Deadly Sins

by Laura Read

  She tried to open the doors to the offices but found them locked. Her access card was still in her bag behind the bar. She swore and angrily punched the door.

  ‘Here,’ came a voice from behind her, and she turned to see Arnie running up the stairs towards her with his card. He opened the door for her. ‘I’ll be outside if you need anything.’

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, looking at him with gratitude and stepping through the door into the dimly-lit corridor. At least he didn’t want to talk about what had just happened, for which she was grateful.

  The door clicked shut behind her and she closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, savouring the quietness and privacy of the secluded corridor. Finally she could take pleasure from being alone again, instead of being frightened that Webster would attack her when she was unaccompanied.

  She heard a muffled voice coming through the door to the poolroom, and recognised Sean’s voice. Creeping towards the door, she tried to listen to what he was saying, but his voice was too quiet or the doors too thick to hear through.

  A floorboard beneath her feet groaned. She didn’t know whether Sean had heard her but decided to enter the room instead of lurking outside. She didn’t bother knocking, she just marched inside, ignoring Sean and heading for the drinks cabinet.

  Sean muttered into the phone, ‘Speak to you soon.’

  He hung up and watched Angela pour herself a tall glass of gin. ‘Vincent told you to sober up,’ he reminded her.

  ‘Fuck him,’ she said. ‘Drink?’

  ‘I’m fine…’

  ‘Of course you are.’

  Sean frowned. ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘I’m fine. Someone only tried to kill me.’ She downed her drink and poured herself another.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Sean asked.

  Angela laughed. ‘What’s wrong?’ With a new drink in her hand, she turned and asked, ‘What’s wrong with me?’

  Sean looked at her questioningly. ‘What do you mean?’

  Angela opened her mouth but couldn’t think of anything to say. ‘I don’t know...’ She took a sip of her drink, wishing she was as intoxicated as she’d been earlier, but she knew that she’d have to talk to the police later.

  What did she mean? She wanted the truth. ‘Did you ever feel anything for me?’ she asked finally. ‘Why did you kiss me? Why did you ignore me afterwards?’

  Her eyes were sad yet imploring, as she drunkenly searched his eyes for answers. Sean walked towards her but then stopped halfway, closing his eyes as he tried to think of what to say.

  ‘You know there’s something between us,’ he admitted. ‘Or there was. But I’ll be gone in a few weeks and right now you’re not ready for a relationship.’

  ‘You don’t know anything about me!’ she said defensively. ‘What gives you the right to decide whether or not I’m ready for a relationship?’

  He sighed and realised that he needed to hurt her to get his point across that he couldn’t be with her. ‘I’ve watched you the last couple of weeks, drinking your life away and fucking any guy who’s desperate enough. Tonight was no different,’ he told her. ‘You pretend that you don’t care and you isolate yourself from everyone. You’ve never loved anyone and I don’t think you can. You’re not ready for a relationship.’

  ‘You don’t know that.’

  ‘Tonight you almost fucked a stranger in front of me. Did you think if you showed me how much of a slut you are it would make me want to be with you?’

  Angela stepped away from him. ‘I didn’t think that...’

  ‘If you were trying to make me jealous, it didn’t work. I’m not interested in fucking you. I’m sorry to say that you’ve failed in your mission to have sex with every single man in this town.’

  Angela stepped further away from him, feeling sick, hurt gripping her around the throat. ‘Okay, so you’re not interested...’ She picked up the gin bottle and her glass and faced Sean. ‘I’m not perfect. I’m fucked up, but I’m not the one here who’s afraid of getting close to someone.’

  She strode out of the room and opened the door to Joe’s old office. She flicked the light switch, but the room remained unlit, shadows hiding the stains on the carpet.

  She stood frozen in the doorway, peering into the dark room that smelt of death. Perhaps she was more like Joe than she realised, standing there drunk and clutching the bottle of gin tightly in her hand; sleeping around so she didn’t feel completely alone. Her eyes welled up again and her hands started to shake. She walked over to the desk to put down the bottle and glass.

