The Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance 2

Michele Hauf The Sin-Eater’s Promise

Blackthorn Regis released the soul that clung to his aura into the sulphur-laden atmosphere. Screams echoed. He told himself it was not the human soul screaming but rather a pleasurable sound made by the mercury-slick river that consumed them.

He remained impartial. It was not his place to discern if a man had lived virtuously or had inspired dread. He simply ferried souls Above or Beneath.

His trips Beneath were more rare than mortals would guess.

“Soul-bringer.”

The Receiver of Beneath stood so high, Blackthorn could not see his face, yet he felt the menacing presence curdle his marrow. Not once had he fixed the creature in the gaping spaces where eyes should be. Blackthorn possessed no soul, yet surely he would still feel the soul-grinding weight of such darkness.

“You’re missing one.”

Blackthorn swore at the back of his throat. “It won’t happen again,” he offered, and bowed reverently before turning and shimmering away from Beneath.

There was only one way a soul went the wrong destination.

“There must be an infernal sin-eater working my territory.”

Shimmering into a small Midwestern countryside, Blackthorn spied the culprit bent over double at the edge of a meadow. Dew spangled the scattered weeds and clover heads, and sparkled on fuzzy cat-tails spiking the nearby ditch.

Thick, black sin exploded from the mouth as it repeatedly heaved. It lifted its head to keep the fluid from spilling down the dress — dress? The sin-eater was female. Blackthorn’s chest and throat muscles squeezed, matching the clench of his fists.

He marched purposefully across the field. “Leave it to a sin-eater to make enemies of not only Beneath but also Above.”

Viscous sin spattered sprigs of white clover. Sin-eaters involuntarily purged following an eating or would forever cloud their soul with the sins of those they’d eaten.

Gagging and spitting, she sat back on her heels, clasping thin arms across her middle. Attired all in black, her pale flesh glowed with moonlight. She was startled as he grabbed her by the throat and dragged her to stand.

Shaky legs made her wobble before Blackthorn. But she quickly grasped her bearings and, bouncing on her black high-top sneakers, fists lifted in challenge, she jounced before him like a scrawny prize-fighter.

Seething, Blackthorn prepared to match the ridiculous challenge, yet though he was not human, mortal civility reminded him that one mustn’t hit a woman. He flexed his fingers open.

The woman’s wide grey eyes, surrounded by smeary black eyeshadow, flickered. He’d never seen eyes so bright and clear. So defiant. And sad. Her eyes pleaded for understanding, and then shoved him away for seeing that weakness.

All that in a scrap of flesh and stolen sin?

Rage settling, a smirking levity emerged. She was just a bitty thing. Not unappealing, either. Blackthorn slid a hand down his waistcoat. What to do with his hands if not choke her senseless?

“Desist,” he growled darkly.

The woman stopped her aggressive bouncing. Sin dappled her lip. Starlight dived into her dark hair and waded iridescent within.

“Who the hell are you? I warn you, I can throw a mean left hook.”

Blackthorn chuckled. The utterance was so odd to him that he abruptly ceased and cleared his throat. “I am Blackthorn Regis. Soul-bringer.”

One of her dark brows assumed a chevron.

“You.” He wagged a finger at her. “Are a nasty sin-eater.”

She smacked a fist into a palm. “Sin does taste nasty, let me tell you. What do you want from me?”

“Stop eating sins.”

“Stop?” She leaned into his space, wafting the sweet scent of cherries on a sugar-high under his nose. “This is my job. It is what I do.”

“You are reviled, sin-eater.” Though he didn’t quite feel the revulsion himself. Odd.

She snapped her arms across her chest and lifted her chin. “Someone’s got to do it.”

“Not in my territory.”

“Oh yeah? What’s a Soul-bringer? Where do you bring them?” She slapped her palms together and exclaimed, “Oh, I get it. You’re the guy who brings the decedent’s soul to Heaven or Hell, right?”

“Above and Beneath. I ferry the newly dead.”

“Cool. I’ve always wanted to meet a psychopomp.”

“You steal my souls!” he announced, angered at his frustration.

The woman rolled her eyes sweetly and teased her tongue across her lips. “I hadn’t considered that before. The stealing part. Of course, that’s your opinion. I like to think I give hope.”

“Every time you eat sins,” he confirmed, “you steal from me.”

“But you still get to take the soul. Just not to its intended resting place. Heaven is so much nicer, anyway — I mean, Above.”

“I do not discern ‘nicer’.”

Blackthorn stepped closer. He ate very little, but he suddenly craved cherries, bunches of them glistening with fresh dew. Could he drink her skin as if it was the syrupy juice she smelled of? Such a delicious repast.

She thrust out her hand. “Name’s Desdenova Fleetwood. Yeah, it’s from a song. Blue Oyster Cult. But you can call me Nova. Blackthorn, right?”

“You do as I ask, Desdenova Fleetwood, and I may show you favour.”

