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Black Velvet and Lace

مؤلف: Lennox Wren
last update آخر تحديث: 2025-06-21 03:09:24

The bar was called Black Velvet & Lace.

Nothing about it was soft, nor elegant.

It was dark, loud in the quietest way, and unapologetically indecent. The kind of place your husband would condemn in a sermon—then visit on a business trip with someone who wasn’t his wife. The walls were black brick. The mirrors were stained with fingerprints. The booths looked like confessionals for sins you didn’t want forgiven.

Eden had passed it a hundred times before. Always in passing. Always in judgment.

Tonight, she walked in like she was the warning on the door.

Her heels snapped against the polished concrete. Her dress—black, backless, feral—moved like it knew this was war. She didn’t come to be asked if she was okay. She came to taste freedom. To get drunk on defiance. To find the version of herself she’d locked in a prayer closet a decade ago and finally give her the mic.

She wasn’t looking for anyone.

But she knew how to be seen.

Heads turned. A man spilled his drink. A woman with wine-dark lips raised her glass in silent recognition. There were no altar calls here, but Eden felt more honest in this darkness than she ever had in the light.

She slid onto a barstool like sin incarnate. Crossed her legs slow. Ordered whiskey—neat.

The bartender didn’t ask her name. He just nodded and poured.

Good.

She raised the glass to her lips and let it burn the back of her throat like a secret she no longer cared to keep.

“First time in?” a voice asked beside her.

She didn’t look. Not immediately.

“Do I look that obvious?”

“You’ve got that edge,” the voice said. Male. Rough. Confident. “Like someone who’s either about to start a fire… or already lit one.”

Eden turned.

The man was older than her. Unshaven jaw. Rolled sleeves. One hand wrapped around a glass, the other loose against his thigh. He looked like he didn’t flinch easy.

Not her type.

Exactly what she needed.

“And if it’s both?” she asked.

His smile was slow, sharp. “Then I hope you brought matches.”

She didn’t smile back. But she didn’t move either.

“You don’t strike me as the kind of woman who needs a man to light anything for her.”

“I’m not,” she said. “But I do like the heat.”

He tipped his head slightly. “Celebrating?”

She finished her drink before answering. Let the silence stretch like a thigh-high stocking.

“No,” she said. “Burying something.”

He watched her for a long beat.

“A marriage?”

“A decade,” she said. “Of silence. Control. Pretending I didn’t know better.”

He didn’t flinch. Didn’t pity. Just nodded, like he understood what it meant to outgrow a life and light the match anyway.

“You made it out,” he said.

“Not yet.” Her voice was low, almost a whisper. “But I’m close.”

He offered his hand. “Callum.”

She stared at it. Then back at him.

“I didn’t come here to be saved.”

His smile didn’t waver. “Good. I’m not the saving kind.”

She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.

“You ever burn a Bible, Callum?”

He raised an eyebrow. “Pages, yes. Covers take longer.”

Eden’s laugh was unexpected. From the belly. From somewhere older than her pain.

“I’ve got one in my trunk,” she said. “Leather-bound. Stained in all the right places.”

He leaned back. “You looking to make a point?”

“No,” she said, sliding off the stool. “I’m looking to stop making excuses.”

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  • Sanctified Sin   High Alert

    Callum lay awake in the dark, the ceiling above him a cold, blank canvas. The house breathed softly around him—faint creaks, the hum of the furnace, the occasional sigh of wind scraping along the eaves. But his mind was anything but still.He thought about Eden.About the way she had looked last night, curled on the couch, cardigan wrapped tight around her like armor. About the tremor in her voice when she pointed out the crow’s feather on the porch. About the message scrawled in the condensation on her car window. See you soon.That wasn’t just a threat. It was a promise.He pushed the blankets off, swung his legs to the floor, and stood. Outside, the world was silent, but his gut tightened as he stepped into the kitchen and flicked on the light. The glow illuminated a stack of papers Eden had left on the table — court documents, maps, and a worn folder with tabs labeled in Eden’s neat handwriting.He ran his fingers over the edge of the folder, but his thoughts were already outside,