  What was she still doing in this town, in this club, her old easy haunts that she visited night after night? Sean’s words had wounded her because they were true. He barely knew her, but he could tell that she’d never loved anyone.

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Her heart jumped and she turned to see Sean. ‘I didn’t mean what I just said.’

  ‘You did. You were right.’

  ‘I’m not afraid of getting close to you... I lost someone, a long time ago, who I loved. I don’t want that to happen again.’

  Angela didn’t know what to say. This was the first time that Sean had let his guard down with her. ‘Who did you lose?’

  Sean was quiet for a while before saying, ‘My wife. She left me a few years ago, for one of our friends. And she took our son with her. I haven’t seen him since, but I want to get him back. I can if I have enough money... That’s why I’m going to leave town after I’ve finished here.’

  Angela nodded. ‘You’ll need to leave soon,’ she advised. ‘Vincent hates you. He wants to kill you, and you know he won’t think anything of killing a cop.’

  Sirens blared through the darkness and the pair glanced towards the window, rain trickling down the glass to distort the starless sky. The rippled glass shimmered with blue light.

  Soon the two would separate. In the dark they turned to face each other, their skin turning sapphire when light streamed through the glass.

  Their lips met, and Angela felt as if warm embers were conjured inside her heart again. Desire fused with romanticism. She tried to persuade herself that the dust of her past could be swept away.

  ‘I wish you didn’t have to leave,’ she confessed, clutching at his shirt. ‘Fuck, what are we doing?’

  She pushed him away and looked out into the night, across the street towards the concrete warehouses, standing empty and unlit. She didn’t know whether this kiss would be their last; whether she would see him again if he was to leave so soon.

  ‘I don’t know what we’re doing,’ he admitted. ‘I never know what I’m doing when I’m with you.’

  She smiled faintly but her thoughts were clouded with doubt. She wished she could leave town with Sean, but suggesting that they ran away together would be too much to ask, and would feel too clichéd. This wasn’t a Hollywood romance, and her story wouldn’t have a happy ending.

  Sean broached the question he’d been longing to ask. ‘Why did Webster want to kill you?’

  Angela’s shoulders dropped at the sudden question. Here was her test: whether she should tell Sean the truth; whether she could trust him to keep her secrets. Before tonight she didn’t think that she could trust anyone again, not after what had happened with Vincent. Sean was different though, and what she sensed now was unlike anything she’d felt before. She wanted to tell him everything and take her first leap of faith with the man she’d fallen for.

  ‘Promise me that you’ll keep what I’m about to tell you to yourself?’

  Sean studied her face, her reluctance to answer his question unnerving. ‘I promise,’ he assured her.

  She considered where to begin before she poured forth her cluster of secrets.

  11

  Love

  She was dreaming, in the depths of heavy sleep, the weight of a blanket draped over her body in the periphery of her consciousness. Her mind was in a dark landscape held captive in a soft shell of physicality.

  In her dream she was naked, but her corporeal form
was insignificant; only the world and what she perceived mattered. She couldn’t distinguish shapes or colours but could sense that her bare feet stood upon smooth, cold rock. Enclosing her was a thick blackness, almost tangible: a velvet curtain shortly to be drawn for the performance.

  She became a bystander as bright colours burst into view like blooms in front of her eyes. A pink sun rose in the sky, and the sunlight gave life to the canyon she watched over. Formations of rock stretching for miles into the distance filled with multi-coloured shapes and details.

  To contend with the colours, the tyrannical wind forced large clouds of terracotta dust into the air, revealing a scarcely discernible track leading down to the valley below. Grains of earth encircled her body and time gnawed at her heart. She shielded her eyes from the grit and the imperious white sun piercing the turquoise sky.

  Yet she wasn’t daunted by the elements; although she was aware that she was alone in the world, she would walk towards whatever fate threw in her way, despite her lack of vision and the blistering heat scorching her body and the ground beneath her feet.

