Ariana held onto Pope Luke Paul’s right arm, guiding him through the pressing crowd. Joe flanked his left, close but not holding his arm back. The Pope lifted that arm to wave to the people and bless them. They passed through the guarded masses along the two-hundred-yard walk from the City Hall Building out onto the plaza to where the platform had been erected for maximum impact, maximum viewing for his people.

Maximum vulnerability. The noise rose with the people’s awareness of the emergence of His Holiness. They knew he was among them even if they couldn’t yet see him.

The crowd density grew, their path tightened, and their job got tougher. This was the part where he and Ariana would earn their stripes, hoping their honor and commitment would not be tested, as much as their nerves were being tested under the pressure, physically, emotionally, and spiritually speaking. The press of the people, the noise, clashed with their need to move forward and up the stairs.

Joe’s eyes darted around, identifying members of the Swiss Guard, alert and stout and ready. Ariana’s gliding slowed to lurching movements interrupted by space and the Pope himself stopping to reach out and touch as many of his beloved people as he could.

It was a dance of wills between Ariana Day, consummate and fierce protector, and Pope Luke Paul, man of the people, an accommodation of deep and long understanding between them that made it work. They approached the bottom of the metal and wood steps rising to the towering twenty-by-forty-foot temporary platform—and the ultimate vulnerability.

The flash of full comprehension blinded Joe for an instant. He absorbed the reason Pope Luke Paul had insisted on Ariana for his personal protection. The Pope had compelled the Swiss Guard to allow it, not because he could control his Ari, as some had accused, but because he trusted her more completely than he could anyone else. He’d helped groom her along with her father, for the vocation. And she trusted him. There was no one other than Ariana who could allow his latitude and protect him at once so seamlessly, so assuredly and competently, so without question from either side.

The com device buzzed in his ear with chattering, competing with the crowd noise, but Joe’s focus remained on Ariana. She took the first step with His Holiness at her side, both looking up at the fifteen steps undaunted. They’d done it all before. There wasn’t room for Joe to flank the Pope’s side here, but he followed close and kept a hand on the holy man’s back as he kept an eye on their right, left, and rear. Swiss Guards followed him. There were two of the guard at the top of the stairs waiting, watching. The pitch of the crowd rose as if they could feel His Holiness climb the steps.

The Pope had stepped onto the third rung when Joe felt the push from behind. He spun around, taking his eyes and focus off Ariana to see a young man thrust his hand forward, breaching the gap between the two Swiss Guards. Joe spotted the black-and-silver object in the man’s hand, reacting before his mind registered what it was as quickly as the intruding hand darted forward and reached between the two guards. Joe reacted reflexively. The Pope stopped and was turning as the two guards grabbed the man’s shoulders and Joe lashed his arm up and out, grabbing hold of the object in the man’s hand and yanking it upwards and back with such force that one guard toppled back with the man off the stairs and onto the ground.

“Move it, Ari.” Joe pushed her and Pope Luke Paul up and away as he turned his body, protecting them from whatever he held in his hand. He hadn’t yet determined what the object was, except that it was not a gun. At least not one he recognized. He ignored the commotion around him, mostly drowned out from crowd noise and hidden from view on the stairs. Swiss Guards closed rank around the stairs as two men in suits dragged the man out of sight under the tarp-enclosed platform.

Joe lifted the object to take a close look at it as he was pushed off the stairs. Then he grabbed a rail.

“Stop.” He shouted at the owners of the hands that tried pulling him away from his charges. Identifying the Captain of the Swiss Guard on site, he pulled him aside and showed him.

The object that had scared them, that caused near panic, was a cell phone. It had been in camera mode. Joe pulled it apart quickly and checked it. Nothing but the battery and SIM card. The young and menacing-looking man had merely been taking pictures. Joe handed the pieces over to the guards.

“We’ll inspect it. Make sure it’s what it appears to be.”

Joe nodded and the man let go of his arm, then disappeared behind the tarp where they’d taken the would-be perpetrator. In spite of a blip of trepidation for the young man, Joe spun around and stamped up the stairs, catching up with Ari and Pope Luke Paul as they reached the top and nudging aside the young guardsman who’d usurped his place.

Ari and the Pope both eyed Joe, stopping still and alert. He knew they both had questions and he knew they would be different questions.

“False alarm. It was a cell phone.” He said to Ari. Then he met the Pope’s eyes. “He was only trying to take pictures.”

“See to it that he is unharmed, Joe.” The Pope, for the first time since Joe had joined him and Ari, was not smiling. His Holiness knew the ruthlessness of his Swiss Guard.