“Really? Favour? I can’t wait.” She clasped her hands before her chest and batted her lashes. It wasn’t meant to tease but rather, mock. “You going to give me back my life? There’s nothing I can do but eat sins. Do you know how many men like to date girls who eat sins for a living? Zero.” She held up her fingers in a circle between them to emphasize.

Was she drunk? Blackthorn couldn’t be certain. Surely, expelling so much sin must weaken her. “I have no concern for your personal life.”

“Why not? Don’t you think I’m pretty? Of course not.”

“You are very pretty. Save for the sin you’ve dribbling down your chin.”

He gestured towards her face. “Perhaps that is what frightens the men off.”

She smeared the back of her hand through the black sludge. “Go away.”

“Not until you promise to stop eating sins.”

Slapping her hands together, she paced before him, kicking up dew in spittals before her. When she turned a look over her shoulder, a bright tease danced in her eyes. “I would give up sin-eating for a kiss,” she whispered.

Blackthorn studied the pleading grey irises set within blackest streaks of make-up. In his myriad centuries of ferrying souls he rarely got involved with mortals. However, he did live on the mortal realm and he was like mortal men; he could appreciate a beautiful woman, and the feel of her skin under his hand.

This little girl lost only wanted a kiss?

And what did he want? Did he want? It had been so long. .

“Give up sin-eating,” he stated, “and then I shall reward you with a kiss.”

“You’re lying. Guys don’t kiss girls like me.”

“Perhaps it is because you dress to put them off.”

“What’s wrong with the garb? This is me.” She fingered the hem of the black tulle skirt, worn over white and black striped thigh-high stockings. “If the world doesn’t like it, the world can screw off.”

“Is that so?” He sensed she’d prefer the world to lunge forwards and embrace her — Blackthorn checked himself. He didn’t care. He should not care.

I want for nothing. I am. . nothing.

“Mr Harvey’s soul shouldn’t have went Beneath anyway,” she said. “He was a nice guy. I don’t think his sins were too great.”

“Says the girl who just vomited up heinous sin all over the meadow.”

“Happens every time.”

“In such copious amounts?”

She studied the ground, apparently realizing only now the output was an oddity. “He couldn’t have done anything that bad.”

“Murdered a child three decades ago,” Blackthorn recited, knowing the details merely from the residue of the man’s soul that yet clung to his aura. He shook his shoulders, dismissing the sludge.

Parted lips softened. She had no idea the affects of her actions.

“Desist,” Blackthorn repeated.

“Very well,” she said, still in a daze. “I quit and you’ll kiss me?”

“That was the proposal, yes.”

She presented her hand to shake. “Deal.”

Grasping Desdenova’s hand shocked his nervous system with a tender jolt of defiance, independence and need. He actually felt her need slide up his arm and squeeze at his heart. A heart of glass that could never pulse. But it could feel. And what he felt surprised him.

Tugging his hand from hers, Blackthorn turned and marched off across the field. Why hadn’t he just punched her and threatened her life?

A kiss?

He slapped a hand over his chest. “It did not pulse. It could not have.”

Nova lived in a one-bedroom apartment in the uptown district of Minneapolis. She wasn’t much of a people person, so instead of taking the elevator up to the third floor, she clattered up the iron stairs hugging the back of the building.

And no, she did not dress this way to keep people away. The Soul-bringer was wrong about her. Mostly. It was easier to keep a distance when connection seemed an impossible dream.

But what he’d known about Mr Harvey iced her blood. She had eaten heinous sins in her lifetime, but she’d known Harvey. He used to serve on the board of his church.

That a person could never truly know anyone further reinforced her need to keep people at arms reach.

Shrugging off her soiled clothing and stockings, she then aimed for the bathroom, flipped on the shower, and peeked at her reflection. Sin drooling down her chin? How utterly embarrassing.

She laughed as she soaped up in the shower. That was all she was worried about? She’d just come face to face with a pissed-off Soul-bringer who had accused her of stealing from him.

Pissed, yet handsome. A strong, angular face had been underlined with a dark goatee to match his record-vinyl hair. The slim-tailored suit and vest was hip, a little Goth, yet he had carried himself with a confidence Nova had only noticed in older men.

“I’ve always wanted to stop,” she sputtered into the water stream. “But what else would I do? How would I support myself? I have no viable nine-to-five skills.”

She’d considered stopping before. Sin-eating was no life for a twenty-five-year-old who wanted to date, get married and have children.

Her mother would turn over in her grave if Nova stopped eating sins; it was a tradition passed through the female generations of the family. Nova had been eating sins since her thirteenth birthday. Families steeped in the ancient tradition of cleansing the soul before burial, hired her. And also atheists with deep, yet completely unfounded, fears of a Hell they shouldn’t rightly believe in.

The job gave her indigestion and ostracized her from normal society. And talk about messed up? Try eating the sins of your parents and see how well you walk away from that surprising moment.

But stop? Seriously, what was normal? She was human, not immortal, or anything remotely similar. Yet humanity grew farther from her grasp with every sin she consumed.

