The guy stepped out of the computer room and followed them into case room two.
Angus shut the door and waited for everyone to sit. “Pippa. You’ve been living with this all day. Give me something.”
She settled her body and tried to think. “Well, Isaac likes hurting women. He’ll like the idea of using women to make the attack, especially if it’s a suicide attack. And he’d love using women to hurt other women.”
Angus nodded. “Okay. We’ll do an analysis of that idea. For now, Raider is the strategic expert of the group, I’m the profiler, Mal is the operative, and Pippa is the wild card.”
She blinked, sitting next to Mal. The heat from his body washed over her. She was the wild card?
“No,” Mal said, pushing back his chair. “Absolutely not.”
Pippa cringed at the venom in his voice. What was going on?
“Raider?” Angus asked.
Raider gave Mal a sympathetic look before standing and leaning against the wall. “Strategy-wise, the only way we’re going to get a location is from Isaac. You both need to be on the inside.”
“I’ll go,” Mal said. “It’s too much of a risk for Pippa.”
“She’s the one thing that puts Isaac off-balance,” Angus said. “She’s the key, Mal. At the moment, you’re more likely to be shot when you show up after failing to secure Eagle and Leroy. He won’t kill Pippa, at least not at the home.”
Pippa stilled. “What do you mean?” The guy spoke as if he knew what he was talking about.
Angus met her gaze directly, his eyes a slightly darker green than Malcolm’s. “He wanted you pure and chaste for your wedding at eighteen. You’ve been gone for seven years, and chances are, he’ll think you’ve betrayed him.”
“So he’ll kill me?” she breathed. Yeah. She actually hadn’t considered that. For years, Isaac had treated her as if she really were set apart, even though he’d tortured her emotionally.
Angus lifted one muscled shoulder. “Could go either way. He’s punishing the world with fire, and he might think you need punishment to be cleansed as well. Or he might see the others dying for your perceived sins the same way the Bible says Jesus died for our sins.”
“Either way, you’re not going,” Malcolm said, crossing his arms.
She thought about the situation, her mother, and Trixie. About the brainwashed women about to not only kill themselves but potentially many other innocent people. “I don’t have a choice, Malcolm.” Her choices had been taken from her the second her mother had joined the family with Pippa in tow.
It was time to take those choices back.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Malcolm drove the van past the city center of Cottage Grove with Pippa sleeping quietly in the passenger seat. It was an incredibly bad idea to let her go back into the family mansion. She’d been adamant.
Did he have a right to stop her? He understood her need to try to protect her friend and her mother. But what if she was killed in the process? If he stopped her from going, even though she’d probably hate him forever, at least she’d be alive to do so.
“Stop thinking so hard,” she mumbled, sitting up in the seat.
“Can’t help it.” The clock on the dash showed it to be ten at night. Almost her birthday. Coordinating the Op for the next day had taken several more hours than he would’ve expected. Raider was a stickler for every detail. “I don’t like this. Any of this,” Mal muttered.
“Neither do I.” She pushed unruly hair away from her face. “A part of me wishes we could just jump on a plane and go somewhere warm. Live on a beach and eat coconuts.”
“Say the word and I’ll make it happen. Right now.”
She chuckled. “You can’t turn away from this mess any more than I can.”
No, but he could send her ahead to a beach and meet her when this was done. “You’re clear on the plan?” He wanted to go over it one more time, just in case.
“We’re both clear. Thank you for taking me back to my home one more time.” Her voice was wistful. “I’ve been happy there. Mostly.”
“You’ll be back there tomorrow night,” he said, hoping to God it was the truth.
She didn’t reply.