Joe nodded. Ariana gave him a last look. He tried reassuring her without speaking, because it was nearly impossible to hear anything now that the crowd had spotted Pope Luke Paul on the platform.

She compressed her lips, resolved to trust him, he hoped. Then she visibly squared her shoulders and led Pope Luke Paul forward, ahead of her. Joe took up his position a quarter step behind and to his right, keeping a touch on His Holiness while trying to stay out of sight.

Once Pope Luke Paul reached the low podium, front and center of the platform, ringed with bulletproof Plexiglas, Joe needn’t have worried that anyone might notice him. All eyes, all attention, and all focus was on the holy man. Except Joe’s and Ari’s and those protecting his life. They watched their surroundings, every flash of light, every glint of metal, every rooftop, every sudden or fast-moving object or person.

Sweat pricked through every pore of his skin as Joe surveyed the vast open space filled with more than a hundred thousand people by his best estimate. This was more danger than the Pope should be exposed to. He concentrated on his mission, managing to keep Ariana in his periphery and within touching distance throughout the Pope’s message.

It was hard not to listen, not to feel the chill when the crowd roared in response, but Joe focused on his assignment like he always did, moving aside his personal angst to allow his training to take hold.

They stood atop the platform while the Pope spoke forever, like a moment caught in an infinite loop of time. But when it was over it seemed to have passed in an infinitesimal flash. Joe knew from his experience that he wouldn’t remember a single word that the Pope said. And that was a shame but Joe couldn’t regret that, wouldn’t trade hearing the speech for the moments spent in private and the Pope’s personal wisdom shared.

Aside from the tense false alarm with the man and his camera, Ariana and Joe manage to get the Pope back to the limo without incident. The car had been waiting for them along Court Street. They would return to the Archbishop of Boston’s residence in Braintree.

Joe and Ariana sat with the Pope in the back seat of the cardinal’s limo flying the papal flag. It was in a cavalcade of vehicles including motorcycles and security alongside for the drive to Braintree. Normally a twenty-minute drive, it would likely take an hour as they traveled five miles an hour through crowded Boston Streets toward the highway.

The sudden silence as he closed the door behind them made him realize how loud the crowd had been and some of Joe’s tension drained. Pope Luke Paul’s elation from speaking to his people hadn’t faded.

Ariana looked satisfied, if not elated. Joe had had no idea now to feel as the adrenaline left his system, except exhausted and grateful.

“Joe,” the Pope addressed him in the middle of his fond recollection of events. “Tell me about what happened on the stairs. What came of the young man who was detained?”

“I’m not sure. He tried to get too close to take a picture. We stopped him. We couldn’t tell it was a phone at first.”

The Pope nodded. “Can you find out where he is? I don’t want this young man punished for his eagerness. I would like to make sure he is not inconvenienced any longer by the authorities.” He smiled. “Sometimes the authorities are guilty of being overeager too.”

Joe took out his phone. He pressed in the private number of the Boston Police Commissioner. It took the commissioner a few calls and some time on hold before he told Joe that they had taken the man to FBI offices across from City Hall Plaza where they’d just been.

Joe put a hand over the phone.

“They’re still holding him for questioning.”

“Ask the driver to turn back,” Pope Luke Paul said without urgency, but with determination. “I want to visit him. I will see if I can persuade the FBI to release him.”

“Holiness,” Ariana spoke up then. “I am willing to wager that you would be as persuasive on the phone as in person. We have many people who will be waiting for us, including our host, Cardinal O’Mara.”

“Say what you mean, Ari. You fear for my life amidst the FBI special agents.”

She laughed. “What I mean is that it’s been a long day and I’m protecting you from your own eager behavior.”

The Pope chuckled and waved a hand at Joe to give him the phone.

Ariana was proved right.

“You should have placed that bet, Ari,” Joe said when the Pope relaxed his face and handed his phone back with satisfaction that all would be well. Ariana had been right, Pope Luke Paul had been wound up.

Ariana thanked Joe with her eyes as he slipped the phone back into his pocket. Joe wished she could thank him with all of her. Then immediately felt guilty, as if he were committing a sacrilege. But he knew she was no virgin nun. Not even close. She was a passionate, whole woman. He wondered for a brief tortured moment if she’d seen other men since they’d been together.

Then he banished all thought about his relationship with Ariana from his mind, fearing Pope Luke Paul could very well be reading every one of his less-than-holy thoughts. The man was uncanny.

