Sinners are Winners

by Vale, Lani Lynn

  I snorted.

  “I tried to meet someone who ordered a cake last week,” I murmured. “Made the cake, showed up at the meeting spot, and was stood up.” I paused. “Thank God I made her pay for it beforehand. It had that whipped icing on it, and it was expensive. A full sheet of cake. When I charged her credit card anyway, she was furious. Tried to get the money taken back. PayPal sided with me and I got the cake and the money.” I paused again. “She left me a bad review on Facebook, though.”

  Memphis snorted and walked to the desk.

  “I knew that you made cakes. I’ve been hearing about them from Lock and his friends,” she revealed.

  I blinked. “Ummm, yes. I do. I’m a one-man operation, though, so it takes me a bit longer than it would a professional.”

  She waved that off.

  “Have you ever done a gender reveal cake?” she wondered.

  I remembered the one that I’d made for Johnny, a good friend of mine, and his wife, June.

  “I have.” I smiled, remembering the memory. “I made one for my friends, Johnny and June.”

  Her eyes went wide.

  “They’re really named Johnny and June?” she asked. “I love that.”

  I nodded. “Funny thing is, Johnny’s dad is named Sebastian Sue. Johnny’s lucky he didn’t get a name like that. Silas, his dad, is really into Johnny Cash.”

  Her eyes lit up. “Now I know who you’re talking about. I didn’t realize the correlation until you said Sebastian’s name.” She paused. “Please tell me they named their child Johnny Cash or something.”

  I grinned. “They kept it a secret throughout the entire pregnancy. It was definitely something everyone wanted to know. I think they were more excited to hear the name than the sex when we did the gender reveal.”

  “You’re keeping me in suspense here.” She sat forward on her seat. “What’s the name?”

  I smiled.

  “The baby boy came out with his daddy into the waiting room about two hours after Mom had him. He announced him as Carter Folsom Mackenzie,” I said. “I actually did the cake for his birth, too. It was a really cool musical note.”

  Memphis grinned wickedly.

  “I love it.” She sighed. “I just love babies all around—which was why I started this business—but there’s just something about their story, with all those names and history, that makes me absolutely giddy.” She paused. “Back to the gender reveal cakes…I was thinking about adding an option to our packaging…and this was something I’d been thinking about for a while so don’t get all flustered, but how would you feel about doing a gender reveal party type thing? I would put together all the things they would need—like the balloon with the colors for the boy or the girl in it, and you would do the cake with the colors in it, and that be a package we can offer so they don’t have to have someone in the know?”

  I grinned. “I would love that…but how do you know my cakes are any good? I mean, they could be trash. You don’t know.”

  Memphis gave me a droll look.

  “My son has been talking about you for six months…though at the time, we didn’t know it was you. We even got a cake from you through his friend a couple of months back, for my youngest daughter’s graduation. It was amazing,” she said.

  I blinked in surprise.

  “Oh, wow,” I said. “I didn’t know that.”

  She smiled sweetly. “He really has been talking about you a lot. More so in the last few days. When he came over last night, you were all he could speak about.”

  I felt my face go hot.

  She started to laugh, then looked up just in time for the door to her place to open.

  She smiled at the pregnant young woman that came through.

  “You must be Marylee.” Memphis stood up, then turned to me. “Can you help get the room prepped and ready? Sheets are in the dresser that the television is sitting on.”

  I immediately did what she asked, setting out a new sheet over the table and then went back out just to turn right around when Memphis gestured for me to stay.

  “Marylee, this is Saylor Spada. She’s likely going to be the one to do your thirty-week appointment with you. Are you ready to see your baby?” Memphis asked.

  Marylee smiled at me excitedly. “Oh yes! I’ve had a Dr. Pepper, and I can feel him moving around like crazy. I’m so ready!”

  So for the next thirty minutes, I sat on the couch and watched as Memphis performed Marylee’s ultrasound. I smiled when the baby did a couple of flips and rolls and knew that I was going to love this job.

  Memphis had no idea whatsoever what she’d just done for me.

  She’d given me my dream.

  And so had her son.

  ***

  “What did you think?” Memphis asked as we watched Marylee walk out of the office thirty minutes later.

  “I loved it,” I admitted. “I loved every second. This was why I got into school to begin with…to do this job right here.”

  She walked to the desk in the front, then handed me a stack of paperwork.

  “Get this filled out,” she said. “Bring it back with you tomorrow. You can start tomorrow, right?”

  I nodded.

  “I can, yes.”

  “Wonderful.” She beamed. “I…”

  The door opened and Lock walked through, two pizzas in his hand as well as a drink carrier full of drinks.

  Memphis walked to him and divested him of the pizzas.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked, looking at him suspiciously.

  He gestured to the pizza.

  “Eating, hopefully.” His eyes turned to me. “And I wanted to make sure she actually showed up.”

  He let his eyes sweep the length of my body, and I felt my face flush.

  “Bummer,” he rumbled.

