Maria gasped, her eyes slamming open and a familiar sight greeting her. Her heart was racing in a heady rhythm as her gaze clashed with the golden stare she had come to adore. She looked down; in her hands was a bouquet of white roses.
She was in the coffin.
She was lying in the coffin, but—
“I’m alive,” she whispered, her voice hoarse from where Raphael had choked her with her hair. He had choked her. She had watched the pleasure on his face as he had wrapped her hair around her neck and made love to her so sweetly as he drained her life.
Raphael was watching her. His cheeks were flushed and his eyes were bright. No, not bright. They were shining with . . . tears . . .
A lump clogged her throat. “I’m alive,” she whispered again. She moved her legs just to be sure she still could. Raphael leaned over the coffin and ran his finger down her cheek. Maria’s eyes closed at the soft feel. “I’m still alive,” she repeated and felt her chest lighten.
When she opened her eyes, Raphael lifted her from the coffin, the white roses she was holding falling to the silk beneath her. Maria watched the bouquet drop, the symbol of death no longer in her hands.
Raphael laid her on the bed and climbed over her. Placing his hands on her face, he crashed his mouth to hers. When he drew back, he said, “You’re mine. You’re mine, and you’re never leaving me. Ever.” His jaw was clenched as his eyes locked on hers. “You’ll be with me every day and never leave my side. You’ll live with me. You’ll bathe with me. We’ll fuck and we’ll never part.”
Despite his harshly spoken words, Maria felt the shaking of his hands on her face, heard the tremor of fear in his voice. She cupped his cheeks, then moved one of her hands to lie over his heart. “I love you too, my lord.” Raphael stilled, and his eyes flared. “I love you with my whole heart . . . my Raphael.”
Raphael exhaled a quick breath, and he kissed her again. His hands tangled in her hair. When he pulled away, Maria’s lips felt bruised. She pushed a falling strand of his messy hair from his forehead. “You didn’t kill me.”
Raphael glanced away, then put his hand on his chest. His forehead pulled down. He appeared confused. “When you were dying . . . when your eyes closed, I knew I would never hear your voice again.” He swallowed, and Maria held her breath. He took her hand in his and stared at their entwined fingers. “When I knew I wouldn’t feel you holding my hand, or sleeping beside me, hand on my chest, or have you in the bath with me, or in the rose garden—”
“Shh,” Maria soothed when his breathing became erratic.
Raphael sighed. “I wanted you to live.” Maria’s heart expanded in her chest, so big that it ached. “I wanted you beside me, alive. Kissing me, holding me . . . I need to fuck you, to wash and dry your hair.”
Maria laughed with happiness, and tears began to track down her cheeks. Raphael wiped the tears from her face. “Why are you crying?”
“Why are you?” she asked, smoothing a single tear from his cheek. Raphael reached for his cheek and looked at the teardrop in confusion.
She loved him. Maria loved Raphael more than she could ever have believed possible. Her bones ached with the need for this man, this incredibly lost and broken man . . . the man who had captured her heart and made it his own, his possession.
And she had his.
“You’re never leaving me,” he said.
Maria felt the order clamp around her heart, anchoring it to his soul. Holding his hand as tightly as she could, she replied, “Yes, my lord.” Raphael awarded her submission with the most blinding smile he had ever given her, which lit her body like a firework on the fourth of July.
“My little rose.” He ran his nose down her cheek and tucked his head into her neck. Lifting his head, he said, “You can’t ever die. I won’t allow it.”
Maria laughed, and kissed the man she loved. As they kissed and Raphael slipped inside her, no cage to cause him pain, she knew she was home. Maria knew, beyond all doubt, that she was saved five years ago to be here with Raphael. To heal his heart with love and walk by his side.
She wasn’t naïve. She knew he would still kill. She knew that was what he needed and who he was. But sex and death would no longer be intertwined. So she would love him. She would love him as no one had ever loved another before.
She would be the saint to his sinner.
The light to his dark.
The chastity to his lust.
But most importantly, she would love him and he would love her. They would heal the fissures of pain in their hearts.
And they would never let each other go.
*****
Maria knocked on the door to Gabriel’s punishment room. Raphael slept, exhausted by the day. Maria would join him soon, but there was something else she needed to do. She opened the door to see Gabriel huddled by the fire, blood spattered around him as he lay in a fetal position on the stone floor.
Gabriel hadn’t heard her. His naked body was covered in lash marks and blood. Cilices were tight around his thighs, the muscles around the blades twitching. Maria spotted his robe on a hook, so she took it and laid it over him. As the fabric touched his body, Gabriel jerked his eyes open. Pained blue eyes locked on Maria. Unfocused at first, he blinked, and his face turned paler than it already was. “Maria,” he said hoarsely, and his eyes squeezed together in pain. “You’ve come to haunt me. To taunt me for my sin.” Gabriel’s tears tracked through the sweat and blood stains on his cheeks. “Your spirit has come to plague me for letting you die.”
Maria’s heart filled with such sadness it was debilitating. She crouched down so she was level with his face. “I’m alive, Gabriel.”
He laughed without mirth. “I’m dreaming. Hallucinating. I’ve pushed myself too far.”
