Page 69 of The Sinner and the Priest: Part 1

I feel her eyes on me, painting the side of my face with fire. Waiting for me to give her the full truth. I want to laugh. To think I could hide anything from this woman was a fool’s errand.

“I have done many bad things because of this curse.”

“I’m sure I’ve done worse.”

As if she could understand. As if she—bella figura in the flesh—could ever know what it’s like to have your mother grab your jaw, peer into your eyes, and…

“You are not my son, Francesco. You are the devil.”

For a heartbeat, I am silent. The void inside twists in my gut, yanking on the coiled darkness beneath my skin, craving a fight. The faintest start of a buzz filters in, like an insect crawling inside my skull.

Show her.

My upper lip twitches, and I bite back a snarl. But Mercy keeps pushing.

“It’s quite convenient, if you ask me.” She leans forward at the hips, bringing her half-exposed cleavage into my line of vision. “Sounds like a get out of jail free card—a way to rationalize your way out of sin.” She scoffs. “At least I’m honest about going to Hell. I own my sins.”

Show her what the cage holds back.

I lean in and lower my tone. “I have murdered many men.”

It is the deliberate, flat voice I use behind the screen of the confessional, the one demanding truth and offering no path for retreat. Her pupils bloom until the blue is almost swallowed by black.

“So have I,” she breathes out, and it tickles my face.

Blood pounds in my ears. “Not like this.”

“That,” she sneers, “That right there is precisely why men like you never see me coming.”

“I have killed women, Mercy.”

“So have I.”

My eyes flash. “After I fucked them.”

“Ditto.”

Red crowds my vision. I tremble. Shake. “There is no stopping me when I get the taste for it.”

She smirks. “That’s what they all say.”

The curse screams.

Twenty-Four

Cisco

Ilaunch on top of Mercy, bracing my rosary-wrapped hand beside her head, knees outside her waist. I am a wall of black cloth and feral need, trembling with the effort of not snapping her neck or kissing her until she bleeds. My bare hand fists her hair and holds her still as I lower my lips to her ear.

“I am not simply a violent man,” I snarl. “I made violence my sacrament. I made it holy. I gorged myself on blood and flesh. I believed I touched God with every drop spilled, every cunt fucked, every⁠—”

“I get the point.”

“You don’t.” I sneer. “There is no end. No point. It is not God who nourishes me when this devil is let out of its cage.”

“What does?”

“Nothing.” I shove off her, move to the end of the bed, and try to stop the trembling need for more of her touch … more of her everything. “But I cannot stop myself from craving. Feeding.”