Sinful Secrets Box Set: Sloth, Murder, Covet

by James, Ella

  “You come out this way much at nighttime?”

  “I rarely go out anywhere at night.” There are rules for such endeavors, though I don’t say that. It doesn’t matter for now.

  “I found this little spot between the middle and the lower lake.” He’s whispering, like it’s a secret. That makes me smile.

  The clouds move, spilling sheets of moonlight over us, and in that bright light, I notice his eyes—how they sparkle. His mouth is curved into an easy smile. The relief of seeing him this way is a warm rush.

  “I adore this valley,” I say. “It’s so far from everything, and it’s lovely how the ponds reflect the starlight.”

  We start down the slanting trail. On each side of it, tall grass bends in the breeze. I see the three ponds out before us and the ocean to the left, and I think of another trail, another time, a murmured story that my mum told me under the dark clouds as the grass bowed around us.

  “Tell me again about the prince and princess…”

  From some corner of my mind, one of St. Thomas Aquinas’s philosophies burbles up. Predestination. God knew and has always known all. He knew some of us would damn ourselves with our choices. It’s an idea I’ve known of for years, but I feel jolted by the idea now. Could it be I’m one of those? Have always been, and simply didn’t know it?

  I reach for Declan’s hand and feel his eyes assess me as his palm meets mine. I want to tell him I don’t mind the consequences. More and more so, I suspect that I was born for this. I am one of the transgressors. How odd that after many years of pious living—or attempts at that—I would prefer to lean in to my wicked destiny. I feel a rush at the notion. At what it could mean for me, and the choice I later make.

  “You okay?”

  I nod, offering him a small smile, and we stop there on the trail, descended halfway into the valley. We kiss gently, cling to one another. I feel him inhale. Then his chin is propped atop my head.

  “You feel so good.” It’s half groaned.

  “You do.” My throat feels so choked, I can scarcely whisper.

  We hurry the rest of the way to the ponds. They’re each about the length of a ship. The top one flows into the middle; that one flows into the lower; and the lowermost lake spills down the rock-strewn hillside to the sea.

  Declan leads me around the lowermost pond to a place beside the middle where water spills downhill in veins that glint moon-white in the dark grass. The spot he found is somehow dry and slightly concave. He makes a nest of blankets there, and we lie down together. Then he pulls more from his pack and covers us.

  The stars look clearer than ever I can recall. I lie against his chest, and his arm wraps around my back, and I watch him as he watches the sky.

  “I summited Mount Kilimanjaro and a couple others,” he says quietly. “After high school.”

  “Did you?”

  He nods, staring at the sky. “One of the only other times I’ve ever seen the sky look like this. Brings back memories.”

  “I had no idea.”

  He smiles, tight. Of course I didn’t.

  “You didn’t die,” I offer.

  “Nope.”

  “Was it awfully dangerous?”

  He smiles a bit. “A little.”

  “How old were you?”

  “I was nineteen…almost twenty. Took a gap year after high school.”

  “That’s a year off?”

  He nods. “It had been a dream of mine since I was a kid.”

  I think of kid Declan dreaming of scaling a mountain. I remind myself to ask later about photos of wee Sailor. Perhaps there are some on his phone. “Who went with you?”

  “This guy from my class, Farhad. We didn’t really like each other that much, but we both wanted to do it.”

  “At the end, did you care more for one another?”

  He smiles. “Oh yeah. We still keep in touch. He climbs for a living now.”

  “That’s possible?”

  “If you’re fucking crazy.” He smiles fondly, and I hug his chest.

  “Do you have photos? Of the summit?”

  “You know…I might. I uploaded some old stuff before I left.”

  He reaches under the covers and pulls out his phone.

  “Ever-present.” I give a teasing laugh.

  “Damn Americans. So obsessed with their world-class technology.”

  “Touché.”

  I peer at the phone’s screen as he scrolls through what appear to be thousands of teeny images. His thumb slows its movement on the screen, and I catch views of what I think must be his journey here. Snapshots of men in baseball garb…a snapshot of a sleek car. The images are so clear; they seem unreal to me.

  “The quality is incredible.”

