by Dukey, Ker
LUST
PRIDE
WRATH
ENVY
GREED
GLUTTONY
SLOTH
Lust
Copyright © 2018 Ker Dukey
Cover Design: All By Design
Photo: Adobe Stock
Editor: Word Nerd Editing
Proofread: Kim BookJunkie
Formatting: Champagne Book Design
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by an information and retrieval system without express written permission from the Author/Publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Preface
Epigraph
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Epilogue
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Books by Ker
For my darKER Souls
My sinners who want that
neck biting, hair pulling, skin slapping, ass spanking, back scratching, angry kinda sex.
Life is for living.
So live.
Wild, dirty, and free to sin.
t h e e l i t e s e v e n
Since 1942, The Elite Seven Society has created and guided influential leaders, molding the country into something better. This society was birthed by Malcom Benedict II, who wanted more for Americans. More wealth. More influence. More power. Some leaders have the skills, but not the influence, and that simply wasn’t fair according to Mr. Benedict. He invested his own money and time to construct a society that bred the best of the best, year after year.
But to be the best, you must be ruthless.
Good leaders make sacrifices. Sometimes the sacrifices are hard, but the rewards are plentiful. Mr. Benedict made sure to indulge these leaders with their utmost desires. A devout Catholic himself, he designed a society that rewarded his leaders with the sins that were frowned upon. If they were giving up love and happiness and joy for the betterment of the country, they deserved something in its stead.
Pride, Envy, Wrath, Sloth, Greed, Gluttony, and Lust.
Choosing leaders for this society takes intense focus. Only seven are to be selected, and the investment and time are showered upon the new seven chosen every four years. The university’s acting dean behaves as a liaison for the society, bringing the applicants to the predecessors so the selection may begin. The society members going out will bring forth a candidate the society votes on and approves.
After they are chosen, the initiates are given a token and an invitation to initiation. The initiation tests their character and ability to do what’s right for the betterment of the society. Once the initiates pass their test, they are discreetly branded with the mark of the society and groomed through challenges during the course of their elite education to breed them into the influential people they were meant to be.
Once in The Elite Seven, there is no getting out. The money and power are their reward. Should they choose to stray or break the rules, the society strips them of everything. Anything they once had will be removed. Opportunities will never arise. They will no longer have the support of the society. To this day, there have been no known occurrences of anyone from the society having to be banished. Every young man and woman aspires to be a part of the elite group whispered about amongst the privileged. Anyone who is anyone knows of the group and secretly hopes their son or daughter is selected, for good fortune is showered on the family for decades to come.
These violent delights have violent ends ~ William Shakespeare.
—Romeo and Juliet.
Rhett
20:15
The clock on my dashboard mocks me. Late is an understatement.
Punishing the throttle, I will my tires to stick to the wet road as the storm rattles the sky above me. Like it’s releasing the fucking Kraken.
I love living in New Orleans but the weather in hurricane season is a bipolar bitch. Soaking rain with high winds that could blow the skin off a gator one minute, hotter than Satan’s asshole the next.
My wipers battle to give me visual as I pass the sign telling me half a mile to my turn off.
Static white noise crackles through the radio, breaking up the vocals of Post Malone’s new track, and smacking the thing doesn’t seem to fix the problem.
This night has turned to shit fast, and it’s only going to get worse when my mother finds out how late I was picking up my kid brother.
Groaning at the time ticking by, I try to focus, my speed eating up the pavement.
Blue and red lights flash through the smog of the rain in front of me, and I slow the car to a roll before I can even reach the exit I need to take.
Perfect.
Slamming my hands on the steering wheel, I squint through the rivulets of water pouring all around.
Orange cones block the road, forcing me to idle the car.
The rain punishes the windshield, blurring my sight, making it almost impossible to make out what’s going on outside.
Fuck.
Like I need this shit.
All I can think about is Robbie waiting outside his Karate class alone, soaking wet and no doubt starving.
I’m a shit big brother, selfish. The guilt is building, and whatever the fuck’s happened here is bad. I’m not going to get moving anytime soon.
Ignoring the constant beeping of my cell phone with texts from our anxious mother, I open a message from my best friend asking me to bail on the party tonight and go dragging with him instead.
He’s got a death wish to risk drag racing in this weather. Hard pass.
I shoot him a message back, telling him to come to the party for a few hours first, then chuck my cell in the passenger seat.
