Page 59 of Sinners Reunion

“Okay, just slide the cock skins over the wieners, and bam!” Rayna says. “You have what Dalton and I like to call the Frankenpeen.”

Dalton scoffs as he returns to the group. “Oh, now you tell me that hot dogs were an acceptable substitute.”

Eve’s eyebrow rises. “Where’d she make you put the cock skin, honey?”

They look at each other, and Rayna opens her mouth, ready to tell the world their dirty secrets. Dalton’s palm slams over her lips.

“Hey, you shouldn’t do that to a woman,” Ice Pick says. His eyebrows furrow. “Not unless they ask you to.”

“Trust me,” Dalton says through gritted teeth. “She gets off on this. She’s biting the shit out of me as we speak."

He finally releases her, and he’s right. She’s wearing a big smile on her face, and he bears a crescent welt on the meat of his palm. Poor lad. He’s landed a wild one there.

“Hassafa fa fa shuffa. Blech!”

Speaking of wild ones . . .

I turn to see who’s broken into tongues, and I realize it’s Josie. She spits a steaming pile of meat from her mouth and looks around for something to drink. I pass her a bottle of water, and she uses it to cool her tongue.

“When the hell did you have time to make one of their Frankendogs?” I ask.

“Frankenpeen,” Rayna and Dalton say.

Ignoring them, I press Josie further. “Why’d you bite into it?”

When she looks up at me, tears brim in her eyes. She’s embarrassed, but I’m irritated. She could have put her mouth out of commission before I’ve had a chance to fully enjoy her oral skills.

“I bit into it because I’m hungry,” she says with a pout.

“Children in war-torn countries are hungry, Josie. Monks seeking enlightenment on the furthest reaches of the Tibetan mountains are hungry. You? You’re just impatient.”

“Well if you already knew the answer, why’d you even ask, Captain Cocksure?”

As I look at her lips now, swollen from the heat of that blazing wiener, I’m more certain than ever.

Perhaps I’ve confused what I’m feeling. I’ve called it love, but there is every chance it’s merely misplaced dopamine from finding a woman who knows how to keep up the intrigue. After all, Marcia wouldn’t marry me, turning her heart into a conquest. That kept me holding on for all that time.

Meanwhile, Josie would marry me in a heartbeat, but kissing me is forever off the table.

Is that all there is to it? Is Josie’s kiss the only challenge I’ve yet to conquer?

As I watch her blow on that Frankenpeen, a sort of calm washes over me.

I just have to do the impossible. I’ll find out why Josie refuses to kiss, and then I’ll use that to my advantage. Then it’s only a matter of time before I press my lips to hers and rid her from my system. This time, one way or another, it will be forever.

Chapter Eighteen

Josie

The sun has been up for hours by the time we wave goodbye to the odd strangers. They take the embalming solution and their message from that sexy hitchhiker with them. Something about salvaging some taxidermy horses in a burning town? I don’t know. I zoned out.

King and I didn’t end up setting boundaries or anything last night, and that’s kind of bugging me. He’s lost any concern.

And that fucking worries me.

It may seem like a huge leap, but it’s not. Those conditions he wanted to set were never about safeguarding my heart. They were always about protecting himself. He couldn’t see that, and I didn’t either. Not until I saw how he started to behave once he felt secure in his own safety net.

He’s acting like he did five years ago.