Envy (Dark Waters Book 1)

Chapter Two:

Bullshit? This wasn't bullshit. This was a need, a want; I ached to come home. The fact that Pride looked at me and laughed as though I were nothing, sliced at what was left of my heart. We were brothers once, weren't we? Fuck.

"No, Pride, I mean it." I slapped my chest. "I need to come back and be one of the Deadly. That life out there? With mortals?" Squeezing my eyes shut, I shook my head. "That isn't for me. I don't want it."

"Oh, you don't?" Pride's tone made me open my eyes again. His grin faded into a slight scowl. His tongue pressed into his bottom lip. "I remember a time when that was all you wanted. A mortal life. A mortal wife."

My hand slid away from my chest. I knew there was no way he could forget it; my one attempt at a normal life. I'd made a mistake, and I'd say over and over again that I was sorry. It was wrong to give up my family, to compromise our position for a life I didn't deserve. The Deadly was all I needed.

Light feels so much better.

"I've grown since then," I said, stepping toward Pride's middle seat.

He pursed his lip and frowned, lazily relaxing his chin against his palm. "Last I recall, Octavio, you're over two hundred years old. The child in you left ages ago. What was there to grow from?"

As Gluttony and Sloth made themselves comfortable within the circle, sitting in their seats, I stood center and eyed each of them carefully. I wouldn't answer Pride's question. Admitting growth was a lie; I was grown at the time. My faults weren't that of a child but of an adult.

To look into golden eyes and fall into every sin, including mine.

I had lusted for her lips. Her body. The sound of her voice whispering my name.

"Failure," I said, pressing my hands together. "I've learned and grown from my errors."

I craved every inch of her. Greed made me want her more than anything in this world.

"Have you?" Pride blinked, then pointed at the dead body in the center of the room. It lay there long enough that it settled, sighed, and flattened into the floor. Sloth, of course, found it funny. Gluttony, on the other hand, watched with his hand over his mouth; his eyes were stuck on me like ice.

"You brought us filth, trash, someone," Pride threw his hand up above his head, "who should've died years ago, but he keeps on kickin'. But you, you," he pointed at me, "believed he would be the right price to pay your debt to us?"

I gulped. "I—"

Wrath took over when I was told to kill her. I became envious of mortals because if I were one, there would be no issue with her.

"Do you really want to come back?" Gluttony asked, running his hand through his bread. "Are you sure?"

"Why are you asking?" Pride's eyes widened. "It's obvious he wants to come back. The question is," he looked at me, "does he deserve it?"

Pride. His sin was my fall. I thought I'd beat the dark and had my chance. The way he gazed at me with large eyes, a grin tugging at his lips, a menacing look of victory.

What had he won just now? Or was he always in character?

"I don't think he deserves anything," Sloth said, leaning into his seat.

"You don't think," Gluttony sneered, glancing at him. "You just are."

Sloth's hands shot up in a shrug as he snickered. "I suppose I am."

Sloth was when I lost. I stopped trying to cover my tracks. I moved slower, lazier, thinking I'd just go on as I wished.

Pride leaned forward in his seat so his arms rested on his knees. He scoffed as the puddle of blood moved near his feet. He kicked away the rest, baring his teeth. When his eyes panned back over to me, the blue returned to black, and I saw nothing. Emptiness. Darkness. The void that was his soul. "How long have you searched for us?" he asked, his voice low.