“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.”