The next week blurred into stolen glances and locked doors. Esther stopped pretending she came for the architecture. She came for him. Julian stopped pretending he didn’t notice her shadow slipping through the side aisle after the last hymn faded. He started leaving the narrow door behind the altar unlocked—always after evening Mass, when the church emptied and the candles were the only ones left burning.
She waited until the footsteps died away, then pushed through that door like she belonged there.
The sacristy was small, warm, cluttered with the quiet tools of his trade: folded chasubles in deep purple and gold, a silver chalice waiting to be polished, shelves of incense boxes that smelled faintly of myrrh even when closed. A single table stood in the center—plain oak, scarred from ye
