Free Saving Sins (Forbidden Erotic Romance) by Ava Lore Page B

scream. She wanted to throw
them back in his face. Wanted to break down into tears and hope he'd hold her.
    He didn't know her, didn't know anything about her. She
couldn't let them find her, and she knew he would fuck it up. There was nowhere else. Nowhere to be safe. Nowhere to be calm. The only thing that made
her push forward were the drugs, and now that prospect was dimming with every
second spent in this junker of a car. "Aren't I going to go to hell if I
use these?" she snapped at him, sarcasm dripping from her words.
    "No," he said. "You'll die if you don't."
    "I'm gonna die anyway," she said, recklessly.
Turning, she put her hand on the car door, but gentle fingers on her arm
stopped her. "What?" she snarled, turning on him like a wounded
animal. "A girl's gotta work."
    He stared at her. His face, lovely in the light, like an
angel. When she saw the guys most girls went home with she could barely repress
a shudder. This man, though...it wouldn't have been so bad. He would have been
a gentle introduction into the trade.
    She should have known better. It was going to take her
another week—or more—to work up the courage to try again.
    His green eyes shone in the light of the streetlamps, and
his face studied hers. He looked so sad, watching her.
    Deep inside, his sorrow struck a chord, plucked a heart
string. In her breast, there was an answering sorrow, so deep she lost her
breath, and she wanted to hide her face in shame.
    "Here," he said, pulling a card out of the
pocket of his black shirt. "Please, take this. Come by the church if you
need anything. If I'm not there, I'm out here."
    "Whatever," she snapped. "I'm out of
here."
    "God keep you," he said.
    She slammed the door behind her and stormed off down the
street. In her hand, the card crumpled into sharp corners, cutting against her
skin as she balled it up and threw it into the street.
     
    The memory feathered against her, bringing a fresh flush of
shame, even though Michael had told her there was no shame in suffering.
Whatever she had done, she did to survive, even—and this always surprised
her—the drugs. They had been a tool, he told her. Anesthesia for the soul. Just
as the shock of surgery could kill you if you weren't properly sedated, so
could the open wounds of the heart.
    Sometimes, you needed to be numb to survive, and you used
whatever tools were at hand.
    Now, five years down the road, Tara thought she was getting
closer to finding peace. Instead of living on the streets, she was in college,
studying sociology. If it hadn't been for Father Michael, she probably would
have died of a drug overdose before she was twenty.
    Now, tonight, she was going out on the streets again, this
time as Father Michael's companion, to help him minister to the prostitutes of
Baltimore. Although minister didn't really seem like the right word... Help,
perhaps? He helped. Small ways and big ways. Fresh clean needles, condoms, hot
food and hot drinks on the cold nights, winter clothes, though of course you
could never cover up too much or no one would know what you were selling.
Standing out in the cold, half-frozen... she remembered those days. And if a
girl wanted off the streets, she had only to ask.
    So few of them did, though. She was one of the only success
stories. Sometimes she wondered what had made her special enough to escape. She
hadn't deserved it at all.
    Pressing her lips together, Tara lifted her chin.
"Let's go."
    Father Michael reached out, one large, warm hand alighting
on the sleeve of her coat. Tara imagined she could feel its heat through her
clothes. "You don't have to do this tonight," he said. "The
destitute will always be with us. You can leave if you like."
    Inexplicable panic welled in her, and she shook her head.
"No! I mean, no. No, it's okay. I'm okay."
    The corners of his mouth quirked up. "Tara." He
shook his head, and the way he said her name made her warm down to her toes.
"Always putting on the brave face."
    She blushed and backed