Page 24 of Sinner's End

Self-flagellation indeed.

Or perhaps self-sabotage.

Emmanuel’s eyes widen when he sees me, his face breaking out into a shaky smile. “Bowen, my friend. What sort of night is it tonight?”

I stare at him, my face blank. That appears to be the thing that scares these mortals the most. Nothingness. Like a psycho ready to kill.

Ah, that’s what tonight is, then.

“I’m not your friend. Pick something worthless.”

“You mean someone,” he mumbles, frowning as he adds my name to the middle of the roster.

I take his pen from his limp, sweaty fingers and cross out all the names. “The first three live. After that…” I shrug. “Who do you want to get rid of?”

His eyes gleam. “I’ll make some calls.”

I snort in his wake as he hurries the departure from this world of those he hates or who are in his debt that he sees as a liability. Thirteen slots. That’s cute. Thirteen favors he will owe me at the end of the night. Not that he understands the depth of his personal depravity right now, but he will.

“Soon,” I whisper, mocking Kaleb’s serenade to his little hellcat. Hiskitten. Excuse me while I puke glowy fucking angel goop on my feet.

The little slut heated up the moment he touched her. Hell, I had God’s own trouble keeping my hands out of his, stealing his touches as my own. But breaking them up and causing a fight with Kaleb doesn’t suit my plans right now.

And yes, I can say the “G” word without being ended. Well, I was ended, but that was because of a certain incident with another of my kind.

“Cage one. You’re good to go,” Emmanuel says, all eager like a newborn puppy with his world about to be shattered.

I crack my neck lazily. “All slots taken?”

“Yes. All filled. They’ll be arriving…”

Now.

I smirk as a train of men, each lankier or more sinful or just fucking stinkier than the last, parade through the doors. “What did you promise them?”

Emmanuel cackles a little under his breath like a good, ignorant lackey. “Your head with your balls in your mouth.”

I smirk. “Creative.” Who knew the little slug had it in him?

I pat his shoulder in a familiar, oh-so-human gesture, pressing my fingers along his spine and clicking the bone there. A tiny drop of blood breaks inside his skin, though he doesn’t know it yet, and the black mark that stains his flesh as part of our bargain will never disappear. His soul is mine now. Who said it was only up to devils and demons and gods to play such games?

The first three leave the ring quickly. One unconscious, two with many contusions and broken bones. In one of my human facades, I studied medicine back when cadavers were opened on a table beneath many eyes on another continent. When all the modern machines came in, I had to fucking well do it again, both amazed and appalled at how much we got right the first time … and what we didn’t.

So many bodies I watched come in and go out. Not all were dead when they arrived, but they left their bodies to meet … well, someone, by the end of the session.

I am no stranger to sin. Much like the multitudes I will claim as my own mini-legion, souls I collect for a battle to come.

The first of the dead men steps into my cage, and I crook my finger.

“Come to Daddy.”

I relish the eye roll, the fist that comes my way. At the air that whistles beside my head, the way my jab folds in his windpipe, crushing it. How my elbow at his temple stops him worrying about how to breathe. The touch at the crook of his neck as his soul leaves him and becomes mine.

Nine more to go.

My clothes are drenched with red by the third dead man walking, and when Emmanuel comes in, I smile.

Perhaps it is not just the nothingness expression that terrifies, after all.

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