Page 183 of Deceit

I steel my spine of things I already know. “I’m still not watching your kids.” Atlas blinks at me, and I swear she’s mocking me.

“Mills.” Blue’s voice comes from behind me before a bottle is shoved in my chest. “Feed her.”

The fuck?

“Four blacked-out SUVs just rolled up at Reagan’s house.” That immediately gains both Mills and my attention.

Marty’s cabin is tucked in the woods, a football field away from Reagan’s. He gets his mail there, which obviously hints that someone looked for him as well knew we’d be here.

“Mills,” Marty sneers, marching towards us, his face clouded in anger. “Why didn’t you tell me that you were going to make me Atlas’s godfather? I had to find the shit out from my sister?”

My face twists because who the hell cares, and Mills flatly ignores him, waiting on Blue to give him more details.

“Let’s go back to Marty’s house,” she says. “I saw it on the security camera and—“

“Wait, wait,” Marty chimes, holding out his hand, then pulls out his cell. “You mean the four Suburbans that just joined the party?”

Mills frowns. “Yeah.”

“I was going to bring that up after I bitched at you about the Atlas thing. If you keep this shit up, I’m not going to ask you to be Blair’s.”

“Do Ilooklike I give a fuck?” Mills storms out. “Who the hell is in the trucks?”

“I don’t know, but I got excited to get my hands on someone for my birthday. Who cares who they are.”

“Because I got a psychopath after mykids.”

“No one is going to take them.” The look on Marty’s face is one of absolute serenity, which, in all honesty, is bugging the shit out of me too. “I got this place rigged.”

“So what you mean to say is that you’re going to blow us all up in the process?” Blue inquires at my side. “Let me grab a drink first.”

Marty narrows his eyes at the redhead. “There are kids running around here so no,Blue,there aren’t any land mines next to the swing set.”

“How about we find out who the hell is here?” Mills wraps up. “Fucking A, man. You guys are…annoying.” Marty and Blue begin to chuckle collectively when Marty’s palm slams into the back of Mills’s shoulders.

“Now you know how we feel, asshole.” He jerks his head. “C’mon, let’s go have some fun.”

They proceed to follow Marty when Blue scoops Atlas out of my arms and gently places her back in her bassinet.

“Hey Rea,” Blue calls out to Marty’s sister. “We’re gonna go smoke. Need you on kid duty.” Reagan waves her off in acknowledgment, and Blue nudges me in the ribs. “Now you can really get some built-up aggression out.”

Once we breach around the woods to get to the side of Reagan’s house—so that we’re not giving away the direction we came in—Mills is already in a guy’s face wearing a suit.

It doesn’t take a brain scientist to know that it’s Alexander.

Blue and I close the distance between him and Marty. And the closer I get is when I can make out everything he’s blabbering about—nervously.

I can’t say that I’ve ever heard Mills break and not be as obnoxiously confident as he always is.

However, he’s got a lot on the line, and if he fails, it’s something I know he’s not willing and ready to pay.

“Get it through your entitled fucking head,” he storms. “Those kids aren’t yours. How many more DNA tests do you need? I thought you spoke and read English, bruh.”

Blue stops short of a few feet from Mills to keep a broader watch on the area, and I—for some fucking reason—stand at Mill’s right.

Maybe it’s because I’m used to doing it like a bad habit. Or that Mills is currently taking on the man who didn’t deserve Emmy in the first place. The rich and entitled prick that she always claimed she’d never be with.

“No need to yell, Mr. Mills,” Alexander articulates slowly. “I just need to make sure I’m protected and—“

---