Page 44 of Sinners Atone
The port beneath the cliffs is ablaze. Destruction in its rawest form ravishes through buildings, lorries, crates. Fires spit out debris into the raging sea, and the angry waves drag it under. The screams rising from the smoke and ash are chilling. They’re deeper, louder, more desperate than they are up here.
Devastation rips a hole through my core. Those screams don’t belong to nameless faces on the news, they belong to people I know. Men who prop up the bar at The Rusty Anchor nightly, whose daughters and sons I count as friends. Innocent lives ruined, maybe even lost.
How?
My only guess is some sort of freak accident.
A hand leaves my waist, and I glance down in time to see it yank on a door handle. I was so consumed by the scene belowI hadn’t noticed that the random man Gabriel passed me on to was carrying me toward a waiting car.
The back door swings open.
A car he’s trying to put me in to.
No.
No, no, no.
The hole in my stomach grows wider. Here come those self-absorbed thoughts again, and my hands fly out to grip onto the frame.
A gruff voice scrapes my nape. “Get in the car.”
I balk at the hard shove on my lower back.
Absolutely not. I drive my weight through my palms and lock my elbows, kicking my feet to find the ground. I find a shin instead, and the man holding me lets out a sharp hiss. When he drops me, I twist around and duck under his arm to escape.
“Get in the car!” he roars, lunging toward me.
I can barely see him, with the huge black void behind him opening wider and wider, threatening to swallow me whole. I can’t get in the car. Ican’t.Every bone in my body trembles, every thought in my brain screams in protest.
The man grips my arm and tugs me forward. I dig my heels into the asphalt, not a thought for my brand-new peep-toes nor for the manicure I definitely couldn’t afford, as my nails claw at any flesh they can find. I’ll do anything—kick, bite, scream. Cry, plea, beg. I’ll walk a thousand miles and back if it means not getting in a car ever again.
As the open door grows closer, my desperation burns hotter. I swing a fist; none of my punches land. A familiar voice is yelling my name from somewhere—it’s Rory, I know it, but I can’t see her through my tears.
“Let her go.” The command slices through my conscience like a hot butter knife. It’s calm, almost bored, but the voice holds weight. It belongs to someone who’s never had to raise hisvoice in his life, because he’s yet to meet someone who’s stupid enough to disobey him.
He drops me in an instant, and I stagger backward, finding my footing as he mutters under his breath in a foreign language. The car door slams shut behind him. Tires screech and kick up dust, covering the hem of my dress.
“Wren!”
It’s Rory’s voice again. I spin to find her through all the screaming and spot her hanging out the passenger-side window of a slow-moving black sedan. Her curls are ruffled, and her face is flushed red. My gaze shifts to the back seat, where Tayce is hammering against the glass, mouthing my name.
“Go with Gabe!” Rory yells, desperation warping her tone. Her big brown eyes are pleading with me. She shouts it again and again, until the car speeds up and carries her out of earshot.
Standing in the road, I watch the car disappear around the bend. The chaos has left too, and an eerie silence settles among the discarded purses, heels, and handkerchiefs littered on the ground.
It’s like a scene from a zombie apocalypse. Everyone’s gone. There’s only one threat to life now, and its shadow bleeds into the glow of a nearby streetlamp.
My chest fills with despair as I strain my eyes sideways and stare down at the shadow. It isn’t moving, and maybe, if I walk real slow and keep real quiet, he’ll let me leave without a fuss.
My house is less than a ten-minute walk away. Eight, if I kick off these heels once I’m out of his line of sight. Gravel crunches underfoot as I take a tentative step. Then another. Before my third footstep finds purchase, a deep command paralyzes my spine.
“Get in the car.”
I let out a sigh—a silent one, obviously. Mostly because I’m scared he’ll hear me, but also because I’m exhausted. I’mrunning on fumes, and now this terrifying turn of events has taken the last bit of fight from me.
Resigned, I turn around. A few feet away, Gabriel cuts a haunting figure. I don’t know what makes me more uneasy, being alone with him on an empty road again or how comfortable he looks among the destruction behind him. It’s as though he’s woven into its fabric—his black suit an extension of the black smoke, his molten glare the brightest of the embers dancing under the night’s sky.
Even if hewasn’tthe Boogeyman, he could fool the world with his eyes alone.
