Page 2 of Priest

Then he nods, and my stomach drops.

Sadie never touches him the same way twice. Some nights it’s grief. Some nights it’s gratitude wearing perfume. She never crosses lines. She blurs them. And Priest, God, he lets her.

She doesn’t look at me when they turn away. She doesn’t have to. She knows I’m watching. She knows I’ll follow.

Priest’s hand settles at the small of her back as they head down the hallway toward his office. It isn’t possessive. It isn’t overtly intimate. It’s familiar, and that’s worse.

I wait a beat longer than I should. Long enough to pretend I won’t do this. Long enough to remind myself that whatever they’re about to talk about is none of my business. Then I follow anyway.

The hallway is quieter, the noise of the party dulling into a distant echo. The door to his office is cracked open, warm yellow light spilling into the dark. I stop just short of the doorway. I don’t mean to eavesdrop. I just need to know I’m not crazy.

Sadie’s voice drifts out first, quiet and controlled. “I needed to tell you before anyone else.”

There’s a pause. Not awkward. Intentional.

Priest exhales. I know that sound. I’ve heard it in the dark, when he lies awake beside me, staring at the ceiling and pretending sleep.

“I’m pregnant.”

My pulse kicks.

“You should’ve told me sooner,” he says.

“I know.” Sadie’s voice dips, soft enough to bruise. “I was waiting for the right moment.”

The right moment.

My hand presses against my stomach before I can stop it. Silence stretches, long enough for every touch I ignored between them to rearrange itself into something uglier. For one impossible second, I wait for him to ask the question.

Whose?

Priest doesn’t ask.

Or maybe he doesn’t need to, because he already knows.

The thought opens cold inside me.

“Okay,” he says quietly. “Okay.”

Something in my chest cracks.

“I know you never wanted this before,” Sadie says. “Not after everything with your father. Not after everything you came from. But I already love this baby. I can’t wait.”

Priest’s voice is lower when he answers. Rougher. “This isn’t about what I wanted.”

Sadie lets out a shaky breath. “This baby connects us forever.”

A beat passes.

“Yeah,” he says. “I know.”

My hand flies to my mouth. Before. Everything. The words slide under my skin.

“I’ll take care of you,” Priest says. “Of the baby.”

There it is. It doesn’t sound like panic or denial. It sounds like responsibility, and my stomach drops.

Sadie lets out a shaky little breath. “I knew you would.”