Page 179 of Deceit

For either of us.

With a glass full of whiskey and a perfect view of Mills, I glare at him while Kyson bitches at me to behave. It’s Marty’s birthday, and Reagan and Stormi have spent days allegedly making it perfect.

I don’t care.

Mills is still alive—that’s all I give a shit about.

And he should be dead, cleaned out, and buried by now.

I watch Reagan coo over one of the babies, tucking her raven hair back to get a better look at them. Blue stands close by, holding the other and this is fucked up and not right.

“You got me?” Kyson presses, propping his elbow on the table next to me. “I don’t want to hear about this shit again.”

I’m assuming he’s talking about Mills still and myfirstattempt to kill him.

And I’d inquire on what the hell he’s going to do about it but I’ll have to have the same conversation with him in a few days when I try for round number two on my ex-teammate.

However, right now, I’m interested in Blue and her subtle change in hobbies.

Rising from my chair, I hear my best friend ask two or three more questions but I’m far past zoning him out.

His redheaded ass can wait.

The other redhead, the one who disappears and comes back without any recourse…something is going on.

Blue is the secretive member that no one bothers to crack—the outsider. And she’s the one I want to nab up before she flees in the dark again.

Her moss green eyes latch onto me the moment she senses immediate peril—me—and she turns to meet me head-on.

Blue has more balls than most of the guys in the Marines. I don’t know her backstory, never cared to discover or inquire about it, but she’s either stupidly foolish or clearly doesn’t give a shit if today’s her last day.

“Well, if it isn’t the Prodigal Son?” Slowly, she raises a brow, silently asking me what the fuck I want. “You should have your ass beat.”

I bring my glass up to my lips and shrug. “You wanna be the first?”

“Nah.” I watch her over the rim as the liquid warms the back of my throat. “I wanna be the last. You’ll remember it longer.”

A smirk creeps up my face. “At least I’m true to my intentions instead of being a poser.”

“A what?”

“Poser.”

Recognition begins to dawn on her face, and she nods. “I’m a fake because I like babies?” She squints at me, covering up whatever bullshit lie she’s hiding.

You see, Emmy used to do the same shit.

She’d try to distract me by biting down on her full bottom lip and fib her big ass right out of my prying.

And, yeah, I’d get absent-minded and forget what the hell I was even talking about. My cock would take over all question-asking, and sometimes it’d be days until I remembered that she never did answer the question in the first place.

That’s what Emmy was.

A deep-rooted and alluring creature who owned me. I was Emmy’s, and I’ve never been anyone else’s.

Not fully.

I will never belong to another human being, and I’ve got way too much time—the rest of my life—to feel the loss of Emmy.

---