Page 5 of Preacher Man (Divine Temptations #1)

Chapter Five

Ethan

T he engine had barely cut off before I realized I was sweating.

Not from the ride. Not from the sun beating down on the cracked road.

No, this heat was my shame, thick and sour in my throat, pulsing between my legs like a curse.

I sat there on the back of Jake’s motorcycle, frozen, my hands clenched into fists at my sides where they’d been gripping his waist the whole ride.

God forgive me, I hadn’t meant to touch him like that.

But I had.

I’d pressed myself against him like I was starving. Felt every ridge of his body under that damn leather jacket. Those broad shoulders, the thick muscles of his back, the way his hips shifted when we turned corners. Every move stoked the ache I’d fought so hard to bury.

And it wasn’t just lust this time. That’s what scared me the most.

Jake was temptation with a heartbeat, temptation with a laugh that made me feel seventeen again, and not in a holy way.

He looked like sin and smelled like sweat and soap and something smoky—motor oil and danger.

And I, like the weak man I was, wanted to pull him close and give in to my sinful desires.

Just like I had before.

I remembered it too clearly. The hushed meetings with Deacon Harris in the church office after Bible study, the tremble in his voice when he prayed over me with his hands shaking, and how we both knew damn well it wasn’t the Holy Spirit moving us.

And when the other deacons cornered me in the sanctuary, their faces tight and pale as wax, the judgment hit like a stone to the chest. They prayed over me.

Like I was possessed. And maybe I was. I remember kneeling, sweaty and humiliated, while they called on the Lord to cleanse me of my abnormal desires.

I cried, begged, and swore I’d renounce it all. My weakness. My wickedness. My sins.

They sent me here to Meadowgrove, not as redemption, but exile. The parsonage was a tin can of misery with a leaky roof and a floor that creaked like it was sighing under the weight of my failure. It was punishment disguised as pity.

And now here I was. Standing in Jake’s dusty driveway, trembling in the wake of the same storm.

But worse.

Because with Jake…it wasn’t just physical. There was something about him. His confidence, the way he looked at me like he saw something, not just a preacher in faded jeans and a button-up that stuck to my back with sweat. He made me feel real.

And when he got off that bike and turned around, his mouth quirking into that devil-may-care smile of his, I nearly lost it.

“Ever blessed something this big before?” he said, cocky as hell, nodding toward the very obvious bulge in his jeans.

I actually choked.

Words failed me. Scripture fled.

I tried to laugh it off. I tried to look anywhere else. But I saw it. Lord help me, I felt it.

A wild pulse shot through me. My thoughts blurred into heat and guilt and sheer want. I wanted to bless everything about him. I wanted to drop to my knees, but not in prayer.

And that terrified me.

I took a shaky step toward him. My tongue felt thick, my heart battering against my ribs like a caged thing.

“I… I can’t do this again,” I mumbled.

Jake’s eyes caught mine. And something flickered there.

Amusement. Understanding. Interest.

“Again?” he asked, cocking his head like I’d just handed him a secret he intended to unwrap slowly.

He turned toward his house, boots crunching on gravel. The way his jeans hugged his thighs made me want to cry and curse and praise God in the same breath.

He unlocked the front door and glanced back at me with that infuriating grin.

“Let’s grab that cold beer now, Ethan,” he said. “Looks like you really need it.”

I stood there like a man caught between heaven and hell.

Because I needed it. The beer and the cold. The distance.

But mostly, what I really needed was to not follow him through that door.

Because if I did, I wasn’t sure I’d come back out the same.

I followed him.

The front door groaned open, swallowing us into the cool shadows of his house.

Jake’s place was clean in a rugged, no-frills way.

Open layout, wooden floors, a big sagging leather couch, motorcycle magazines fanned out on the coffee table.

It smelled like cedar and something a little spicy, probably whatever cologne clung to his neck and made me weak in the knees.

He moved to the kitchen, grabbing two beers from the fridge. Then he popped the tops with one smooth flick of a wrist against the counter.

I hovered awkwardly in the doorway, like a vampire waiting for permission to enter, except I was already inside, already falling, already damned.

He handed me a bottle. Our fingers touched. I jolted like he’d burned me.

“You good?” he asked, voice rough like gravel and warm like whiskey.

“Fine,” I lied. Took a long swig, too fast. The cold bite of the beer went straight to my head.

Jake leaned against the counter, watching me. Not like he was assessing. More like he was studying. Like he was looking past the preacher’s collar I wasn’t currently wearing, the nerves, the stammering politeness I wore like armor.

“So…” I said, fumbling for something—anything—safe. “This, uh, place is nice. You did the renovations yourself?”

He raised an eyebrow. “You really gonna talk drywall right now?”

I coughed. “I just meant… ”

“You said, ‘I can’t do this again.’”

He said it softly, but it hit hard.

My grip tightened around the bottle. I stared at the label, wishing it would blur into scripture and absolve me.

“It’s nothing,” I muttered. “I didn’t mean anything by it.”

Jake didn’t move. Just sipped his beer and waited.

The silence stretched between us, full of unsaid things. My skin prickled. Every nerve felt exposed.

“Ethan,” he said, “I’ve seen how you look at me. On my bike, back at the diner. Hell, even in church. You watch me like you’re hungry and ashamed of it.”

I swallowed hard. “I’m not… ”

“Don’t lie.”

His voice wasn’t cruel, nor was it mocking. It was just… certain. Like he already knew the truth and was waiting for me to admit I did, too.

I put the beer down. My hands were shaking. I turned away, pretending to admire the backsplash, but my voice betrayed me.

“There was someone,” I said, my throat tight. “Before.”

Jake said nothing. The air between us stilled.

“My last church,” I continued, barely above a whisper. “He was a deacon. Married. Kids. We were…close.”

