He spread his hands. "If someone makes a deal with me, promises me their company without realizing just what they're getting into, that's hardly my fault."

Eugene stared at him. "When she told me not to take anything from the devil, she meant you, didn't she?"

Johnny shrugged and ambled up to the pulpit, where he leaned one shoulder against the wood. “Have you said all your goodbyes?”

“There's no one left to say goodbye to.”

Johnny patted the side of the pulpit and climbed the steps to take his place behind it. On top, the Bible lay open waiting to be read, its pages damp with mildew. He rested his hand on it absently, no care for holiness. The light from the stained-glass windows glowed over him like a halo, the dust motes floating around him as he stood there like some long-lost pagan king, modernized in his suit and his shiny black boots. He looked like the afterimage from a dream.

“I know you,” Eugene said.

Johnny smiled and stepped forward, holding out his hand. Slowly, fighting the current, Eugene stood and joined him. He was struck by the sudden wild thought of a wedding ceremony, bodies wrapped up in holy matrimony—except God was absent, and in his place was Johnny Walker with his too-long hair, too-sharp teeth, too-keen eyes. The scent of Angelique's death clung to him like blood and gunpowder.

“I know you,” Eugene repeated, but before he could say more, Johnny kissed him.

A thrill swooped through Eugene's stomach at kissing a man in church—even an abandoned church, even a man as dangerous as Johnny Walker—and Eugene curled his fingers in the lapels of Johnny’s suit without knowing whether he meant to pull him closer or shove him back.

"Stop," he demanded weakly against Johnny's mouth.

"Stop what?"

"I can't think like this," he said desperately.

Johnny nipped at his tongue in teasing bites, and Eugene opened his mouth and shut his eyes, pressing into every kiss. Johnny drew him up the steps to stand behind the pulpit as if in sermon, but their sermon was spoken in panting breaths and shuttered moans.

"Don't think. Just turn around."

Eugene moved as Johnny directed, bracing his hands against the Bible’s edge, letting Johnny press close along his back, covering him from shoulder to hip. When Johnny pushed his fingers against Eugene's lips, Eugene opened his mouth to suck them in, his tongue roving over Johnny's knuckles. He tasted salty and bitter, with the floral aftertaste of Angelique's perfume, and Eugene gagged and nearly retched when he pushed in too far. Johnny made hushing sounds in his ear, his other hand firm on Eugene's waist, holding him in place, before pulling out and dropping both hands to Eugene's belt.

"Say no," he whispered, his words hot against the nape of Eugene's neck.

Eugene clenched the Bible's edge until his knuckles were bleached white and aching and he tasted blood from biting his tongue. God help me, he prayed, but "Do it," was what he said aloud.