Page 66 of Sinners Retreat

“I’m not feeling too well,” he says. “I think I’m going to head back myself.”

Are you kidding me? I’ve found my brother’s killer. I’ve told my story in front of everyone. There’s a weight off my chest that’s finally letting my heart beat a little more freely. And now he’s going to leave? Now?

I’m speechless.

“Go inside, Kindra. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Yeah. Night.”

I watch him leave, his hands slipping into his pockets as he disappears into the darkness. And isn’t that always the way? The moment I let my walls down, the man decides I’m no longer worth the effort.

“At least I still have you,” I say to the wine bottle in my right hand. And that’s when the tears come.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Ezra

They weren’t sevens.

That’s the pervading thought that circles my exhausted mind as I blindly stumble toward my villa. Those little lines I carved into his skin weren’t meant to represent the number seven, though I can understand why she would have thought that was the case.

I carved him up when I had him tied to a table, long before the family discovered him, so each symbol would have appeared upside down once I changed his orientation and draped him from the hooks.

But they weren’t sevens. They were letters. More specifically, dozens of capitalized letter Ls.

Letters or numbers, it didn’t matter either way. She and her mother wouldn’t have made the connection because they were blissfully unaware of what their beloved son and brother had been up to in his free time. The missing eyes wouldn’t have made much sense, either. But now I know everything I need to know.

I killed Kindra’s brother.

A terrified mother brought him to my attention all those years ago. She didn’t hire me to kill the man who’d been molesting her child, though. She only wanted me to ferret out enough evidence so that he could be brought to justice. Instead, I meted out justice myself.

My methods haven’t changed much over the years. Someone brings a name to my P.I. firm, and I sally forth and return with the evidence they require. But, on rare occasion, that evidence secures my right to kill, and that was the case with Kindra’s brother.

His name was Reese Amato, and he paraded around as a community do-gooder. No one questioned a twenty-something youth pastor who just wanted to help the neighborhood kiddies with their batting average, especially when that man had been the star of the local baseball team in high school. Someone should have been asking some questions, though.

A week of investigative work gave me more details than I could stomach. The mother had been right to worry. He’d been doing horrible things to her son, but he’d been molesting other boys on the team as well. Unfortunately, I learned her son had been his personal favorite since he was eight years old.

After warning the child’s parents, I stalked Reese for three days, waiting for the right moment to strike. When that moment never presented itself, I got tired of waiting. Just knowing he did such vile things to such innocent children tipped the scales of rage in my heart. It was the only time I’ve ever lost myself to a kill.

It was stupid to stray so far from my MO, which usually involves careful planning and rigid execution, but I couldn’t help myself. I really wanted to hurt that asshole, so I snatched him from his bed one night and hauled him back to my place.

That’s where I tied him to a table and carved those letters into his skin. That’s where I removed his eyes with a melonballer, all while he was still alive. He would die with that child’s brand on his skin, and he would never look at another innocent babe with lust again.

I wanted to do so much more. I wanted to shove his stumpy cock into his mouth, wait for him to shit it out, then feed it to him again. I yearned to pull each of his nails from his fingers and toes, then drip acid into the open wounds.

There just wasn’t enough time. There never is.

So, I loaded him up in my car and took him to his mother’s address, where I hung him in the garage and proceeded with exsanguination. That’s where Kindra comes in, I guess.

Now, knowing all this, I’ll be forced to explain everything to the woman I’m falling for. I have no way to prove anything to her, as all the evidence in my possession has been destroyed, so I can only hope she believes me.

If we were back on the mainland, I’d just call up the families and ask them to corroborate my tale, but that isn’t possible here. The cell connection is too spotty, and the internet is about as accessible as a pious nun’s panties.

Which is to say, not at all.

I sigh and lean against the door to my villa. My heart has done a very stupid thing and attached itself to someone who can’t possibly return the affection. Once she learns that I killed her brother and lied about it, she’ll never want to see me again.

That means I have one more day with her. I promised Bennett I would tell her before the hunt on the last day, so I still have tomorrow. But is that fair to Kindra?

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