Even as there was a part of me that knew how wrong the words were, still I couldn’t help but respond to them. “I’m not the beautiful one. Ruth is.”

“No. She has no light inside of her. No purity at all. But you . . . you . . . are perfect.” He placed his lips against my neck and let his arms drop so that his hands were on my elbows, pinning them to my sides.

His breath seemed to come in ragged gasps and mine sped up in response. How I’d yearned to be told that just once in my life. If it had come from anyone else, I wouldn’t have believed it, but I’d seen the way Ruth had looked at Father Thomas and I’d seen the way he’d spurned her. Not even Riaan, who I knew loved me, had ever told me I was more beautiful than my sister.

I felt something moist and hot travel from my neck to my ear and realized that Father Thomas was mapping a trail across my skin with his tongue. All that existed then was the heat from his body pressed against mine and the glorious thrill of it.

It was when Father Thomas cupped my breast over my nightgown that I recovered from my daze and returned to my senses. What we were doing was wrong.

Matthew 26:41 leapt to mind. Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. The molten feeling from earlier, the delicious warmth, was gone. Instead, I felt afraid.

“No, Father, please.”

“Don’t play games, Delilah. Don’t be coy now when you’re finally getting what you wanted.”

“No, I don’t want—”

“Don’t pretend this isn’t what you and your sister were whispering about earlier, and why you were so happy when I told you we had to spend the night here. This is what you wanted. You are true to your name, Delilah. You are the destroyer of men’s powers.”

He stood and walked around the bed, pushing me backward as he climbed on top of me. His eyes were closed but mine were wide open, fixed on his face, which wore an expression I’d never seen before, one of such hunger and need that it made him look ferocious. It occurred to me then, and in the many sleepless nights that came afterward, that I had made him like that. I’d turned him from a devout man of God into a beast driven by animal urges. Just as I’d done the same thing to Riaan the previous night.

When it was over, Father Thomas rose and got dressed.