  The landscape sensed her newly-found determination, and silence descended on the scene. The wind died down and the windswept particles of sand settled into the earth once more to reveal the breath-taking views that lay beyond.

  The sun fell from the heavens and twilight threw a fresh blanket of colours across the canyon. Somewhere behind her eyes, a spark ignited as she waited for the moon, her pupils swimming in the familiar beauty of the darkening sky. Colours faded as the sun stepped down from her throne, and her partner reclaimed his seat in the sky.

  The moon dwelled in a darker world, his love illuminated in dazzling rays of light that shone across his kingdom. He was surrounded by ghostly stars, but none came close to shining as brightly as their competitor, and none could affect the sun as much as he. The sun was hidden in the darkness of the night, every so often out of the corner of her eye thinking that she could see the moon, her love, shining faintly in the distance when her thoughts turned to him.

  Angela was the sun, waiting for the darkness to release her from its spell so once more she could rise in the sky and be free. Yet her path was one to walk alone: although she had found love, the sun and moon were destined to remain in separate worlds. Their paths would seldom cross, if at all…

  She woke to a cold room, her skin prickling, the pressing darkness from her dream abating when she stirred. Her body felt heavier in the real world but her head lighter as she shook herself from the haze of her dream. She stretched her limbs beneath the blanket, her short dress twisting around her body. She was tired from her ordeal the night before, as well as from the endless questions the police had asked.

  Someone knocked on the door loudly and she realised that the sound had drawn her out of her dream. Avoiding the shoes slung next to the sofa, she rose and made her way to the door, smoothing down her hair using the mirror in the hallway, barely recognising her thin features.

  She peered into the peephole then stood back from the door, uncertainty clouding her face: it was Sean. He’d disappeared last night when the police separated them for questioning, after she confessed her sins to him. He had remained silent afterwards; she hadn’t been able to judge how he felt about everything she told him.

  Opening the door, she noticed the snowflakes melting across the shoulders of his bourbon-coloured coat. The first snow of the winter had fallen. His skin was flushed, his hair damp, and his eyes looked at her with longing in the dim light emanating from the small stairwell. They stood in the doorway staring into each other’s eyes, neither wanting to be the first to move, forgetting how to form words.

  Angela still felt as if she was lost inside a dream when they stepped towards each other, her hands resting shakily on his woollen jacket, the fabric rough and moist from the snow. Awareness of their surroundings diminished as their thoughts brimmed with nervousness, doubt and anticipation. Language became abstract movements in the coldness of the hallway, both attempting to read the other’s mind to discover what was wanted.

  Not wanting to wait any longer, Sean gently pulled her towards him and kissed her, passion balanced with tenderness, and together they moved further inside the apartment to close the door and shut out the rest of the world. Neither of the pair broke the spell of their closeness, their cold hands warming against each other’s bodies, her palms inside his jacket, clinging onto the sides of his shirt, almost so as not to lose him again.

  One of his hands rested against the nape of her neck, the other hugged the small of her back, and he kissed her neck softly with warm wet lips. He created a winding path of kisses across her shoulders, his mouth exploring her collar in intimate detail, her skin soft beneath his brushing lips.

  Angela closed her eyes to amplify the warmth of his mouth, breathing in the faintness of his sweet cologne, the subtle scent rising from his unshaven jaw. She felt his fingers slide down the zip at the side of her dress and the material loosen then slither down her body. She wanted him unclothed too and grasped his jacket, pulling it down his shoulders to pool on the carpet. Then she began to unbutton his shirt while his hands skimmed down her naked back.

  His shirt undone, she kissed a similar path across his broad shoulders before glancing down at the scars on his chest, still in the process of healing. Those scars were ingrained in her heart, and guilt overwhelmed her. Always she would know that she’d been too late to stop the infliction of his injuries.

