Page 74 of Seven Deadly Sins

Since the door was metal, nothing had burned inside the room. The fire had started to eat away at the walls, spreading to James’s cubicle.

“McConnell, get to the hospital and have that armed looked at. Harper, you go with him. I’m sending the other two FBI agents to James’s address.” The chief set his extinguisher on the floor. “Find me when you get back. I’m ready to hear you out.”

Something good had come out of the day then.

Chapter Nine

Robert hung uphis phone and faced Lucy. “I’ve got a job for you. It’s a simple one, so only half the money. Take it or leave it.” What a fool James had been. How dare he step outside the plan?

“Well, well, aren’t you an angry hornet.” She moved to the bedroom, returning half an hour later looking like a young black-haired beauty around twenty-years-old.

“How do you do it? I thought I was a master of disguise.”

“Talent, baby.” She patted his cheek. “Text the target’s address. Any sin I should think of?”

“Not the one we’re currently working on. Only disobedience.”

“Boring. Okay, I’ll be back in a flash.” She waltzed from the room with a bounce in her step making her look even more like a young woman.

Strange that he didn’t find himself physically attracted to her. Perhaps it was her bossy attitude toward him. He liked women to be submissive to him, and it had been a long time since he’d had one to care for his needs.

No, he needed to focus on the task at hand. He paced the living room of Lucy’s modest house. Like her, the outside didn’t match the inside. Expensive furnishings and stylish décor hidden behind the red brick of a home built in the late 70s.

What to do, what to do. He wanted something big to end lust and propel them all into the sin of gluttony. A sin not so different from lust when you think about it. A lust for the physical things, or a desire for excess. He’d need a disguise, too. One he hadn’t used before.

A visit to the country club with Lucy on his arm would give him his next target. One that would fit both sins.

He wanted this to end. Once he’d worked his way through the seven sins and rid the world of the last descendants of the men responsible for his father’s death, Robert could widen his place for a sin free world.

He’d gain more and more followers. Devoted men and women who would do his bidding without question.

He would become their god.

~

After recounting every single step of the case to the chief and agents again, them finally agreeing to focus their energy on Thompson, Harper had spent the most restful night she’d spent in a very long time. She stretched and tossed aside the sheet.

She sniffed, capturing the aroma of coffee and…something sweet, yeasty, buttery. Her stomach growled.

“Good morning.” Liam turned from the stove when she entered the kitchen.

“Are those cinnamon rolls?” She sniffed the air again. “From scratch?”

“Is there any other kind?” He set one on a plate and handed it to her. “Sit. I’ll pour you a cup of coffee.”

“Thanks.” The roll was still warm and gooey when she took a bite out of it. Laughing, she reached for a fork, wishing she were five again so she could eat it as messy as she wanted.

“You’ve frosting on your lip.” Liam wiped it away with his thumb. He lingered, brushing his thumb across her lips. Then, he gave a slow smile and set her coffee on the table.

She told her racing heart to slow back to normal and cleared her throat. “What’s the occasion?”

“The fact we’ll finally get somewhere. The office agrees with us now. Macey and Harris are going to focus on the mule, leaving us to find Thompson.” He sat across from her and cut into a roll. “What bothers me right now is the fact the man hasn’t sent a text in a while. They didn’t seem to this few and far between before.”

“When we hadn’t heard from him in two weeks, I had hoped he’d died.” She shrugged. “Not the right thing to want, but he needs to be stopped.”

“If he’d died, we might not ever have known his identity.”

True. She’d have wondered her whole life what had turned this man into a monster.

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