Ashlei was free to spout off how much she loved her savior because Jesus was not about to rear back and tell her He did not quite feel the same way, that He had died for the sins of the world just because it was fun and did not want things to be too serious. He was only thirty-three, after all, and might want to martyr himself for other people.

Sins don’t go away as long as there is someone to remember them.

My life of sin among people I’m sure he thinks are deviants is happier and more honest that his oppressive, sexist cesspool.

I don’t much care for all this talk of God washing away all my dirt. I like a bit of grit around the edges. It gives me character and does a passable job of faking depth, from a distance.

Las Vegas was as real to me as Neverland, opulence built in the Mojave Desert by mobsters for sins I could not bring myself to commit. What business did I have in disgracing its doorstep?

[H]er retaliation only made the sin the greater because she could not find words to confess.