Afterburn
1539 Words
(Luna POV)
Rain.
Still hammering down like the sky was pissed at the ground.
Or maybe just at me.
My boots splashed through puddles I didn’t see, my jacket plastered cold to my skin, but I barely felt it. Inside? Inside was a nuclear meltdown wrapped in static.
My lips.
Jesus Christ, my lips.
They felt… different. Swollen. Tingly. Like they’d been plugged into a faulty socket. And the taste.
Fuck.
I could still taste him.
Strong black tea and something darker, cleaner, sharper.
Like rain on stone and suppressed violence.
It clung to my tongue, my teeth, the roof of my mouth.
I licked my lips instinctively, chasing the phantom pressure, the bruising heat of his mouth on mine, and a fresh jolt of electricity shot straight down my spine, pooling low in my belly.
He kissed me.
Father Vale. The Iceberg. The walking statue of disapproval.
He grabbed me. Hauled me up.
Kissed me like he was trying to inhale my soul.
And I’d kissed him back.
Oh God, I’d kissed him back like my life depended on it.
Arching into him, grabbing his stupid cassock, feeling that hard ridge of him pressed against my stomach…
A low whimper escaped me now, right there in the muddy lane.
I clapped a hand over my mouth, glancing around like a criminal.
Empty. Just rain and the distant rumble of thunder.
Good.
Because I was losing my damn mind.
Aunt Mildred took one look at me dripping on her doormat and gasped.
“Luna! Good heavens, child, you look like a drowned squirrel! Get out of those wet things immediately! I’ll put the kettle on.”
She bustled off, radiating warm, oblivious concern.
Child. Again.
If only she knew what her ‘child’ had just been doing with her village priest in the holy confession box.
My face flamed hotter than any fever.
I peeled off the wet jacket and jeans in the tiny downstairs loo, shivering in just my damp t-shirt and underwear.
My reflection in the mirror was a shock.
Hair plastered dark to my skull, cheeks flushed, eyes wide and wild.
And my lips… they looked kissed.
Slightly puffy.
Undeniably touched.
I traced the lower one with a trembling finger.
The ghost of his teeth scraping there made me gasp again.
My n*****s tightened painfully against the thin, damp cotton of my t-shirt.
Just the memory…
The feel of his hard body against mine, the iron grip on my arm, the fingers tangled in my hair…
It was like being branded.
From the inside out.
---
Dinner was torture.
Mildred’s homemade vegetable soup tasted like ash.
Her cheerful chatter about Mrs. Henderson’s prize-winning marrow sounded like it was coming from underwater.
All I could hear was the echo of his growl.
“You play with fire, child.”
All I could feel was the phantom heat of his hands.
All I could see behind my eyelids was the raw, burning hunger in those obsidian eyes, stripped bare of all that icy control.
He hadn’t looked holy.
He’d looked feral.
And it had been the hottest thing I’d ever seen.
> “…and Father Vale looked quite peaky after confessions today,” Mildred was saying, snapping me back to the nightmare dinner table.
“I saw him heading back to the rectory earlier, head down, moving fast. Probably caught a chill in this dreadful weather.”
Peaky?
Try ravaged.
Try self-loathing incarnate.
Try just had his tongue down my throat.
I shoved a spoonful of soup into my mouth, scalding my tongue.
Good. Physical pain was easier.
“Mmm,” I managed, hoping it sounded vaguely interested and not like I was having a stroke.
---
Later, in the tiny room under the eaves, the rain drummed a relentless rhythm on the roof.
I’d changed into dry pyjamas – soft cotton shorts and a worn camisole top.
I tried to read.
Tried to listen to music.
Tried to think about anything else.
Failed spectacularly.
Every creak of the old house sounded like the confessional door opening.
Every gust of wind moaned like his low groan against my lips.
My body wouldn’t settle.
It hummed.
Ached.
Thrummed with a restless energy that centered between my legs, a persistent, heavy pulse.
It was like he’d flicked a switch I didn’t know I had, and now it was stuck on ‘ON’.
The memory of his kiss wasn’t fading; it was getting sharper.
More detailed.
The scrape of his stubble against my chin.