  • Sanctified Sin   Glass Shadows

    The sound of rain woke her.Not the soft kind that lulled you back to sleep — this was sharp, needling against the windows, the gutters rattling with the rush. A branch scraped somewhere near the bedroom, an insistent fingernail dragging down the siding.Eden lay still, holding her breath. Sometimes she swore she could hear more than the weather — little changes in the air, like someone had stepped too close. She listened harder until her own heartbeat filled her ears.Beside her, the space was empty; Callum had stayed downstairs again. She rolled out of bed, pulling a sweatshirt over her tank top, bare feet whispering against the hall rug.The glow from the kitchen spilled into the hallway. Callum was at the table, laptop open, a legal pad covered in his tight handwriting. His shoulders hunched forward, his focus absolute.“Couldn’t sleep?” she asked.“Didn’t want to.” His voice was rough from hours awake. He gestured toward the papers. “Security quotes. Cameras. Motion lights.”She

  • Sanctified Sin   Cold Hands

    The house wouldn’t sleep.It breathed and creaked the way all old houses do, but tonight every sound felt sharper, like it was cutting through the dark to find her. The wind scraped along the siding, sighed through the eaves, and made the loose screen on the back porch door thrum like a heartbeat.Eden sat on the couch, cardigan pulled tight, one knee tucked under her. Callum was across from her in the armchair, still in jeans and boots, as if undressing for bed meant letting his guard down. His head was tipped back, eyes closed, but she knew he wasn’t asleep.Upstairs, a soft cough. Katie Faith.Eden pushed herself up and padded down the hall, careful to avoid the board that groaned when stepped on. She found Katie tangled in her blankets, hair sticking to her cheek. Eden smoothed it back and kissed her warm forehead. The little girl stirred but didn’t wake.“Go back to sleep, baby,” Eden whispered. She stayed there a moment longer, hand resting on that small rise and fall, grounding

  • Sanctified Sin   Eating Crow

    The wind clawed at the house, rattling loose shingles and whispering through the cracks like it carried secrets.Eden sat at the kitchen table, court papers and maps spread before her like a battle plan. A half-full mug of coffee sat cooling by her elbow, untouched. The house wasn’t silent—it breathed, creaked, whispered—but every sound felt like a question she didn’t have an answer for.She stared at the manila folder in front of her. Not the one from the lawyer—no. This one was older. Worn edges. Tabs labeled in her neat, obsessive handwriting.It still smelled faintly of candle wax and old hymnals.August.She could see herself as she was then—his cologne on her pillow, his voicemail in her ear, and the heat of a Tennessee summer pressing against the windows like it wanted to listen in.“You’re such a good girl for me, baby. I wish she touched me like you do.”The words hadn’t detonated that day. They’d settled—slow and smoky—until her ribs felt like cinders and her stomach like so

  • Sanctified Sin   Ashes in the Air

    Callum had never been good at waiting.It had been nearly a decade since he’d worn a badge, but the instinct was still there, thrumming beneath his skin like a live wire. Back then, waiting had meant the difference between pulling a drunk driver out alive or dragging a tarp over a body. Now it felt just as high stakes, only worse—because this wasn’t some faceless stranger. This was Eden.She was down the hall, her footsteps soft as she moved from room to room. He didn’t have to see her to know her pattern by now—check the front lock, check the back, peek out the windows, circle back to the kids’ rooms, repeat.He rubbed a hand over his face, the stubble catching rough against his palm. He hated the sound of her quiet determination. Not because it made her weak—it didn’t—but because it meant she was preparing for war.⸻“Callum.”Her voice pulled him from his thoughts. She stood in the kitchen doorway, hair twisted up in a messy knot, dark circles under her eyes. Even like this—barefoo

  • Sanctified Sin   Ember

    The house creaked with movement—pipes ticking, walls settling, wind pushing against the eaves. It wasn’t silent. Not anymore. Every sound made Eden’s skin prickle, every shadow in the corner of her vision felt like it was holding its breath.She stood at the kitchen sink staring out into the black yard, her reflection faint in the glass. Beyond that—nothing but trees, swaying in the wind. No headlights. No movement. But she couldn’t shake the feeling that someone was out there, watching.The kids’ sound machine hummed faintly down the hall, a soft rush of static that should have been comforting. It wasn’t. It felt like a thin barrier between them and whatever waited outside.Behind her, Callum’s boots scuffed against the floorboards. He wasn’t trying to be quiet—he never did—but she knew him well enough now to hear the difference in his pace. Measured. Heavy. The walk of a man coiled tight and ready to spring.She didn’t turn as he came into the kitchen. She kept her eyes fixed on the

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