Peccatum in Carne: Sins of the Flesh (The Three Sins of Mallory Moore Book 1)

by Coco Mingolelli

  He spit in Steven's eye before nodding to Baum to strangle him some more. "Does it hurt, you pikey arsehole? I hope it hurts like fookin' hell, since I can't do what ya' deserve for real. I ain't scum like you."

  Long strands of spittle wheezed out of Steven's lips, which now verged on being blue from asphyxiation. He could feel himself becoming lightheaded, and Baum slapped his head roughly when it began to loll against his shoulder.

  "Nah, you gotta wake up now." Charlie slapped at his face. "You cut a lil' girl, so you take it like she did."

  The shiv stabbed into Steven's neck in three rapid thrusts. None of the other men in custody noticed, not that they cared. It hadn't been particularly loud thanks to the ligature wrapped around his throat, rendering him unable to speak or scream. Daylight began to fade behind the jeering faces that surrounded him.

  "Prop 'im up next to the shed, and tie the lace to the doorjamb, Baum. Fookin' stupid guards will think he did it 'imself," was the final thing Steven heard before white noise filled his mind, and he began to lose consciousness from blood loss.

  The shiv being slid into his clenched fist was the last he ever felt of this life.

  Chapter 24: Dilabi in Translationi (Lost in Translation)

  Dawn rolled around her bed, startled awake by the loud, booming voice a few rooms away. Her eyes popped open in fear, for it was rare that this particular voice raised in anger. Whenever it did, it meant something very bad was happening.

  Stumbling out of her bed, her feet then shuffled along the plush white carpeting of the bedroom, and into the hallway. She rubbed her sleepy eyes and yawned, intent on finding out what was the matter. No matter how many times Dawn was told to stay away when the yelling happened, curiosity always got the better of her.

  Just as her hand pushed the already ajar door of her parents' bedroom open, her father unleashed another tirade.

  "– and I will not tell you again, Leila! Do not question me in this!" he snarled, and raised a hand in the air over the woman she knew as her mother.

  Mummy did not cower, but glared bravely at Father. "How many times must the Crown tell you no, Steven? She's sick, and I don't want her under this roof! What of Dawn? You would have a mentally ill teenager around Dawn?"

  Her father began to pace the room, still unaware of Dawn's presence just outside. Yanking at his hair in frustration, Father looked crazy. It was so weird to see him this way. He hated to yell, and hated to show emotion. "You don't understand. None of you understand."

  Her mother screamed. "I know she has money! She's a pretty little thing, or at least she was!"

  Mummy's smart mouth sent Father into motion so fast, he looked like a blur. His hand flew out to meet her face with such striking speed that Mother had no chance to block it.

  Her beautiful pink lips – Dawn would never forget them – turned down into a grimace as blood spilled from them. Mummy didn't try to run away, but gingerly touched the injured part of her face.

  Dawn gasped aloud when her mother's teary green eyes met her gaze. She'd never seen her father actually hit someone before.

  "'Dawn, sweetheart..." Mummy whispered, a tinge of fear now lacing the words.

  She had seen, and heard, something very bad. Dawn was bad.

  Turning away from her mother, Father's icy blue eyes cut straight though to Dawn's soul. She was frozen in place, and unable to produce a single sound as he picked her up by the forearms with a vice-like grip.

  She did not whimper as he wordlessly promised punishment with that raw, enraged stare. She did not make a peep as Father marched her, stiff as a board in his arms, back to her bedroom.

  Only when he had deposited Dawn back in bed, and made a clear show of locking her door before slamming it shut for effect, did she let herself cry. Dawn was very, very bad.

  Those cries got louder as time went on, calling out for her dead mother. Dawn's heart raced painfully, and she clawed at her chest in vain. She'd never had this particular dream before, and the reality of the memory crashing down upon her left her breathless. She wasn't in London, nor was she a little girl. She was –

  – in Mallory's empty bed, shivering with the cold sweat that coated her skin. The sheets were just as cold beside her. Where was Mallory?

  Her stomach rolling with an uncanny sense of dread from the dream, Dawn stumbled her way downstairs.

  Half way down, she heard the quiet murmurs of the woman she sought.

  "Mal? Mal..." she cried, hands gripping and ungripping in a futile attempt to hold onto someone still unseen.

  She found Mallory just inside the library nook, seated with her back turned. The iPhone was pressed against her ear, and the robed woman leaned against a shoulder to hold it there, while she hunched over and hugged at herself.

  "I don't understand," Mallory repeating herself, confused. "How could he? No, don't answer that. I don't understand."

  "Mal," Dawn sobbed, unable to wait any longer to be acknowledged. Tears rolled hot down her cheeks. She was crushed by the shame she felt since the nightmare. "Mallory!"

  Startling at her name, Mallory finally turned around. Her eyes were red and puffy, like she had been crying long before Dawn even realized she was missing from their bed.

  "Oh! Ah," she cut off whomever was on the phone. "We'll... we'll will be down later." The cell was dumped unceremoniously onto the chaise from her hand, the red 'End Call' button flashing.