  He lifted her chin and told her with his eyes that he didn’t consider her responsible for his wounds. Guilt remained in the back of her mind though, as well as shame for subjecting him to the sight of a stranger’s hands on her body last night.

  Her defences melted in Sean’s presence, as if they didn’t exist, but she was scared of sharing too much of herself with him. This moment felt different from what she’d experienced before, promising more than just the lust that overtook her in the past. With other men she could let down her physical barriers, but she’d never shared her heart with anyone. She wanted to allow herself to be honest with Sean and show him how much he meant to her, but she needed to feel comfortable being vulnerable.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked, concern filling his eyes.

  ‘Nothing,’ she told him, mentally waving away her thoughts and kissing him in reassurance.

  ‘Are you okay?’ Sean whispered.

  I love you, she wanted to whisper back. Instead she nodded, taking his hand in hers to lead him towards her bedroom.

  The room was full of dark shadows, the sun veiled by heavy material. Letting go of Sean’s hand, Angela walked towards the window and drew back the thick curtains. The snow had settled upon the pavements, roads and parked cars, a layer of sugar sprinkled on the outside world. She stood naked behind the white lace of the net curtains and watched snowflakes fall from the sky.

  Sean’s warm chest and his cold belt buckle pressed against her back. He swept her hair across her shoulder and kissed her neck, trailing his hands across her breasts and over her stomach. His fingers slid between her legs and she felt his fingertips lightly circle her opening. Still watching the snow descend, she leant back against him, her breath quickening as her body reacted to his touch.

  She reached behind so she could feel him too, but he moved her hand aside and she heard him unfasten his trousers. He kicked the last of his clothing off and she felt him hard pressed against her back before he leant her forward and slid inside her.

  ‘Are you still okay?’ he whispered in her ear.

  She nodded hastily and he took that as a sign to start thrusting, his hands gripping her sides while he kissed her neck and shoulders. Her fingers spread out against the lace and cold glass beneath, her hips moving in time with his rhythm, watching the snow descend as her head filled with light. She felt her first orgasm build and then she came, her body convulsing and mind swelling with pleasure.

  Sean lifted her towards the bed, nestled his body between her legs and kissed her again.
As he thrust inside her once more, she felt her body moulding against his; their hips adopting the same rhythm. They were one and the same. She’d waited for this moment for so long, perhaps since she first met Sean and wondered why he looked familiar. They’d played mind games on each other, ignored their attraction and then yearned for each other, their wants waxing and waning until they finally submitted to desire.

  Sean’s mouth found her breasts and he drove harder into her, each thrust filling her with pleasure and further want. Her nails dug into his arms and she closed her eyes in ecstasy as warmth spread through her body. She wrapped her legs around him and sensed the muscles on his back flex. His eyes darkened when he looked up and watched her shudder beneath him.

  She stared into his eyes, spellbound by the emotions dormant in their blue depths. She lost sight of everything else as she gazed at him, scarcely aware of her pleasure or the sensory world, detaching her body from her consciousness. Her vision dappled with colours as she came again, gazing at his eyes filled with lust and, she was sure, of love.

  The couple lay intertwined, white sheets enclosing their warm bodies in the late afternoon sun pouring through the thin net curtains. The rays transformed the room into a haven where golden light played across the ceiling. One of Angela’s arms was draped around Sean’s chest, her head nestled on his shoulder, feeling his heart beating beneath the palm of her hand.

  Her eyelashes flickered against his skin, each blink an unspoken wish that she could stay wrapped in his arms forever and wouldn’t have to leave the safety of the room to venture outside again.

  She wondered how many nights she lay in the arms of strangers and wanted to feel anything besides chilling neutrality, when she had remained unmoved by the sex and unfeeling towards her lovers? She always hoped for something more. Sometimes the sex would be the high, the lust her drug, but when it was gone there was only emptiness left. Yet with Sean, she didn’t feel empty, but instead sensed peace: a mixture of happiness, clarity and self-awareness.