Defrocked: House of Bolton Novella, #1

By MJ Green

Faith Shattered. Vows Broken.

 

After three years spent grieving secretly for his past lovers, a chance at something new appears in front of Killian McDonald. But will he grab a hold of what Nicoli Beltrame is offering him or ignore it in favour of renewing his commitment to his faith.

 

Love isn't restricted to being a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Nicoli Beltrame knows this firsthand having fallen in love with several men already, and he isn't one to shy away from a chance of falling for another. It doesn't matter that Killian was a gift to him from his deceased nephew or that it came three years after his nephew had been buried.

 

But Killian is different to the other men who share Nicoli's bed—a priest with broken vows and shattered faith—while his world is full of danger that might cost Killian his life.

 

Defrocked is a 36k MM+ age gap novella set in the House of Bolton universe. It involves a priest with shattered faith and broken vows falling in love with a mafia emissary who sees the priest's darker desires and willingly grants them. Being MM+ there is also consensual sharing of partners.

• Language: English
• Publisher: NaomiAoki
• Release date: Jan 25, 2024
• ISBN: 9798224641093

Book preview

Dedication

FOR ABRI AND AMBER who demanded that Killian get his chance at a HEA. I didn’t say I’d make his getting it painless... hee.

Extra special thanks to needs to go to my beta/proofreader extraordinaire Abri at Abrianna Denae Proofreading.

Author Note

THIS BOOK INCLUDES references to the Catholic Faith, Violence, Murder, Self-flagellation, Dom/sub situations, Abduction, Sharing.

Defrocked is NOT a Christian Romance... but did you really expect it to be?

While Nicoli Beltrame is polyamorous and his other partners are referenced, this book focuses on his relationship with Father Killian McDonald. For this reason, I class it as MM+.

Prologue

KILLIAN TREMBLED AND clutched the bible in his hands tighter as he watched the two coffins being lowered into the ground. Alberto Tomasi and Giovani Beltrame had wreaked havoc on his life over the past six months and he should’ve been elated that they were now gone. He should be relieved... not wishing to be somewhere private and letting his grief overwhelm him, the tears a priest should never shed spilling down his cheeks. But no one could know what these two men had meant to him beyond their being devoted parishioners and generous benefactors of the church...

...or they had been.

But that Sunday after Mass, Killian had lost two friends...two forbidden lovers in a hail of bullets.

He’d loved them...even if they hadn’t loved him back.

And fuck them for deciding that he should be the one who presided over their funeral and delivered the eulogy. It wasn’t that he’d been completely unaware of their intention, Albie and Gio having shown Killian a copy of their will where his role in the funeral proceedings were explicitly laid out. Except Killian had written it off as a joke or something that wouldn’t ever happen. There was no way Albie and Gio knew their deaths were fast approaching or that they’d die within seconds of each other...

Except their lives had been cut short.

And they had died together on the church steps.

A tragic ending to a romance movie where the two lovers lay wrapped in each other’s arms while their life ebbed away. Romantic wasn’t how Killian would’ve described it. Haunting... devastating... soul destroying as he—and the rest of the Tomasi family who’d attended Mass—could only listen as Gio sung to Albie until there was no more breath in his lungs all while their enemy continued to fire upon them.

As a priest, Killian couldn’t hate... shouldn’t hate... and yet, he hated.

Hated the emptiness that now existed within him.

Hated the ache of desire he’d once fought against for so long, but now couldn’t forget. That his very reason for joining the priesthood had been ripped out of his soul and displayed in such a manner that Killian could no longer ignore it.

Hated that his devotion to his faith...the vows he’d once taken pride in were now shattered.

Albie and Gio had cast him adrift in a world that was both foreign and familiar to Killian all at once. He’d spent days on his knees praying to God for salvation, forgiveness... anything at all that would fill the void inside of him. Killian’s nights too were spent on his knees while penance was delivered with the sharp thud of a flogger.

Amen, he muttered, closing the bible he’d been reading from before hazarding a glance at the mourners gathered at Albie and Gio’s gravesite.

Selfishness was another sin Killian could add to his ever-growing list of transgressions because it wasn’t only him who mourned their deaths. The whole of Melbourne, if not Australia mourned them. Albie and Gio hadn’t only been friends, sons, brothers, and cousins... they’d also been tutors, mentors, philanthropists, and internationally acclaimed classical musicians.

To many of those who mourned Albie and Gio, their deaths would forever remain a mystery.

To their family, it would be something that needed to be avenged...

Killian winced at the thought, not looking forward to the family’s visits to the confessional booth if those behind this devastating loss were ever caught. He’d already learned far too much about the truth of who the Tomasi Family truly were.

Father... thank you for the beautiful, touching service, Ryland Beltrame choked out. I’m sure that my brother and Albie would’ve appreciated it. He gripped Killian’s shoulder tight before stumbling away from the gravesite and the rest of his family.