Maria squeezed his hand. “He spared me, Gabriel.” Gabriel seemed to stop breathing. “He couldn’t kill me.” The sadness in Maria’s heart was smothered by the blinding love she felt for Raphael. Every second she was away from his side, she yearned to be near him. He was her soul. He was her savior. He was now her sole reason for living.
Gabriel blinked, then sat up. Maria turned as he pulled on the robe. “He . . . saved you?” Maria smiled. Gabriel’s face filled with disbelief, then something like understanding settled in his haunted eyes. “He loves you.”
Maria nodded. “And I him. So much and so fiercely.” Maria laid her hand over her heart. “I never knew it was possible to love someone so much. He is my heartbeat and I am his. I was sent here for him. I was saved from William Bridge because somewhere in the world there was a young boy who was suffering in an underground hell, just waiting for my love to heal him.”
Gabriel shook his head. “I don’t . . . I don’t believe it. I never thought him capable of love. Any of my brothers.”
Maria sat down on the chair. Gabriel stayed on the floor, too sick to move. “Gabriel.” He looked her way. “I believe that is not the only reason I was saved.”
Gabriel frowned. “What do you mean?”
Maria shuffled to the end of the seat. “I was taken by a serial killer at the age of sixteen. Now, in my twenties, I have fallen in love with one. I understand them, Gabriel.” She knew that was true. Sinners needed love too. They needed people to care for them and believe in them and help them from the depths of darkness that evil could drag them down to. Maria felt a strong calling deep in her soul. Everything she had been through was now explained. “And Gabriel, you have borne this burden too long on your own.” Maria regarded Gabriel sadly, nodding toward his wounds. “I believe I was sent here to help you too. A fellow person of God to help aid your tired soul.” Gabriel opened his mouth as if to argue. “I believe in your cause. In what you have your brothers doing—ridding the world of evil and sinful killers.”
“I can’t damn your soul, Maria. I can’t . . .” Gabriel shook his head.
“It’s not on you to make that decision, Gabriel. Raphael has asked me to live with him. He is my one true love, and I will be here. And I want to help you too.”
“I can’t, I—”
Maria took hold of Gabriel’s hand. “Release some of the responsibility to me, Gabriel. Let me help you. Let me assist. I know, in my gut, that this is my calling. I believe God sent me here, to the manor. I am strong, Father Gabriel. I can do this.”
Gabriel stared at Maria, then stared into the fire. “It’s not an easy life.”
Maria sighed. “Nothing about my life has been easy, Gabriel. I am war-torn, but I am strong and now have Raphael by my side. I love him and want to keep him safe; that is all the incentive I need.” Maria put her hand on Gabriel’s head. His eyes closed at the gesture. “This life is destroying you, Gabriel.” Her heart broke for this man. For how broken all the Fallen were. “Don’t let the darkness consume you. Take my help. Let me share the load of your pain.” When Gabriel lifted his head, she said, “You have six brothers, Gabriel. From this day on, you have a sister too. A fellow sister of the faith. You have a friend.”
Gabriel’s head fell. “I’m lost, Maria. I’m so lost. I pray, but God doesn’t answer me. I sin . . .” He looked into her eyes. “And I too have a darkness inside me. One that grows day by day. I’m . . . I’m so afraid that one day it will consume me too.”
Maria tipped her head to the side. “How long has it been since your last confession?”
Gabriel laughed, but it was stained and laced with agony. “Thirteen years,” he whispered.
Keeping her hand on his head, she said, “Then confess. Confess to me, a novitiate and your sister. Confess to me.”
As if a weight had been lifted off his shoulders, Gabriel inhaled a deep breath and began. “Forgive me, sister, for I have sinned. It has been thirteen years since my last confession . . .” Maria listened to Gabriel purge his soul of his sins. Thirteen years and more of sins that haunted both his sleep and his waking hours. For hours she listened to him confess, and when it was done, she left him sleeping in his rooms, unburdened for the first time in so long.
When Maria returned to her room, and Raphael pulled her into bed, his arm tugging her in close, she closed her eyes and silently whispered a prayer: “Thank you, God. Thank you for giving me this man. Thank you for sending me here to these men. I will love each of them as you do. Without judgment, and as one of your own. I will protect them and guide them as best I can. And I will cherish the love you have given me in Raphael, my heart, my soul, my heaven . . . Amen.”
*****
His feet shuffled on the stone floor as he approached the wooden doors. He could barely walk, needing his wheelchair, but he refused any aid right now. The skin on his legs was tight and slowed him down. But anger fueled his every move. He had a new purpose in his heart, a new mission in his soul. God had kept him alive for a reason. Seven reasons.
As the door opened, hundreds of his brothers got to their feet and watched him move slowly to the altar. He heard the gasps and whispers at his ruined appearance. But vanity was a sin, one he cared not for. He reached the altar, and, taking over the pulpit from Bishop McGuiness, he turned to the congregation.
“Brothers,” he said, his words slurred from the damage done to his lips. “We are now at war. A new crusade.” He felt the excitement flow through the room. He held up his hand to calm them. “Holy war has been declared by us, the Brethren, against a group of evil sinners known as the Fallen.” Father Quinn smiled, his scarred skin pulling tightly at the movement. “And we shall cast them all to hell.”