  Reaching out towards Dawn with a beckoning motion, Mallory walked a few steps to close the distance between them. "Oh, darling. Shhh," she crooned once Dawn had snuggled into her comforting arms.

  Dawn couldn't push the strange conversation she'd overheard out of her mind. Anything was better than beginning her morning by talking about her nightmare straight out of the gate. "Who was that? What's going on?" she hiccoughed into the crook of Mallory's neck.

  The hands that were stroking her back stopped, and hugged Dawn more tightly against Mallory's chest. Unsteady breaths jostled her, as did Mallory's sudden shaking of her head.

  "Mallory? I asked you... what's going on?" The dread that had settled in Dawn's gut now flared with foreboding.

  Repeating her question seemed to bring Mallory back to the present, though Dawn wasn't sure where Mallory went mentally for the minute or so that they'd rocked together in this strange, consoling dance.

  Her hands were taken up and squeezed before Mallory made her way back to the chaise. Dawn allowed herself to be led along, and sat down as well.

  Silence stretched between them, and Mallory finally relinquished her hold to wipe the back of her hands across her face. "It's over, Dawn."

  Such an open statement could mean anything, Dawn thought.

  The trial was over?

  That made absolutely no sense, but why else would Mallory be crying? Were these tears of relief, of cathartic emotion finally being released? "I don't understand," she found herself saying, much as Mallory had while on the phone.

  Turning her bloodshot eyes to face Dawn, Mallory gulped like she was swallowing knives. "Your father is... Steven is..."

  And then, it all made sense. It was over, because her father was no longer available to prosecute. It was over, because her father was dead.

  No matter how much Dawn hated her father, and wanted him to suffer every bit of pain he had put them both through, his death shook her to the core. It wasn't that she felt sorry for him, or that she wanted to grieve him.

  That was all true, but there was another truth, far more important. She was alone in this world. Isla was alone in this world.

  Mallory cupped a hand over her mouth, and screwed her eyes shut. "I'm so sorry, Dawn. So very sorry."

  Her mind unwilling to comprehend what this information meant, Dawn's body took over. A foggy sort of feeling invaded her brain, rendering her incapable of thought past instinct. It was disorienting at the very least – the odd way her other senses picked up on the miasma blocking the words that screamed to make their way to her lips. Her ears stopped heari
ng Mallory's sniffling, and replaced that noise with a high pitched squeal over the slow glug-bump of her heartbeat.

  Standing up slowly, her hands came out in a defensive gesture. That astonished her most of all, and she stared at the shaking, sweaty palms in confusion while backing away from the library nook, and into the kitchen. She felt cool hardwood underfoot instead of warm carpet, and stumbled to regain her balance.

  Why was she afraid?

  Mallory followed, her hands held out in a mirror of Dawn's. The anguished expression on her face told Dawn what the woman was feeling, even though she couldn't understand the words that were coming from her moving mouth.

  Some of them broke through, if only for their volume. Mallory's face morphed from shocked to stricken as Dawn continued to retreat. Her cheeks scrunched under the force of what must have been screaming.

  Why was Mallory screaming? Why did everyone have to yell?

  "Stop..." Dawn panted. The reverberating noise bounced against her non-compliant ears to echo in the growing void. Her heart raced in response, forcing a rapid delivery of norepinephrine to join the residual adrenaline from her dream. "I can't breathe! Mallory, why?"

  Just as the fog thickened and threatened to consume her mind whole, darkness crept in from the edge of her vision. Dawn knew that she was falling. The kitchen turned on end, and Mallory rushed forward, aghast with fear.

  "Dawn!"

  She finally heard the sound of her name falling from Mallory's lips, and her world went black.

  _____________________________________

  "I told you, I'm fine now. I was just..." Dawn shrugged, her attitude becoming more sour by the minute.

  It had taken an hour of reclining on the couch with tea and cold compresses for Mallory to entertain the idea of her sitting all the way up. Permission had not been granted until Dawn had insisted to the point of agitation – the increase of which had Mallory backpedaling quickly – that she wanted to be left alone. "Just go and get ready, please?"

  Mallory looked wounded for a heartbeat before steely resolve washed the hurt away. She limped up the stairs without a backward glance, though Dawn didn't know for what.

  Fully dressed, Mallory carried clothes for her to change into. The clock above the mantle told Dawn an hour and a half had passed.

  She must have fallen asleep, but tried to shrug off her surprise at the impromptu nap – anything to keep Mallory from fussing over her.

  Mallory didn't fuss over her so much since school had ended, and there were times when Dawn would have liked her to again. At the moment, it would have been disturbing.

  Dawn knew why. She missed her mother fiercely. As much as she wanted to forget the dream, clinging to the memory of the woman in it was winning out.

  "Amare?" Mallory became worried at the amount of time Dawn sat stock still, lost in thought.

  Whispering her reply, Dawn stood and turned away to change out of her pajamas. "Thank you."

  The pained smile in response to her thanks came from impeccably painted red lips. Even though she couldn't see them with her back turned, Dawn knew. Looking at Mallory now would cause another pang of guilt to gnaw at her already nervous stomach, so she didn't. Dawn had grown used to seeing Mallory in the past month or two with her hair messy, and without makeup. Truthfully, she much preferred it.