  “Yeah, these things are like computers. Let me see…” He slows a bit more in his scrolling, and I see an image that stops my heart: Declan, with his eyes taped shut and stickers on his face and a thick tube in his mouth. It’s gone the moment my eyes focus on it.

  I grab at his wrist. “Wait!”

  “What?”

  “Back there…”

  He chuckles. “I just flipped through like five years of pictures.”

  “May I see it?”

  “Which one?”

  I shake my head. I mean the phone. When our eyes meet, he frowns. Then he pulls his gaze away; he tilts the phone’s screen away.

  “Carnegie,” I rasp. “Are you ill? Or were you?”

  His eyes close, and my heart pounds sickly. I move off his chest, where I’d been lying, and he sits up, staring blankly at the pond in front of him.

  I watch him swallow. Then, so quietly, he says, “Yeah.”

  I feel faint with alarm.

  What’s the matter?

  He breathes for a moment, still as a stone. His jaw hardens as his eyes move to mine. “Back in November,” he says evenly, “I overdosed.”

  He offers nothing more, and I can’t seem to find my voice. My chest feels like it’s frozen solid.

  “I was in the ICU.” I see his hand flex, making a fist in his lap. “On a ventilator for a little while.”

  I drag air into my lungs. “All the tubing?”

  “Yeah, that’s what that was.” His eyes find mine again for a brief moment. Then he’s stretching back out on his back, one arm behind his head. His blank gaze points at the sky. Conversation over, then?

  I lie on my side, my cheek propped in my palm.

  Is that really it? I’ve no clue what to say back. I didn’t know. Of course not. I’m so sorry. Is there anything more trite? What was it like? Quite prying.

  I’ve no clue what to say, so I scoot closer. After a moment feeling like I’ve just swallowed a fly, I rest my cheek against his pec. I wrap my arm over his chest. When he doesn’t stiffen, I relax against him.

  It’s okay. My fingers rub the softness of his jacket. It’s okay, Carnegie. You’re okay now.

  I try not to think of it. I don’t want to think of him there, with his face red and his eyes taped shut, his lips around a tube because he can’t breathe for himself. I saw the image briefly, but his chest and face were covered with so many wires and tubes. I’ve seen nothing like it—ever.

  I drape my leg over his, shut my eyes.

  You’re where you should be now—with me.

  I feel a breath move through his torso. “My uh…cousin had a flight to catch, a redeye…headed here. To Cape Town. He remembered that he had this box of balls. Baseballs. So he came by.” A cool breeze makes me shiver, and his hand rests on my shoulder. “He’s the one that found me.”

  My throat knots up. I swallow hard and feel him inhale.

  “It was pretty fucked up…but they got me back.” A tremor moves through him. Again, he inhales deeply.

  “Got you back.” I dare a peek at his face, finding his eyes closed.

  “They gave me Narcan. There was a defibrillator.”

  Narcan. That’s the medicine that helps if someone’s given—or takes—too much opiate-base
d medication. We have some here, for dire emergencies.

  “When I woke up—” I feel him shake his head.

  “What?” I whisper.

  “After I got out, I decided no more rehab.”

  “No?” I’m stroking his jacket, smoothing the fleece fibers as if he can feel it.

  He shakes his head, and I can feel his breaths quicken. He inhales, long and slow, and seems to steel himself.

  “That shit doesn’t work.” Another big breath. “It’s not rocket science to get clean. Afterward—” He shakes his head. Locks his jaw. I feel him inhale deeply, and he says, “Sorry you saw that. I should have been more careful.”

  “Please don’t be—sorry.” I shift my weight a bit and ease my hand into his jacket’s collar, stroke his warm neck. “I can handle anything. It’s what I do, that—caring for the ill. And there’s no pity,” I add softly.

  “Yeah.” He’s not looking at my face, though.

  I push up on my arm and peer down at him. On a whim, I paste myself atop him. I wrap my arms around his neck, and kiss his jaw and chin and lips.

  “You’re so strong. So wise, choosing to come here. I know there’s a path for you. A better path.” I whisper it between kisses. Then I feel him move beneath me, and his mouth joins mine. We’re kissing slow at first, then harder as his tongue delves into my mouth.