I’ll get him drunk tonight—which is all too fucking easy with him—and take his keys away. No racing and dying tonight.
I roll down the window and try to flag down one of the officers laying out cones to prevent traffic from coming through on the other side.
“Sir, I really need to get through here,” I call out, waving my arm in an attempt to get his attention.
Thunder rumbles from above, followed by a lightening show dancing in the clouds.
This storm wasn’t supposed to hit
until tomorrow.
Rain instantly begins pouring in through the open window, soaking me and the leather interior of my new dodge charger. The selfish prick I am, it irritates me I’m even in this situation.
I should be getting ready for the house party on the other side of town.
Our dad was supposed to pick Robbie up, but once again, he had to work late. It wouldn’t be that bad if his office weren’t five blocks over.
Dick.
Most boys admired their father, but not me. Mine was a pretentious prick who hated that I chose to pursue a football scholarship instead of taking his money and following him into the world of finance.
He made it no secret that Robbie was his favourite kid, and hell, I didn’t blame him. Just because we’re related, there are no rules that say we can’t clash—and clash we do.
An officer approaches my window wearing plastic overalls that do nothing to prevent the fierce winds from blowing the rain sideways into his face. Poor bastard.
“You’ll need to turn around, sir,” he instructs, and irritation grinds my bones.
I can practically see the building through the gathering of magnolia trees lining the opposite side of the road.
Inhaling a frustrated breath, I look to the grass border on my side, then nod to the officer. “Fine”
I watch him walk away in my wing mirror, making his way to a car pulling up behind me, no doubt giving them the same instructions to turn around.
Fuck it. I’ll have to jog the rest of the way and get wet.
Pulling my car over to the side of the road, I jump out and immediately regret my choice of not wearing a coat today. My boots slap on the asphalt that’s becoming more like a river than a road.
The officer jogs back toward me, hurried and pissed off, pointing at my car.
“You can’t leave your car there,” he shouts, shaking his head.
I look past him to an ambulance stopping by two police cars parked at an odd angle in the road. Squinting my eyes, I make out a truck just beyond them. Looks like it collided with a tree.
I can only see the back end and don’t recognize the licence plate, thank fuck.
“I just need to run over and pick my brother up from his karate class. I’m late, and he’s only twelve, sir,” I say, trying to appeal to his humanity.
Rain makes it hard to speak. It’s pouring over me, drenching my clothes. Without a jacket on, my shirt becomes a second skin, slick and stuck to me like glue. My jeans become heavy, and a frigid whisper skitters up my spine as Mother Nature breathes down my neck.
I hate the sploshing of my boots as I take a step forward, pushing a hand through my hair to remove it from my eyes.
Leaves rip from the trees and dance to the tune of the wind picking up speed.
The officer has gone silent. He looks through the trees to where I gesture, then back to the sight of the incident.
Sirens blast through the quiet night, and my eyes scan the road as a fire engine approaches.
I nod over to the accident. “That bad, huh?” I wince, folding my arms to ward off some of the chill cutting through me.
“What’s your brother’s name?” he asks, pulling me from being a nosey bastard trying to get a look around him at the damage.
Seeing a guy sitting in the back of one of the cop cars wrapped in a blanket, I ask, “That the driver? He okay?”
“What’s your brother’s name, son.” He turns his head to hear me better, ignoring my question.
Shit. Robbie has to be freaking out. He’s a sensitive kid and it’s getting dark. I really need to go.
“Robbie, and he’s going to be really worried. He was expecting my mother an hour ago,” I confess, my shoulders jerking with guilt.
I’m a piece of shit. My mother asked me to go get him because she was caught up with something and Dad dropped the working late shit on her.
She made me promise not to forget or be late, and I was too busy getting head from the captain of the cheerleader squad. Such an asshole.
I’d been trying to get her on my list since I started at that school, and she’d held out—until today. She’s a bad bitch too. Deep throats like a pro.
Filthy and fucking thirsty for dick, she exceeded all my expectations.
“And you said he’s eleven?” the officer continues, bringing me back from the memory of her lips around me.
“Twelve,” I correct with a frustrated grunt.
Dude, I don’t have time for this. Fuck, I hope he’s not thinking we neglected him or some shit. Mom’s going to have my balls for this.
“You have a picture of him?”
“What, why?”
What the hell? Why the fuck would he want a picture?
Firefighters pour onto the scene, their voices are raised to be heard over the torrent making their job twice as hard.
