Page 9 of Preacher Man (Divine Temptations #1)

Chapter Nine

Ethan

M y heart was thudding so loud I thought it might give me away.

The door creaked open like some kind of slow-motion horror movie, the kind where you already know what’s coming and you still pray you’re wrong. I kept my expression calm, my posture upright, but I was trembling under the surface.

I risked a glance down.

Jake was crouched beneath my desk, his chest rising and falling fast. His lips were parted, his face flushed—still wrecked from what we’d just done. What I’d let us do. No, what I’d begged for.

And now someone else was in the room.

“Brother Ethan,” came the voice, low, sticky, too-smooth like honey drizzled over spoiled meat. “The Lord’s peace be upon you this fine day.”

Brother Thomas. Of course, it was him.

I looked up, my smile stiff, my hands shaking as I folded them in front of me. “Brother Thomas. You startled me.”

He stood in the doorway with his thick leather Bible clutched like a weapon, his face pink and sweaty beneath his too-tight collar. He had that waxy look some old men get when their skin starts clinging to the bone, like his soul had already left, but his body didn’t know it yet.

“The Board of Deacons has requested your presence,” he said, each syllable slow and heavy, like it was being delivered straight from Mount Sinai. “They’d like a word. At my home, if you’d be so kind as to join me.”

My heart dropped straight into my stomach.

“Oh,” I said. Just that. My voice cracked like I was back in high school choir trying to hit a tenor note with a cold. “Of course. Just let me grab my keys.”

He stepped aside, and I forced my legs to move. My knees felt like splintered wood, barely holding me up as I brushed past him.

Jake was still silent under the desk, bless him. I didn’t dare look again.

I walked outside with the air strangling me, thick, damp, and judgmental as hell. The sun was blinding, bouncing off the cracked pavement like it had something to prove.

Brother Thomas headed for his truck, a mud-brown Ford that looked like it had been blessed with motor oil and spite. I veered toward my car instead, fumbling with my keys as I broke into a jog.

I needed a second. A breath. A plan.

I climbed into the driver’s seat and slammed the door shut, then slouched low against the headrest. My shirt was already sticking to my back with sweat. My palms were wet. I wiped them on my jeans, but it didn’t help.

What the hell did the board want?

My mind spun in circles, fast and panicked, like a moth beating itself bloody against a lamp.

Had someone seen us? Heard something? Smelled the fucking sin still clinging to my skin?

Or maybe it wasn’t about today.

Maybe they knew about the last time. About the affair with the married man. The reason I got packed up and moved out like a scandalous family secret.

God, I thought, hands gripping the wheel. Why now?

I stared into the side mirror, waiting for Brother Thomas to pull out so I could follow him. His truck growled to life like a beast roused from slumber, and I fell into line behind him, watching the road but barely seeing it.

What was I walking into?

An ambush? An inquisition? A meeting where they’d smile all sweet while planning to strip me of my position, my title, my last scrap of dignity?

The deacons knew everything. They had to. Even if they didn’t have proof yet, they knew what kind of man I was. The kind who couldn’t keep his pants zipped up. The kind who chased desire straight into damnation, begging to be consumed by it.

And all I could think about was Jake.

Under my desk. His mouth still wet with me. His hands trembling with love and defiance.

What the fuck had I done?

What the fuck was I about to do?

And was there still a way to claw myself out of this hell, or had I finally fallen too far to climb back up?

* * *

The air in Brother Thomas’s house was thick with some kind of artificial lemon scent, the kind that clung to your throat and made you wonder what sins they were trying to scrub out of the walls.

Esther Thomas appeared from the shadows like a buzzard in a floral muumuu. Her lips were drawn in a line so tight they looked stapled shut, and her eyes raked over me like she was hoping I’d combust into flames right there on her linoleum.

“Brother Ethan,” she said without a hint of warmth. “This way.”

