Page 152 of Tempting Fate

My head spins with all the possible implications of Zeke’s threats.

I slide down the wall and hug my knees to my chest.

I feel so stupid.

After all my promises to trust Zeke, I fell at the first hurdle.

I believed the worst in him without question.

Thought he was done with me.

But what if this is still part of the game we’re playing to save the Shamrocks?

As quickly as that hope dawns, it dies. The man in question stomps out of the chapel. His stride falters to a stop when he sees me. I peer up at Zeke, expecting to see something more than indifference in his expression now we’re alone. All I find is the same blank look he had when he told my father our separation is permanent.

“What are you doin’?” he demands.

“I don’t know.”

Dropping to his haunches in front of me, Zeke pinches my chin in an unforgiving grip. He tilts my head from side to side, apparently checking out how well my damage is healing. This time, I allow myself to breathe him in.

I inhale his distinctive scent.

Leather. Amber. Spice. Zeke. Home.

It settles over me like a blanket, calming my racing heart.

“Leave, Lilianna,” Zeke tells me in a voice designed to chastise an unruly child. His use of my real name turns my stomach. “You don’t have a place here anymore.”

With a hiss, I wrench my chin free of his fingers. “I hate you.”

For the first time since I laid eyes on him at the cemetery earlier this afternoon, emotion flickers in Zeke’s expression.

He smiles. “Good.”

I shove him onto his arse and run out of the clubhouse without a backward glance.

Somehow, Nadia finds me as I push my way through the people milling through the now-open gates. She takes one look at my tear-stained face and the way I’m favouring my ribs and leads me over to her little red hatchback. Once I’m ensconced in the passenger seat, she dashes around the bonnet and slides behind the wheel.

“What happened?”

“Zeke.”

“Did he say something to you?”

I hug myself around the waist as Nadia pulls out onto the main road. “Not really. Just told Dad that we’re permanently over. Nothing I didn’t already know…”

“Then why are you crying? I thought we agreed you’d play this cool—show him that you don’t care.”

“He smiled when I told him I hate him.”

My best friend stomps the brakes and careens into the next side street without using her indicator. Horns blast. Someone shouts at us. Cool as a cucumber, Nadia simply rolls to a stop, knocks the gear lever into park, then turns her entire body to face me.

“He’s hiding something,” she declares. Her eyes are wild as her mind runs through a dozen hare-brained schemes until she settles on the one she likes the most. “And you’re going to get it out of him.”

Shaking my head, I slink down in my seat. “Why would I do that? He’s made it clear he’s done with me.”

“What if he’s only pretending… like you both did when you faked your break-up to get out of the compound?”

---