Page 7 of The Ecstasy of Sin

“Thanks,” I murmur, slipping inside before the door closes. As I make my way towards the front desk, a fresh wave of stomach cramps threaten to make me double over. Sometimes when I eat after a long stretch of hunger, I get a belly ache. Racing around the city to get here didn’t exactly help the situation.

“No more beds tonight,” Clarissa states, not even looking up as she pushes her glasses up the bridge of her nose.

When her eyes finally meet mine over the high counter, they instantly soften.

I stop in front of the desk, taking a moment to steady my breathing. A wave of disappointment crashes over me, sharp and familiar. “I didn’t make it in time tonight, huh?”

She shakes her head, and a shadow of guilt passes through her dark eyes before it disappears behind her usual façade of calm. “Afraid not, darling.”

I hold her gaze for a moment longer than necessary. “Thanks anyway.”

There’s no point begging. I’ve been down this road before. If they say there is no bed available, no amount of pleading will make a bed suddenly appear.

I offer her a smile, one that I hope helps relieve some of her guilt, before I turn away to leave.

“Wren?”

I pause with my hand on the door, and glance back over my shoulder.

I see pity in Clarissa’s eyes, and it makes my heart hurt a little more. Shame washes over me, but I don’t fault her for it. It’s not like she intended to hurt me with her compassion. “Take care of yourself tonight,” she says gently. “Try and come by earlier tomorrow.”

I nod, but say nothing else, before stepping back out into the chilly night air. Kevin frowns at me, but he doesn’t speak. He is just as powerless as I am—neither of us can make a bed spontaneously become available for me.

I hurry down the steps and stop when I hit the street, taking a moment to get my bearings. I need to find a place to close my eyes for a little while, ideally in a safer area of the city.

I’ll need to start job hunting first thing tomorrow, so my best bet is to make the twenty-minute trek to the main library and tuck myself away somewhere private, just outside of the building. That way, I can get inside to print off some résumés as soon as they open.

It’s not like this is the first time I’ve had to sleep out on the streets. In my seven years of homelessness, I’ve found many quiet areas I can camp at to make it through the night.

I keep my head down as I walk, doing my best to avoid anyone still loitering out this late. The streets grow quieter the closer I get, and eventually, I reach the library.

Exhaustion feels like a one-hundred pound iron ball attached to me by a chain, dragging behind me every step of the way. The weariness from a difficult day has me fighting against waves of sadness that would overwhelm me if I let them.

I don’t waste any time finding a spot in a low traffic, narrow corridor on the library property. It’s dark, but it’s risky, and all I can do is hope that I am lucky enough to survive the night unscathed.

People don’t usually bother mugging the homeless, but desperation makes monsters out of men. And as a woman, I have more to lose than what’s in my backpack.

I’m as silent as a mouse as I pull my blanket from where it is strapped to the bottom of my backpack. I wrap the scratchy wool around myself and over my head, hiding beneath it until I resemble a pile of discarded trash.

Sleep never comes easily for me, but it always comes eventually. I'm too exhausted, and often too sick, for my sadness and anxiety to hold me hostage for long.

The dirty concrete is cold and hard beneath me, but the only one who cares about that is me. I’ve long since been forgotten by the world. I am nothing but a ghost drifting through the citystreets; unseen and unwanted, without a single person left alive to care whether I live or die.

As I drift in and out of restless sleep, I'm haunted by nightmares of post-apocalyptic wastelands—with faceless enemies, and hunger so profound it whispers a cruel promise of death to my malnourished soul.

CHAPTER 2

Dominic

“Please,”Sebastianbegs,hisvoice trembling as blood sputters and drips from his bruised lips. “You don’t have to do this, man, I haven’t even seen your face.”

His voice is thick from the blood pooling in his mouth, and the sound strokes my nervous system like a lover, calming the beast inside of me.

A sick grin spreads across my face from behind the black mask I’m wearing, and with a twinge of excitement, I reach up and pull the balaclava up over my head, tucking it into the front pocket of my sweatshirt in one swift motion.

Sebastian flinches, and I lower myself until my eyes are mere inches from his own, allowing the grin on my face to reflect the elated madness within.

The hefty man kneeling before me cries out like a frightened child, his eyes fluttering closed as he realizes I just ruined his chances of walking away from this alive.