He feared Ryland wasn’t handling the death of his brother well, not that anyone would under the circumstances. But for all his concerns, it wasn’t Killian’s job to go after the man and tend to his mental well-being. Spiritual health, definitely...yet if Ryland suddenly found himself in the midst of a crisis of faith, Killian wasn’t sure that he’d be the right priest to bring the man back onto the path of God.

Shaking his head, Killian returned his attention back to the other mourners wishing to express their gratitude for the service he’d performed here and back at the church. Killian shook hands with senior members of the family, older generations who’d appeared to age decades more as they watched the heirs to the family disappear into the ground. Shook those that belonged to symphonia members, classical music stalwarts, and art patrons. Killian even found himself standing in front of the Lord Mayor of Melbourne and he stared at the outstretched hand not quite believing they were here before shaking it and accepting their words of thanks.

STANDING AT THE PULPIT and presiding over Sunday Mass was the second hardest thing Killian had ever needed to do—burying the two men he’d grown dangerously close to being the first. Preaching to the loyal congregation about morality, the need to lead pious lives that were free of sin and reminding them that kindness was a gift worth giving... Sermons Killian had once delivered with ease all while knowing that his own vows, the ones he’d sworn to uphold as a priest, had already been broken.

Obedience...when he’d agreed to marry Albie and Gio despite it being against the papacy’s decrees on the matter.

Celibacy...when he’d given into Albie and Gio’s seduction...repeatedly and with little remorse.

Harder still to stare out across the pews that were filled with reminders of all that Killian had lost. A family that he’d never gotten a chance to be a part of...not that he could’ve openly belonged to them unless Killian had been prepared to admit his crimes.

He’d given into the temptation of the flesh...

And shattered his faith.

Not that Killian had fought hard to resist the force of nature that had been Albie Tomasi and Giovanni Beltrame. He’d fallen in love with them too, during those weeks that he’d been blessed with their presence. Even before that, Killian wasn’t afraid to admit that many a night spent in self-flagellation had come about because of them. Envious of the way Albie and Gio’s love for each other was evident in every glance they shared, the fleeting touches they shared, and their lack of hesitancy at displaying their affections. And their determination to be married in their family’s church despite it going against the papacy’s prescribed teachings... that had only impressed Killian more. Made him want things he’d never allowed himself to desire...at least not since his early high school years before he’d decided to enter the seminary programme.

And in the end he’d married them.

Loved them.

Envied them.

Lusted after them.

Hated them.

Albie and Gio had belonged to a world so far removed from Killian’s despite their adherence to the Catholic faith. A loose adherence to the tenants of the faith they’d been raised in...dismissing all aspects that conflicted with their way of life—of loving. In that alone, they’d done something Killian had never been able to do—separating their belief in God—their idea of faith—from the pious edicts set down by the Pope. Men who still believed they’d go to Heaven with their blood-stained hands... believed too that God and Jesus, their Lord and Saviour would welcome them with open arms. Delusional, maybe? But Killian had not seen Albie’s faith waver—and nor Gio’s belief in his husband—not even while their cocks were buried in Killian’s arse.

And was defiling a priest, a man who served God, a sin equal to or worse than that of murder?

Or had Albie and Gio’s greatest sin been that they’d made Killian fall in love, only for them to leave Killian alone in the end?

Chapter One

I NEVER THOUGHT MY nephew would leave me anything in his will, our small age gap aside, Nicoli Beltrame said as he walked into Father McDonald’s office, locking the door behind him. And three years after his death is definitely an odd time to learn of it... don’t you agree, Father?

Depends on what the gift is, I suppose, Father McDonald replied, his gaze flicking nervously between Nicoli and the locked door.

He’d been shocked when his brother, Giovanni, had handed him a letter addressed to him from his nephew...Giovanni, when it had been three years since his nephew’s death. His brother had apologised profusely at the delay in Nicoli’s receiving it, especially when his letter had noted on it that it was to be delivered within days of his nephew’s death...not years. Yet there’d been no point in getting at angry at his brother, who’d understandably been overwhelmed with grief at the loss of his son and heir. It didn’t help matters either, that Nicoli was more often in Italy than he was at home in Melbourne, due to his role of emissary between their family and the main Tomasi Organisation back in Calabria.

But what had shocked him more was the contents of Giovanni’s letter. He might’ve expected to be left a sum of a cash, a few of the shares his nephew held in various international companies, maybe even a few juicy blackmail secrets... or a vineyard property on the coast—wishful thinking really, when it’d been obvious Giovanni would leave it to his brother, Ryland.

No...instead of cash or property his nephew had left him a person. A priest. Father McDonald to be more precise. Nicoli could admit to feeling somewhat disappointed...dissatisfied with his gift right up until he’d clapped eyes on the man. Now though... now that he could see the obvious subby vibes that Father McDonald gave off despite the collar around his neck, he understood Giovanni’s reasoning perfectly.

You... My nephew—and his husband I guess—gave me you.

Father McDonald stood up quickly, knocking over the chair in his rush to put distance between them. I’m a priest... a man of faith, he protested. "I’m not something that can be given to another... not a piece of property