The way his hand had slid down my back, possessive and demanding.
The feel of him, hard and insistent against me…
I tossed my book aside.
My heart hammered against my ribs.
The room felt too small, too hot.
My skin felt too tight.
I paced the few steps the tiny space allowed.
It didn’t help.
The ache intensified, a deep, throbbing need that drowned out the rain, the guilt, the sheer insanity of it all.
He kissed me. He wanted me.
The f*****g priest wanted me.
The thought was a spark in dry tinder.
A reckless, terrifying heat surged through me.
I stopped pacing.
My breath came short and fast.
My hand moved almost of its own volition, slipping beneath the waistband of my shorts, beneath the thin cotton of my underwear.
My fingers found the slick heat waiting for them.
A gasp tore from my throat.
It wasn’t like touching myself before. This wasn’t boredom or frustration.
This was… fueled. By him.
By the memory of his mouth, his hands, his body.
The forbidden thrill of it crashed over me, making my knees weak.
I stumbled back onto the narrow bed.
I closed my eyes. Not darkness.
Him.
The shadowed intensity of his face leaning in. The feel of his cassock rough under my clutching fingers. The heat of his breath on my skin just before his lips claimed mine.
I could smell him again – that clean, sharp scent mixed with incense and rain.
My fingers circled my c**t, the touch electric.
I moaned softly into the quiet room, biting my lip to stifle the sound.
It wasn't gentle. It was frantic. Needy.
Trying to replicate the desperate urgency of his kiss.
I imagined it was his hand.
His large, strong hand, calloused maybe, sliding down my stomach, pushing aside the fabric, finding me wet and ready for him.
Because of him.
“You play with fire...”
His growl echoed in my mind.
Yes. Yes, I am.
And I was burning.
I arched my back off the thin mattress, my other hand fisting in the sheets. My hips lifted, seeking pressure, friction, something.
My fingers moved faster, sliding through my own wetness, circling that tight, aching bud.
The image in my head shifted. No confessional. His rectory? My room?
Somewhere dark.
Him, looming over me, those dark eyes burning, not with piety but with pure, unadulterated hunger.
His cassock open? Gone? Just him.
The hard planes of his chest. The lean strength of him.
That fierce mouth trailing down my neck, my collarbone, lower…
A choked cry escaped me.
My body coiled tight, tighter, the pressure building like a storm surge.
I thought of his lips, swollen from kissing me.
His eyes, wild and possessive.
The hard length of him pressing against me.
Mine.
The word echoed in my head, desperate and defiant.
It hit me like lightning.
A white-hot burst of pleasure ripped through me, stealing my breath, arching my spine off the bed.
My thighs clenched around my hand as wave after wave crashed over me, intense and shuddering.
I gasped his name into the damp air, a ragged, broken sound.
“Lucien...”
---
Silence.
Just my ragged breathing, the frantic drumming of my heart, and the relentless rain on the roof.
The aftershocks trembled through me, leaving me boneless and slick with sweat.
Slowly, reality seeped back in. The small, familiar room. The scent of lavender detergent from the sheets. The fading echo of my own voice saying his name.
His name.
Not Father Vale.
Lucien.
Shame washed over me, cold and sudden, dousing the lingering heat.
Holy s**t.
What had I just done?
I’d just come harder than ever before… thinking about the village priest. Fantasizing about the man who’d kissed me with desperate fury only hours ago.
A man who clearly hated himself for it. A man sworn to God.
I yanked my hand out of my shorts like it was poisoned. My skin felt hypersensitive, raw. The taste of him was still faintly there.
The ghost of his touch lingered everywhere.
I curled onto my side, pulling the thin duvet up over my head, trying to hide from myself, from the enormity of it.
I’d wanted to rattle him. To crack the ice.
I hadn’t expected to fall into the f*****g crevasse with him. And I definitely hadn’t expected to like the fall.
Under the covers, in the stifling dark, a shaky, slightly hy
sterical laugh bubbled up.
Well. At least I wasn’t bored anymore.
Now I was just royally, spectacularly screwed. In every sense of the word.
And the worst part? The traitorous pulse still beating low in my belly whispered that I wanted more.
- Writer