  Memphis snorted.

  “You just wanted to see her, didn’t you?” she teased.

  “Maybe.” He didn’t bother lying. “But I brought you your favorite pizza…so that counts for something, right?”

  “I suppose so,” she said as she led the way to the break room.

  Lock came up to me, seeing the paperwork in my hand.

  “You’re joining the team?” he asked hopefully.

  I smiled and grabbed a pen off the desk.

  “I’m totally joining the team.”

  Chapter 7

  Some days I wake up and think ‘I got this.’ Other days I wake up and think, ‘Fuck my life.’

  -Lock’s secret thoughts

  Lock

  The storm clouds seemed to come out of nowhere.

  One second, I was running at the track, pushing through my fourth mile, and the next I looked up and the black clouds were rolling in so fast that it’d completely covered the track between one lap and the next.

  The lap after that the wind started to blow, and I looked toward my bike, wondering if I should leave before the storm hit.

  Then I decided, fuck it.

  It felt fucking amazing, the wind blowing in the cold air that finally canceled out the blazing heat of the day, and the stray raindrop or two was cooling me down fast.

  It was the first time in a month that I’d run and not contemplated suicide via heat exhaustion.

  The wind blew harder, kicking up dust and dirt from the freshly mowed field.

  “Ack,” I said, trying to get the pieces that’d stuck to my face off while still maintaining a moderate pace.

  “Gonna be a big one,” the old man that I passed for the tenth time said.

  I agreed but was too winded to say a word.

  I was trying to pace out a ten-kilometer run in forty minutes.

  I wasn’t going to make it.

  Not with the heat for the first sixteen laps, and now the blowing of the wind for the last eight and a half.

  But, at least it felt good.

  Right?

  Wrong.

  Because between
one lap and the next, a light rain started to fall from the sky and lightning struck about a hundred meters in front of me.

  It was so loud and so terrifyingly shocking that it took me off my feet.

  The man behind me started to laugh when I nearly face planted.

  Luckily, I knew how to fall, going down fast but rolling so that I was once again on my feet before he could finish his booming laugh.

  I would’ve flipped him off had he been anyone else but an old man.

  “Fuck off,” I muttered under my breath.

  Then I started running again.

  But only as long as it took me to get to the bike.

  Once there, I turned my watch off, then grabbed my water off the seat before chugging it all down.

  It was when I was halfway home that the downpour started.

  And not just any rain.

  Torrential, probably a goddamn hurricane type rain.

  It didn’t bother me, though.

  The car that hydroplaned nearly taking me out once I was turning onto my street, however, did.

  I looked up in time to see the car that I’d seen previously—the one that Saylor said lived in her apartment complex—nearly hitting the ditch.

  He was able to correct himself, though, driving off moments later.

  I, on the other hand, was breathing so hard from my almost near death that I had to pull to the side of the road for a second to catch it.

  “Holy fuck,” I said as I rubbed along my forehead with the palm of my hand.

  “Holy fuck!”

  Saylor’s loud curse had me turning around in time to see her staring at me in fury.

  “Do you want me to go fuck him up?” she asked.

  She was standing in the middle of the downpour, in cute as fuck Baby Scooby-Doo scrubs, looking at me like she’d seen a ghost.

  I grinned.

  She really did look cute, and the only thing I could see her doing once she tracked the guy down was lecturing him to death.

  “No,” I called out, jerking my chin to the house. “Let’s go home.”

  She went ahead of me when I waved her on, pulling into the second driveway while I chose to go into the first one.

  Instead of following her to her place, I decided that it might be best for me to cool off at my own place before going over to hers.

  Because if I went to hers, I knew damn well and good that we wouldn’t be talking.

  I’d be fucking the hell out of her.

  Except, when I got to my carport door, Saylor had different ideas.

  When she parked, instead of running into her own place, she came to mine where I was underneath the carport.

  I heard the squelching of her wet Crocs as she ran, momentarily making me pause in my attempt to put the key in the door.

  “What are you doing?” I asked when she arrived at my side.

  She didn’t look up, though, and I frowned.

  Touching her cheek, she looked up at me with surprise.

  “What are you doing?”

  She grinned, then spoke a little loudly as she said, “I took my transmitter off. It’s not waterproof.”

  I watched as she took it out of her pocket and showed it to me.

  Understanding dawned, and I gestured for her to follow me inside.

  She did, and when she was inside my kitchen, she frowned and looked around, worried now that she was dripping on the floor.

  “It’s waterproof,” I said. “I use the same shit in my bathroom.”

  Except she wasn’t looking at me, so she didn’t hear a word.

  Knowing that she was worried about getting it wet, I walked to the washer and dryer and snatched up two clean towels, tossing one her way when I saw her staring at me.

  She caught it expertly, but instead of drying herself off, she dried off the transmitter.

  “It’s actually ‘water-resistant’ they say.” She placed it on the counter next to my phone and keys that I’d dropped the moment I got inside. “But water-resistant and waterproof are two totally different things in the grand scheme of things.”

