Page 10 of The Sin Eater (Carnival of Mysteries #27)

Damon

Y our boyfriend’s acting strange again.”

“Uh, hello?” I don’t recognize the voice, and I have no idea what she’s talking about. The only reason I answered my personal cell phone was the call’s St. Nowhere prefix.

“It’s Geneva, from downstairs.” She’s whispering.

“What’s going on?”

“Are you still working?”

I’m getting annoyed. “For about ten more minutes.”

“He’s jumpy as a cat and he’s talking to bodies. I want to get him to tell me what’s going on, but not by myself. Come down here.”

And... she hangs up. I slap the desktop, making Tolliver jump. We’d been running the patient census so I can go home. Clearly that’s going to have to wait. “I’m going to run down to the morgue real quick. I’ll check with you before I leave.”

He squints at me, like he can’t decide whether to be worried or not. “Everything okay?”

“I’ll know in a few.”

Of course I’m going down there, so I leave before he can ask any more stupid questions. I’m hungry, it’s cold enough that my shoulder’s aching, and I want to know how Geneva from the morgue got my phone number.

More than that, I want to know what the hell is going on.

When I arrive, I peek through the glass window in the right-hand door.

A couple of emergency lights are bright enough to show me that Ezra’s standing next to a body that’s half out of the cooler.

His head is bowed, his lips are moving, and Geneva was right.

Something weird is going on. I give him a couple more seconds, long enough for him to take something from the corpse’s chest. His shoulders hunch like he’s afraid he’s going to be hit.

I push the door open.

“ Blessed is the one whose transgressions are— fuck.” Ezra springs away from the corpse. Geneva comes through the door to the autopsy suite and, giving us both a wild look, Ezra stuffs whatever it is into his mouth.

“What the actual fuck are you doing?” Geneva’s frown is fierce, but the crease in her brow shows her concern. Ezra doesn’t respond, at least not right away, and even in the semi-darkness I can see that he’s chewing something.

“Come on, man. This is not good,” she says.

Ezra blocks her move toward the corpse. “Let me,” he says, the words muffled, and with efficient movements, he zips up the bag and pushes the body back into the cooler.

Shaking her head, Geneva crosses the room and flips on the overhead lights. “I don’t guess you’ll tell us what’s going on.”

“I was praying.”

“Praying?” I manage to stifle most of my surprised laughter.

“Praying.” There’s an edge of defiance in his voice, despite looking like a weak sneeze will tip him over. “Why were y’all spying on me?”

Geneva flops into the nearest chair. “Dude, you’ve been acting the freak all day.”

“What are you talking about? I’ve been fine.”

He’s glancing between the two of us, a little frantic, like a player caught in a rundown between first and second base.

And one of us is going to tag him out.

Geneva’s snort echoes my skepticism. “So you, what? Hang around here late at night to pray over the bodies like some kind of atheistic minister?”

He’s silent for a couple beats, his throat working like he’s trying to swallow down whatever it was he ate. “Yup.”

“You know you can get fired for messing around with dead bodies.” Geneva adds real-world consequences to the horror movie vibe.

He stands straighter. “I know.”

“Hey look, praying sounds well-intentioned,” I say, almost pleading with him. “You gotta give us something more, dude. I don’t think either of us want to see you fired, but I’ll have to write a report, and... “

He cuts me off with a bitter laugh. “Go ahead and write it. They won’t have to fire me. I’ll quit.”

“Aw, come on, man. That’s not what I meant.”

“It’s cool.” He pulls off his headband and a curtain of hair falls in front of his face.

Instead of hospital scrubs, Geneva’s wearing jeans and a sweatshirt that says SALTY in block print. Her expression has turned salty all right and she ignores my say something helpful look

“You really expect us to believe that you’ve been hanging out after work to pray over the dead bodies?” she asks.

Ezra flips the hair out of his face, lip curled in a sneer. “Yup.”

“Don’t... “ I say it quietly, not quite sure which of them I’m talking to. Both, probably.

Geneva shoots a glance in my direction. “You believe him?”

“Do I believe he was praying? Sure.” Do I believe that’s all he was doing? Not for a minute.

“You’re thinking with your junk,” she snaps, which honestly makes me laugh. My junk is the last thing on my mind right now.

“And you’re having some kind of military flashback, bitch,” Ezra snarls like he’s angry on my behalf. “I told you the truth. I pray over bodies sometimes. It’s a... family thing, and you’re interfering with my religious beliefs.”

He stumbles over the word family, a glitch I almost miss. Surprise will do that. He’s both come to my defense and claimed to have religious beliefs, and I never would have expected either. He’s also more confident than when we first caught him, and the mood in the room shifts.

God help us if we interfere with someone’s religion. HR sure won’t .

With a muttered “for fuck’s sake,” Geneva relaxes her arms and shakes out her hands. “Come on, man, you don’t have to quit. Just let me know the next time you need to stay late.”

“So you can supervise me?”

Jesus, Ezra . I shove my hands in my pockets to keep from covering his mouth with my palm. He’s going to make more trouble for himself if he doesn’t shut up.

“Maybe I want to pray with you.” She leans forward, hands planted on her thighs. “Look, asshole, I’m here because I was worried about you. Don’t flip me any more shit or I’ll make sure you have to explain those precious family beliefs to Dr. Chen or someone from administration.”

“I never asked you to worry about me.” If he’s embarrassed about sounding like a teenager, it doesn’t show.

