Page 104 of Overkill

“He’s a teenage dickhead. They’re all dickheads. All guys are. All men who haven’t figured out their shit.” Was Griff implying he or I had figured ourselves out? If so, that was pretty optimistic.

“Including you?” I finally turned to the man I’d once called a best friend. The person who’d known all my secrets. The only person I’d confessed to about how I couldn’t read, and had come from a cult, and had a mother who was so God damn selfish, she made Narcissus seem selfless.

We both turned back to the jewelry case. He looked at earrings and necklaces, but I knew he was watching me hover over the engagement rings.

“Yeah, including me.” He chuckled, eyes growing distant. “Remember we talked about the seven sins?”

“Yeah. I was a fucking moron. What’d I say…?” I thought back, but I already knew the answer.

“Lust. Your sin was lust. You were proud of that, too.”

“I was a teenage dickhead.”

“We both were.”

It was the first time in five years that Griff admitted we had anything in common.

I felt the moment for the olive branch that it was, hovering between us.

“Mine’s pride. Always was. Still is.” He stuffed his hands into his leather jacket. “I don’t forgive people who have done me wrong much, even if it wasn’t their fault.”

I froze, not wanting to move and spoil the moment by saying the wrong thing His words were a confession, and possibly the start of peace between us. Forgiveness, even.

“You see, V, your sin was lust. Gluttony, too. You drank like a fish, ate like shit, and fucked your way through all of Fayetteville.”

“Alright,” I grumbled. “If we’re gonna have the same conversation for the hundredth time, I’d rather just put it off until tomorrow. Can you do that for me? You can come into the barn and berate me in the morning, but for now—”

“Your sin now is wrath.”

“Bullshit.” I snorted.

But maybe he had a point. I rarely lost my temper. I hadn’t been in a bar fight for years until Turner tried to confront me about framing Melody. I was about as fucking zen as a man in my situation could have been. But this past week, I was a rage-filled prick, snapping like a twig right and left, and reaping the consequences of it.

“I don’t mean wrath towards others. You’re mad at yourself. You’re so fucking mad at yourself all the time, it’s like you’ve got a vendetta against your own soul. You sabotage yourself from getting the things you want, because you hate yourself too much to think you deserve it.”

I gawped.

Was that a fucking almost-compliment? Was he almost saying something nice about me?

He didn’t meet my eyes. Instead, he nodded at an earring and necklace set.

“I know Daria and Taz called dibs on taking you engagement ring shopping, but considering you’ve been staring hard as hell at that five-carat, Tiffany-style solitaire for the past five minutes—and I’m pretty sure I’m about to buy that set right there to celebrate the news of our soon-to-be baby—what do you say we go in and do some shopping?” He nodded at the door.

“I did not think you, of all people, would be the person I shop with for this”

“Yeah, well…also seems kinda fitting, don’t it?” He held the door open for me, the bell above it chiming our entrance. As he gestured for me to enter first, despite thinking this could still be a trap, I walked in.

“We were looking at your front displays,” Griff said to the man behind the counter.

“Oh!” The jeweler wore a bow tie and a lavender blazer, his white-gloved hands coming together in front of him. “Are you, perhaps, shopping for each other?”

He eyes us back and forth, and we both cringed. I didn’t care that he thought I was gay, but I did care that of all the guys to pair me up with, he’d pick Griff of all people. “He’s not my type.”

“He’s looking for something for his wife-to-be, and I am looking for a push present for my pregnant wife.” Griff clarified, then flicked a thumb at me. ““Unwashed squatters aren’t my type. We’re just friends.”

“Oh.” The jeweler almost looked disappointed. “The best ones are. Anyway…”

I had shit for brains and shit for taste. I asked for his biggest engagement ring, and it was exactly the oval at the window. So that was what I bought. I had to call my bank when the transaction got flagged, because it had been a long time since I’d spent so much as a few hundred in one go. I appreciated the security but did not appreciate the embarrassment of having to call and confirm my identity to the nice old lady on the phone who was asking about my purchase.