Page 25 of The Devil's Daughter

“Ellie, did you…” He snaps his mouth shut as if the words are too foul to speak, and I can almost taste the bitterness on my own tongue. But I can’t leave him hanging.

“I didn’t fuck Drake,” I say. Elle shoots me a confused look that disappears a split-second later when she catches on.

“Baz, it just happened—please don’t be mad. He was having a nightmare. I couldn’t just let him suffer.”

My brother’s shock and hurt digs deep, leaving me wishing I’d blamed Drake after all. I’m such a fucking idiot sometimes.

“I… I can’t look at you two right now. I just can’t…” Baz pushes his half-full plate away and slides his chair back, standing so fast the chair tips over. He runs up the steps onto the upper deck, taking them two at a time until he disappears around the corner.

“Fuck,” I mutter, closing my eyes and slumping back.

“Go talk to him,” Elle says. “And for the record, I don’t think we should lie about what really happened. It’ll just piss him off more if he finds out.”

“What the fuck do you want me to tell him? That I broke every rule in the book last night by sleeping with you two?”

“We can’t undo it, Ben. Tell him whatever you think you need to, but he deserves to know the truth.”

I toss down my napkin and stand, pausing to upright the chair he left behind before following him. I find him pulling a Rose fromTitanic, standing at the rail facing into the wind, looking every bit as if he might just dive into the water.

He tenses as I approach, and I feel that tightness reflected in my own body. We are too in tune with each other sometimes, to the point that right now I can taste the acrid jealousy he must be feeling, because I sure as shit know how I’d feel if the tables were turned.

I grip the rail next to him, offering my excuses to the wind. “She’s not lying. I wasn’t in a good place, and she was there for me. I lost control, and the next thing I knew, I was waking up naked beside her.”

His brows twitch and he gives me a worried look. “How bad did you lose control?”

I shake my head and take in a sharp breath. “Nothing as bad as you’re thinking. You saw her. Does she look traumatized?”

He snorts and shakes his head. “She looks… happy.” Then he heaves a sigh and slouches back against the rail with a scowl. “I hate you right now.”

“You shouldn’t. She wanted you there. She even said as much… suggested we call you, make you fly up last night instead of this morning.” I doubt that’s the piece oftruthElle was suggesting I share, but it’s a piece that’ll soften the blow of the other one when he finds out.

He frowns and jerks his head to the side in disbelief. “You’re fucking with me.”

“You can ask her. You know she’ll be straight with you—she always has been. More than with me, anyway. You’re the one she always talks to.” I can’t conceal a hint of bitterness in my tone. Baz closes his eyes and chuckles.

“You always hated that, but I was never going to shut her out. I hope you know that.”

“I know. So don’t shut her out now.”

He turns back around, staring off into the distance toward the rolling hills of Catalina Island. I can predict the trajectory of his thoughts as if they were my own, and I’m not surprised when he lets out another sigh and shakes his head.

“Knowing itcouldhappen is enough. But it can’t. Not for me, and not again for you. I’m sorry,hermano, but you need to let her go, at least for now. We need to stay focused on the job. We can’t protect her if our heads are clouded by emotion.”

“My thoughts exactly. Did you make any headway last night? Do you know who’s targeting Drake?”

He takes a breath and shakes his head. “I found out a few things that don’t add up. Someone’s trying to blackmail him into stepping down as CEO of Typhon. Whoever’s doing that is the one behind the cameras. He wouldn’t move us here so fucking fast if he wasn’t freaked out about it, but I’m not convinced he’s not into something messed up that put us in this position. I just wish he’d come clean about what it all means to him. He has to have some idea who’d do this.”

“My gut says we can trust him, even if he’s being tight-lipped about his past,” I say, though I’m not about to explain that the real reason I trust Drake has more to do with how he looks at Elle than anything else. He’s falling for her as hard as Baz and I did ages ago. Why that doesn’t incite any kind of possessive, jealous urge in me, I’m not sure I’m prepared to examine though. “What’d you find out?”

“I’m not ready to give him the benefit of the doubt yet. Let’s head back down. I need to talk to him, see what he has to say about the things I uncovered.”

Worried now, I follow him back down the narrow steps to the main deck, only to stop short when he blocks the path at the bottom of the stairs, staring at the table.

Drake’s there now, his chair canted toward Elle’s, their heads bent close, foreheads nearly touching. It’s such an intimate pose, there’s no way in hell Baz is going to interpret it any way but one.

“Brother, what the fuck actually happened while I was gone?”

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