No kidding. This tenant of the holy see seemed to see everything.

The ride to Braintree with the protective cavalcade took over an hour as predicted. Joe had no sense of what the traffic should have been. All norms of comings and goings in the Boston area were out the window on this day.

The Pope told him stories of Ariana’s young life and his early acquaintance with her and her father when he was a mere priest serving at the Vatican.

“I was the undersecretary of the Congregation for Catholic Education in the Roman Curia when I got to know Ariana’s father, then a Major in the Swiss Guard.”

“Our family lived in one of the small apartments for the married Swiss Guard officers. I still live there now.”

“It has been one of my tasks to see that more housing is provided for the guard. I am told the lack of housing is the main reason for not allowing women in the guard.” The lift of one brow told Joe that the Pope doubted the verity of the housing shortage as the issue. “It will be interesting to test this assertion.”

Ariana held her commentary on the subject.

“As I was saying, I enjoyed the comradery of the guard and would often watch their sport—their games of football—or to you as an American the sport would be called soccer.”

“My father was a star of the team until he was old, then he coached and I was always there watching,” Ariana said. “I was enthusiastic. Maybe a little out of control. Then Father DePrisi delighted in my antics. But at the same time, he calmed me, he channeled my energy so when I might be inclined to yell at the referees—or anyone who touched my father—I learned to …tolerate.”

“You impressed me with your ability to learn so quickly. You were always smart, always a delight. Always so full of vitality and passion.” The Pope studied Ariana. She stayed silent under his gaze until she looked away.

“Joe doesn’t want to hear about me.”

That made Pope Luke Paul laugh until he coughed and she became alarmed. It seemed Joe didn’t need to set him straight on the point.

Joe wanted to hear about her, but more than that he craved private time with her. His Holiness seemed to grow in bulk between them, increasing his agitation to talk with her, reconnect with her, touch her. With each minute his sense of need forced an urgency in him that needed quenching as if he’d been away from the planet on an interstellar journey for years and he now approached the atmosphere with only a thin layer of clouds separating him from returning home. A seemingly impenetrable layer at the moment.

It was that frame of mind that caused Joe to leap from the car almost before it stopped under a portico at the guest entrance of 66 Brooks Drive.

They arrived at the combination rectory and offices of the Boston Archdiocese in time for rest before dinner. No matter how exhausted or anxious to talk with Ariana alone Joe might be, if Pope Luke Paul could bear the dinner gathering, then he could. The Pope was not one to disappoint those who wanted a piece of him. As far as Joe could tell, His Holiness viewed it as his main job to give of himself generously and without reserve.

Joe also observed that Ariana viewed it as part of her protection detail to protect Pope Luke Paul from the worst of the users and abusers of the Pope’s generosity, without appearing to. But he knew anyway.

As they paraded inside the spacious accommodations among bishops and priests, Joe realized this was not a crowd to worry about. Cardinal O’Mara and the bishops and priests of the Archdiocese gathered to admire and behold the Pope’s greatness.

Cardinal O’Mara himself walked with them to show them their rooms. The cardinal had put Joe in the room adjoining Pope Luke Paul. Ariana was on an upper floor where his housekeeping staff were accommodated.

Joe knew this was not the first time this had happened her. Her graciousness impressed him, but Joe couldn’t help speaking up for her.

“Ariana Day is the personal protector of the Pope at his request. She will stay in the room adjoining his and I’ll stay—”

“I’ll stay in the room on the other side, Joe. The one without an adjoining door. We’ve prepared for this. We know the layout of your beautiful rectory, Cardinal O’Mara.”

Before the Cardinal said another word, Pope Luke Paul put a hand on his arm.

“This is a new age of empowered women, amazing women. I trust Ari with my life.” He paused and showed a sly dimple before adding. “Certainly you are not concerned about impropriety—”

“No, certainly not Your Holiness.”

The poor cardinal went on. Joe stopped listening and found himself staring across at Ari. If only she didn’t have that beautiful face. The thought jarred him. Because his vision blurred, essentially proving to him that it wasn’t her face he was in love with. It was her soul, her beautiful blessed stubborn soul, warm and tough at the same time. She was an impossibility come to life.

The cardinal left them and Pope Luke Paul went into his room, leaving him with Ariana in the semi-privacy of a well-guarded busy hallway.

“After dinner we’ll have some downtime,” she said to him now as if seeing his well-hidden exhaustion.

“The Swiss Guard gets close duty?”

“This will be the safest part of the itinerary, our only real chance to relinquish some measure of responsibility. They’re capable.”

