Page 76 of Sinful Crimes for the Artistically Inclined
“So in a way…”Shut up, Percy, he thought to himself.
“What?” The word dropped like a brick.
“That makes me…”Percy, shut up now.
“Don’t you dare say what I think you’re about to say.”
Please shut up, Percy.“That makes me… your Go?—”
Joe all but exploded. There was some talk of Percy being the worst boyfriend he had ever had, which Percy didn’t doubt at all. There was a lot of gesticulating and loud ranting about Percy not understanding how Catholicism works, which Percy believed was posturing nonsense, given that he specialised in Renaissance art and, therefore, Catholicism was his bread and butter. There was still more about Joe’s worth as a priest outside the rules of the Church, which Percy was, in theory, in full support of, but it all went on far too long and eventually gave Percy the uncomfortable feeling he had touched a very raw and painfully exposed nerve.
Definitely shouldn’t have said it.
Percy looked for an amicable way to withdraw from the conversation without giving too much ground. “I’m only saying, you’re different… You’re… not like other priests.”
Joe pushed his lips together so hard they turned white, before trying his equal best to finish amicably with, “I get the feeling you haven’t spent a whole lot of time around priests.”
“Certainly not the way I spend time with you,” Percy quipped, far too lasciviously, which made Joe turn red and Althea groan deeply. Percy, having quite forgotten she was there until that moment, moved the conversation on as quickly as possible. “Now do you believe he’s a priest?”
“Yes,” she moaned under her embarrassed breath.
“Now will you tell me how you gained Cleo’s trust?”
Althea licked her lips, suddenly dry, and not only from pasta sauce and cheese powder. Percy tracked the movement. A muscle in her cheek tensed. She blinked a few times, and her jaw clenched that little bit harder.
He knew guilt when he saw it. He knew the look of a person struggling to come to terms with themselves, becauseevery physical quirk about her right now were those he had trained himself to hide.
“I’ve killed at least seven people just today,” Percy said, to a mighty kick in the back of his seat from Joe, which he chose to ignore. “And not even for you, though I do like you. I did it for that rusted old relic in the back. And I did it because I know something worse will happen if I let anything get in my way.”
She barely breathed now, and a tear stole down her cheek, so he kept his eyes to the road, wondering slightly why Joe hadn’t slipped into priest-mode, taken her hand and started advising. Perhaps he hadn’t realised.
“You don’t have to tell me,” Percy said. “I can guess what you did, because I know what I would have done in that situation.”
She watched the nothingness out the window very carefully. “What would you have done?”
How he hated to say these things in front of Joe, but more important than that, was making sure she knew she wasn’t at fault. “I would have offered to get her more bodies. It would be easier for a teenage girl to do that.”
“‘Bodies’,” Althea repeated, her voice thick with disgust.
“You can’t help anyone if you’re dead.” Joe kicked his seat again, and Percy couldn’t think what on earth he was doing wrong. He was only condoning manslaughter under duress, so again he ignored it and tried all the harder to concentrate on making his point clear. “You know, my brother says you should never feel bad about doing what you had to do to survive. And he’s right. If you hadn’t found your way to us, no one else would stop her. From what little I know of you, I’m already convinced you did the right thing.”
She looked down into the chip packet, but she was a little less upset now, and she finally sent him a sad half smile. Percy replied with one of his warmest.
“Are you really going to stop her?” she asked.
“Of course. Isn’t that right, Joe?”
There was still no sound from the back. Odd for someone so mouthy. Percy turned his head, and his eyes bulged in horror as he took in Joe’s face, steadily turning blue.
At first glance, it was as though he were strangling himself, fingers pushing deep into his skin, already turning a vicious red at the destructive force where they clamped down on his neck. Yet there were three hands, Joe’s own two pulling hard at the strange thing, grasping where he could, and the bloody stump of the third deteriorating shortly after the wrist into swinging tendrils of vein and sinew.
Percy ripped his knife from his ankle holster. “Wheel!”
“I can’t drive!” Althea yelled.
“Now!” Percy pushed the car into neutral, grabbed her hand, stuck it on the wheel, and lunged at the atrocity in the back. The already-too-fast car veered wildly as Althea attempted to take control, and Percy’s body was thrown to the side as he brought his knife down, Joe arching as the blade hit his chest, any attempt to cry out at the sharp pain cut off at the throat.
Percy reached for the bloody end of the phantom hand to steady himself, finding nothing but a mess of gore which slipped and squelched away from him, until Joe’s strong hand found his and pulled him up. He aimed again, and sank his dagger into the hand, which let go at once, allowing a deep, desperate, gasp of air from Joe, who fell down beside Percy as Percy swore wildly at the writhing hand stuck upside down on his knife, all while Althea continued to yell at Percy about which pedal was the brake, though he hadn’t noticed that last thing until just now.