I strain to listen, and a rock forms in my gut at their words.
“He’s pinned from the chest down. As soon as we separate the truck, he’s going to drop. We need to secure his body.”
Damn, that sounds brutal.
“I need to go. I promise I’ll be quick,” I shout to the officer as I take off jogging. He calls out to me, but I’ve wasted enough time.
Going around the fire truck, I cut through the trees. The wind howls, tossing the branches around violently. They whip me across the face, scraping holes into my flesh. My feet sink into the ground with each determined step, submerging me in more than one puddle, flooding my boots.
By the time I make it through the brush, I’m a mess. Mud cakes my boots and jeans, and I may as well not be wearing a shirt. My dark hair flops over my eyes, blinding me.
Mom’s going to owe me for this shit.
I cross the street, and my stomach knots when I don’t see Robbie’s silhouette under the lamppost where he’s supposed to wait.
Shit.
Scanning the parking lot, I look for any sheltered areas he might have taken refuge, but there’s nowhere he could be.
Jogging over to the building, I grab the handle on the door and give it a tug, but it’s locked and there are no lights coming from inside.
Mom had warned me this was the last class of the night and they lock the building up so Robbie would be outside with no way of getting back in.
I’m a cunt.
There’s a pounding in my chest—a vibrating, nervous energy trying to rip from under my skin with each passing second he’s not materialising in front of me.
Where are you?
The sky darkens with each fleeting breath I take, my body jolting with the thunder as it rips through the night.
Unease settles in my chest, and panic races up my throat as I call out for him.
“Robbie!” I shout, water spraying from my lips.
Nothing.
“Robbie,” I try again, my tone more urgent. I pat down my pockets for my cell, but already know I left it in the car. Fuck. Fuck.
The lights from the emergency vehicles taunt me through the trees, then someone emerging through the same brush I just came from catches my eye and I take off in their direction.
I come to a slow walk when I see the silhouette is too large to be Robbie.
It’s the officer from before.
What the hell?
My car’s not even in anyone’s way, and finding my brother is more important. Let the jerk give me a ticket.
“What’s your name, son?” he asks, coming to a stop in front of me.
“Rhett. Rhett Masters, why?” I bark, anger and fear eating away at me.
He looks around me to the building where Robbie should be, then back to me.
“He’s not here,” I tell him before he gets suspicious that I was making shit up.
Where are you, Robbie?
“Ok, I need you to listen to me and prepare yourself for what I’m going to tell you.” His eyes hold mine with an intensity that makes every hair on my body rise.
Thud.
My head swims, and there’s this know
ledge taking over my mind I can’t possibly predict, but my head turns to the emergency chaos happening through the trees and I stagger backwards.
Robbie.
“Wait. Wait, no, no.” I shake my head, holding out my arm to him. I’m not prepared to hear what I know he’s going to tell me.
I just fucking know he’s going to say something bad.
The darkness of the impending night wraps its angry fist around my throat and begins to squeeze.
“The accident…a truck swerved off the road and hit a boy.”
Stop.
Don’t fucking say it.
“We believe him to be around eleven or twelve years old.”
Shut up. I can’t hear this.
“He’s wearing a Karate Gi.”
Thud. Thud. Thud.
Robbie.
Thick fog begins stirring inside my mind, making me woozy. My stomach clenches, and I dry heave.
It’s not Robbie. This isn’t real.
No.
No fucking way.
I try to tell my mind it’s not factual, but I feel the truth constricting my heart.
Robbie tried to walk because I left him here and now he’s pinned by a truck to a tree.
“He didn’t make it,” the officer says, placing a hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry, son.”
No.
My head shakes back and forth manically, and I bat his hand off me.
“He died on impact. He wouldn’t have felt a thing.”
Take that back.
It’s not Robbie.
“Can you come with me? We need to contact your parents.” He makes a move with his hand, but I step away.
No.
Shut the fuck up. Stop touching me.
My legs steady themselves, becoming solid once more beneath me instead of jelly, and I run.
Before I even realize it, I’ve cleared the trees and I’m at the truck.
Thud… Thud….
“Whoa, what the hell? Move away now,” someone barks, but my knees fail me.
“Robbie,” I yell, tears clogging my throat and acid burning in my chest.
It’s then I see it—his backpack peeking up just over the bumper—his brown hair soaked to his head that’s slumped to the side.