Drying off and pulling on a fuzzy white robe, Nova tried the idea of desisting in her thoughts. The pros: no more ruined clothing. Sin was like tar; no laundry detergent or bleach could take it out. No more attending dismal wakes or funerals or meeting the bereaved at the morgue. Possibility of finally making friends.

The cons? She’d think of something.

Was a kiss from a stranger worth abandoning a notorious yet revered profession handed down to her through generations?

Nova sighed. “It shouldn’t be.”

Daily, Blackthorn made dozens of trips Above and Beneath. Yet he had a lot of down time. He liked to shoot billiards in scuzzy local bars and drink wine from glasses instead of goblets. And he read anything with an appealing title.

Add tracking a sin-eater to the list. He’d found her easily — only to feel his heart pulse. As if his body had reacted to her presence. As if she could make him think of things beyond bringing souls. Wondrous things, like kissing and holding hands.

“You’re letting those dewy grey eyes of hers throw you off-balance.”

That was the truth of it. No woman adjusted her life so monumentally for a mere kiss. She had been playing him. The desperate need he’d thought to see in her eyes? Must have been loopy after-effects from purging sin.

Prepared to shimmer out from Beneath and back to the mortal realm, Blackthorn paused when he sighted something charging toward him.

“Blackthorn Regis, do you bring all my souls?” the Receiver growled.

“Yes. I’ve taken care of the sin-eater.”

“You had best be right. There’s a blackened soul will be mine in a few days. So many it has murdered.”

“If it is destined Beneath, it shall be yours.”

“Not if your sin-eater snacks on its murders. If you do not bring that soul to me, Soul-bringer, then I shall take recompense in the sin-eater’s soul.”

“But you cannot.” Blackthorn clamped his mouth shut.

The Receiver roared and inclined his shape so he met Blackthorn eye to fangs. “What did you say?”

“Only that you cannot force a soul your way until her time of death occurs.”

“I can make anything happen.”

Blackthorn had known that. Why argue for the mortal woman?

“And to make things more interesting, should I be denied this soul, I’ll take your life, too. But not until after you’ve watched me lick the sin-eater’s soul to shreds.”

“You will not have the opportunity.” Blackthorn squared his shoulders before the malevolent creature. “I will bring the killer’s soul to you.”

He shimmered away and landed in a dark alley in the depths of a city. Holding out a hand before him revealed shaking fingers.

Blackthorn held nothing dear, had no family, no ties to anything living, so he had no reason to fear. He’d never thought himself capable of fear.

It mattered little if the Receiver decided to take his life. But if he could get hold of Desdenova’s life simply because Blackthorn could not convince her to give up sin-eating. .

Glancing up, he spied light in the window he knew belonged to Desdenova. If she ate the killer’s sins, the insurmountable evil consumed would crush her, and she would die.

One way or another, the Receiver would claim her soul.

The voice on the other end of the phone receiver announced this collect call was from a federal penitentiary lockup and was being monitored, and then inquired if she would accept the charges.

Befuddled, Nova muttered, “Sure.”

She didn’t know anyone in prison, yet after replying she kicked herself for not hanging up.

“Desdenova Fleetwood.” A man’s ragged voice came on. She didn’t recognize it. “It’s been a long time since we were ten years old, Nova, but I had to speak to you one last time.”

Ten years old?

“This is Scott,” he said. “Scottie Weston from down the block?”

“Scottie!” Remembrance flooded her brain with sunny summer afternoons spent playing on the jungle gym, and of trekking down the alley, red wagon in tow, in search of dinosaurs and buried treasure. Heck, Scottie had even played Ken to her Barbie, but they had pinky sworn never to tell a soul.

An ominous cloud quickly covered those memories.

“You’re um. . in prison?”

“I am. I don’t have more than three minutes to talk to you, Nova, so listen. Remember the promise you made to me under the apple tree after you told me how all the women in your family eat sins?”

She clutched her throat. Words did not form. The air hazed and her eyelids fluttered.

“I’m holding you to that promise, Nova. Come to the federal penitentiary on Saturday at twelve. Arrangements have already been made to allow you admittance. You have to bring ID. Can you do that for me, Nova?”

She had promised a ten-year old boy she would someday eat his sins. Because they had been young and silly, and she’d thought the whole idea of going into the family business sort of exciting, yet steeped in weird gothic overtones that involved religious persecutions and ostracization.

She’d also promised Scottie to give him his first kiss, marry him and jump naked into the Atlantic Ocean with him some day.

It’s what kids do.

Nova did not lie or break promises. Never did she sin. It would prove detrimental to her immortal soul when she took her final breath. There was not a sin-eater in the world who would touch another sin-eater’s sins.

“Sure, Scottie. Uh. .”

The receiver clicked and the dial tone hummed.

She moved to replace the receiver. The plastic headset clattered to the floor just as someone beat on her front door. Scrambling to wrangle the phone, she slapped it to the wall cradle and rushed to the door.

The Soul-bringer leaned against the doorframe. The smartly fitted black suit was unbuttoned to reveal a gold-threaded black vest over a black shirt. He looked dapper, seriously, if not for the skater-boy goatee.