  I run my fingers into his thick hair, tugging gently at the dark locks. When we break for breathing, I say, “You’re so strong. And you’re here. You made it to me.”

  He kisses me so hard, I moan into his mouth. His arms lock around my back, and then he flips us. I’m on my back on the blankets now, and he’s above me. His gaze glows as it holds mine. Then he’s rocking back a bit.

  He’s jerking my pants down…my panties down. He pulls a blanket over his shoulders and kisses softly down my belly. He stuffs a finger into me, and then another. I moan, and he licks me, clit to core. I feel his body tremble.

  I grab at his neck, wanting his mouth on me. His fingers shove in deeper.

  “Oh, is it like that?” he goads.” You think you’re in charge?”

  I thrust my sex against his hand, tipping my head back. “Perhaps I am.” I grab at his hair. “I loathe…that I wasn’t there. Didn’t know you.” I gasp as his fingers pump. “Now I know you.”

  The tip of his tongue circles my clit. He drags it wetly down between my lips as his thick fingers surge inside me.

  “You think you know me?” He laps at my slit as his fingers thrust.

  I tug his hair, and then I’m too lost to find words. I moan as his fingers push in and drag out; his hot mouth licks me to a frenzy. When I lose myself, I shout into the night. I open my eyes to find him on his knees. His face is hard, near angry. I can see his sex straining at his pants.

  “Do you have a condom?” I murmur.

  He stares at me. “You can’t fix me, Finley. If you met me anywhere but here, I would have never touched you.”

  My heart quickens. “That’s malarkey. You’d touch me because you wanted me. Because we’re meant to touch each other.” I lean up, rubbing at him where I know he’s aching for me. “And besides, I met you here.”

  His jaw clenches. I rub up the hose of his shaft, drawing my thumb along his rim. “As it happens, I don’t think you’re broken or need fixing.” With my left hand, I explore the soft bulge down below his shaft, causing his thighs to tremble slightly. “If I knew you someplace else and couldn’t get you to see reason, I would chain you up out in the wilderness and keep you there.”

  He barks a laugh—his surprised laugh. His hand grips my shoulder. “Think you’re strong enough for that?”

  “I think your money can buy someone who is.”

  He gives another rough laugh, but his hand moves from my shoulder to his forehead. He rubs at his temples even as he presses his stiff sex against my hand.

  “You can’t do shit like that,” he rasps.

  Like locking him up, I suppose he means. “Why not?”

  “It’s illegal.”

  “I don’t care what’s legal.”

  I unbutton his fly. He grips my shoulder as I tug his pants and boxer briefs down to his knees. He groans as I stroke his bare sex.

  “I would never let you hurt yourself.” I work his shaft the way I’ve learned he likes, and he breathes fast and heavy.

  “You don’t have a choice,” he groans. “That’s why it’s fucking toxic.” I tease the notch there on the underside of his thick tip, and he makes a hoarse sound.

  “You should lie back now.” Our eyes hold like magnets for a long moment. Then he eases down onto his back. He’s thick and hard and heavy, masculine perfection. I roll his heavy sac in one palm, work his long sex with the other.

  “I’d figure you out. I know it.”

  “Too much on you,” he breathes. “It’s too fucking much on anyone.”

  I stroke him harder. “Perhaps you’ve been spending time with the wrong people.” I squeeze him and he moans, thrusting at me a bit. “If you were…from somewhere else…you’d get it,” he breathes.

  “Perhaps I would hold your tourniquet.”

  A harsh groan rips from his throat. His hand captures my wrist. “No.” With gentle pressure, he stops my hand moving. His dazed eyes hold mine. “I would never, ever let you near that shit. Not in a billion years.”

  “I’m not so fragile.”

  “No…not fragile. Precious.”

  I can feel a flare low in my belly at the word, and suddenly, my throat aches awfully. He releases my wrist, and I start on him again, working steadily until his chest is heaving and his eyes are squeezed shut.

  “I meant what I said,” I murmur. “I’d never give up.”

  He shakes his head.

