REBEL SAINT Read online

  Contents

  rebel saint

  rights

  description

  dedication

  epigraph

  one

  two

  three

  four

  five

  six

  seven

  eight

  nine

  ten

  eleven

  twelve

  thirteen

  fourteen

  fifteen

  sixteen

  seventeen

  eighteen

  nineteen

  twenty

  twenty-one

  twenty-two

  twenty-three

  twenty-four

  twenty-five

  twenty-six

  twenty-seven

  twenty-eight

  twenty-nine

  thirty

  thirty-one

  thirty-two

  thirty-three

  thirty-four

  thirty-five

  thirty-six

  thirty-seven

  epilogue

  land of the setting sun

  rebel saint playlist

  about adriane

  more from adriane

  acknowledgements

  REBEL SAINT

  By

  Adriane Leigh

  Copyright 2019 by Adriane Leigh

  All names and characters are a work of fiction.

  Please do not replicate or plagiarize art on openalty of perjury.

  Editing: Silently Correcting Your Grammar

  She found herself on the steps of St. Michael’s seeking shelter. What she didn’t expect was temptation so sharp and sweet concealed beneath one snow-white collar.

  He rescued her from rock bottom, desperate people squeezed together by the desperate cracks of life, but their relationship was never innocent. The thinly veiled attraction combustible, magnetism so explosive it rattled the very foundations of their belief.

  But can their unholy love story withstand the fall?

  For the

  rebels and the saints,

  and every nonbeliever

  who found a way to

  believe again.

  Every revolution begins in the heart.

  ONE

  Tressa

  “How much longer until my mommy gets here, Ms. Tressa?”

  I pushed a hand through the chocolate hair of the three-year-old boy at my knee. “We got so much snow last night, the power is still out, Hugo. I bet the traffic is really extra terrible because the stoplights aren’t working.”

  His little shoulders shrugged before he settled back at the table of matchstick cars and blocks where he’d been playing.

  The door crashed open then, a burst of arctic air filling the room, a fine dusting of Philadelphia snow shimmering in Father Bastien’s dark hair. His eyes glinted in the dim light as he ducked under the archway into the rectory and dumped an armful of wood next to the stove.

  “Weatherman says tonight will be colder.” Father Bastien shrugged off his coat, his shoulder brushing mine when he did. I had to control the slow shudder that unfurled within my bloodstream. I’d been lucky to get this job when I’d landed on the steps of St. Michael’s nearly two months ago. I hadn’t stepped inside a church in over a decade, but when life pulled the rug out, St. Michael’s was where I’d found myself.

  Call it divine intervention.

  Or maybe just luck.

  “Is there any way I can be of service here?” Warmth laced his words, driving them like a nail into my skin and causing my fingers to twitch with something I didn’t even want to bring myself to admit.

  “You’ve already done more than enough.” I caught his dark-rimmed eyes just long enough to steal my breath.

  “I’ll light the fire.” One quiet nod, eyes penetrating mine for a brief second before he turned, the crisp cut of his broad shoulders pulling at the seams of his black button-down clerical shirt.

  The thing was, I’d walked into St. Michael’s expecting to find Father Martin.

  Instead, I’d found Bastien Castaneda.

  Father Bastien.

  I watched his broad form across the small room, bent to one knee and loading the kindling into the mouth of the stove. We’d already been suffering this storm for two nights, the furnace out since the first spray of rain froze on the limbs of the trees and took down power lines all over our neighborhood, along with the entire city of Philadelphia.

  Being confined in the winter months was already hard enough, but relying on life without power made it infinitely worse. I’d spent my last two days at the rectory, the fire warm and the food good enough when the small church family banded together. And sweet Hugo, his mom required to go into work at the only service station still open with the help of giant generators.

  This wasn’t the first time we’d been forced to battle Mother Nature, but it was the first time since I’d been back.

  I swallowed down the bite of emotion that tore at my throat when I thought of the state Bastien had found me in, unceremoniously dumped on my ass on the sidewalk, angry tears leaking from my carefully made-up eyelashes.

  The story was complicated, not something I cared to get into again, but even without knowing me from Eve, Father Bastien Castaneda had taken me in. And he’d been in my life every day since then.

  “I was thinking, if you’re not uncomfortable with it—” Bastien locked the door of the wood stove and stood “—you’re welcome to stay here tonight. There’s another bedroom upstairs that never gets used. I don’t even remember the last time I opened the door.”

  I swallowed the ache in my throat, the idea of sleeping under the same roof as this man not something my fragile heart could take.

  He must have taken my silence to mean something because he continued.

  “I’m more than happy to, of course, get the fire going again tonight at your cabin, but I just thought…collectively—” his eyes crossed the homey space of the church’s residence “—we work pretty well together.”

  Oh heaven.

  I swallowed again, pushing my eyelids shut as I nodded. “Right. It’s so much work to ask you to walk through the snow to light my stove when we’re already here and warm, and there’s food.”