When common sense dictated she slam the door in his face and barricade it, she dumbly asked, “How did you know where I live?”

“Followed your soul path. Every mortal leaves one. The brightest, most lasting, belong to those who live good, abundant lives.”

“Huh. So mine was pretty bright?”

“No.” He bent his head around the doorframe and scanned her efficiency-size living room. “Would you invite me in?”

“Why?” Regaining some of her confidence, Nova stretched an arm along the wall. “Do you need an invitation? Are you like a vampire?”

He strode across the threshold. “No, but an invitation would have left you feeling in control. How are you today, Desdenova?”

“I’m great.” She clasped her arms across her chest to allay the nervous jitter. Her heart still pounded after that weird phone call. “Why the visit?”

He strolled behind the purple velvet coach, drawing his fingers along the crushed nap. His eyes took in the abundance of clutter, silk scarves draped over windows and lamps, pillows, books, plants and Mucha lithographs on the wall.

“Quite the marvel,” he mused. His crooked smile appealed to her. “But I don’t see you in here. Of course, the ego always holds the soul captive.”

“I don’t have an ego.” That was a lie. “I do,” Nova blurted out the correction. “We all do.”

“Yes. Only the newborn soul is pure. And the soul released from the body following mortal death.”

“What about killers like. .” Mr Harvey.

“Mortal sin does stain the soul irrevocably. There,” he said, pointing out the crocheted snowflake tucked in the corner of a picture frame. “A bit of the real you. How intriguing.”

“My grandmother taught me the craft. It was for my mother. She died before I could give it to her.”

He placed a hand over his heart, which Nova thought reminded her of one of those Knights Templar who vowed to fight for king, country and lady, all in the name of honour.

She could so get behind having her own knight.

“So you think I’m intriguing?” she prompted. “Is that in a ‘I’d like to take you out for coffee sometime way’, or an ‘I’ve never seen a chick barf up sin before’ way?”

“A little of both.”

Suddenly Nova grew an inch, and the control he had mentioned bubbled to the surface.

He trailed his fingers along the bookshelf where mysteries and thrillers loitered with the lush pink and violet spines of romances. “You said last night you would give it up. I thought to stop by and ensure you’d spoken truthfully.”

Nova sucked in her lip. Shoot. Last night she’d been playing with the idea of just that. But one phone call had changed everything.

Blackthorn tilted his head to study her face. She wouldn’t meet his eyes. He’d see her conflict. And she would want to kiss him just to know his taste.

“So my soul trail isn’t bright?”

“You are a thief, Desdenova. Would you expect as much?”

“I uh. . Thought to live a sinless life. I am not a thief. You are looking at things from the wrong perspective.”

“It is my perspective. I can never see things as you do.”

She quirked a brow at that cryptic statement.

When he touched a slip of her spiked hair, she inhaled. She’d never stood so close to a man before. Not counting slow dancing with Howard Leeds in eleventh grade, but that had been a lesson in avoiding roaming hands and she hadn’t looked at his face once.

Blackthorn had no scent, which bothered her. Yet he possessed the room, the very air, with his stature, his definite there-ness. No other place he should be right now, but right here, before her, preening over her hair, her face, her clothes.

You don’t do things like this. Connect.

It felt good. Was that allowed?

“Blackthorn?”

“Yes,” he whispered.

“What are you doing?”

“Waiting for you to look at me.”

“I. . can’t.”

His shoulders sagged and a sigh followed.

She’d let him down. So she put back her elbows and bounced on her heels, because that’s what she did when the world tried to pry down her walls. “I never promised you anything.”

“No, but I had thought the handshake a deal-clincher,” he said.

“I just wanted to touch you. Feel if you were real, or maybe cold like an angel whose blood is blue.”

“You’ve met an angel?”

“No, but I know things.” Like that angels bled blue and demons stalked the Fallen ones with blades forged from divinity. Her grandmother had taught her. But granny had never mentioned handsome Soul-bringers who would hold a mirror up to her life.

“Okay, listen.” She dropped the bravado. “I have one more job to do and then I promise you I will never eat sins again. I swear it to you. And I never break a promise.”

“Never?”

She shook her head adamantly. His eyes were as black as his name. Filled with something so immense. Like centuries, or even millennia. Everything in there. Even her.

Nova gulped and looked aside. “That is, if you’re still willing to give me that kiss.”

He touched her chin and directed her gaze to his. “You know two days in advance of a dying soul? I thought your job was an on-call basis?”

“I. .” How did Scottie know he was going to die on Saturday at noon? The only way a man in prison could possibly know something like that was. .

“Desdenova?”

Suddenly shaking, she sensed Blackthorn’s hug, him pulling her against his chest and cooing softly as her vision blackened. Felt too good, like a dream.

Her last fleeting thought was of the mournful cry as a soul is put to death for the heinous crimes its body has committed.

Blackthorn laid the sin-eater on her bed and pulled down her skirt to cover her knees. The room was another exercise in bohemian excess. The red lacquered dresser was crowded with framed photos. Family, he decided, comparing the little girl in various pictures to that of mother and father. A family she no longer had, for he felt her loneliness.

