Page 25 of The Sin Eater (Carnival of Mysteries #27)

Ezra

S aturday turns out okay. I manage to get through the shift without fucking anything up and given that I’m operating through a cloud of confusion, survival alone is sort of impressive. I go dancing after work so I can take the edge off then leave early, edge firmly in place.

Damon doesn’t magically come through the crowd, the beat’s all wrong, and I’m home in bed before midnight.

Shanny calls in sick so I work Sunday, too. The other morgue tech is our on-call guy, Bob. He’s older than my father and there’s not much he hasn’t seen. He hasn’t probably met a sin eater before, but other than that, he’s got it covered.

Maybe he has met one. I’d ask him if I could say the fucking words.

No one’s at the Brew when I get there, except Jett—of course—who jumps down my throat before I can even get a word out.

“You didn’t take a card yesterday.”

I don’t growl at them. I want to, but I don’t. “I’ll have the usual.”

“This first.” They thrust the deck of cards at me.

I have a couple of choices here. I could get rude and ignore them, I could leave and drink hospital coffee, or I could take a card.

Jett’s hair is still wrapped in that silver and blue scarf, with a loose knot of dreads at the nape of their neck.

A braid has come free, partially hiding one eye, which makes it harder than normal to read what’s going on in their head.

I take a damn card. “The Queen of Cups? What does this even mean?”

Jett brushes the stray braid out of their face, their eyes lighting up. “Intuition, baby. Your heart knows what it wants. Listen to it.”

“Oh, for fuck’s... “ I sink my chin so my mouth is covered by the collar of my puffy coat. “Whatever, dude. I need to get back to work.”

Intuition my ass. If my heart knew what it wanted, I’d be in a much better place.

Even as those words float through my brain, though, I can hear the lie.

I want Damon, my big, strong security guard.

I want him to bring me coffee and tell me what to do in bed because in both situations, he’ll get my order right.

He didn’t seem too put off by the idea that I’m psychic, so maybe, if I’m a very lucky girl, I’ll be able to keep the rest of it a secret.

I doubt it, though. Something’ll happen, it’ll come out, and then it’ll be Bumfuck, Arkansas, all over again.

Makes me sick to my stomach.

My phone’s chirp is just louder than the hiss of the steamer. It’s Bob, wondering when I’m coming back. The rehab floor sent us a new patient, and the on-call pathologist wants to start the post in an hour.

Jett must hear me grumbling, because they set a cookie on top of my coffee cup. “I only ordered a—”

“Hush. It’s oatmeal, and I can tell by looking at you that you haven’t had breakfast. You’ll be nicer to the dead people if you’ve got something in your belly.”

I have to blink back some suspicious moisture before I can respond. “I’m always nice to the dead people. It’s the only thing I can do for them, and they don’t talk back.”

“And this is something I can do for you.” They slide the cup and the cookie across the counter. “Besides, it’s so quiet in here the cookies’ll go stale before I can sell them.”

For a second we simply grin at each other. “Thanks,” I say, and tap my bank card on the white reader. “I hope business picks up for you.”

“And I hope you listen to your heart.”

I grin through the groan I can’t stifle. “What are you? A Hallmark card?”

We’re both laughing as I head to the door. I can’t stop for a cigarette, so I snuggle into my jacket and make the trip to the hospital as fast as possible. My tentative good mood shatters as soon as I hit the morgue. The corpse’s plea for help hits me before I get the door fully open.

What the fuck is happening to me?

The wailing only gets louder once I’m inside. This person—I still don’t know if they’re a man or a woman—did not expect to die, and they’re flat-out terrified of facing whoever they expect to face without having begged for forgiveness.

While it may or may not be the devil talking to me, somebody is.

And it fucking freaks me out.

Except I’m at work, so I can’t have a meltdown.

Instead, I channel all that energy into annoyance.

Not only am I going to have to extend my stretch of penance, now I’m going to have to put the lovely oatmeal cookie Jett gave me on the chest of a dead person and I won’t be able to eat it until later. “Damn it.”

Bob glances at me from his workstation. “We needed some action today. I’ve only got so much patience for you and your shitty attitude.”

Despite his grin, I can tell he’s not entirely joking. Whatever . “Do you want to assist or to play secretary?”

His grin goes sly. “Secretary.”

“Sure.” I down some coffee and head for the autopsy room.

Dr. On-Call is rattling around in the supply room, which is my territory and doesn’t bode well for the rest of the procedure.

Perhaps I should have scanned the patient’s chart to make sure they don’t have any extra limbs or weigh four hundred pounds or something.

It turns out, Dr. On-Call was simply unfamiliar with our system, so I spend a few minutes getting him oriented.

There’s nothing anatomically unusual about the patient; he’d been in his fifties, with a long-term neurologic condition, and as a result of the autopsy, we are able to confirm that he’d had a massive stroke.

Once the case is complete, I send Dr. On-Call and Bob off to write their reports and I pull the cookie out of my pocket.

