Page 36 of Heartless Sinner

He was so happy to get it back he gave me twenty bucks and treated me to candy floss. Johnny teased me for an entire month, calling me Mother Theresa. He thought I should have kept the wallet. Dad, on the other hand, was proud of me.

That was just one of many incidents where I chose to do the right thing. Now I feel like I tarnished my soul by stealing that chip, and God knows what hell door I opened by doing so.

For a start, it really was too easy. I was in and out of that vault like it belonged to me.

Nothing happened like what I imagined. The surveillance was turned off and the key card worked, so I just waltzed right into the room the vault was being stored, and then I left the hotel. There weren’t wild car chases or mobsters chasing me with machine guns like I’d imagined. And I never had to escape and hide like Harrison Ford did inThe Fugitive.

I got home safe and sound, and Dad was fine, too. We talked as normal, and I was even able to mask my whole one-night stand. Not that it’s the sort of thing you bring up to your father.

Now I just have to do this final thing and get the money.

I breathe super slowly as I get closer to the rusty-colored factory. It seems to rise from the industrial wasteland like a metal giant. Every step closer makes my heart beat faster.

I touch the chip in my pocket for the millionth time, reassuring myself that it's still there.

I feel it. I placed it in an envelope just like I was instructed, and I didn’t try to see what was on it.

The moment I spot the large metal doors, a guard appears from the shadows like a ghost, his military look obvious in the way he holds himself. And his gun.

His eyes rake over me with the kind of contempt that makes my skin crawl.

Shit, this is it. Up until now, I’ve only been speaking to these people through text messages. He’s the first one of them I’ve seen.

The guard stands around 6'2", with a thick neck, pale almost colorless eyes, and a weathered-looking face. The sleeve of histactical jacket is rolled up just enough to show a Navy SEAL tattoo, faded yet still visible.

He might be anywhere from thirty-five to fifty—it's hard to tell with the way the shadows cut across his face.

"Password?" His voice is as rough as the gravel crunching under his boots.

I swallow hard past the dryness in my throat and hope my soul doesn’t shatter from my nerves. "Nightshade."

He grunts and jerks his head toward the door. The hinges screech as he pulls it open, the sound echoing through the empty lot like a warning.

I follow him inside the factory, right into the smell of rust and mildew and something else—something metallic that makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up.

Our footsteps echo off concrete walls, a rhythm that matches my racing pulse.

Five men wait in what must have been a loading bay, their faces carved from stone beneath the fluorescent lights surrounding them.

They're arranged in a loose semicircle like a wolf pack. It’s a fitting description because I feel like a little rabbit who just stepped into a lair.

"You have it?" the tallest one barks, his accent thick with Eastern European hardness.

“Yes. I have it here.” My fingers tremble as I reach into my pocket and pull out the envelope containing the chip.

I hand it to him, and he takes it, but I don’t miss the way he looks at me in that way most men do when they first see me. They do that scan of my face then my breasts and try to analyze me as if they’re trying to determine if I’m a slut.

“Very good.” He tries for a smile that doesn’t quite reach his lips. It makes me think you’d rarely see a smile on his face.

"About my payment?—"

“We’ll check it first.” His face hardens.

The guy next to him hands him a device that looks like a card machine. He switches it on, and it hums to life, casting a sickly blue glow across his face.

While he scans the screen, nerves eat me up from the inside out and I feel like I’m gonna go crazy with every second that stretches the silence between us.

His brows snap together and a look that can only be described as feral washes over his face.