Laurie Breton - Mortal Sin

So, he said, youre a friend of Josies.

Actually, Im her boss.

Warmth flooded those golden eyes. Of course. Youre the lady who just bought the bookstore. Josies mentioned you.

Then you have a distinct advantage over me, Father, because shes never mentioned you until now. And youre not at all what I expected. Youre so She paused, searched desperately for the right word. Dark. Intense. Intriguing. Sexy.

He picked up his coffee cup and took a sip. So ?

Young, she said, breaking eye contact and focusing on a single dark blue paperback sitting on a lower shelf, just at eye level. Catechism of the Catholic Church. She supposed if he ever suffered from insomnia, the cure was readily available, right here on his bookshelves.

Also by LAURIE BRETON

FINAL EXIT

Watch for LAURIE BRETONs next

novel of romantic suspense

LETHAL LIES

Available March 2005

ISBN 0-7783-2025-1

MORTAL SIN

Copyright (c) 2004 by Laurie Breton.

All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.

MIRA and the Star Colophon are trademarks used under license and registered in Australia, New Zealand, Philippines, United States Patent and Trademark Office and in other countries.

Visit us at www.mirabooks.com

Printed in U.S.A.

This ones for Paul, for more reasons than I can count.

Thanks to my two dear friends, Judy Lineberger and Jamie Disterhaupt. If not for your support and friendship through a long and difficult winter, this book might never have happened. Bless you both!

Thanks to my wonderful editor, Valerie Gray, for her endless support, encouragement and faith in me.

And as always, thanks to my family for putting up with me when Im on deadline.

March 2003

Revere, Massachusetts

Living in the ugliest house on the block was so humiliating. Kit Connelly hoisted her cumbersome backpack higher on her shoulder and trudged through a gloomy March dusk toward the hideous two-story bungalow that some demented previous owner had painted bright blue. The garage was ready to collapse, the roof had been clumsily patched with shingles that nobody had bothered to match, and the front steps lurched to one side like a drunken sailor. Aunt Sarah, of course, loved the place. She called it a fixer-upper, and kept saying it would look just fine with a fresh coat of paint and flowers blooming in the yard. Her aunt was obviously as loopy as the guy whod painted the house blue. It would take a wrecking ball to improve this dump.

She let herself in through the kitchen door, tossed her coat over the nearest chair, and plodded up the stairs to her room. Dropping the backpack on the bed, she plunked down beside it and rummaged in a side compartment for the third-quarter report card that was about to destroy her life. It wasnt that bad, overall. Two Cs, three Ds, and one F. Shed passed everything except French. But Aunt Sarah would go ballistic when she saw it, and Kit couldnt very well hide the damn-fool thing, because her aunt knew grade reports were due today. Shed be expecting to see it tonight.

Kit lay back on the bed and stared miserably at the crack that ran across her bedroom ceiling. Her life was over. Shed be grounded until she was too old to care. Sarah was already on the warpath after this mornings go-round, all because she wanted to get her tongue pierced. What was the big deal? A lot of the kids had piercings. But Auntie Dearest, fossilized at the advanced age of thirty-three, was seriously behind the times. Shed refused to even consider it.

From there, the battle had progressed to the nasty R word: Responsibility. Something that, according to Sarah, she still needed to get straight. Wipe your feet. Turn off the lights. Pick up after yourself. No matter how hard she tried, she could never get it right, and every time she screwed up, her aunt was on her like a duck on a June bug.

Momma would never have treated her so shabbily. Momma would have let her take the T into Boston with the other kids to hang out after school. Momma would have understood how important it was to be seen at the right parties and with the right people. Momma would have realized she didnt need a keeper. She was sixteen freaking years old, not five. At sixteen, she was old enough to make her own decisions. Old enough to take care of herself. She didnt need Sarah. She didnt need anyone. Shed proved it last summer, hadnt she? Shed taken care of herself just fine, at least she had until the New Orleans cops had busted her and dragged her back home to live with Remy and Sarah.

No way was she going to survive two more years of living in this prison, with Warden Sarah governing her every move. She was going to have to get out before she went absolutely bugfuck.

She got up from the bed and walked to the mirror, lifted her long blond hair and pursed her lips in a sexy pout like the women did in those mens magazines that old man Gior-dano sold from the back room of his store. Turning one way and then the other, she critically studied her appearance. Most girls her age were troubled by acne, but she had nice skin, smooth and pink and flawless. And her eyes were her best feature: wide and blue, fringed by thick lashes.

But the good stuff stopped there. Her lips were too thin, her nose tilted to the left, and her thick, wavy hair was hopeless. And her body well, there wasnt anything good she could say about her body. No matter how much she dieted, she still looked like a fat cow.

One more thing she and Sarah didnt agree on. Youre not fat, sugar, her aunt had said, youre just built like me. Not an ounce of fat on you, just lots of womanly curves. All the Connelly women are built that way.

Kit didnt want womanly curves. She longed to be one of those wispy, delicate women like Jennifer Aniston, with a washboard tummy and tiny hands and feet. The kind of woman who disappeared when she turned around sideways. But it wasnt ever going to happen. At sixteen, she was already five-foot-eight and wore a size nine shoe. A freaking Amazon.

On the other hand, there were certain advantages to being tall and full-figured. With the right clothes, the right makeup, the right hairdo, she could easily pass for eighteen. She could move into the city, get her own apartment, find a job. Maybe in one of the theaters. Cleaning bathrooms, selling popcorn, she didnt care, as long as it was in the theater. Maybe, if she was lucky, shed get a chance to audition for some bit part. Maybe, if she was really, really lucky, shed get discovered.

Fueled by the sweet lure of freedom, Kit emptied her backpack onto the bed and took down the locked box she kept hidden in a dark corner of the closet. Inside was the cash shed been saving. Guilt money. Daddy had dumped her like an unwanted litter of kittens, and his way of dealing with his guilty conscience was to send an elaborate card and a big check every time her birthday or a major holiday rolled around. In a year and a half, hed called just once, but as long as the checks kept coming, he could continue to delude himself about being a good father. Kit pocketed the money, scrabbled around the bottom of the box and pulled out three joints in a plastic bag. She hid the joints in an inside zipper compartment of the backpack. From her dresser drawer, she scooped up underwear, socks, a few shirts, and shoved them into the bag. She added a couple pair of jeans and the black leather miniskirt Sarah detested, then crammed in her hair gel, her blow-dryer, and all her cosmetics.