It occurs to me that I might have a better chance getting Ezra to talk about what really happened if I can get him on his own. “Come on,” I say. “Let’s get the hell out of here.” Nothing. Silence. “Guys? Hello? Let’s go. I want to lock up.”

For another heartbeat, I think neither of them is going to blink. Then Geneva huffs, “Did you really just call me a bitch?”

Ezra’s sneer softens into something closer to a grin. “If the labubu fits... “

They both laugh awkwardly and the tension fades. The runner got tagged, but I’m not sure which team recorded the out.

Geneva takes off, depriving us of a chance for a kumbaya moment.

I don’t even have the chance to ask how she got my damned phone number.

She must know somebody who knows somebody who knows me.

Seattle’s really a small town in a big city costume.

When Ezra moves to follow her, I catch him by the arm.

“For a little dude, you sure can be spicy.”

He stares at my hand, maybe debating if he should bite it. “It’s my inner princess.” Shaking free, he sidesteps me, grabs a backpack that’s been sitting on the desk, and fishes inside.

He brings out—I squint—”Are those lollipops?”

“Yeah, want one?” He holds them up, his gaze considering. “The green one’s mine.”

I take the purple one he offers me, wondering if this night could get any weirder. The little blob of candy is wrapped in a white Dum-Dums label. “I haven’t had one of these since about third grade.”

His is different, a flat green disc wrapped in clear plastic. “You’ve been missing out.” He slides the candy between his lips, and a new kind of tension grows between us.

“Apparently.” I’m caught by his gaze, a mouse trapped by a hawk.

His sharp features are even more defined, his eyes dark and dangerous, his lips soft.

“Let me buy you dinner,” I say, the question taking me by surprise.

It knocks off a couple of bullet points, though.

I do want to get to know him and I have a weird need to figure out what really went on here tonight.

Somehow the white lollipop stick makes his sly smile even hotter. “Did you just ask me out?”

This is about as close as he’s come to acting like I’m more than something he’d scrape off the bottom of his shoe. “Sure, if your answer is yes.” I must be a secret masochist . “We can hit the Deluxe.”

His eyes slide shut. “I’m having trouble making the shift from you’re a naughty boy to let’s hang out .”

Hell if I’m going to give away my secret agenda, no matter how right he might be. “This is my way of apologizing.”

He slings his backpack over his shoulder, gazing anywhere but at me.

“Come on.” I hope I sound encouraging and not like he’s making me beg.

The lollipop stick shifts from one side of his mouth to the other. “Weather’s shit. We’ll have to Uber.”

“Yeah, makes sense.”

“You’re paying.”

I can’t quite stifle a laugh. “That’s what I said.”

I’ve got the Uber app open, looking for rides, before we get the elevator to the main floor.

It’s raining buckets so I’m glad we don’t have to walk, even though the Deluxe is only about a mile away.

An Uber rolls up, a newish Rav4. For a good few blocks neither of us say anything at all.

My nerves are hyperaware of the man sitting next to me.

His energy. His floral cigarette scent. I swallow down the want, willing myself to be cool for once in my damned life.

Lights flash—white headlights, red and green streetlights, and a brilliant rainbow from the neon shop signs on Broadway—the colors smeared by the rain.

Ezra clears his throat, making me jump. He laughs and, facing the window, says, “You don’t seem like the kind of guy who would ask another man out on a date. ”

“So, this is a date.” I sound more panicked than I should. Nice job playing it cool .

He shifts in his seat, still staring away from me. “Isn’t it?”

It’s my turn to clear my throat. “It could be, yeah.”

“I wasn’t sure,” he says softly, and some bit of tension in him relaxes. “I mean, I wasn’t sure which way you swung.”

“Which way I what?” I can’t help but laugh. “I guess you’d say I’m open to suggestion.”

He tenses up again. “What’s that mean?”

“I’m bi. Is that a problem?”

He stops staring at whatever’s so fascinating out the window without quite looking at me. Somewhere he’s lost the lollipop. “Depends on what you want.”

The Uber driver pulls the car to a stop across the street from the restaurant.

That doesn’t seem like the right time to get into a discussion of who wants what, so I simply climb out and thank the guy.

Ezra follows me, and while we wait for the cross signal, I try to figure out what I do want.

The light changes, we cross the street, and I give up. “Now I’m not sure what you mean.”

He snorts, like I’ve surprised him. “Mean by what?”

“You said it depended on what I want, and I’m not sure what that means.”

Laughing, he opens the restaurant’s heavy wooden doors and waves me in. A hostess leads us to a small booth near the window, tucked away from the general flow of the room. Only when we’re settled does he respond.

“Here’s what I mean. If you want a quick fuck, I’m down with that.” His shrug is a dare, an invitation. “If you’re after moonlight and roses, I am not your guy.”

“Because I’m bi?”

“Because I don’t do moonlight and roses under any fucking circumstances.”

I look pointedly out the window. “I don’t see any moonlight out there tonight, and”—I glance around—”no roses here.”

He grins, and for the first time since we left the morgue, he looks directly at me. “So we eat and we fuck, then.”

He did not just say that. “Let’s eat and see where things go.” Whatever this mood he’s in —this post-prayer-ritual-nearly-fired energy surge—I don’t want to take advantage of it any more than I already have.

I’m not exactly looking for moonlight and roses, either, but I’ve already invested several cappuccinos in the guy. I want him to confide in me, to tell me the rest of the story. More importantly, I don’t want this to be a one-and-done thing.