  Yes, they were.

  She dried off her hair next, not stopping until almost all of the excess water was out.

  Then she reached for her shirt.

  I swallowed my tongue—or about did, anyhow—when her shirt was gone and her wet bra containing her full breasts was the only thing left.

  “Fuck,” I whispered under my breath.

  She looked up then, her wet curls falling into her face, and grinned.

  “What?” she asked, eyes focused entirely on me.

  I gestured to her body. To her wet bra with those turgid, tan nipples standing out so prominently that it was all I could see.

  She looked down and scrunched up her face, as if the thought of a wet bra showing her nipples hadn’t occurred to her.

  “Shit,” she said, covering them up with one arm.

  That was when I decided ‘fuck it.’

  I moved toward her, my arms going around her waist, and hauled her into my body.

  “Don’t cover yourself up,” I said, making sure she could see my mouth.

  She reached for her transmitter and fitted it into place, then looked up at me.

  “It was bothering me that I couldn’t hear your voice,” she paused. “Though the growly thing you did when you did it,” she patted my chest with her hand. “Came out loud and clear.”

  My smirk was shameless as I picked her up and spun her around to sit on the counter of my bar.

  She bit her lip and looked down at me.

  “What’s with us and bars?” she wondered loudly.

  I didn’t know.

  It just seemed to be where the urge came upon me.

  “I kind of like it,” I said, reaching forward and taking the band of her sports bra and pulling it up her body.

  She lifted her arms and snorted when the wet fabric almost took out her nose when it finally popped free of her breasts.

  “Sorry,” I said. “Wasn’t expecting for it to try to kill you.”

  She shrugged and dropped her hands when I finally had the bra-free of her.

  “Hazards of having big boobs,” she said. “I’ve actually been running before and one has popped out.”

  I blinked.

  “You run?” I run.

  “I just told you that my boobs popped out of my bra while I was running, and you’re more incredulous that I run?” She stuck out her tongue.

  I leaned forward and bit it.

  Lightly, but still bit it.

  She squeaked in surprise.

  “What the fuck?” she asked, touching her tongue with the tip of her finger.

  “Sorry,” I said. “But it was cute.” I looked down at her breasts and cupped them both in each hand. “Just like your breasts.”

  “Jesus, your hands are warm,” she murmured, watching me mold and form them to the palm of my hands as I squeezed.

  I pinched one nipple between my fingers, watching her eyes as I did so.

  Goosebumps took off all across her skin, spreading like wildfire.

  I wanted to run my tongue along the path it took.

  Instead, I controlled myself and settled with pulling her nipple into my mouth and rolling the peak around between my teeth.

  “Shit,” she breathed. “You and that tongue of yours are lethal.”

  I liked the sound of that.

  Even more, I liked that her hands were now buried in my hair.

  Her hands tightened in my long locks—which were getting to the point where they needed to be cut to stay within the Kilgore Police Department’s regulations—and pulled my head back to look into her eyes.

  I took her nipple with me, causing a hiss to release from between those perfectly straight white teeth.

  “I want to suck on your cock.”

  I blinked, then blinked again, looking at her owlishly.

  “I want
to suck your cock,” she said again, pushing this time.

  I let her nipple go and it slipped free of my mouth with a loud pop.

  “Saylor…”

  She pushed me back even farther, then dropped down to her knees in front of me.

  I reached forward and grabbed the edge of the counter when she palmed my dick through the thin wet nylon of my shorts.

  “I like these shorts,” she said. “I can see every little detail of your penis.”

  She was right.

  That was why I very rarely wore them out seeing as my cock and balls were always on display when I wore them.

  My sister had seen me in them once and once only, and since then I remember never to wear them unless I’m running.

  I can see the vein in your wiener. I shouldn’t be able to see my brother’s wiener vein.

  But they were the most comfortable pair of shorts I owned, and they stayed in place well when I ran, so I only wore them to do just that.

  I hadn’t expected to see anybody out today seeing as it was going on mid-afternoon and was honestly too fuckin’ hot to do anything beyond walking from your car to your house.

  “They’re indecent,” she said, tracing her finger along the ridge of my cock head. “I love them.”

  I grinned when she leaned forward and pressed a kiss to the wet fabric.

  “I saw you leaving in them,” she said. “I had to go get gas…and Jesus Christ. They should be illegal.”

  I laughed and allowed my fingers to sift through her hair.

  It was so soft and heavy.

  I wanted to wrap it around my fist and hold her head to the bed while I fucked the hell out of her hot pussy.

  “Can I?” she asked, hooking her fingers into the elastic waistband of my shorts.

  I nodded once, and she didn’t waste time, pulling them down all the way to my ankles.

  I stood there in a sopping wet t-shirt and nothing else, looking down as she took stock of my cock.

  “Take your shirt off,” she ordered. “I want to see your abs clench when I make you come.”

  She wouldn’t be making me come. Not today.