“It’s… just a thought,” he repeated, less certain this time.

Here he was, backtracking again for the sake of someone else.

He’d been too quick to take that answer at face value. Of course Nettie would say all of that about the church, and about it being better to leave if it made him unhappy – it would have been impolite for her to say otherwise.

Malachi lingered at the bottom of the steps, hands drawn behind his back again, teeth worrying the inside of his cheek.

“Please don’t cry,” he said softly.

Had she been anyone else, he would have slapped her for the indecision she’d worsened in him; for the tears she was allowed to shed when he was the one struggling. Would have told her that before he was a priest, it had still been his place to sacrifice for the sake of the Brennans. That nothing had changed since then except his desire for something different.

But it was Nettie, and the anger he repressed was not her fault.

Stepping closer, he slipping his arms around her again, holding tighter this time.

“You aren’t losing me. And what makes you think that if I did leave, I would suddenly stop writing to you?” Malachi tilted his head down, looking over the blonde waves of her hair. “Don’t be silly. I would hardly be moving to the other side of the world, so I would expect to be visited too.”