Sinful Ruin (Mayet Justice #20)

Chapter 1

MINKA

“Hey. I know you got my texts. What are you doing?”

My breath catches in my throat, tears blurring my vision until I can barely see more than three feet in front of me, and since the universe isn’t done taunting me yet, a furry blur skitters across the tree-lined road, forcing me to whip the steering wheel to the left.

I gasp as my wheels skid on the tar, the sound screeching into the cab loud enough to scrape at my soul.

Dammit. Dammit. Dammit!

“Chief?” Soph’s biting tone cuts through the SUV's speakers. “You know I’ve got you hooked into every piece of tech I own, right? Which means I know you’re recklessly speeding down that hill. Are you running from a bear, or do you enjoy playing with your life?”

“Archer knows.” Tears scorch over my cheeks, burning my skin as they slowly, torturously roll south. “He knows, Soph!” I swipe the horrifying moisture from my face and breathe. Just breathe. I’ve felt this way before. I just have to breathe. “He knows what we did to Agosti.”

“Uh… okay? So, you’re the primary participant in a police car chase, then? Is that why you’re risking your life on that hill?”

“No!” Furious, I tap the brakes and come around a curve in the road.

“Oh God, Soph. He knows. I got home from work and walked into a fucking ambush. Him. Felix. Tim. Aubree,” I choke out.

“They knew! And I was such a dick that, instead of having an actual conversation and working this through with him, I basically ended my marriage.”

“You…” She draws a stunned breath. “What?”

“I’m so stupid!” I slam my palm onto the steering wheel, the thump reverberating up through my wrist and into my shoulder. Which is just another reminder of everything I’ve screwed up. “He was so mad.”

“What the hell do you mean you ended your marriage? These things take time, Chief. And a judge.”

I bring the SUV around the final bend and onto flat road, my eyes shooting to the rear-view mirror and my pulse thundering in my throat.

Is Archer following me? Do I want him to?

“It was just a fight,” I whimper, slowing the car before I run some sweet family and their Golden Retriever down during their evening walk.

“We’ve had this argument before. The one where I want to protect the girls, and he wants to protect me.

We keep going around and around, because we can never truly come to an agreement that makes us both happy. ”

“So you…” She’s lost. Perhaps for the first time in her life, Sophia Solomon can’t quite keep up. “You asked for a divorce?”

“No!” I drag the heel of my palm over my left cheek.

Wipe it on my pants. Then I swipe the other side.

Wipe it on my pants. “I said it’s possible he jumped into us a little too quickly, and that maybe he didn’t realize how serious I was in my convictions.

If he needed time to reconsider our marriage, he could take it. ”

“Well, that was stupid.” She rolls her eyes.

I don’t see it. But I feel it. “Believe it or not, Chief, but I know a thing or two about stubborn women setting good things on fire instead of admitting they’re kinda scared of vulnerability.

Turn the car around, dummy. Go back and tell him you've changed your mind. He doesn’t get time or space to reconsider, ‘cos you already have the wedding certificate, and you’re not giving it up.

Eat a meal. Drink some wine. Go to pound-town and work through the anger with sex. Then you can talk it out.”

“God.” I squeeze the bridge of my nose and release a long, pained groan. “I’m so stupid.”

“Not usually.” She takes a leisurely sip of her drink. “But with this? Yeah. That was stupid. Now you need to stop freaking out, stop speeding like an idiot, and just…” She pauses for dramatic effect. “Stop setting shit on fire. Turn your ass around, go home, deal with your business.”

I drop my hand and bring the car around a corner, my eyes flitting to the rear-view mirror again.

Will he follow? Or has he finally realized how much fucking work I am?

It was only a matter of time.

“I can’t go back.” My voice crackles and aches. It burns and scratches, each word an assault on my already sensitive throat. “He doesn’t agree with what we’re doing, and I can’t stop what we’ve started. We’re not compatible.”

“Me and you?”

“No! Me and Archer.”

There are no shiny trucks riding my bumper.

No angry cops glaring at me through the mirror.

No Archers begging me to come home. Our entire relationship, from the moment we ran into each other inside the airport and, just a couple of hours later, shared a bed, has been on fast-forward.

Everything we are has been passionate and accelerated, and, luckily for me, too quick to allow Archer a chance to truly think this through.

But now I’ve gone and given him the one thing that could undo us: time.