  “I know myself. I’m loyal.” I laugh, given what we’re doing, but it’s true. I’m far too loyal. That’s the core of my problem.

  “If you…ever do leave…it can’t be with me.” His voice is hoarse and low. His hand fists in the air atop his bare abs. “I would fuck it up. And you would hate me.”

  I run my thumb over the slit where he’s slick, and Declan moans. I feel his shaft thicken, and it energizes me; I work him more quickly.

  “You’d hate me,” he says, “and I couldn’t stand to hurt you.” His voice cracks on the last word as I lean down and suck his tip into my mouth.

  I draw my cheeks in, teasing him like a moment before swallowing him more deeply. I inhale slowly through my nose, working to settle him, until it’s difficult to breathe around his hard girth, and he’s moaning desperately.

  I take him as deep as I dare, and then I suck hard as I ease him out. I wrap my hand around his balls and stroke their seam until his eyes peek open.

  “I don’t think you’d hurt me.”

  His eyes widen slightly, but he’s too lust-filled to speak. I lap at his tip, tasting the saltiness. Then I lick the sides of his sex.

  “Oh fuck.” I suck his head into my mouth again, and his hands cinch my hair. “You don’t know me. Not…that…version.”

  I suck him until my mouth is aching, till I taste a bit of his seed; then I ease him out again. “There’s no version that would hurt me. That I know.”

  He’s shaking his head.

  I suck him in again, swallowing with care to get him lodged in my throat. I feel his hips tremble, and I can feel he wants to press in deeper.

  “Do it,” I say—but of course, it comes out humming.

  He barks a groan and rocks his hips. I choke on him.

  “Oh fuck.” His hand trembles as he pets my hair now. I suck in my cheeks around his base, and he moans loudly. “Ohhh fuck.”

  I hum more, and he tugs my hair, groaning gutturally. And then it’s in and out. I ease him out and take him in until I want to cry from the ache in my jaw. Sweat rolls down my temples. Tears roll down my cheeks. I give it my best, and I suppose I’m getting better all the time.

  This time, when he reaches his climax, he makes a sound like
a harsh sob.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Declan

  She lifts her head, and cold air hits my dick. I reach down for it—shit, that’s cold—but she’s already on the job; she’s pulling up my underwear. I lift my hips to make it easy on her, and her eyes move to my face. She gives me a small smile and then tucks my dick into my boxer briefs. She pats it lightly with her palm and smiles softly at me again.

  I try to smile back, but my face feels kind of weird and shaky. Finley doesn’t notice. She’s working my pants back up my legs now. It’s the dark gray North Face pair I’ve had forever. They’re pretty loose; I remember as she gets up to the fly. I can tell she notices. Her fingers feel around the button, like she’s checking to be sure there’s not another one or something.

  Then she’s stretching out beside me, her eyes on my face as her soft fingers stroke my hair back off my forehead.

  Fuck. My eyes go hot, and I can’t blink without them spilling over.

  Finley snuggles up beside me, and she hugs me hard. Like she can tell I’ve grown a pussy and I need some TLC. I drag in a few deep breaths. A shiver hits me.

  Fucking worthless addict.

  I cover my face with my hand, and her grip on my chest tightens.

  “Did it feel good every time?” It’s such a quiet whisper, it takes me a second to process her words.

  “You mean what you did? Hell yeah.”

  “No…not that.”

  I blink at her hair. Does she mean using? Would she ask something like that? I get a slow breath. Cold sweat flashes through me.

  “I was curious. Perhaps it’s too prying. If so, hum your favorite song, and I’ll attempt to guess it. I have quite a few records for reference—”

  “No,” I rasp out.

  She goes quiet and still, but I can feel her interest. Why the fuck she wants to know…

  I don’t get it. But Finley’s stubborn, and that picture got her thinking. That was my fault. I made her upset. I owe her something more now, don’t I? I shut my eyes.

  “No,” I offer quietly. When she says nothing, I look down at her hair, dark in the moonlight. “Toward the end…it never felt good. Rarely.”

  “I want to ask,” she murmurs, stroking my arm. “But I’m afraid to.”