“I know. They show remarkable restraint in not displaying their resentment of me.”

She laughed.

“If they’ve gotten over me in their midst, Joe, they can overcome anything in the name of their mission of protection.” He watched the dancing twinkle in her eyes and felt like pulling her into one of the rooms that lined the hallway where they stood and shutting the door behind them.

She read his mind. Or maybe she had the same thought. Either way, he enjoyed the rise of pale pink to her cheeks, the extra glaze in her eyes.

“Let’s get some rest before dinner.” She disappeared into her room.

That exchange wasn’t nearly enough to quench his need. It was an appetizer that heightened his hunger. He resolved to steal them some time alone from the incorruptible itinerary after dinner.

If the Pope had arranged the dinner table, Joe was certain he’d have been sitting near Ariana. As it was, he could watch her, but he couldn’t hear her. He could see her bemuse an old bishop and make people around her laugh. God—and the Pope—only knew what she said, how she maintained her energy.

All Joe had left was the underlying buzz of anticipation propelling him to the end of the meal. No one seemed to mind that he excused himself shortly after Pope Luke Paul and Ariana stood and left the room. He caught up with them in the hall as the Pope retired with his personal assistant. After a last check of the Pope’s room, she said, “The only thing we need to worry about now is a bomb or a fire or betrayal by a fallen staff member. None of which are likely.”

“Good to know, Sherlock.”

“I’m glad you’re still full of sarcastic humor.” She showed a dimple. “We have work to do. Final preparations for tomorrow. Follow me.”

“I’m as full of piss and vinegar as you.” He would follow her anywhere.

The knowledge was disquieting, but it didn’t stop him from walking into a library office behind her. She sat behind the desk and he sat in the only place he could—in a chair on the other side of the desk from her. Alone but separated. He spied the door. It was ajar. He contemplated getting up and closing it.

“We’ll leave the door open for propriety’s sake. Cardinal O’Mara’s staff graciously allowed me the use of his library.”

“You taking mind-reading lessons from His Holiness?”

“I hate to tell you, but you’re not a tough code to crack.” She laughed.

“I should be embarrassed by that, but I’m not—“.”

“Before we go down this road, let’s take care of business,” she said. His anticipation ratcheted up to Vesuvius levels.

She briefed Joe on details about the exact nature of the threat on the Pope.

“The intel is unusual and indicates an up-close-and-personal attack, from what translators and analysts can tell me. They won’t share the original voice transcripts and messages that were intercepted.”

“It’s probably a stupid question, but is there any way we can talk the Pope out of giving communion? It will be his riskiest point of vulnerability.”

“It is a stupid question. But I’m hoping we can get some significant updates in intel—or chatter or whatever they call it—from the FBI. I’ve set up a conference call.” She looked at her watch.

“For right now?” The phone rang and she picked up the receiver from the old-fashioned desk phone. He figured it was as secure as they were going to get.

“Let me put you on speaker.”

The conference call with the Boston Police Commissioner and FBI Special Agent in Charge of the Boston office on the other end of the line yielded no additional significant intel.

After the call, Ariana sighed deeply, then stood. He stood. Neither of them moved toward the door. He felt like a tuning fork that had been struck hard by a violent need to act. It was funny that he felt paralyzed at the same time.

She held his eyes and seemed to be on the verge of speaking. He didn’t trust her not to dismiss him, so he jumped into the beat of silence when she took a breath.

“We need to talk. You and me. About us.”

They both held their breath for a beat as if letting the dust settle after an explosion.

He’d said us as if there were an us.

But so far nothing that had happened or had been said on this assignment between them should have led him—or any rational man—to that conclusion. Which left him to conclude that he was no longer rational about Ariana Day.

Not a big news flash.

She nodded, stayed silent. She’d never been a talky woman. Another thing he loved about her. Loved about her? He was fucked.

She waited him out but he took his time, trying to think what to say, to think what was bothering him most. What the hell could he ask her that would help him bring closure to the gaping wound she’d left in his heart and soul?

“Did I ever have a chance?”

“More than you know.”

“Don’t give me f—stupid riddles.” He swiped a hand through his hair and held onto his head, literally and figuratively.

“I felt myself falling for you. It was a scary thing for me, Joe. It would have meant the end of everything in my life, everything I’d known and worked for…” She trailed off, seemingly running out of words. Maybe she was running out of patience with him.

“Don’t you think it was scary for me too?” But I wanted you anyway. He couldn’t bring himself to say the words.