“He deserves better than to go round and round with me about the same shit, Soph. He deserves—”

“A woman who doesn’t insist on becoming the ultimate fucking martyr just so she can avoid having a real conversation for once in her damn life?”

“I—” I frown. “What?”

“You did a thing this week, Chief. You don’t regret doing it, since Agosti was a piece of shit, but you knew Archer wouldn’t approve.

Now you’re throwing yourself on a sword and ending your relationship first, all so he can’t end it.

Being the breaker saves you from the pain of being the broken.

Jesus,” she huffs. “You act like we’re not exactly the fucking same. ”

“Soph—”

“You think I haven’t tried to throw my relationship in the trash a million times over the years?

Like I haven’t tried to save Jay from a life sentence of being attached to me?

What the hell did he do in his last life to end up with this nasty slice of karma?

” She pauses, grunting, so I see her in my mind, sitting back at her desk and plopping her feet on top.

“These are the intrusive thoughts children of trauma are typically saddled with, just so you know. This is how we build walls and protect our fragile hearts, because we’ve already hurt so damn much for way too long.

We can’t carry any more of that shit, so instead of enjoying the good stuff, what do we do?

We sabotage it. At least then we get a modicum of control over the eventual, inevitable crash. ”

“Did you get a psych degree since we last hung out?” I bring my aching, swollen eyes up and search the rear-view mirror—again.

But when the only car in sight is a beat-up Hyundai from the early two-thousands, I release a noisy exhale and pull the SUV to a stop at the curb.

Slipping it into park, I drop my head back with a loud thunk, close my eyes, and brush loose tendrils of hair off my face.

“All of that…” Breathe in. Breathe out. “That stuff… sounded very intelligent.”

She coughs out a laugh, shaking her head from side to side. “I have my moments. You calm now? Stopped being a menace on the streets?”

“I pulled over to the side. I’m gonna sit in the air conditioning for a second and talk to you.”

“And then you’ll call your husband and tell him you’ve changed your mind?”

“Yeah.” I drag my bottom lip between my teeth and bite just hard enough to remind myself of the vial in my pocket. Useless. “I suppose it’s possible I was a little hasty in my sacrificial sword slumping.”

“Ya think?” Phones trill around her. Computers ding.

Men chatter. She might’ve sent me texts not so long ago that included proof of a dead man, but the woman herself, the ballerina, sits comfortably in her office over in…

some town really far away. “Archer’s gonna be way more pissed about your habit of running than he will be about the killing pedophiles thing.

He’s probably already planning to spank your ass and teach you a lesson for walking out on him. ”

“You’re projecting.” I massage the bridge of my nose. “Your propensity for sexual punishment has nothing to do with me, Solomon. Whatever happens in your bedroom is between you and Jay.”

She snorts.

“Besides, it’s infusion night, and I wasn’t even smart enough to grab my meds before I walked out on my marriage. In addition to having a martyred idiot for a wife, Archer also has the misfortune of not being able to spank me when he’s horny or mad, since I have that dumb bleeding disorder.”

She snickers. “Poor guy. Life really sucks for him.”

“I know.” I drop my hand and roll my head from left to right. Stretching my neck and swallowing a groan as it works along my throat. She’s joking—poor Arch—but I’m not. Martyr or not, I’ve known all along that our relationship depends on Archer’s ability to look past my flaws and love me anyway.

Even if he never admits it, I know the truth.

“This might be the worst Tuesday I’ve experienced in a while. Just… ya know…” I sigh. “Putting it out there.”

“Your marriage is over,” she teases. “But Dragovi? is currently swimming in his own blood. The cops will discover him at some point between now and never. No one will trace him back to us, and best of all, he was a fifty-four-year-old degenerate piece of shit who purchased two of those girls. Two. Feels like a Tuesday worth celebrating to me. I’ve got men tracking Giambattista right now.

And I’m following Poul Abate, too. He’s still in Copeland City, so when the time is right, he’s yours. ”

“Yeah. I…” I shake my head and glance up, my pulse spiking as a car turns into the street behind me. It’s a silver hatchback with peeling racing stripes on the side, a massive MAZDA sticker on the top of the windshield… and worst of all, no Archer in the driver’s seat.

“Mayet? You having second thoughts about Abate?”

“No.” I bring my focus back down, my fast pulse replaced by the sluggish drag of a heart breaking. Splintering. Aching. “I’ve got it. When it’s time, I’ll take care of Poul and cross him off our list.”