Page 139 of Tell Me Something True

“Get what?”

The kid smirked at Greer. “Told you.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Greer said slowly, thoughtfully, as she studied Miles like she’d just returned from a little stroll through his head where she’d seen every thought he’d ever had. Felt every one of his emotions. “My guess is that Assistant Chief Jennings knows more about it than we realize.”

Something in her expression had him hesitating.

His mother used to warn him about asking questions he wasn’t ready to hear the answers to.

But his curiosity and pride wouldn’t let him let it go.

“More about what?”

Her eyes softened, her mouth twisting in a sympathetic smile. “Loneliness.”

Miles felt like he’d just been punched in the gut.

Damn if that hadn’t been a direct hit.

“It’s the sweet-acting ones you have to watch out for,” Walsh said, as if imparting some hard-won, smartass wisdom.

The kid was right.

Miles hadn’t thought Greer was a threat, yet she’d laid him out with one simple word. One simple, undeniable fact about himself.

He was lonely.

And it was clear enough for this nineteen-year-old with her bubbly chatter, dimpled smile, and neck tattoo to see.

“I don’t act sweet,” Greer told Walsh, “I am sweet. I can be both a delight and a speaker of hard truths. It’s part of my charm. I’m also incredibly good at reading people.”

“And modest,” Walsh muttered flatly as he poured spiced rum into glasses.

“Speaker of truths, remember? False modesty is the worst. Besides, it’s not vain to know your strengths or your own worth. I know mine. Just as I know my weaknesses and my fears.” Picking up the tray, she gave Walsh, then Miles, a glance that was somehow pitying and condescending at the same time. “You both might want to work on learning yours. Remember, if you want love, any kind of love, you have to learn to love yourself first. Flaws, mistakes, fears and all.”

Miles and Walsh both stared at her as she walked away—Walsh with a flinty gaze and tight jaw, Miles with his mouth hanging open.

Guess Verity wasn’t the only teenager in town who could leave him speechless.

“What the hell,” Miles asked Walsh, “was that?”

The kid gave an irritated shrug. “Fuck if I know.”

“That,” Hayden piped up, as if she’d not only been privy to their conversation, but a part of it all along and not pulling beers, mixing drinks, and taking orders the whole time, “was you getting schooled by a nineteen-year-old.”

He jerked his head in Walsh’s direction. “He got schooled, too.”

She waved that off with one hand. “Pfft. He’s a child.”

Walsh glared at her, then stomped off down the bar to take another order without a word or backward glance.

Miles glanced back at Tabitha, still unable to see her fully, but taking in the parts he could see. Her high-heeled, wedge sandals on the rung of her stool and the dark denim of her jeans, the frayed hem ending an inch above her ankle. The curve of her hip when she straightened. The flash of the rings on her fingers when she reached for her drink. Her fucking elbow as she lifted a hand to flip her hair off her shoulder.

“Why don’t you ask what you really want to know?” Hayden asked him.

Still taking in those pieces of Tabitha, as if they were all he was ever going to get, all he deserved at this point, he shook his head. “I can’t.”

He had too many questions. Wanted to know too many things that were none of his business. Answers he had no right to.

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