No greeting. No offer of sweet tea or polite small talk. Just that look. The one that said she knew exactly who I was and wasn’t impressed.

She turned and started down the hall, her orthopedic sandals slapping the floor like judgment itself. I followed her past dusty doilies, framed Bible verses, and a painting of a blond, blue-eyed Jesus so pale he could’ve passed for a country club tennis pro.

The dining room was already full.

Members of the Board of Deacons lined the long oak table on both sides, and every last one of them looked like they’d been carved out of stone.

None of them smiled.

They just stared.

Some with open disdain, some with mild disappointment, but all of them with that same brittle, sanctified coldness that only lifelong churchgoers could truly perfect.

There wasn’t a single empty chair.

Not one.

My stomach flipped.

I was here to be talked to, not heard.

Esther cleared her throat like she was about to spit something out, then turned on her heel and disappeared, leaving me standing like a scolded child about to be handed a ruler to the knuckles.

Brother Thomas stood at the head of the table. His hands were folded over his bloated belly, and his eyes were closed. He let out a long, dramatic sigh.

“Let us pray,” he announced, and dove into the most long-winded, self-righteous invocation I’d ever heard.

“Our Father in Heaven,” he began, voice oily with performative reverence, “We ask that You guide us this afternoon as we make decisions that uphold Your truth. Let Your light cast out confusion, disorder, and sin in all its forms…”

I didn’t close my eyes.

Instead, I let my gaze drift from face to face.

Sister Eileen: skin like burnt parchment, lips pursed like she’d tasted vinegar and liked it.

Brother Whitmore: face pocked with sunspots, knuckles white on his Bible, a twitch in his jaw that said he wanted to say something ugly and was trying very hard not to.

Sister Marla: fake pearls, a tight perm, and wearing a scowl that would sour milk.

One by one, I took them in. Not one kind expression among them. No kindness. No curiosity. Just judgment.

My fear twisted in my gut. But beneath it, something else was rising.

Anger.

Not loud or wild. Not yet.

But there.

A low simmer.

The prayer finally ended with an “Amen” that felt more like a final warning.

I echoed it under my breath, still standing, hands at my sides.

Brother Thomas turned to me, his eyes sharp, his jowls twitching like he’d swallowed something sour. “Brother Ethan,” he said, dragging out my name like it hurt him. “The Board has gathered today because we are… concerned.”

I didn’t speak. I didn’t even blink.

He continued. “Your style of preaching, while… poetic, has not gone unnoticed. Your emphasis on love, on acceptance, on the softer attributes of God’s character, these things have raised eyebrows.”

There were a few pointed coughs and a couple of nods.

Sister Marla muttered something about “slippery slopes.”

Brother Thomas didn’t pause. “And while we value passion, Brother Ethan, we are first and foremost stewards of truth. Unchanging. Firm. God’s word is not a buffet from which one can pick and choose.”

The room was silent.

I swallowed hard.

“However,” he said, “it is not our desire to remove you from your post. We believe, with guidance and prayer, you may yet return to the fold with renewed conviction.”

A chill ran down my spine.

“Therefore,” he said, with a self-satisfied sniff, “we would like to send you to a regional youth camp in the mountains for two weeks. Their chaplain has taken ill, and your services would be useful. You will have time for reflection, for spiritual examination, and, above all, to commune with the Lord.”

I froze.

Two weeks?

Away from Jake?

From the life I was only just beginning to admit I wanted?

It felt like exile, or a polite execution.

Brother Turner, a slouching, weaselly man with too many teeth, grinned like he’d just seen me get pantsed in public. “This is a wonderful opportunity,” he chirped. “You’ll have solitude, space to recenter yourself. To come back stronger.”

I looked down, trying not to show the scream building behind my ribs.

This wasn’t a punishment, they said. It was a gift.

God, I wanted to walk out. I wanted to tell them all to go to hell, that their poison masquerading as piety had done more damage than anything I’d ever done with Jake.

