Page 20 of The Sinner and the Priest: Part Two

Feast. Taste their sins . . . know how they plot against you.

“And?” I raise my brows.

“You moved your family to Rome.” He swallows. “Bought them an osteria . . . to get away from . . . you, not Paolo.”

I bare my teeth in a wolfish grin. “But I’m here, now. Aren’t I?”

“Do not give up everything you’ve built here,” Valerio says. “All the progress with your penance. You made a promise to God.”

Do they not remember who you are?

“Sì.” I nod, my chin tilting toward the gilt ceiling. “To Him. Not you.” I let a sneer curl my lip. “Not you, who does not even believe the apocalypse is real. Not you, who are afraid of women coming to take your power away. You, who fabricate stories and let them suffer. You, who let black smoke pour through the cracks in His temple.”

A cold, violent pressure builds behind my eyes. Hunger yawns beneath my ribs, whispers into my mind: You are omertà incarnate. Silence given shape. The condemned never see judgment coming until it’s too late.

“We are not afraid of the women.” Valerio’s nervous chuckle fools no one. “You shouldn’t be either.”

“Agreed,” Gunther adds. “Don’t worry. We will teach them their place.”

Pray for them.

My lips start moving. “Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine.”

They all know those words, and their faces turn ashen. They’ve whispered them over a thousand mahogany coffins—Eternal rest grant unto them, O Lord.

“Francisco,” Valerio gasps. “That prayer is for the dead.”

I rise from my seat and continue.

“Et lux perpetua luceat eis.”

And let perpetual light shine upon them.

They scramble but can go nowhere. O’Malley reaches for something beneath his seat, probably a weapon, but the void is already leaking in ribbons from my skin, curling through the steam toward each of them.

“Fidelium animae, per misericordiam Dei, requiescant in pace.”

May the souls of the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace.

I don’t get to say Amen. The door opens, a draft of cold air hits my back, and then Mercy’s husky purr is behind me.

“Sorry, I’m late. My invitation must have been lost in the mail.”

Eight

Cisco

The mere presence of Mercy is enough to rein in the leash on my hunger. I don’t want her to see me like this. Shadow ribbons snap back into my body. I whirl to face her, wide-eyed and prepared to explain, but then freeze.

She is dressed only in a tiny, white towel. Her voluminous red hair hangs loose, and strands plaster to her damp, freckled shoulders, reminding me of that time I saw her from the belfry. Steam already forms droplets on her skin. I watch, mesmerized, as a rivulet runs down her neck, across her decolletage, and then disappears into the plump swell of her cleavage.

Hunger roars inside me anew. This curse is a coin with two sides: violence and lust. It cares nothing for timing or decency, and now that it fed on Jasmine’s violence, it’s remembering everything else it has a taste for.

“What is the meaning of this?” Valerio tugs his towel over his lap. Lars does the same. O’Malley grips a stiletto blade, resting on his wobbling knee. But Gunther . . . the sick bastard grabs his crotch and squeezes once, a lascivious gaze trained on Mercy.

Mine.

Every cell in my body screams the word.