  Bastien’s throat cleared, dark-chocolate eyes narrowing a moment before he shifted around me and into the kitchen. “I’m glad you agree.”

  Had I agreed?

  I wasn’t sure about that.

  I wasn’t above YouTubing a video of how to light a wood stove. I was confident I could do it, but the idea of wasting wood with two stoves burning all night felt more than a little indulgent.

  I had worked off of my own stores of wood, but they’d been depleted pretty quickly, and not in my memory had we had an ice storm that killed the power for this long.

  “Hugo! Your mama is here.” Father Bastien crossed the room and flung open the door, ushering her into the house and covering himself in another layer of angel’s dust.

  The godliness of this man was ridiculous.

  “Mommy!” Hugo ran full tilt across the room to greet his mother, wrapping his arms around her legs.

  “Oh, Hugo, I missed you today.” Exhaustion laced her words.

  “We had fun. Hugo even helped me cook and store some meals for parishioners,” I offered positively.

  Her smile widened before she pulled the little boy into her arms. “I’m so proud of you, my beautiful boy.”

  Bastien had already gathered Hugo’s snowsuit, boots, and backpack, helping it on the little boy’s arms as his mom picked up the few toys he’d played with. “Thank you again a million times, Tressa. I don’t know what I would do without you. All these additional shifts are almost killing me, but th
e extra money can’t be beat. And Hugo loves you so much.”

  A smile lit my face. “I love him.”

  I meant it.

  I did.

  I had no idea I loved kids so much, as a matter of fact. That was another thing that St. Michael’s had given me—my passion.

  “You have my number. Text anytime you or Hugo need me.”

  Hugo’s mom, Tracey, mouthed the words thank you again, before locking hands with the little toddler and guiding him out of the side door and to the car.

  The way Bastien guided the tiny family to the safe warmth of the idling four-door sedan made deep corners of my heart swell.

  I tipped my head to the side, watching intently as he opened the back door for Hugo, helping the seat belt around his little body in the car seat.

  The thought struck me that it was too bad a man like Father Bastien would never have children—forbidden from the very dream, when he had so much love to give.

  Maybe that was the thing about a man like Bastien—called to fulfill something greater with all that love and patience overflowing.

  Bastien turned then, catching my eye in the frost-laced window of the kitchen. Wet snowflakes melted into his eyelashes, the quirk of a quick grin appearing before he bowed his head and ducked from my vision.

  He entered the tiny space a moment later.

  I felt him.

  The warmth surrounded him like an invisible curtain, enveloping everyone without really touching them as he crossed their path.

  I pressed my lips closed, containing the sigh on my lips.

  “I can show you the rooms. Each is ready for a guest, with beds made and everything.” His eyes cut across the room to hover on mine.

  “Sure.” I forced a small smile, locking my hands together in front of me as he gestured me out the kitchen door and up the stairs.

  A wave of cold air nearly took the breath out of my lungs when we reached the top landing.

  “Oh.” Bastien pushed a hand through his cropped dark hair, a frown gracing his features.

  “This feels colder than my house.” I scrunched my nose from the extreme chill.

  “It does, doesn’t it?” He breathed a small chuckle, turning and heading back down the stairs. “Unless you want to lose some toes to frostbite, maybe camping out next to the fire would be best.”

  “I don’t really find much use for them, but who am I to argue with evolution,” I teased.

  He laughed, really laughed, then.

  A laugh that I felt down to the tips of my warm toes despite every nerve in my body resisting.

  “So, tell me, has the new pope updated his views on Darwin yet?”

  Amusement swam in his eyes, his focus wandering across my face for long moments.

  Father Bastien did that often.

  Letting his eyes linger while his thoughts ran away.

  I’d give untold stashes of money to be inside his head then, wading through all those saintly thoughts.

  But were they?

  Saintly?

  I didn’t know why Father Bastien fascinated me so much. Maybe it was just his age, the first man I’d seen in a clerical collar who was within roughly ten years of my own. It definitely wasn’t the way his corded muscles stretched the dark fabric of his shirt, or that custom he had of looking you in the eye, listening intently, compelling you to divulge your greatest sins.

  Well, I wouldn’t know about that last part.

  I hadn’t been brave enough to enter a confessional with Father Bastien. In fact, my status as a lapsed Catholic was something of a running joke between us.

  It was weird, the life I’d found myself in, knee-deep in the traditions of a religion I no longer believed in.

  “My—the pope’s—innermost thoughts on things like evolution and the Big Bang might surprise you.” He picked up the small prayer missal that sat on the end table, bathed in dim yellow light.

  “And?” I breathed as he uncapped a small vial of holy oil, dampening the pad of his finger before indicating to me, a familiar gesture from my childhood, one I hadn’t thought about until that moment.

  “Surely my first anointing from the new priest must have some special merit.”

  “Maybe.” His eyes glinted with dark mischief as he started the time-honored ritual. “You really want to peel that onion?”

