged the blankets around our shoulders, our arms brushing, hers shaking with the cold. Without thought, I pulled her against me, chest to chest, enveloping her in fleece and body heat.

  She rested her cheek against me and sighed. My body hardened. Our hips pulled together. Her soft, pearl-colored hair tickled my throat. I wasn’t wearing my collar.

  This was a bad idea.

  She snaked her arms under the blankets and wound them around my back. “Confession time.”

  “We already did that today.”

  “This isn’t a sin. It’s more of an admission.”

  “I don’t want to hear it.”

  “Too bad. I know who left the carnage in my room, and when you punish her…” She made a groaning sound. “This is hard for me to say.”

  I bit back a smile, knowing what would come out of her mouth.

  “I don’t want you to whip her.” She stared up at me through her lashes. “Or spank her or look under her skirt or—”

  “Tinsley—”

  “—touch her in any way. Mostly, I don’t want you to be with her the way you were with me today.” She propped her chin on my chest, her gaze never leaving mine. “I have no right to ask this of you, and hearing it out loud sounds so petty and inappropriately jealous. I swear, Magnus, I’m not going to make any more moves on you. Except for maybe hugs.” She tightened her arms around me. “This is nice. But I’m not going to come to class without underwear or try to sleep with you or anything like that again.”

  I waited for the relief to hit, but it didn’t come. “Does this mean you’ll behave in my classroom? No more backtalk or disrespect?”

  “What?” She reared her head back, snorting. “Let’s not go crazy here. I’m still going to make your life a living hell.”

  Impossible. Every second with her was unexpected and challenging and pure bliss.

  “I won’t give up on my one great passion.” She shifted her weight, inadvertently rubbing against the fly of my jeans. “But while I’m removing you as part of my plot against my mother, I don’t want…” Her lips parted as she searched my face. “Damn, why do you have to be so exasperatingly gorgeous?”

  I had that very thought about her every second of every day.

  “What I’m trying to say…” She blinked and sucked in a breath, abdomen tight. “Nevada has a massive hard-on for you, and I don’t want you to reward what she did to me tonight by lifting her skirt and—”

  “Shut up,” I murmured, watching her plump lips roll in and push out, wrestling with her silence. “I’ve only ever taken a strap to three students, and in all three cases, I felt nothing. No anger, no frustration, no interest outside of a professional capacity.”

  Her eyes flickered as she absorbed my words. “You felt anger with me.”

  “I feel everything with you.”

  Dear God, I couldn’t suppress this fixation, couldn’t pretend my attraction to her didn’t weaken my promise to God when, at soul level, I wanted this heavenly creature with every filthy breath in my body.

  The moonlight lit up her hair in unearthly hues of glimmering white. Her beauty was elegantly delicate and airy in a way that seemed too perfect for this world.

  But it was her perceptive, intelligent gaze that reached into my carefully constructed existence and shredded my control. I couldn’t remember my name when she looked at me like this. Like she saw me—the man, the sinner, the murderer—and accepted what she saw.

  My lips separated on all the words that wouldn’t come.

  We can’t.

  You’
re my student.

  I’m twice your age.

  You’re a Constantine.

  I’m a priest.

  I’ll hurt you.

  I’ll kill you.

  All the reasons, all the logic and truth and sanity, slipped through my fingers as she lifted on her toes and stared at my mouth. There was nothing but the rapid thud of my heart, the timorous tumble of her breaths, and the temptation of her forbidden lips.

  My hand went to her neck, fingers curling, restraining. I dipped my head, weightless, gasping for air and finding none. Until her sweet exhalation misted over my lips, teasing me with the taste of sin.

  The scrape of my shoes kicked up gravel. My heart hammered. The blanket fell from my shoulders, and there, in the cloak of night, I stole a forbidden kiss from an angel.

  I didn’t just kiss her. I consumed her, possessed her—or she possessed me, this tiny elven goddess, meeting the lashes of my tongue, lick for lick, in a frantic, voracious rhythm that made my balls draw up tight and perspiration bead across my skin.

  Nine years.

  I hadn’t touched a woman, smelled, tasted, or kissed a woman in nine years. The heat from her lips was staggering, the honeyed flavor of her tongue more sinful than I could’ve ever fathomed.

  The sweetest heaven.

  My heaven, my salvation—neither of which I deserved.

  The lemony scent of her sank into my lungs as I took and took, and she had no choice but to be taken. She was my charge after all. Mine to instruct. Mine to discipline.

  Mine.

  I kissed her with all the pent-up hunger of the last six weeks. She echoed my intensity, stroking my lips and tongue with eager, impish caresses as though my mouth held what she most needed to exist. I wanted to give it to her, and I did. With a palm on one of her bottom cheeks, I squeezed the firm curve of it, punishing her sensitized welts.

  Her moan shuddered through the night. Her kiss shuddered through me, and my brain stopped functioning. We could’ve been the last humans in the world, for all I felt was her.

  Just her, the woman who made me so painfully hard, and the cocoon of darkness that was our freedom from the outside world.

  I ground my cock against her, telling her with my body what I should never again demand with words. I wanted her innocence, her pleasure, her pain. I wanted her completely, no matter how wrong.