Did he want to save Desdenova Fleetwood? Or would it be far wiser to save his own hide and ensure the devil got his due?

Blackthorn had lived uncountable millennia. He’d gone beyond the everyday thoughts and trivialities of mortal life. He had become a vessel that ferried souls. Yet, he existed on the earthly realm and had perhaps even loved.

Loved? Maybe not.

But he understood the concept, and knew it was what kept most mortals alive. The emotion of everything being right and in its place. Of belonging. Of intimacy and respect. The mortal soul actually required love to beam brightly.

To be honest, when standing so close to Nova he’d felt something akin to want. To needing to belong. To existing again.

Why should he be denied simple pleasure when he served his holy and unholy masters so well?

Glancing to the bed, he noticed that her body wore a nimbus of moonlight. He wanted to kiss her pale lips. Lips tainted by multitude sin. Lips formed from the sweetness of innocence he’d never known. And though she was innocent — or believed herself to be — the woman was steeped in evil for some sins cleaved to the sin-eater’s soul ever after.

And who would eat her sins? Not any sane sin-eater.

The woman needed rescuing. But he was no knight.

He shimmered away from her and got caught in the stream of soul cries that beckoned for his attention.

Nova owned far too much stuff. She made connections with inanimate things more easily than with the living and breathing.

But he had breath. You felt it on your face.

She wanted to feel it again.

She splayed her fingers over the books on the shelf. Memories of heroes and heroines would always be hers; she didn’t need the physical pages. The furniture in the living room echoed her bohemian aesthetic, but who needed a couch when they were dead?

Kicking aside the packing boxes half-filled with books she had labelled for the library and kitchen utensils she’d donate to charity, she settled on the floor, sinking against the wall.

The family photos peered at her from the bedroom dresser. Packing those felt like sacrilege.

“I am the queen of sacrilege,” she muttered, “according to the Soul-bringer.”

Could he be right? Was she the real thief?

An insistent knock at the door prompted her to call out, “It’s open, Blackthorn.” She didn’t get company. Ever. So he was the only possibility.

The Soul-bringer stepped through the doorway and swept the room with his dark eyes. He wasn’t much of a smiler. Yet his snazzy vest chased away the dour. He had stepped out of a different time period. Perhaps he had lived them all. Had he made connections in all those periods of time? Or was she a unique intrusion into his life?

“You intending a move?” he put out.

Nova sighed.

The man accepted her silence, wandered around the boxes, and circled back to Nova. Squatting before her, he pressed the heel of his palm to the wall over her shoulder and replicated her world-is-ending sigh.

“You cannot go through with your task tomorrow, Desdenova.”

“Who are you to tell me what to do? And what makes you think you know what I’m going to do?”

“You are going through your things. It is as if you do not expect to be around after tomorrow.”

“So what if I’m not? We all gotta go some time.”

“I can agree that Scott Weston must leave this realm tomorrow at noon. But you have a choice.”

“Don’t you find it interesting a man can know his exact hour of death?” she pondered, avoiding his eyes. “And because of that knowledge, suddenly I’ve been given the hour of my death.”

“Nova. .” He didn’t know what to say. Did he feel as uncomfortable as she, so close to one another? Did he want to taste her breath on his lips? “You don’t need to do this. You cannot.”

“I made a promise.”

“Is breaking a promise a sin?”

“It is if I believe it a sin.”

“You have to believe in a god to subscribe to sin.”

He had her there. She did believe in a higher power — in Heaven — and redemption.

“My word is good, Blackthorn. I would never say something and not carry through with it. And if I had no intention to do something, then I would never say it.”

“You’ve more integrity than ninety-nine per cent of the world’s population.”

“I don’t know about that.”

“I admire your honesty,” he offered.

No one had ever admired a thing about her. Why did something interesting have to happen to her now, when her end was so near?

“Then don’t ask me to break a promise. I’ll stop eating sins right after Mr Weston. You don’t think my soul will go to Heaven?”

“I cannot know. Your sins will be judged by your maker.”

“You got that right.” Bravery was getting heavier to bear.

Blackthorn dipped his head and looked aside. “What gives you the right to steal sin? You cannot be any man’s judge. Only your god is allowed such mastery over the human soul.”

She’d had this argument with herself before she’d begun sin-eating at thirteen. “People make mistakes, Blackthorn.”

“Murder, dozens of times over, is not a mistake.”

And was thirteen too young to know any better? It should be.

“Nova.” His sighs sparkled within her when they should have made her sad. “There is a sinister delicacy to the human soul. Once tainted by evil it is very difficult to clean, no matter the circumstances that brought about the taint.”

“Even if those circumstances involved taking other people’s sins,” she stated, not liking the reality of her profession. Thievery, indeed.

She took his hands in hers and smoothed her thumbs along them. They were strong and calloused. A man’s hands. What would they feel like wrapped around her?

Nova cleared her throat and her wandering thoughts.