  “You know I do.”

  “Rebel.” The thick accent on his r vibrated down to my toes as he swept the blessed oil across my forehead.

  His fingers on my skin set off sparks of desire inside me like the grand finale at a Fourth of July show.

  “Saint,” I whispered under my breath, accusatory.

  His grin cracked even further, another layer of the armor he carried every day falling away.

  “I wish more people could see you like this.”

  “This?” He stepped closer.

  “Funny.”

  He grinned, stark-white teeth cutting the warm pink flesh of his lips. “Throwin’ another log on that fire, Tressa?”

  I bit back a lie, knowing he wasn’t talking about the fire at all, rather my relentless jabs at the core of his very life’s vocation.

  “Just waitin’ for you to take the bait one of these days.”

  “I knew you were.” He took two steps closer, shoulder grazing mine before he leaned into my ear and said, “I’ve made it my goal to withhold the very thing you want most.”

  My heart thundered inside my chest as he and his heavenly bubble of radiant warmth moved away, heading to the kitchen where he quietly tipped the lid on a pot bubbling away thanks to the gas-powered stove.

  That was the other bonus of the rectory. My house was much older, in need of countless updates, the electric stove being one of them.

  “Dare it be?” Bastien’s smile deepened. “Tressa speechless?”

  I snagged my bottom lip between my teeth, still begging my heart to quiet its righteous rebellion against the loneliness consuming my chest.

  “This time, Castaneda. This. Time. But it would be a grave mistake to get used to it.”

  TWO

  Tressa

  “Thoughts can weigh more than quicksand if you allow them the room.” The accent in Bastien’s voice curled around the words, my heart strumming along to the tune, regardless of their meaning. “What’s caught your attention, Tressa?”

  I shifted away from him, an attempt to gain some sort of distance from the heat spreading between us.

  I didn’t know if he was feeling it, but I sure was.

  But I couldn’t tell him that, could I?

  “‘Imagine,’ by John Lennon.” I blurted.

  His eyebrows rose, shock registering for just a minute on his face before his bronzed features settled somewhere between human and holy.

  “That song was on the radio before the lights went out the other night. I’ve had it in my head ever since.” I inhaled, wood smoke, leather, and incense invading my senses. Funny, I’d never thought of those three things as so…intoxicating before now. “I was the only kid with Beatles posters on my wall in middle school. The day I graduated seminary, Fidel Castro unveiled a statue of John Lennon in Havana.” I snort-laughed at his admission, it was so unexpected.

  “He praised Lennon and drove out the Jesuits. A rebel and a tyrant, Fidel was. It’s funny, I always thought that statue was a sign that I would go back someday.”

  “Really?” I asked, feeling the tension that seemed ever-present easing slightly.

  Bastien shrugged, the rugged lines of his face anchored in the warm firelight. He was beautiful in a weathered way.

  “I still have plenty of family there. Sometimes I think I could do more good.” His shoulders eased back against the couch. My eyes fluttered closed, heart thundering as I sucked in a soft breath of leathery goodness.

  “You do so much good here—the new day care program alone.” The one that’d been created when I’d shown up on his steps, poorer than a church mouse.

  “The fact is, assignments for clergy
aren’t often more than a few years at a time. It’s usually only by special request, as in the case of Father Martin, that a priest could stay in any one parish for long. The worthy priest is an angel of purity in mind and body, a cherub of light and knowledge, a seraph of love and charity, an apostle of zeal in work and sanctity, a little God on earth in power and authority and patience.” His lips moved melodically as he spoke.

  “‘He is the living image of Christ in this world, of Christ watching, praying, preaching, working, weeping, going from town to town, from village to village, suffering, agonizing, sacrificing himself… He is the light of those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death. He is the converter of sinners, the sanctifier of the just, the strength of the weak, the consolation of the afflicted, the treasure of the poor. He is the confusion of hell, the glory of heaven, the terror of demons, the joy of angels, the ruin of Satan’s kingdom, the establishment of Christ’s empire, and finally, an ornament of the Church.’

  “We recited that before each meal all my years of seminary.” Bastien’s face was soft with peace, but something hollow lingered in the depths of his eyes. “I’ve gotten used to moving for my vocation, but it’s been nearly twenty years since I’ve been home.” His eyes followed licks of red and orange flame that threw embers from the wood stove. “I think I’d like to go back someday.”

  Quiet moments fell softer than the snow outside.

  Far from the palm trees and sandy beaches where he’d grown up.

  I didn’t really think of Father Bastien Castaneda as anything other than a man of God, but I guess, as a man, he had desires framed outside of the Church.

  “You still consider Cuba your home?” I asked.

  He only shrugged. “Homeland, maybe.”

  Silence hung, the air thick as Jack Frost etched up the windows around us. Closing us in. Hiding us.

  “So, Castro was Team Lennon. I was always a Ringo girl myself.”