Page 78 of Tell Me Something True

Walsh brushed past him. “Changing.”

Miles stepped in front of the kid, blocking his path. “Take off.”

Walsh bristled. The anti-authority gene was strong in this one. “What?”“You can leave. I’ll get Tabitha home from Bissett’s.”

“No.”

“That wasn’t a request.”

“You going to arrest me?” When Miles remained silent, Walsh smirked. “Guess it’s a request after all.”

“What’ll it take?”

Christ, but he’d sunk low. Bartering with Reed Walsh. Willing to give him whatever he wanted short of breaking the law, going against the code of ethics, or anything having to do with his sister.

“Give me a reason.”

“What?” Miles asked.

“Give me a reason why I should step back. A good one.”

“I was thinking more along the lines of me giving you fifty bucks.”

The kid snorted. “Must be a Jennings family trait.”

Miles narrowed his eyes. What the hell did that mean?

“Better hurry up with that reason,” Walsh said, settling his hand on his dog’s head.

“We have a history,” Miles admitted. “Me and Tabitha.”

“From what I hear, you had a hook-up.”

His sister had a big mouth.

“I want to be the one to help her.”

He needed to be.

“Why don’t we wait until she gets down here?” Walsh asked. “Let her decide.”

They could do that. They should do that. Miles had no right to take this decision from her. To make it for her.

But he knew she’d say no.

From the look on Walsh’s face, he knew it, too.

Miles didn’t want to risk it.

“Please.”

It came out more growl than sound, but if Walsh’s shit-eating grin was anything to go by, he heard it crystal clear.

“Got you by the short hairs, doesn’t she?” Walsh murmured.

Miles’s first instinct was to deny it, but if there was one thing he knew, it was that too quick of a denial, too vehement of one, often came across as a lie.

Instead, he glanced pointedly at the living room window where Verity stood in the window watching them. “That really somewhere you want to go with me?”

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