Page 114 of Twilight Sins

Therefore, bugging her phone to make sure she isn’t planning to flee into the night and never come back is my only option.

I scroll around and don’t find anything more incriminating than a few texts between her and her friends in Moscow and a string of unanswered texts from our mother. Nothing alarming.

I almost don’t check her call log at all. I’ve never seen Mariya actually use her voice to make a call. But I’m nothing if not thorough.

The only call she’s made in the last five days is to a number not in her contact list.

A number I instantly recognize.

My hand tightens around the phone just as I hear footsteps behind me. “There you are,” Luna says. “You didn’t sleep in your room again. I’m starting to wonder if I smell or?—”

I grab Luna by the arm and spin her against me. She yelps, but the sound dies in her throat when I cage her between my body and the countertop.

“When did you steal my sister’s phone?” I growl.

“I didn’t steal anything. What are you talking about?”

She tries to shake me off, but I pin her down with my hips and hold up Mariya’s phone. “I know you called Kayla.”

Emotions flicker across Luna’s face almost too fast to read. “I didn’t steal anything.”

“But you did call Kayla,” I confirm. “You fucking lied to me.”

“No. No, I didn’t.”

“What do you call this?” I roar.

She stretches onto her toes, her body sliding against mine. The friction is really undercutting how pissed I am at her. I inch back, but Luna closes the gap. “Mariya let me borrow her phone. She thought I should talk to my friend. I didn’t tell Kayla anything at all.”

“Bullshit. Why call her if you aren’t passing information?”

“Have you ever heard of having friends?” Luna throws her hands up in frustration. “I was proving to her that you haven’t tossed me in some dungeon and thrown away the key. And don’t worry, I didn’t tell her about when you did actually lock me up in some dungeon and throw away the key.”

I grimace. “You’re making me regret the decision to let you out every day.”

Her eyes narrow. “You may find this hard to believe, but people in my real life care about me. They want to make sure I’m okay.”

Real life. As if everything here has been some vacation from reality. Some break before she goes back to her shitty apartment and her shitty job and her shitty blind dates set up by her shitty best friend.

“There is no ‘real life’ without me. Don’t you get that? The only reason you’re still here is because I’m keeping you alive.” I snap. “Do your friends realize that a man was waiting outside your apartment the morning after we met? If they knew how quickly he would have shot you in the head and left you to die on the sidewalk, they’d be thanking me for everything I’ve done for you.”

Luna’s eyes are wide and her skin is pale. Fuck, I scared her.

I need her to wake up and realize how serious things are. She’s in danger and she needs to start fucking acting like it. But the look on her face dims the fire in my chest. I don’t want to lock her in a room; I want to drag her against my chest.

I take a concerted step back, my teeth grinding with the effort it takes to pull myself away. “Running away is a bad idea. If you leave this house, you’re going to get yourself killed.”

“Do you really think I’m trying to run away?”

“You’re sneaking around to call your friend and tricking my little sister into using her phone. Running away seems like the next step.”

“You think I’m—You told me to get close with Mariya. I’m doing that to help you.”

“And helping yourself along the way,” I bite out. “You’re smart, Luna. No survival instincts to speak of, but you know how to manipulate a situation to your advantage.”

She shrieks in sheer frustration. “You are so annoying!”

“Feeling is mutual.”

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