Page 130 of Under the Lies

Pulling away, I give him a fiery stare. He doesn’t get to act all casual and sensual. “Someone’s ego is hungry tonight.”

Noah doesn’t heed the warning in my tone. He shifts closer, his body curving around mine. “Admit it, Sayer. You missed me.”

His lips press down on the curve of my neck, they feel like venom.

“No.” My teeth grind together as my hands go to Noah’s chest, giving him a shove with each word. “I.” Shove. “Didn’t.”

He barely moves, barely shifts his weight.

I shove again.

Leather gloves cover my bare, cold fingers, keeping them on his chest. “For someone who didn’t miss me, you are protesting quite vocally.”

“That’s because I’m pissed!” I shout, the sound echoing around us. In a lower voice, I add, “I’m pissed that you left to go after my sister and haven’t told me anything.” You left me.

His eyes soften while his words are still sharp. “I don’t report to you.”

“We’re partners in this,” I remind him. “You don’t get to keep me in the dark.”

“I will if I need to, Sayer. If it means keeping you safe, then you bet your ass I will,” he tells me. “If I could, I’d lock you in my home until this is all over.”

My already narrowed gaze hardens like steel. “I dare you.”

“You really want to make that bet?” He steps closer.

A disgusted noise escapes my throat as I push him away. “You don’t…”

My voice trails off as his face shifts, catching the light from the lamppost.

“What happened?” I whispered, taking in his bruised face, the swelling around his eye.

With a tentative hand, I reach up to touch it only for him to grab it with his, pulling it to our sides. “You’re shivering.”

He tries to pull me toward him, but I’m not having it. I step away from his touch. “Did you find her?”

He freezes, eyes narrowing.

“If I did, we wouldn’t be here right now.”

It feels like a punch in my throat, in my gut. Of course we wouldn’t be here. Because I’m nothing more than a means to an end.

Seeing my reaction, his jaw hardens, hands flexing at his sides, but he doesn’t try to reach for me again. He doesn’t say anything.

Good. I’d probably knee him in the groin if he did.

Words don’t begin to cover how I feel right now, crashing into the deep abyss of the sea with nothing to rescue me.

“C’mon, let’s go home.” He starts to walk away, expecting me to follow, which I do. If only because I’ve lost feeling in my fingers and I refuse to lose any of them because I was too stubborn and too naive to let Noah worm his way into a place he had no business being in the first place.

Tonight I’m on a date with a devil.

A devil with black-framed glasses and a tailored suit to be exact.

I’ve tried to ignore the little stab in my chest, tried to ignore it all day. Tried to ignore it for a couple days. Ever since he came back empty from his manhunt of my sister.

Apparently, the lead Noah was given was a cold one, taking him and Reeve all the way to Maine for nothing.

Now he’s in a frantic search to find her. And I’ve become background noise, competing with the newest houseguest of Hotel Kincaid—the ghost of my sister.

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