Three days.
I pull out my phone as I walk back to my car. No messages from Ash. One missed call from a number I don’t recognize, probably a client.
I ignore it.
Right now, I need to get home to prepare.
But first, I sit in my car in the campus parking lot and let myself cry.
Just for a minute. Just long enough to let out the fear and rage and grief I’ve been holding back since I saw those letters on my kitchen table.
Then I wipe my face, start the engine, and drive home.
Because that’s what I do. That’s what I’ve always done. Survive. Protect. Keep moving forward.
Even when forward leads straight into the dark.
4
The diner is called Ruthie’s, and it’s the kind of place that’s been around so long, it’s become part of the neighborhood’s DNA. Red vinyl booths patched with duct tape, a checkered floor worn smooth in the high-traffic areas, coffee that tastes like it was brewed sometime last week and has been slowly dying on the burner ever since. The air smells like grease and burnt toast and something vaguely chemical which might be cleaning solution or might just be despair.
It’s perfect.
Diners like this are neutral ground in the sin eater community. Too public for violence, too anonymous for surveillance, cheap enough that you can nurse a cup of terrible coffee for hours with no one caring. I’ve met contacts in places like this dozens of times over the years. Always different diners, always different cities, but they all have the same worn-down, seen-everything quality that makes them safe.
Or as safe as anything gets in our world.
I slide into the back booth, cracked red vinyl creaking under my weight, and the table in front of me tacky from years of syrup and neglect. The waitress appears instantly. She’s in her sixties, bleached blonde hair teased into a style that died in 1987, nametag that says, “Dolores.” She doesn’t ask what I want, just pours coffee into the chipped white mug in front of me and moves on to the next table.
I wrap my hands around the mug, letting the warmth seep into my palms even though the coffee is barely hot. It’s something to do with my hands. Something to focus on besides the nervous energy crawling under my skin.
I texted Vera yesterday when I returned home from meeting Luna.
Need to talk. Urgent.
Her response came an hour later.
Ruthie’s Diner on Fifth. Tomorrow, 2 PM
No questions. No hesitation. That’s Vera. She knows when a sin eater says it’s urgent; you don’t ask for details over text. Too much can be intercepted, overheard, traced. You meet in person; you talk in whispers, and you never stay in one place too long.
The bell over the door jingles, and I look up.
Vera stands in the doorway for a moment, scanning the diner. She’s in her fifties but looks older; that’s what thirty-plus years of sin eating does to you. Gray hair pulled back in a tight braid, lines carved deep around her mouth and eyes, thin frame that’s all sharp angles and careful movements. She’s wearing a long coat despite the mild weather.
Her eyes find mine, and she nods once, before she makes her way to the booth, moving with a stiff gait. Her hands shake slightly when she slides into the seat across from me, but I pretend not to notice.
“Raven.” Her voice is rough, like she smokes too much. She doesn’t. It’s just what happens when you spend thirty years screaming through purges. “It's been a while.”
“Six months. That thing in Baltimore.”
“Right.” She signals Dolores, who appears with another mug and the coffeepot. The woman fills Vera’s cup without a word, tops off mine, and disappears again. Vera takes a sip and grimaces. “Christ, this coffee is awful.”
“You picked the place.”
“I picked it because it’s neutral and the owner minds his business.” She sets the cup down carefully, as if she’s afraid she might spill it. “So. What’s urgent enough to risk meeting in person?”
Sin eaters are rare, but not rare enough either. It’s a weird balance. The angels use us, our clients use us, but no one wants to have to use our services at all. We are both prized and hunted for our gifts.
