Page 5 of Sinners Atone
But more fool me, because now the sky is slipping. I’m falling forward, down into the Devil’s arms.
The ground catches me, becausenot yet.
With her sweet voice, she calls out to God again. My cheek scrapes gravel, then suddenly I’m on my back, and there she is.
Fuck. Maybe she is an angel. Because I swear, the streetlamp above wasn’t as bright until she dropped to her knees beneath it. Now it bends to accommodate the curves of her heart-shaped face and reflects in her wide blue eyes, like sunlight dancing on water. It skates over her golden bangs, sparkles on her eyelids,and carves a straight line from the top of her nose down to the deep groove of her cupid’s bow.
No. This isn’t how death is supposed to go. I’m meant to die in the dark, not under her light, and the last thing I need is to be seen like this. Remembered like this. Weak and pathetic, lying in the fucking dirt bleeding out.
But the ground is too comfortable and my jaw too heavy to tell her to fuck off again. The best I can do is fight to keep my eyes open and track her every move.
Her gaze fixes on my stomach, wide-eyed and disbelieving. “Is thatblood?”
“No, it’s ketchup,” I grit.
“It looks painful.”
“No shit.”
She nods solemnly, ignoring my sarcasm. With a hand at her mouth, she bites down on the tip of her middle finger and tugs off her pink glove. “Don’t panic, I’m going to call for help.”
Trying to call anyone is useless, but so is my voice box, so I only watch as she stuffs her hand in her coat pocket and pulls out her cell. Like the rest of her, it’s ridiculously pink, as are the half a dozen charms attached to it. They clink and rattle like my mama’s wind chimes on the back porch as she furiously taps in her pass code.
“No signal,” I manage to huff out after several attempts. “Just go.”
She glances at her screen, down to me, and back again. The tiniest crease lines her forehead. “Dammit. Well, there’s a phone booth just there. You got any quarters?”
“It. Doesn’t. Work.”
“What?”
Fuck this, I’m wasting too much time. Must cross the road. I feel for the ground beside me and push down on it in an attemptsit up. A sharp stabbing pain shoots through my core, and I collapse back against the asphalt.
“Hey, you need to stay still?—”
I bark at her to leave again, but it comes out in a gurgle so guttural it jolts her to her feet.
“Crap, crap, crap,” she whimpers, her composure cracking for a moment. Then she rolls her shoulders back and takes a deep breath. “Okay, wait right here.”
As if I can go anywhere else. The light follows her to the middle of the road. My eyes tag along too, watching as she paces from left to right and back again, holding her bag on her shoulder with one hand and her cell to the sky with the other.
Pausing for breath, I try to make sense of her.
Maybe God sent her as a cruel joke. A final taunt of what could have been had I been born Angelo or Rafe. But then I dismiss the idea immediately, because He’s not stupid enough to send her to a man like me. He wouldn’t take the risk.
So if she’s not from another world, what the fuck is she doing in this one, walking along a dark road alone in the middle of the night?
Curiosity and a slither of annoyance entwine with my pain, but I ignore it. I don’t have the time or energy to dig deeper. She needs to leave, and I need to get moving.
With a hard puff, I roll myself onto my side. I ball my hands into fists and press into the earth, trying to drag myself forward on my knuckles. If I can’t walk, then I’ll crawl to the church. And if I can’t crawl, I’ll fucking roll—whatever it takes to warn my brothers.
She jogs over and gives my chest a little kick with the tip of her toe. “Christ—stop moving! You’ll make it worse!”
I glance up to see if she’s joking, because how can this get any worse? But I’m distracted by the cell phone pressed flat against her forehead.
What the fuck is she doing?
I guess my glare asked the question for me because she launches into a rambling explanation.
