The Road To The Pope Lick Trestle

“Forgive me, Father… for I’m about to sin again.” "Get on your knees and take my cock like it’s your only salvation. Hold it like you held your rosary tight, desperate. Suck it like it’s the only prayer left to save your filthy soul." She’s temptation wrapped in innocence. And I’m a sinner beneath this collar. ~~~~~~ When Mia Voss escapes heartbreak and moves in with her grandmother, the last thing she expects is to fall for the man behind the altar. Reverend Thorne Maddox—quiet, composed, and dangerously handsome—sees right through her walls.And she sees what he's trying to hide.Their encounters are supposed to be innocent, church duties, quiet confessions, polite conversation. But glances linger too long. Words slip too close to sin. And when she falls into his arms… it stops being holy.In a town full of watching eyes and sacred vows, desire becomes the ultimate sin. But the deeper they fall, the harder it becomes to let go. Where salvation ends… temptation begins. ❕ ❕Trigger/Content Warnings:This story contains themes of religious conflict, age gap, power imbalance, sensual scenes, and morally gray decisions. Reader discretion is advised 100% Sex ❕

By the seventh year of my engagement to Tristan, he postponed our wedding for the third time. The reason was simple. His childhood sweetheart, Gabriella, had returned to the country. She had just gone through a divorce and was emotionally unstable. Tristan personally retrieved every invitation we had sent out, his tone calm and steady. "Gabby has no one by her side right now. I can't upset her at a time like this." I held the ring that had already been resized twice and asked, "What about me?" Tristan glanced at me. "You're different. You're sensible." I had been hearing that word for seven years. Sensible. When his startup failed, I sold the old house my grandmother had left me to help him pay off his debts. When he suffered a gastric hemorrhage, I stayed at the hospital for three days straight and missed my own promotion defense. When his mother said my background was too ordinary for him, he only rubbed his temples and said, "Tori, don't make this difficult for me." Every time, I nodded. He once told me that no matter how thick the fog became, he would always leave a light on for me. Until the day Gabriella stood in front of the mirror wearing my wedding dress and smiled as she asked, "Victoria, you don't mind, do you? Tristan said your wedding's being postponed anyway." Tristan stood behind her. He did not deny it. He even reached out and adjusted her veil for her. The fog lamp he had given me with his own hands sat by the display window of the bridal shop. It was still lit, illuminating someone else in the white dress I had waited seven years to wear. Only then did I realize that some roads were not lost because the fog was too thick. It was because he had never planned to come for me at all.

After finals ended, the most popular girl in class organized a graduation trip. She proposed hitchhiking the entire way, crashing in budget hostels, and seeking food and shelter from nomad camps along the route. At 200 dollars a head, she said they could ride the Ridgeline Highway all the way to Alvor Base Camp. Freedom and adventure, that was the pitch. My family ran a highland travel agency. I knew exactly how dangerous that route was. Every year, budget backpackers vanished along the Ridgeline without a trace. Young women traveling alone were the most vulnerable. In my past life, I did everything I could to stop it. I called every parent, one by one, and talked them out of letting their kids go. The whole class backed out, except Phoebe Harding, who left on her own. She went radio silent three days in. A week later, her body was found in the Barrens. I got my acceptance letter to Kingsley University. On the first day of orientation, my childhood friend Wyatt Morse stabbed me in front of everyone, screaming that it was my fault. "If you hadn't stopped us from going with her, Phoebe wouldn't have died alone! Now, you're going to pay for it!" Most of my classmates turned on me, forgetting I had saved them. They even cheered and said I deserved it. When I opened my eyes, I had gone back to the day the trip was first pitched.

A blizzard had buried the mountain, turning every road into a death trap. Locals called it Deadman's Pass—seventy-two icy switchbacks with zero room for error. As the only person who had ever made it through without a scratch, I'd just gotten a million-dollar rescue call from beyond the final curve. Ten years ago, I went there once. My seventeen-year-old daughter, Maya, was skydiving with her classmates when a violent air current forced an emergency landing. The rescue came too late. She died there. Later, I learned my husband, Jayden Boone, had ignored Maya's safety. He poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into the rescue effort and redirected every team to save his ex's daughter instead. The girl had only sprained her ankle on a hiking trip. The day Maya died, I walked away from my career as a professor and stayed here, living as a broke driver. I risked my life running Deadman's Pass again and again until I knew every turn by heart. In the ten years since, no one else had died on that road. Today, a friend shoved a million-dollar rescue job in front of me and told me to leave right away. I looked at the face in the photo—the one I could never forget. Then I smiled and tossed my keys onto the table. "I can't take this job."

On the Northwind Trail, just before sunrise, my flashlight cut across the inside of the SUV and landed on five lifeless bodies. My hands shook as I dialed 911. "Hello? I'm on Route 296, the Northwind Trail. Everyone in my car… is dead." The operator's voice was calm but quick. "Please confirm your location. Officers are on their way." My words dropped heavy and flat, like stones hitting the ground. "I'm on Route 296, about three miles east of the mountain pass. The plate number is NA318X. Five people inside the car are dead… and I'm the only one alive."

At the World Rally Championship Final, my fiancee, Brielle Fuller, deliberately gave me the wrong turn call. Because of her, I lost the championship. Right there on the spot, she called off our engagement and ran straight into the arms of my rival, Chase Monroe. Just when I thought I'd lost everything, my childhood friend, Naomi Sutton, proposed to me. "It's okay. To me, you'll always be number one." Seven years later, I rebuilt my career and fought my way back to the top. Just as I was preparing to break Chase's championship record, a brake failure sent my car plunging off a mountainside. While drifting in and out of consciousness at the hospital, I overheard a conversation outside my room. "You're ruthless. You actually did something like this. Weren't you afraid he might die?" "If he dies, so be it. The only person I've ever loved is Chase. I only regret that you married him before I could. Otherwise I wouldn't have had to put myself through that all these years." I stared wide-eyed into the darkness. The love I thought was so deep was nothing more than wishful thinking. If they cared so much about Chase, then maybe I should disappear.