“When I first started,” she said, “I ate the sin from a man who had dropped his crippled mother down the stairs. It was an accident. He had been carrying her from the bath to her bedroom. Her head hit the tile landing and she died instantly. He spoke to me a week before he died of cancer. He thought he was guilty, couldn’t get beyond it, even after the police had ruled it an accident.

“I am there to calm worries, Blackthorn. To take away guilt for things that should never cause guilt. In a sense, we are all sin-eaters. We sit beside our loved ones when they are dying, ease their discomfort, grant them absolution for simple things.”

“Yes, but you’ve the power to erase sin, Nova. It should not be wielded without great care. The only worry this serial killer has is that you won’t make it there in time. He bears no remorse for his crimes. His soul belongs Beneath. It is not for you to decide.”

“Nor is it your decision.”

She tugged her hands from his and drew her knees up to her chest. “I will quit after this last one. I promise.”

“The Receiver of Beneath will take your soul if he is not satisfied.”

Nova grimaced. “The devil wants to take my soul? Bring it on.”

“And then he’ll kill me. But only after I have watched him torture you.”

She flicked a look at him. “Why? Do you care about me so much it would cause you pain?”

He touched her cheek, stroking his thumb along it. The touch was so intimate it made her want to lunge forward for the kiss she so desperately needed.

“Desdenova, you and I, we don’t get to love.”

Swallowing, she looked aside. “I know that.”

“Love is a cruel emotion.”

“So says the guy who probably doesn’t even understand guilt and honour and. . and emotion. You’ve no capacity to love, do you?”

“I see that love hurts those who cared about the deceased. They are torn apart. Why do you insist love is so good?”

“Blackthorn, love is the reason we are here on earth. To love, and be loved.”

“I am aware that love feeds the soul.” He explained, “I know how to love. I know how to want, to desire, to pine for something. I ignore that evil.”

“Don’t call something so perfect evil.”

“It is something you pine for.”

“I do.”

“Is it more important to you than honour and truth?”

“I think so. I had it once, from my parents.”

He nodded, pleased. “That is not your ego talking, but your truth.”

“You’re missing a lot if you don’t feel it,” Nova said.

“You think so?” He sat beside her and took her hand between his. “If love can be a distraction, you are it.”

A blush warmed her cheeks.

The moment felt so freakin’ normal. It wasn’t as if some immortal man who had the ability to enter Above and Beneath sat beside her. He was just a guy. A handsome, warm, wonderful guy she wanted to kiss all day and night until she had to leave this world.

Leave her entire life behind. All because of a ten-year-old’s naive promise.

“I won’t allow this to happen,” he said. He kissed her knuckles and held them there at his lips.

“I won’t let you force me to break a promise.”

“Keep your promise. Go to that bastard tomorrow.”

She turned and clutched his vest, the fine silk too soft and rich. “Don’t screw things up for me. If I steal these sins from you—”

“I’ll be fine. But you. . The devil will not have your soul,” he said with determination. “Nova, trust me.”

“I don’t even know you.”

“I like you.” He winced, as if the words had cut his tongue. Or maybe it was such an odd declaration, he didn’t know what to think of it.

“You like me? Like. . romantically?”

Nova liked him, too. And she didn’t have a reasonable explanation either, other than that he appealed to her. He made her want to know more about him. To want to show him that love was not always cruel.

“You’re not frightened of me,” he said. “You were born into a family tradition, and yet you face it with remarkable courage. There’s not a sin-eater in this world who doesn’t revel in sin and indulge because he knows the taint in his soul will see him Beneath when death calls his number.”

“I may be tainted with the sins of others, but it’s not my sin. I believe the greater power — be it God, Allah, Buddha, whoever you want to name — sees only those sins that belong to the person, not others.”

“Interesting theory.”

“You know otherwise?” Please say no, please say no.

“No.”

She relaxed. She would have enjoyed getting to know this guy if she’d more time. But she couldn’t mourn the things she’d miss if she hadn’t yet had them. Things like love, desire and sex.

He clutched his heart. This time the wince creased his forehead. “Sorry. I’ve to go.”

“Souls?”

He nodded. “You will see me tomorrow.”

“I know. But it better not be until after I’ve done the deed.”

Blackthorn’s smile disappeared like the Cheshire cat’s as he shimmered away from her side, leaving Nova shivering for the lack of warmth, and the thrill of new desire.

Nova walked up the pristine sidewalk to the penitentiary. Not a bird chirped, there was no breeze to cool her sweaty palms. The sun was so bright it bleached the sky white. The prison’s red brick walls made it look a schoolhouse, if not for the chain-link fence, razor wire, floodlights and towers with armed guards.

“Farewell,” she whispered, knowing it sounded dramatic, but feeling it in her marrow, “to all my earthly attachments and my family.”

And then there was Blackthorn Regis. Talk about wrong place and wrong time to find Mr Right.

Heck, she didn’t know enough about him to decide if he was right or wrong. Probably a smart woman would say wrong because the man could never be around all the time.

Yet he believed in her. He accepted Nova held her own beliefs, and didn’t try to make her something she was not. That was something no girl should let slip from her grasp.

