“Stop,” she whispers, shaking her head. “Don’t—don’t scare me like that.”
“I’m not fucking scaring you. I’m telling you what I saw.”
She swallows hard.
And her mask fractures.
The confident woman who lies easily, who pushes me until I snap, who pretends she’s untouchable—that façade slips right off her bones. What’s left is raw and shaken.
She believed me.
Finally, fucking believed me.
My pulse kicks faster—fury, adrenaline, and a darker edge crowding my veins. Whoever that man was… he wasn’t afraid of being seen. He wanted me to notice. He wanted me to know Pia isn’t running from shadows—
—she’s being hunted by someone willing to walk onto holy ground to get her.
“Stay behind me,” I say.
She doesn’t argue.
That scares me more than the fucking shadow did.
I step forward, scanning the corridor. My senses flare wide, catching everything—the draft whispering along the floor, the tremble of a warped wooden beam, the faint metallic tang of something that doesn’t belong here.
But there’s nothing now.
Only the echo of danger.Only the memory of that silhouette slipping into the dark.Only the knowledge that someone crossed into my sanctuary without hesitation.
Pia touches my arm—barely. A whisper of contact.
But it jolts through me like a brand, sharp and territorial.
“Santino…” she says softly, “who would follow me?”
I turn just enough to catch her eyes.
And I tell her the truth neither of us wants to face.
“Someone who knows exactly who you are.”
Her inhale trembles—fear curling through her like smoke.
“And someone who’s not afraid to break into a church to get to you.”
Her fear turns to ice.My rage turns to fire.And something else coils low inside me—dark, violent, promising retribution.
I take her hand—because I need her close, because I need to keep her alive, because I can feel the threat circling us like a wolf—and pull her deeper into the rectory.
This night is not over.This danger is not over.This obsession between us sure as hell isn’t over.
The storm rattles the stained glass. Thunder rolls like distant artillery. Candle flames bow low, trembling.
And in that trembling light, I understand the most terrifying truth so far:
Whoever is hunting Piawants her badly enoughto walk through God’s houseto take her.
And I will kill him before I let that happen.
