Sinners are Winners Read online

  I assessed the situation as well, knowing that the girl in the car was more than likely dead.

  Just based on the way her car was smashed in so badly.

  But we’d get off and look anyway.

  Which we did together moments later.

  “I can’t reach her from this side,” I said as I reached into the car. “Can you?”

  Malachi was on the opposite side of the car, reaching in just as I was doing, and he could just barely get his fingers on the girl’s neck.

  A neck that, from what I could see, was obviously broken.

  “Dead,” Malachi confirmed seconds later. “Goddamn.”

  Goddamn was right.

  The entire front end of the car was just gone.

  It was smashed up so far into the front seats that there was no way in hell she could’ve survived that.

  “What happened?” I asked the man that was standing next to the car wringing his hands.

  The man looked sick to his stomach and tried to look anywhere but at the girl.

  “I was driving by,” he started, swallowing hard, trying desperately to control his stomach. “Some guy with fancy rims cut her off. She swerved to avoid him going the speed limit, or thereabout, and ran straight into the pole seconds later.”

  The ‘pole’ in question being a concrete pylon that held the bridge up above it.

  It wasn’t a pole as much as a fuckin’ concrete wall.

  To hit that at the speed limit, which was fifty-five miles an hour, would’ve done the damage that we were seeing.

  “What did the vehicle look like that cut her off?” Malachi asked, focused.

  The man’s face turned to Malachi, and he visibly winced.

  Malachi didn’t miss a beat.

  “He, uh, it was a car. Smaller. Older. I’m not sure about anything else. I’m not good with cars. I…I…I ride a moped.” He gestured to the moped that was pulled off to the side of the street behind him. “Really not good with cars. I just know it had really fancy, sparkly rims. I might be able to pick it out of a lineup…but that’s about all I can tell you.”

  I nodded, then turned when the first ambulance pulled up.

  I nodded my head at Drew who got out first, followed by Tai, another one of his buddies.

  “Status?” Tai, a veteran firefighter/paramedic for the Kilgore Fire Department, asked.

  I left Malachi talking to the witness and moved to the side of the car.

  “DOA,” I said softly. “She’s got injuries not compatible with life…though I’m not the expert here. Gonna need y’all to…disentangle her first. I don’t even think you can get a lead on her to test if she has any heart rate.”

  She was one with the dash of her car…and the motor.

  And the entire thing smelled like it was burning flesh while it was at it.

  It was quite disturbing, to say the least.

  “We’ll figure it out,” Tai rumbled. “Drew, pull the medic up here and block the road.”

  Drew did what he was asked, and soon a firetruck pulled in doing much the same on the other side.

  I would’ve pulled my bike up to the back, but there was no need.

  Not much could be seen due to the angle of the concrete pillar, as well as the two fire department vehicles.

  More officers arrived on scene, one of which was an accident investigator.

  After releasing the scene to him, Malachi and I took off, grabbing lunch before we headed back out on shift.

  “That was fun,” Malachi said as he bit into a hot dog. “Do you think seeing that didn’t affect me all that much because my brain is wired weird?”

  I thought about it for a long moment, then shook my head.

  “If you were a SEAL like you said you were,” I said. “You’ve probably seen way worse than that,” I confirmed. “And, it’s possible, you’ve been the person to afflict those wounds in the first place.”

  Malachi took a bite of his hot dog.

  “I feel like something’s wrong with me,” he admitted. “My parents didn’t come see me in the hospital. I saw my still missing best friend’s parents before I saw my own. I have money in the bank account that I could live off of, yet I want to be a police officer. How does that make any sense?”

  I didn’t have an answer for him.

  “I wanted to be a police officer ever since I was a kid,” I said. “My dad’s a cop. Was on the SWAT team for years. He’s a hostage negotiator. He’s seen his fair share of fucked up. I’ve watched him, idolized him for a long time.” I paused. “It’s possible that you’ve just got the bug, the need to feel the adrenaline, and you can’t put that on pause, no matter if you have a memory or not.”

  I found that I quite liked Malachi over the course of our shift together.

  I also found that I was very protective of him when people would stare at him.

  “This uniform invites people to stare,” he murmured, catching my rising anger as we left yet another accident scene. “They look at me, expecting something pretty, and end up getting a nightmare.”

  I didn’t have anything to say to that.

  False platitudes, I knew, would definitely not be welcome.

  So, I stayed silent and hoped that was the right thing to do.

  He grinned. “I enjoyed myself, Lock. I was told that you were the laid back one. I hope the rest of them are the same.”

  I laughed then.

  “There are some characters on this team,” I found myself saying. “Jonah, he’s my uncle, by the way, isn’t very talkative. In fact, it’s like pulling teeth sometimes, but he’s a good guy. You’ll like him. Then there’s Justice and Pace. Both good friends. Logan is an instigator, but I highly doubt that you won’t like him, too.”

  We parked our bikes at the back of the station and were just dismounting when a black-haired woman caught Malachi’s eye.

  I watched him go still and his head turn in confusion.

  “What?” I asked.