But I didn’t.

Because the church was in my blood. It was my home, my history. My shame. My pride.

I wasn’t sure who I was without it.

And mercifully, none of them had said Jake’s name.

They didn’t know. Or at least, they couldn’t prove it.

Yet.

So I nodded, my voice a raw whisper. “Yes. Of course. I’ll go.”

And in my chest, something cracked.

Two weeks without Jake. Two weeks of pretending again. Two weeks of silence and sermons and empty prayers whispered to a sky that never seemed to answer.

Maybe, I told myself, maybe I could use the time to figure things out. To examine what I’d done.

Who I was becoming.

And how the hell I was supposed to live in a world where Jake wasn’t pressed up against me, telling me with every kiss that maybe—just maybe—I wasn’t damned after all.

* * *

The trailer felt even smaller than usual, like the walls were closing in on me. Sweat clung to the back of my neck, and the little box fan rattling in the window did nothing but push hot air around.

I tossed a pair of jeans into the duffel bag on my bed, then a handful of clean, well, clean-ish, T-shirts.

Underwear. Socks. Toothbrush. Bible. I paused when my fingers brushed the leather cover.

The pages were bent, the corners dog-eared from too many nights spent flipping through it, looking for answers I never seemed to find.

“Two weeks,” I muttered, yanking open a drawer. “That’s all they said. Just two goddamn weeks.”

But I already knew it wasn’t about the camp. Not really.

It was exile dressed up as grace. A polite way to tell me I was straying too far from the path.

They didn’t want Ethan, the man. They wanted Ethan, the puppet. The mouthpiece. The good little preacher boy with the spine of a doormat and the sermons straight from Leviticus.

And I couldn’t stop thinking about Jake.

God help me, I loved him.

I hadn’t meant to. That wasn’t the plan. It never is, is it?

But there it was. Raw and aching inside my chest. Every look and touch. Every whispered “I need you” in the dark.

And now I had to go.

I zipped the bag with more force than necessary, the plastic teeth catching briefly before giving way. I lifted it off the bed and slung it over my shoulder, glaring at the sagging walls like they were somehow to blame.

“Whole damn place feels like a coffin,” I said under my breath. “Maybe that’s fitting.”

Outside, the sun beat down mercilessly. I opened the door to my car, tossed my bag in the passenger seat, and slid behind the wheel, wincing as the vinyl seat burned the backs of my thighs.

I started the engine. It sputtered twice before catching, like it wasn’t sure it wanted to go either. I didn’t even think about where I was going. My hands moved on instinct, steering me down the back roads that led away from the church and toward something—someone—I couldn’t leave without seeing.

Jake.

I needed to tell him. To explain. To say goodbye.

At least, that’s what I told myself.

The trees grew taller on his road. The sunlight filtered through them like stained glass in motion. I slowed as his house came into view. The place looked peaceful and quiet. His truck was in the driveway, and a window was cracked open.

I was almost there.

Then I stopped.

Right in front of his house.

My hands tightened on the steering wheel, knuckles bone-white.

What was I doing?

Running to Jake like some lovesick fool, ready to dump all my guilt into his arms and beg him to tell me everything would be okay?

He deserved more than this.

More than hiding.

More than a man who couldn’t even say his name in front of a congregation without tasting ash. I couldn’t drag him through this anymore. And if I walked up those steps, looked him in the eye and told him goodbye… I wouldn’t be able to leave.

So I didn’t stop.

I eased my foot back onto the gas. The car rolled forward, slow and smooth. I passed his driveway, didn’t look back.

Didn’t even blink.

My throat burned, and my chest felt hollow, like something sacred had been scooped out and left behind on his porch.

I kept driving.

And as the road stretched out before me, winding into the horizon, I whispered a prayer.

Not for forgiveness. Not for salvation.

Just a question.

“God… if love feels this holy, how can it be wrong?”