  While the clothes brought down to for Dawn to dress in were appropriate – opaque footless tights and a black tunic dress – they had been chosen for comfort.

  In stark contrast, Mallory had attired herself in one of her more rigid, serious skirt suits – black silk shantung, paired with riding boots instead of the heels she couldn't wear yet. Her face was completely made up, all the way to the heavily winged eyeliner and mascara that had once mesmerized Dawn. Now, she knew it to be a mask. It was a pretty one, but a mask nevertheless.

  Merely four hours after her harrowing nightmare and news of Steven's death, Dawn found herself wobbling stubbornly towards the blue Jag. The gravel of the driveway wasn't helping her unsteady balance, and Mallory half-scrambled, half-limped to throw a supportive arm underneath hers. They were a mess this afternoon, both unstable mentally and physically.

  "No, no. We'll take the sedan today, hmm?" Mallory murmured, and pulled her close against her side.

  Being tucked under the towering woman's protective arm would have usually been a pleasure. Today, even her girlfriend's touch made Dawn want to crawl out of her own skin, and run screaming. She wouldn't have gotten far, even though Mallory had tucked her trembling feet into her favorite jeweled flats on their way out. Everything felt too tight, and too much.

  So entrenched in her thoughts, Dawn did not notice that she'd already entered her side of the Lexus, and closed the door. Dark hair tickled at her throat as Mallory leaned over to buckle her in, and she stayed quiet until they were well on the road.

  _____________________________________

  Half an hour passed while driving down the highway, and Mallory had smoked three cigarettes. Dawn lit one now.

  That got Mallory's attention. It wasn't like Dawn to be so very quiet. "I know you're upset, darling. It's normal to be sad and –"

  "I'm not sad," Dawn shook her head, and took another puff. She glared at a tree in the distance, trying to avoid direct eye contact. "I'm pissed off. I'm so pissed, and I don't have the fucking words."

  Mallory pressed her lips together. "I'm angry too, you know." Her gaze slid to look at Dawn from beneath her sunglasses. She took one breath, and then two, waiting for the inevitable.

  "You should be angry! You're not acting like it, though! All cool and collected, once you had a good ol' cry. 'Oh, yes – we'll be down later!'" Dawn exploded. "Like we're going to some bullshit tea. And here I'm acting like –"

  "Like your father just met his very untimely end," Mallory concluded, and cleared her throat.

  Furious, Dawn railed against the sugar-coated fact. "The hell! It wasn't untimely, Mallory. The bastard had it coming!" Smashing her cigarette butt into the ashtray, she then crossed her arms to stare out the window. "You and I both know there's no way he killed himself. I have no idea how you're not freaking the fuck out right now."

  Mallory did indeed know that, or at least suspected it. What Dawn didn't know – and Mallory wasn't going to tell her – was how she remained dignified in the face of the news.

  She hadn't hidden how on purpose, but Mallory kept the charade going to give Dawn the appropriate time and space to go through the normal process of grieving. At least, as much as anyone could grieve for a father such as Steven Rose.

  On the subject of her maintained calm, her hands itched to stop their white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel of the car. She knew precisely which zipper pocket of her purse hid an emergency bottle of pills, and had put them there for easy access. Clenching her jaw, Mallory reasoned with herself. Chiefly, why she couldn't admit to taking a nerve relaxer after Dawn's panic attack, and why she shouldn't take another.

  To Mallory, Dawn should not see pills as an easy way to escape, especially now.

  Too often, Dawn saw them as a miracle cure, and Mallory knew that to not be true. Miracles were a farce, as was justice. Perhaps even God was dead, or too disgusted with this world to care any longer; miracles and cures be damned, just as the human race was.

  The truth was, Mallory despised every simultaneously glorious and wretched medication that had been her breakfast upstairs and out of sight. They were a necessary evil in her life; an inevitable consequence of her condition. That didn't mean she had to like it.

  The only cure for what ailed Mallory sat but a foot away, and she wasn't about to let her own demons hurt the person she loved any longer. She had only needed to calm down before approaching her again, too afraid to lose the tenuous control that almost snapped in the kitchen before Dawn had fainted.

  "Better the devil you know, amare... than the devil you don't," she thought out loud.

  "W-What?" Dawn turned back around, perplexed.

 
"Nothing. Just talking to myself," Mallory chuckled sardonically, and flashed a toothy smile. It felt awful – both the fib, and the way her face lit up with artificially infused happiness. "We're here, anyhow."

  Dawn rolled her eyes at the lie, but let it slide. Once the car was parked, she exited and waited for Mallory to walk to her side. Reaching out with her free hand, she laced their fingers together before taking a deep breath.

  With a brisk nod of approval, Mallory led them through the parking lot, and up the sidewalk of the Middlesbrough Central Police Station.

  It was slow going, weaving their way through the barristers and constables that congested their path. Just as they were about to reach the front doors, Mallory tugged at Dawn's hand and took a sharp, whistling breath though clenched teeth. Her internal alarms had gone off the moment she spotted two people exiting the building.