I felt Jake’s presence behind me, even before he stepped closer.

“It got found out,” I said, each word dragging pain behind it. “The other deacons, they prayed over me. Told me I was corrupted. Sick. They said if I truly repented, maybe God would show mercy. So I did. I said what they wanted to hear. I begged, and I told myself I’d never do it again.”

Jake’s voice was quiet. “But you want to.”

I turned, fast and flustered. “I haven’t. Not yet. I won’t.”

He stood a breath away from me. Tall, solid, eyes dark with something that wasn’t pity.

“Then why are you shaking?”

He brushed his fingers down my arm, just a graze, but it lit me up like a struck match.

“You think this is sin,” he said. “But what if it’s just real? What if wanting me doesn’t make you broken?”

I exhaled, shaky. “You don’t understand. I’ve already ruined one life. If I do this again—if I fall—I don’t think I’ll get back up.”

Jake stepped closer, close enough that I could feel the heat of him, smell the mix of beer and sweat and leather.

“You’re not falling, Ethan,” he murmured. “You’re finally choosing.”

He cupped my jaw with one hand, rough palm against my stubbled cheek, thumb brushing over my lips like he was blessing me with blasphemy.

My knees nearly buckled.

“Tell me you don’t want this,” Jake said. “Say it, and I’ll back off. But don’t lie. Not to me. Not to yourself.”

I should’ve pushed him away. I meant to.

But my heart was thundering, my body betraying me.

I looked at his mouth. His full, infuriating, gorgeous mouth. I looked into his eyes and saw something there I’d never felt before. Desire, yes, but also something deeper. Gentler. Something that felt dangerously like hope.

“I do,” I whispered, brokenly. “God help me, I do want you.”

Jake’s smile was slow, sinful, and entirely too pleased.

“Then shut up and let me kiss you.”

He didn’t wait.

His mouth crashed into mine, hungry, demanding, everything I’d feared and craved. I gasped, and he swallowed the sound, his tongue sliding past my lips, claiming me like he’d been waiting for this since the second we met.

I gripped his shirt like a drowning man, like I could hold back the tide with my fingertips. But it was too late. The moment our mouths met, something snapped inside me.

All the guilt and the denial. All the self-hatred I’d carried like a second skin—gone. Burned away by Jake’s kiss and the fierce way he held me.

I kissed him back. Harder. Deeper.

There was no prayer in this. Only fire.

And for the first time in years… I didn’t feel damned. I felt alive.

His lips devoured mine again, hot and urgent, and I swear something in me short-circuited. This wasn’t a kiss. It was a spiritual awakening. My heart pounded, my breath came in shallow gasps, and my cock, already thick and aching, pressed hard against the front of my jeans, demanding attention.

Jake moved like a man possessed, like he’d waited his whole life to get his mouth on mine. And maybe I’d been waiting, too. All those lonely nights spent praying for mercy when what I really needed was this. Someone who didn’t ask me to hide, or lie, or shrink myself into something I wasn’t.

When his lips left mine and traveled down the curve of my jaw, I made a sound—half gasp, half whimper—that I would’ve rebuked from the pulpit.

“Fuck,” I hissed, as he kissed the side of my throat, warm breath fanning over my skin. “Jake…”

He didn’t stop. His tongue flicked out, tasting my skin, dragging along the tender line of my neck like he was branding me with his heat.

“You smell like guilt and desperation,” he murmured into my skin. “It’s driving me fucking insane.”

My knees buckled. Not metaphorically. They literally gave out for a second, and I had to grab his shoulders to keep from slumping to the damn floor.

“You okay, Preacher Man?” he said, pulling back just enough to smirk at me.

“No,” I breathed. “God help me, no.”

His grin turned feral. He reached down, took my hand, my trembling, calloused, traitorous hand, and laced his fingers through mine.

“Then come with me,” he said. “I want to show you how good sin can feel.”

He led me through the house, step by slow, electrified step, like we were crossing into sacred ground. Except nothing about this felt sacred. It felt primal. Dangerous. Soaked in heat.

“You ever been fucked properly, Ethan?” Jake asked as we moved down the hallway, his voice low and dirty. “Not that clumsy sneaking-around shit you did with that married deacon. I mean slow. Deep. Honest-to-God moaning-into-the-pillow kind of fucking.”

My breath caught.

“I bet no one’s ever had you on your knees and made you beg.” He glanced back at me, eyes gleaming with lust. “But I will. I’m gonna get you so worked up, you’ll be praying for my cock like it’s the Holy Spirit.”

Oh. My. God.

My cock pulsed, leaking, aching, absolutely helpless. I should’ve turned back. I should’ve said no. But all I could do was follow him, like a lamb, to the slaughter.

He pushed open the bedroom door.

Dark sheets. Big bed. Dim light spilling through the slats of the blinds.

Jake turned to face me, framed in that soft golden light like temptation itself. His shirt clung to his chest, and his fingers were already at the hem, lifting it slowly—teasingly—up, revealing taut abs and a trail of hair that disappeared into the waistband of his jeans.

“Take off your shirt, Ethan,” he said, voice rough. “I want to see you. All of you.”

I stepped forward. My fingers reached for the buttons on my collar—out of habit, maybe—but then stopped.

My heart slammed against my ribs.

This was real. This was happening.

And I… I couldn’t.

I took a shaky breath.

“Jake—wait.”

He froze, mid-motion. His eyes snapped to mine.

“I… I can’t,” I said, voice raw. “I’m not that man anymore, and I promised myself I wouldn’t sin again.”

The air thickened between us. I was trembling, caught between salvation and desire, heaven and the sin standing half-naked in front of me.

Jake stepped closer again, but slower this time. No seduction. No swagger. Just… intense.

“Tell me,” he said, “what are you really afraid of?”