She started to wonder how painful it would be, dying. It was never a picnic vomiting up sin. What followed after she’d performed the eating today was going to be that, multiplied by a hundred.

“Stop it,” she muttered. Her black sneakers tracked the sidewalk. “Focus on the now. You can’t change any of this.”

Yet Blackthorn believed she could.

Certainly, she could make a different choice. But any choice other than this one would see her promise broken.

She had to respect a promise, no matter that it had been made fifteen years ago. Then she’d honour the promise made to Blackthorn.

The door to the prison opened with an ominous creak and shut so quickly Nova wondered how many had skinned a heel if they hadn’t stepped in fast enough. A steely-eyed officer wearing full uniform and a gun at his hip waited for her to approach. This was no reception area playing muzak and offering magazines while you waited.

“I’m Desdenova Fleetwood. I have an appointment to see Scott Weston, er. . after?”

“Right, the religious liaison,” he said, noting something on the schedule before him. “Here to view the body and bless it, eh? The killer’s dying wish. Sweet.”

She nodded, nerves keeping her silent, for to speak she would have to reveal the truth. It wasn’t her lie; it had come from Weston.

He pointed to the right. “You’ll need to go through security.”

“Thanks.”

Shouldn’t a dying man’s last wish be honoured?

You have too much integrity.

At what point did a man lose his rights if he had taken the lives of so many? Truly, did he deserve a dying wish?

Nova was not the person to make that call. She was simply here to do a duty.

You’ve no right to be their judge. You are a thief.

Blackthorn had a point.

Nova clutched her neck. Was this wrong? She needed someone to tell her what to do. She was one person. One soul who followed her beliefs. But who was to say those beliefs were the right ones?

She glanced over her shoulder. Where was her rescuing knight?

You’re letting him influence you, to sway you. Be strong. Don’t succumb to base attraction. The man could never be right for you. He isn’t even mortal.

Summoning courage, Nova walked onwards.

The security check was tedious. She was frisked from head to toe. It was embarrassing, even with a female officer doing the frisking. Nova thanked a God she wasn’t sure existed for the freedoms she had enjoyed all her life.

Must a Soul-bringer lead a tethered life? He was always at the beck and call of souls waiting to be collected. A man couldn’t possibly develop meaningful relationships that way.

They were two alike, in so many ways it heartened her. She wanted to know him. She wanted more time with him.

“Ma’am?”

Nova jumped and started towards the door to her right, but the female officer harrumphed loudly.

“Your bag.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

She set down her bag and the officer upended it. A glance at the clock showed two minutes to noon. Nova didn’t have to show up while Weston was still breathing. Her work started after his heart stopped.

And no Soul-bringer had better beat her to it, either.

Yes, please, beat me there. Stop this thief before she sins again.

Oh, hell, Nova, you are the one in the wrong. You take away the judgment owed all men. And you will be judged yourself.

The officer shoved her empty bag towards Nova. “Stay right here.”

Nova glanced at the wall. The clock’s long hand clicked across the twelve at the same time the short hand did. She eyed the fluorescent lights. Would there be a power surge?

No, silly, that was only in movies. Besides, they gave lethal injections nowadays.

“You can enter the waiting room, Miss Fleetwood. The decedent will be brought in shortly.”

Dead bodies did not bother her. She ate the sins. Nothing bizarre happened. She didn’t feel the sin go into her with a thud or shock. It was a non-event. Until she puked it up later. Nova ate the last bits of salted bread from the plate she had set upon the unmoving chest. The corpse was dressed in a white cotton jumpsuit and no shoes. Scott Weston didn’t look as she remembered him fifteen years ago. As always, the decedent merely looked asleep, caught in reverie.

Tears rolled down her cheeks. She’d never allowed emotion to contaminate an eating. Nor had she allowed conflicting thoughts to interfere.

This is your last meal, kept pinging the surface of her brain. And then — Blackthorn didn’t get here first.

She dropped her arms to her sides and glanced to the guard standing inside the small room. A nod from him and she collected her bag from the floor beside her feet, and walked out.

Simple as that. Salt the bread. Eat it. Think pure thoughts (or try to). Leave.

Her footsteps quickened as she anticipated the inevitable violent purge.

Once outside, she ran towards her car, bag clutched to her chest and tears spattering the air. Slamming her hands to the trunk of her yellow VW Bug, she huffed and panted. She’d learned Weston had murdered eighteen women after raping them. This was not going to be pretty.

How dare she steal those sins? Was a promise so much grander than theft? Than murder?

Closing her eyes, Nova bent her knees and sank against the wheel well, the tyre digging into her hip. She should have parked at the back of the lot, next to the line of weeds under the chain-link fence. Towers dotted the high brick walls, capped with curled razor wire. Guards would see no matter where she positioned herself.

Soon the heat would rise through her muscles and skin and bring up her bile.

“I’m not ready,” she said in sniffling sobs. “I can’t die here. Alone. I’ve made a mistake.”

The smell of hot tarmac should have dizzied her, yet the scent reminded her of summer. Gasoline fumes fixed her to real time, the now.