“You haven’t found anyone else? All these years, Joe?”

He couldn’t tell if she wanted him to say yes or no. He told the truth.

“No. But then I haven’t been looking. I never meant to find the love of my life.”

Boom.

He’d said the words that he’d never meant to say, that he’d never said aloud before. They echoed in his head, echoed in the room., He forced himself to keep her eyes on his, to feel the full brunt of her response, whatever it would be.

“This is exactly what I didn’t want to happen. I didn’t want to hear this from you. I didn’t want to have to admit my feelings for you. I wanted them to be gone and to stay gone. And they would have—”

Raw need roared in his ears, driving him forward to hold her. She leaned against him, in his arms for no more than a few hammering heartbeats.

Then she pushed him away.

“We need to get rest, Joe. We have important duties tomorrow, you and I. This can’t happen between us.”

She swept past him and out the door. He gulped air and followed after her, swallowing his pride along the way. He didn’t catch up with her before she closed the door of her room behind her.

Joe went into his room and closed the door. The adrenaline spike he felt now was more powerful than he’d had earlier that day, than any he’d had in a dangerous situation. It was all Ariana. It felt like he had more than his life at stake. He was there to protect her and he wondered now what he was to protect her from? What danger? Himself?

Or was he to protect her from her own ambitions?

Pacing around the room, he looked at the adjoining door and thought of asking His Holiness these questions. But that would have been beyond presumptuous. He was out of his mind. He needed to cool down. He needed to get the vision of Ariana Day from his mind.

But he hadn’t been able to extinguish his passion for her in years of absence so who was he kidding about being able to do it now? He needed her to do it for him. He needed her to reject him all the way, to reject his lust and his love.

Joe went back out to the hall and walked to her room in spite of the Swiss Guard he passed by outside the Pope’s door. He knocked on her door, eyeing the guard with a warning.

“Stay outside that door. All night.” He would have felt guilty if the Pope hadn’t told Joe he was there to protect Ari, not him.

She opened her door. He stood silent. He wasn’t going to beg. After a very long pause, she let him in.

He closed the door behind him and pulled her into him before she could speak or argue. Even as he knew he was out of control, letting his lust and, worse, his emotions get the better of him, he held her, lowered his head and kissed her.

It felt like coming home, like walking through the front door after being away at war for years. It was a feeling he knew. It was a lightening of his soul he hadn’t known he needed.

She returned his kiss, lips cool and thirsty against his, soft and pliable. But then she separated, pressing but not pushing. He let her.

He spoke then, his voice raspier than before.

“What is it that can’t happen between us?”

“None of this. I want you Joe, but I want more than I can have.”

“Who says you can’t—?”

“Let’s not argue.” She pulled back.

“I want everything you can give me. I want to give you everything you’ll take. Isn’t that enough?”

He moved close again while she stared at him, her eyes glassy, heat swirling between them. He backed her toward the bed. It was tall, but he pushed her onto it all the same, lifting her as she tried to protest.

But the only coherent word that came from her mouth was his name.

“Joe…” She didn’t say no. She didn’t say go away and leave me alone as he’d feared she might.

A sense of power and euphoria filled him like he was about to conquer the highest mountain in the universe. That stopped him as he lay on top of her, looking down into her eyes, the soft features of her face cloaking the tough-as-nails interior. He wanted her, but he had no intentions of hurting her, not even to take what little comfort he could get to treasure. He would hate himself.

“Ariana, I’m in love with you, with who you are—all the complicated messy parts of you, not an ideal. I’m in love with you—the woman trying to do the impossible and struggling like we mortals sometimes do.”

A tear slipped down her cheek and he kissed it away.

“Joe, I wish you didn’t make me feel this way—as if I’d discovered the one person in the world who was my perfect match, who knew me, who excited me, who wanted me—all of me. The same way I want you. Because you know I made my choices—not any official vow like a nun or a priest, but the vow of a Swiss Guard and an extra vow to myself.” She paused and caught her breath and when she continued her voice was strangled. “An impossible vow.”

“Not impossible. I promise I won’t…” What could he promise? That he wouldn’t seduce her? Because that’s sure as hell what he was doing at that very moment.

She waited for him to finish.

“I promise I’ll leave you alone.” It cost him to say the words. He commanded his arms to push off her that very moment in spite of his throbbing cock, in spite of his raging need, in spite of his breaking heart.

But she held on. She pulled his head down to hers, pulling his hair and holding his chin with her hand. She opened her mouth all the way to devour him, to take in everything he had.