CHAPTER TWENTY TWO
There were times when fate interceded to prove the rightness of Lillian’s actions. She wondered briefly why fate hadn’t interceded on behalf of West when he needed it, but it occurred to her that had fate done so, there would be no reason for Lillian to torture Faith Bold and no reason for Franklin West to ever notice Lillian.
He would notice her soon. Faith would notice her now. Fate had intervened in the best possible way.
Lillian was at the grocery store shopping and who should happen to walk in but Special-Agent-in-Charge Grant Monroe of the FBI’s Philadelphia Field Office. Lillian was so shocked to see him that she almost gasped.
Fortunately, she controlled herself. She bought her groceries and waited at the bus stop, waiting to see which way Monroe’s truck would turn when it pulled out of the parking lot.
And fate intervened in her favor once more. The truck turned right just as her bus arrived. The bus followed the truck for two miles before the truck pulled into a residential neighborhood.
And parked in the first house on the left. In ten minutes, fate had spared Lillian weeks of work.
She spent the rest of the day in a haze, unable to believe her good fortune and afraid that if she did, it would jinx everything somehow. It couldn’t be that easy. This was something she was supposed to have to work for.
But slowly, she realized that there must be a reason for it. West had always been right. People were weak. They were foolish. They were parasites. They relied on the help of other weak, foolish parasites to protect them, and they deserved to die until the species weeded out the weaklings and left the fittest to survive. This was evolution’s way of blessing Lillian’s part in the quest to return the world to the way it should be.
With the haze cleared, she was simply excited. She had the biggest grin on her face when she left her house, her tools in her backpack. She boarded the bus and returned to the stop where she had seen the truck park.
And fate intervened again. The truck was there. Monroe was home. Lillian was going to kill him tonight.
She giggled and reminded herself that if this was going to work, she needed to be stealthy. Grant Monroe had been a SAC for close to twenty years, but he might still have some instincts left from his time in the field. Lillian had to be careful, or this could all blow up in her face.
But she was confident she would succeed. Fate willed it.
She walked down the street behind Grant Monroe’s house and sneaked into the backyard. For a moment, she was terrified that he might have a dog. That would ruin everything.
But fate intervened yet again. The yard contained no living things save for a small koi pond.
A koi pond and an old Toyota pickup. What a study in contradictions Monroe was.
She pulled her first tool from her backpack. This one was a five-pound chunk of diorite, an intrusive igneous rock formed by slow underground cooling of magma. In other words, a stone.
She threw the stone through the back window. The glass shattered and Lillian quickly grabbed her second tool and hid in the shadows at the side of the back door.
Now, fate would need to intervene a final time. The prudent thing for Monroe to do would be to call the police and report the noise. That way, he wouldn't risk his own life investigating the sound.
But if Lillian was right about him, he would be brave. He would investigate the noise himself. He would want to find out who was invading his home and deal with the threat himself.
Lillian was right. Fate intervened. The back door opened, and Grant Monroe stepped outside, a handgun in his right hand, a forbidding frown on his face. His shoulders were square, his head held high, his eyes full of courage.
And Lillian lifted the crowbar high and slammed it down onto the back of his skull.