Sinners Consumed (Sinners Anonymous, #3)

by Somme Sketcher

“Since when did you start drinking vodka?” “Since you said you wouldn’t kiss me if I drank whiskey.”

“What did Blake do?” “Pissed me off.” I swallow. “So you killed him.” His palm presses harder into my stomach, and his chin comes to rest on my shoulder. “He was eyeing something up that doesn’t belong to him.”

“Martin O’Hare was found dead in Clam Lake.” It doesn’t sound like my voice. It’s too calm, too at-odds with the violent pulse in my throat. While my eyes are glued on the screen, my attention is tethered to Rafe as he moves from behind the sofa over to the bar cart. In silence, he pours a vodka. “Really?” The clink of ice cubes rattles my bones. “That’s not where I left him.”

“All right, all right, I’ve got one more.” Benny picks up a plastic snowflake off the table runner. “You’re brave having all this flammable shit lying around when your wife starts a fire every time she turns on the oven.”

Beside me, Angelo laughs into his eggs. I turn to glare at him. “How did you grovel?” He looks up at me lazily. “I killed her seventy-year-old fiancé with a bullet to the head. What did I need to grovel for?”

“Come here.” I don’t move. First of all, why the fuck should I? He’s got legs too. Second of all, “come here” means I have to go ‘“over there” and “there” is where bad decisions are made.

“Look at me.” Through blurry eyes, I meet his soft, green gaze. “I’m your hotline now, Queenie. All your mundane thoughts, all your ramblings: they’re mine. I want them all, no matter how trivial. Do you understand me?”