Thoughts were too clear. She did not feel out of sorts, as if her stomach billowed up to her throat. She did not feel. . anything.

A pair of legs materialized beside her. Nova followed the elegant black trousers up to the snazzy vest.

She jumped up to face Blackthorn and clutched his jacket. “You stole from me!”

“I stole nothing,” he said calmly. “I heard the soul shout and arrived to collect it.”

“Before I was allowed in to eat the sins. You were waiting for it.”

“Not at all. I cannot know when a soul is ready until the actual death. Nor am I aware who has, or has not, visited the body before my arrival. Nova, I am sorry. Had you actually eaten Weston’s sins, you would be the real thief.”

“Don’t touch me.” She stepped away from his touch. “I don’t want to be a thief! I hate you!”

Scrambling around to the driver’s side, she hopped in and fired up the engine. Blackthorn no longer stood in the parking lot when she drove out.

So he had lost the girl. And had he ever even wanted her?

“Yes,” Blackthorn whispered.

He sat on the flat, pebble-frosted rooftop of a building across the street from Nova’s apartment complex. Considering her emotional temperament, he’d been worried about her getting home safely.

Keep telling yourself that, buddy.

He hadn’t stolen Weston’s soul from her. He’d been doing his job. He had pleased the Receiver — and life went on.

Yet had he stolen Nova’s integrity?

He knew he had not, but did she?

A shadow passed before the picture window fronting her apartment. No lights on inside. She’d packed all her things, had been prepared for death because she believed in her heart that her way was the right way. A woman like her stood alone. She could do so many great things if she stepped away from the abysmal darkness of sin-eating.

But who was he to judge? Without adversity life would be dull. If he had not the sin-eater’s challenge he would not now be pondering his own heart. She had made him suddenly. . not nothing.

Had he the capacity to love? At the very least, to care about a mortal soul still firmly affixed within a body? And not just a body. A simple, beautiful woman who required nothing more than a kiss — and trust.

He wanted to know things about her. Like, what was her favourite book on the shelf full of many? How had her grandmother smiled as she’d taught her granddaughter a craft? Had Nova known how great was that love?

Something lighted on his shoulder. Blackthorn started, and turned to find Nova beside him. Dressed in jeans and a soft blue sweater, she sat close, her arm hugging his and drew her knees up and propped her chin there.

“Sorry,” she said. “I don’t hate you.”

“You’ve every right—”

“No, I don’t. You were doing your job. I wanted it to happen that way, but denied the truth when it was granted. I’ve had a good talk with myself. I have no right to make judgments. I can’t worry about what happens with my soul when it leaves this world. I want to live, Blackthorn. Right now. Tomorrow. The next day. What are you doing today?”

“Me?” Blackthorn drew her hand up to his mouth. Fragile fingers capable of caressing his hardened heart closed about his. “I think there’s a deal I have to pay up on. Something about a kiss?”

“I was hoping you hadn’t forgotten. But let me.”

“Let you?”

“I’m going to kiss you.”

He turned his body towards her. “I have never been warned about a kiss before.”

“It’s not a warning — well, maybe it is. You look the sort who will be surprised.”

“Nothing surprises me, Nova. I have lived and experienced far too long.”

Nova pushed her fingers through his hair and leaned to touch his mouth with hers. Yet she didn’t connect immediately. Instead, the two of them lingered there, face-to-face, breaths blending, hearts pounding.

Becoming. Two learning.

She was the first to move forward and brush his mouth with hers. Warmth burnished more than her lips, perhaps her very soul. She wanted him to have a soul, to know this exquisite connection.

His touch drew her into the dark, sweet glimmer of alluring passion.

Want. It was a simple thing, laced with yearning and desire.

Sinful? That all depended on who was doing the judging. Nova didn’t want to judge; she simply wanted to live. To take what life offered her.

When she pulled back, his eyelids flickered and his dark irises gleamed.

“You’re surprised,” she said.

“So I am.” He held out his hand and Nova threaded her fingers through his. “That was a splendid kiss.”

She laid her head on his shoulder. “So I didn’t actually break my promise today.”

“You went to the penitentiary with intention. It was not your fault the soul cried out before you got to the body. But you do know perhaps only monks live sinless lives?”

She nodded. “I understand now that sin-eating is sin in and of itself.”

“Well-intentioned.”

“I’m not going to worry about it. There are much better ways to occupy one’s time.” She tilted her head against his shoulder. “Do you date, Blackthorn?”

“You mean, a steady girl? I’ve never tried it.”

“Maybe you should. It’s good to make connections, and have friends. Love, well, it is important to survival.”

“The soul’s survival. I admire you. When I look at you my glass heart pulses.”

“It’s glass? That means you’re a—”

“I was once.”

“Wow.”

He hugged her against him. “You understand me, Desdenova. Perhaps we could give it a try?”

“Would you disappear during the middle of a date to go collect souls?”

“Probably. But when I am not on a task I would be with you. Always.”

“Kiss me again, Soul-bringer.”