  “She’s…intriguing,” he said.

  And then he was walking, following the woman into the front doors of the police station.

  Since she was practically jogging, it took us a while to catch up.

  When we finally did, it was to hear her talking to the receptionist, saying that she had to file a police report.

  Malachi went absolutely still as he watched her and I wondered if there was something there—or had been at one time—that caused him to latch onto this woman the way he had.

  But before I could ask him, I was called away by an excited voice.

  One that I was more than willing to be dragged away from the entertainment for.

  I turned to find Saylor hauling ass toward me.

  When she was close enough, she launched herself into my arms and wrapped her legs and hands around my body.

  “Hey,” she said softly, looking down into my face, a wide grin making my heart happy for the first time since the accident earlier in the day.

  “Hey,” I said, squeezing her closer. “What are you doing here?”

  She scrunched up her nose.

  “I heard about that accident,” she said softly. “And I wanted to give you a hug.”

  This girl, I thought. She was it for me.

  Her legs slowly dropped from my hips, but even when her feet were touching the ground, I still didn’t let her go.

  I held her for the longest of times, and even when the shift change started pouring in and out around me, I held her.

  Nobody stopped to talk, and I was grateful.

  My day really had been shit.

  And I was glad that I had Saylor to make it just a little bit right again.

  “Come on,” she said. “I had your momma drop me off.”

  I let her loose finally, allowing her to step back.

  “I have to go get my shit out of my locker,” I said.

  She pointed to my bike.

  “I’ll wait right
there.”

  When I came back, she was right where she said she would be.

  When I arrived, throwing my leg over the bike she was already straddling, I said, “Where to?”

  And, smiling widely, I drove us to every single one of my favorite places in town, much the same as I’d done for her the other day when she was upset.

  Except we didn’t go home with our goodies. We went to a park right in the middle of town and ate until we couldn’t eat anymore.

  Then I watched the sunset with her until the last ray of light disappeared from the sky.

  Chapter 12

  If smoking marijuana causes short-term memory loss, what does marijuana do?

  -A suspect to Downy

  Saylor

  I smiled at the postman that handed me the large envelope.

  “Have a good day,” I waved. “See you tomorrow!”

  The postman grinned and gave me a thumbs up in return.

  “See you tomorrow, Saylor!” he called.

  I closed the door on his retreating back, then took the envelope that was addressed to Lock and me into the kitchen where he was making us sandwiches.

  “What’s that?” he asked.

  I looked at the envelope.

  “I don’t know,” I admitted. “But look how much this stamp was for! That’s twenty-five dollars!”

  He frowned and looked over at it where I’d twisted it around on the counter.

  “I didn’t even know they made a twenty-five-dollar stamp.” He paused. “Is it heavy?”

  I shook my head.

  “No,” I immediately denied. “It’s actually pretty light. Feels like a bunch of documents or something. It says do not bend.”

  “Open it,” he suggested. “Who’s it addressed to?”

  I picked it up and turned it so that he could read the address label.

  “Both of us?” he frowned. “What the fuck?”

  He pulled a knife out of the drawer and started to smother his sandwich in so much mustard that he’d be wearing it by the end of his sandwich if he wasn’t careful.

  There was no doubt in my mind that he would be wiping it out of his beard.

  He was pretty messy when it came to eating and keeping it out of his beard.

  Then again, my father was, too.

  It must be a beard thing.

  Though, Lock’s wasn’t anywhere near as bushy as my dad’s was, and he still managed to catch everything in it.

  “Open it,” he said again.

  So, I did, ripping into it without care.

  “Maybe it’s a wedding invitation for Pace and Oak…” My voice trailed off when I saw a picture.

  I frowned.

  Then I realized what I was seeing.

  A penis.

  A man’s hard penis with his hand wrapped around his cock.

  I froze, momentarily stunned.

  “What is it?” he asked when I remained silent.

  I swallowed hard.

  “A penis.” I found myself nearly choking on the words. “Umm,” I blinked. “A lot of pictures of penises.” I narrowed my eyes. “I think he’s masturbating.”

  “So definitely not a wedding invitation,” Lock said as he put the mustard away and then came to my side.

  He frowned when he saw the penis in all of its glory.

  The man’s hand that was holding the penis had black painted fingernails. One of those fingernails was ragged and chipped, as if the man had taken to biting that fingernail in particular.

  “What the fuck?” Lock asked, frowning hard.

  I surrendered the pictures as he shouldered me over and swiped them from me, looking over his shoulder as he too went through the photos.

  When he got to the last one I’d looked at, he froze, then brought the picture up closer to his face.

  “Lock…” I said.

  “Son of a bitch,” he cursed, dropping the pictures as if they had suddenly formed into something poisonous.

  That was when I saw the background of the last picture.

  It wasn’t just the bedspread that had been in all the others. It was a picture.

  A picture of a woman, dead in a car. And the man coming on the picture.

  I felt bile rise and threw my hand over my mouth to keep it at bay.

  It didn’t work.

  I made it into the bathroom in time to lose all the contents of the sandwich I’d eaten before Lock had arrived home from his run.