It’s a little crumbly around the edges, and I break off a chunk—like, half—for myself before putting the remainder on the corpse’s chest. Then it’s simply a matter of finishing my own charting and fabricating a reason for hanging around after Bob and the doc leave.

I spend the time debating whether I need to restart my penance clock or if I can double up one day since I had to eat sin twice in close succession.

I’m leaning toward whatever’s shortest, tbh.

Neither Bob nor the on-call doc questions my flimsy excuse. Once I’m alone, I dim most of the lights and simply... sit. For reasons I don’t want to consider, I feel the need to ask my heart what it thinks about all of this.

Jk. After eight hours of a wailing corpse and Bob’s low-level antagonism, I just want some quiet. My heart is keeping its opinions to itself.

Mostly.

Ever since tangling with James Smith, I approach sin eating with more nerves than I used to.

All afternoon, I’ve been telling myself that nothing bad will happen, as if I could make myself believe it.

I should have said, “Most likely nothing bad will happen,” or “Odds are, nothing bad will happen,” or anything that would have given fate some wiggle room.

Instead, I think about god and about Damon, not necessarily in that order. God, because the corpse’s faith is so absolute he’s making me doubt my own lack of belief.

Damon, because I’d rather think about Damon than just about anything else.

Good thing we don’t have plans for tonight and I’ll be done with my penance before the next weekend, read date night.

Grabbing my ’nads, at least metaphorically, I tug the gurney out of the cadaver cabinet and unzip the corpse.

Say the prayers. Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name ...

Let go of conscious thought and open myself to the flow of energy that’ll carry his sins to me.

It’s like being clawed by a cat.

His sins are heavy. They scratch against the inner space where I try to contain them.

I don’t know if they could really break free.

Fuck, I don’t know why any of this is happening.

I take it, though, grateful that it’s just pain.

No ghosts, no memories, and no more dead people yelling.

My fists clench so tight my nails cut into the skin on my palms, but I remember to breathe and wait it out.

It ends with a whisper, words I don’t understand. Sure as hell don’t hear thank you . I take what’s left of the oatmeal cookie off his chest, acutely aware that it looked a lot more appetizing this morning at the Brew. Eating it is the last step and I manage to choke it down.

Even better, I don’t puke it back up.

It takes a couple minutes for me to get my gut and legs organized in order to stand and once I’m standing, I have to take a few deep breaths before I can move.

I get the corpse tucked back into his cabinet, shut down the last remaining lights, and pull on my puffy coat.

Let myself out of the morgue and damn near have a heart attack.

Damon Clemens is standing in the hall, his expression uncharacteristically blank. “Praying?” he asks.

“Yeah.” My voice is full of gravel. What the fuck is he doing here?

“Geneva take off early?”

“She didn’t work today.” I don’t explain that our part-time guy had lit out as soon as he possibly could.

Damon’s got me trapped in his gaze, weighing, assessing. “You didn’t call me this time.”

“I didn’t know you were working.” Though I probably should have checked.

“Does this have something to do with being psychic?”

“No,” I snap. “It has to do with being raised by crazy people.” Fuck. I need a cigarette . I fish in my pocket and thank everything holy there’s a lollipop in there. I’ve got it unwrapped and in my mouth with lightning speed.

“At some point I’m going to have to write you up.” He shakes his head, letting loose a sigh. “Come on, man. You’re going to get fired if you’re not careful.”

I lean against the door, arms crossed, lollipop secure. “They’d be doing me a favor.”

He snorts. “You’re not wrong.”

We’re quiet for a moment. I’m staring holes through his broad chest and I can feel the weight of his gaze.

“Damnit,” he says finally. “I came down here to see if you want to have dinner. I think my friend Mo might have found your girl.”

He said dinner . My mind heard sex and just as quickly went to penance . “Fuck. I can’t.”

His expression grows harder. “Got a hot date?”

“No.” The lemon-flavored lollipop is super tart and I have to blink to keep my eyes from watering. Tart candy, not tears. “Text me or... whatever. I need to—” My voice cracks and I take a big step to the side, intent on escape.

He stops me with a hand on my arm. “This is getting old, Ezra.”

I spin away from him. “I’m glad you found her, but this is not a good time.” I’m already wondering if there’s enough Jack in my apartment to wash away this foul lemon taste.

He finally cracks, a flicker of disappointment crossing his face before he shuts it down again. “When do you work next?” His voice is distant, removed.

“Tomorrow, most likely.” I back away, although he’s standing between me and the stairs. I can go out the loading dock if I need to. He nods a couple times, lips pressed together like he’s determined not to say anything else.

Yeah, that Jack’s going to need to do triple duty. Clean my mouth from that nasty lollipop, heal the frayed edges of my soul from whatever just happened in there, and help me forget the hurt in Damon’s eyes when I finally make a break for it.

That last bit’s going to stick around longer than the other two.