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Penny follows my eye line and cocks her head. “That’s quite smart actually,” she admits.
Of courseshe’dthink that, the fucking little grifter. “Come.” I take her hand and pull her toward the booth. With the light from my cell phone, I illuminate the narrow eaves behind it, making the cobwebs glisten like strands of glitter. “My brothers and I would hide behind here and listen to all the locals confessing their sins.”
“Ah, so you’ve always been a nosy shit,” she snaps, yanking her hand out of mine. Behind us, the door groans in the wind, and she quickly clings onto me again.
“We wouldn’t just listen, Queenie. Our father would get us to decide on the worst sins we’d heard through the week, and then…” I chew on the inside of my lip. Sure, Penny is no saint, but I still hate being so fucking crude with her. “Eliminate them.”
Her eyes pierce through the shadows. “What?”
“We’d kill the worst sinners.” I shrug, recalling the fond memories of my childhood. “The ones who’d admit to raping their wives when they’d come home too drunk from the bar. Ones who hit cyclists on Grim Reaper road driving home after a night shift and left them for dead.”
Penny takes a deep breath, processing my words. “So, you were basically choir-boy vigilantes?”
I can’t help but laugh. “More like Viscontis-in-training. Violence is a way of life for my family, and I guess my father wanted us to start early.”
“Did you hate it?”
I glance at her. “No. Truth is, we loved it—me more than my brothers. It started my fondness for games, I suppose.”
She tightens the blanket around herself, glaring at the confessional like it’ll suddenly come to life and tell her all the secrets spilled within its oak walls. “You loved it so much you started the hotline.”
“Yes. After our father died and my brothers and I scattered to different corners of the earth, I decided to bring the game back on a more…professionallevel. It gave us a reason to stay close. Now it’s bigger than Dip.” I reach out and stroke her cheek with my knuckle. “Bigger than you, Queenie.”
Her gaze touches mine, dancing with confusion. “You choose the worst confession from the hotline, hunt them down and kill them?”
“Mm. Once a month.”
“Jesus Christ.”
“Shh, he’ll hear you.”
She doesn’t laugh at my joke. Instead, she studies me like she’s seeing me for the first time. “Why are you telling me this?”
Angelo’s words bounce between my ears.Prove to her that you’re not the massive cock you’ve made yourself out to be.
“Because I need you to know I didn’t set up the hotline because I’m some weirdo that gets off on listening to people confess their sins.” I pause. “Sure, some of them are juicy, but being nosy was never my end game. We choose the dregs of society, and we kill them. Of course, I’m not some sort of savior, and yes, it’s ironic because killing them also makes me a bad person, but there’s no denying the world is a better place without them.” I take a deep breath. “You weren’t using the hotline for its intended purpose. And, sure, when I first heard you call, I was thinking of all the petty ways I could fuck with you—”
“The tuna subs,” she says dryly. “Ripping the page out of myFor Dummiesbook.”
I flash her a sheepish grin. “You telling me wouldn’t have done the same if it was the other way around?” Only a beat passes, but it’s enough to know the galvanized wall around her heart has fissured. I move closer to her, capitalizing on the progress. “There was never a malicious intent. The novelty of fucking with you wore off so quickly, baby. Soon, I just became obsessed with hearing you talk. About anything and everything—I didn’t care. As long as your voice was in my ear, I was happy.”
There’s a thunderous silence between us, set to the backdrop of the wind rattling the boarded windows. When she finally speaks, it’s nothing by a tiny, one-worded question. A whisper in the dust-filled air.
“Why?”
I run my thumb over her pillowy lip. The truth slides from my mouth like warmed butter. “Because I love you.”
She stares at me for a few more moments, her expression stiff and unreadable. My heart drops as she suddenly pulls away and walks around the confessional, running a finger over the intricate woodwork and latticed doors.
With a quick glance back at me, she dips inside the penitent compartment and shuts the door behind her. Without questioning it, I slide into the other compartment and shut the door, plunging us into darkness.
Penny’s slow, heavy breaths seep through the latticed opening that divides us.
“Do you really love me?” she whispers.
I press my temple against the iron grate. “Yes.”
There’s a pause. “That night in the phone booth, you told me you’d never been in love before. If you’ve never felt it, how do you know?”