  I’d gone on that run with him, but like instructed, I’d turned around after a half a mile and run back home.

  I’d been so hungry that I hadn’t been able to wait until he’d finished all seven of his miles, though.

  Which led us to now, me emptying the contents of my stomach into the toilet bowl.

  When I was done, I flushed, washed my face, and rejoined Lock in the kitchen.

  He was on the phone with whom I assumed was his dad.

  “…No. It was addressed to both of us. All of the pictures are nearly identical except for the last one. It shows a picture of the accident. The one that that young girl died at,” Lock continued.

  When I arrived back in the kitchen, his eyes immediately shot to me, assessing me.

  I gave him a weak thumbs up, and he nodded once, gesturing at the chair that was sitting next to him.

  I was thankful to see the pictures gone.

  However, just because they were no longer there didn’t mean that I couldn’t still see them. They were permanently seared into my brain.

  Who would do a thing like this? Who would take a picture of themselves masturbating to something like that?

  That was sick.

  “No,” Lock continued. “There’s a postage stamp on the envelope. One for twenty-five dollars. Like he bought it and attached it to the envelope so he didn’t have to go into the post office and mail it. There’s no way to track that.” He paused. “Yes. Both of us handled it, but I wouldn’t say we handled it that much. There might be some prints they can pull. Yes. Yes. We’ll be down there in about thirty minutes. Meet you there.”

  When he hung up, my eyes lifted to meet his.

  “We’re going to the station?” I asked.

  He nodded. “They need us to give our fingerprints so they can rule them out. Hopefully the sick bastard made a mistake and didn’t wear gloves when he put those pictures in the envelope.”

  I shuddered and stood up, heading for the bedroom to collect my shoes.

  When we arrived at the police station twenty minutes later, Downy was already there waiting for us.

  I smiled at him timidly when we arrived, and he slung an arm around my shoulders and walked with me that way into the department.

  Five minutes later I was having my fingerprints run through a fancy machine.

  “I guess I thought this would be with an ink pad,” I said to them as they waited patiently for me to get done.

  I did all ten of my fingers, and for shits and giggles, even the palm of my hand.

  “We’ve moved into the twenty-first century,” Downy laughed. “I don’t think they’ve done an ink pad for the fingerprints since I was a rookie.”

  I was a little more bummed about that than I should be.

  “That sucks,” I admitted. “I was kind of thinking it’d be cool.”

  Downy laughed and tugged one of my curls. “I’m sure that we could scrounge some up for you.”

  Laughing now, Lock went through the same song and dance as me, giving his thumbprints.

  “They don’t have this stuff on file?” I asked curiously.

  “They do,” Lock said. “This is more for expedience.”

  Downy went with us into a detective’s office next, and I was surprised to find an officer I knew in it.

  “Officer Sage,” Downy said to the woman behind the desk. “This is…”

  “Saylor!” Detective Sage, better known as Anna to me, smiled. “What are you doing here?�
�

  I waved but stayed where I was sandwiched between the two men.

  “Sadly, it’s not under as fun of circumstances as the last time I saw you,” I admitted.

  The last time I’d seen her, I was handing her a birthday cake she’d ordered for her daughter’s fifth birthday.

  This time? I was handing over a bunch of masturbation pictures.

  Detective Sage listened intently, even went through the pictures with Downy as Lock and I sat in the seats across the desk from her.

  I studiously avoided looking at the desk. In fact, I chose to stay focused on my hand, and the way it looked so small in Lock’s hold.

  He had such big hands. His fingers practically twice the size of my own…if not more.

  In fact, those fingers could crush mine if they wanted.

  Not that they ever would, of course.

  But he had so much contained power in his grip that it would be possible for him to do.

  “This picture looks like it was taken at the accident scene itself,” Detective Sage suddenly said. “As if he was there. The picture on the screen is too clear for it to be a photocopy.” She looked up. “Did you see anybody at the scene?”

  “Would’ve been before the ambulance got there,” Downy said.

  Lock frowned hard, his eyes opened and unfocused on the world around him as he thought back to the accident that he’d been having a hard time forgetting since yesterday.

  He’d woken up from a nightmare the night before, flushed and angry, and all he’d said the next morning was that he was dreaming about the crime scene.

  “I remember a car stopped on the top of the overpass and a young man looking over,” he began. “But the angle is all wrong on the photos. If it’d been him, the pictures would’ve been from above.”

  Downy leaned his broad shoulders against the wall as he said, “Man could’ve walked down while you weren’t paying attention.”

  Lock frowned.

  “Maybe…” He shrugged. “I vaguely remember seeing a man up there looking over, but other than that, I don’t recall seeing anyone.”

  Detective Sage sighed and leaned back in her chair, throwing her arms behind her head.

  “I don’t think, at this stage, there’s really anything I can do,” she admitted. “Other than running prints and holding on to everything. If we do get a hit on the prints, and he happens to be in the system, we can charge him for sexual harassment. But really, there’s not much more I can do but that. It’s sick. It’s gross. But yeah…my hands are tied.”