Sinner by Ted Dekker Read Free Book Online Page A

looked completely out of place in the dingy hall.
    â€œIf he’s as smart as I think he is, he does.”
    â€œWait here.” He stepped back in the shadows, spoke softly into a cell phone, then emerged.
    â€œNo.”
    â€œNo? What do you mean, no?”
    â€œIt means you have about ten seconds before I break your face. Leave.”
    â€œTell Muness that I have $526,000 dollars for him. If he refuses it, I will assume he intends for me to have it. The choice is his.”
    â€œYou don’t understand the word no , I take it.”
    â€œAnd I take it that you’re about as stupid as a sack of air. Have it your way.” Billy spun and headed back up the stairs.
    He made it all the way into the main casino before the suited muscle caught him by the arm from behind.
    â€œThis way.”
    A single look in the man’s eyes told him that the guy’s head really was about as empty as a sack of air.
    Ricardo Muness sat behind the pale desk that had become synonymous with Billy’s image of the man. Bleached maple. Like bone. Otherwise everything about the man was dark. Boots, goatee, slicked hair, tanned skin. Even the dark glasses that covered his eyes.
    â€œSit,” he said softly.
    Billy sat in one of two black leather chairs and stared at Atlantic City’s wealthiest underground financier.
    Nothing. Not a whisper of the man’s thoughts.
    Glasses .
    Okay, well, that was new. So he needed to actually see a person’s eye-balls to hear their thoughts. Billy crossed his legs and nonchalantly dried his palms on his thighs. Over the last six hours his focus had been split between the keys into cyberspace that Sacks had given him, and the phenomenon that was opening his mind to the world’s thoughts.
    Between the two he’d discovered just how badly one could sweat when truly freaked out.
    â€œI understand you have a death wish,”Muness said.
    â€œIs that what you heard? No, sir. I did what I knew you would want me to do given the information I was able to obtain.”
    â€œNever assume to know my mind.”
    The order struck Billy as a little too direct. Muness knew about his new talent?
    â€œThen maybe I was mistaken,” he said. “I could leave now if you wish.”
    â€œOr?”
    â€œOr I could tell you about the money Anthony Sacks stole from you.”
    â€œAnd?”
    â€œAnd show you how to retrieve it.”
    â€œHow much?”
    â€œFive hundred twenty-six thousand. And change.”
    â€œYou missed some.”
    Billy felt his face flush. “What do you mean?”
    â€œHe’s taken five hundred and thirty-seven thousand from me in the last twelve months. Eleven thousand of that was a loan he never paid back. The rest is in a bank in Belize, under my watch.”
    The fact that Sacks probably didn’t consider the eleven thousand as stolen accounted for the disparity. But Muness knew about the money anyway.
    â€œSo you’ve come all this way to return money that is already in my hands?” the man said.
    â€œEvidently.”
    The man stared at him through the dark glasses. It was almost as if he really did know about Billy’s gift and was playing him.
    â€œWe have a problem, my friend.”
    â€œWe? Or me?”
    â€œFor the moment, we. There are those in my organization that know about our little arrangement. Which means I am obligated to follow through with the promises I made to you. If Tony goes down, so do you, it’s that simple.”
    â€œThat’s my problem,” Billy said. “What’s yours?”
    â€œThe fact that you know about the money. I need to know how you found out.”
    Leverage. But not much.
    â€œAnd you expect me to tell you when? After you remove my left arm?”
    The man smiled. “The thought had occurred to me. If you don’t tell me, I’ll assume Sacks told you, in which case I’ll have to kill both of you. The choice is yours. So much