Page 83 of Priest (Priest 1)
She slid her arms around my waist, burying her face in my chest, her whole body trembling.
“How did you find me?” she managed.
“Sterling.”
“You talked to Sterling?” she asked, pulling away, swiping at her eyes.
I ducked down to meet her gaze. “Yes. And he told me what happened that day. The day you kissed—” and my own resolve failed here, because despite job changes and living on a different continent, seeing her now and remembering the hole carved in my chest the moment I saw her kiss Sterling was too much for me to speak out loud.
She cried harder now. “You must hate me.”
“No. In fact, I came to find you to tell you that I don’t.”
“I thought I had to, Tyler,” she mumbled, looking down at the floor.
“Had to what?”
“I thought I had to make you leave me,” she whispered.
Even my pulse paused to listen. “What?”
Her eyes were raw with pain and guilt. “I knew we could make it through anything Sterling threw at us, but I couldn’t handle the thought of you leaving the clergy…leaving for me.” She looked at me, face pleading. “I couldn’t live with myself if you had. Knowing that I had taken your vocation from you—your entire life—all because I couldn’t control my feelings for you…”
“No, Poppy, it wasn’t like that. I was there too, remember? I was choosing the same things you were; that mantle of guilt wasn’t yours to bear alone, if at all.”
She shook her head, tears still falling. “But if you’d never met me, you wouldn’t have ever thought about leaving.”
“If I’d never met you, I would never have really lived.”
“Oh God, Tyler.” She buried her face in her hands. “Knowing what you must have thought about me all these months. I hated it. I hated myself. The moment Sterling’s lips touched mine, I wanted to die, because I saw you coming through the park, I knew you were there, and I knew you were hurting, but I had to. I wanted you to forget all about me and keep living your life the way God wanted you to.”
“It hurt,” I admitted. “It hurt a lot.”
“I hated Sterling so much,” she said into her hands. “I hated him as much as I loved you. I never wanted him, Tyler, I wanted you, but how could I have you without you losing everything? I told myself it was better to push you away than watch you wither.”
I peeled her fingers away from her face. “Am I withered now? Because I did leave, Poppy, and not because of you and not because of the pictures Sterling released, but because I realized that God wanted me elsewhere, living a different life.”
“You left?” she whispered. “I thought they made you leave when the pictures came out.”
“I did. I thought…I guess I thought that you would know that.”
“But the rumors…everyone said…” She took a deep breath, her eyes on me. “I just figured the pictures had ruined you. And it killed me knowing that it was partially my fault, because if it hadn’t been for me, Sterling would have never have targeted you. Knowing that split my heart in two, and I couldn’t take it. I had no heart left to split. I missed you so much.”
“I missed you.” I pulled out the rosary and poured the beads into a clinking pile in her palm. “I brought this back for you,” I said, curling her fingers around the rosary. “I want you to have it. Because I forgive you.”
That’s not the whole truth, Tyler.
I took a deep breath. “And there’s more. I was so hurt—gutted—by what you did. And I’m angry with you now, for doing something that only brought both of us pain. You should have talked to me, Poppy, you should have told me how you felt.”
“I tried,” she said. “I tried so many times, but it was like you didn’t hear me, like you didn’t understand. I needed you to forget about me so that I didn’t ruin your life.”
I sighed. She was right. She had tried to tell me. And I had been so caught up in our love, so caught up in my own struggles and my own choices, that I hadn’t really listened to her. “I’m sorry,” I said, meaning those two words more than any person ever has before. “I’m so sorry. I should have listened. I should have told you that it didn’t matter what happened with my job, with us, because in the end, I believe God is looking out for you and me. I believe God has a plan for us. And wherever I go—wherever we go—and no matter what awful things happen, we’ll be comforted by his love.”
She nodded, tears streaming down her cheeks. And something happened then, an infusion or an awakening, because I realized something.
I still want her.
I still love her.
