Page 34 of Vengeful Secret

Gray and I have never been friends. We’ve always been more, and after we hooked up the other night...

“You’re old friends,” Lara drawls, looking at me with a little smirk.

What is that supposed to mean? Does she suspect that Gray and I used to date? We kept it under wraps from his family and mine, but…

I breathe in deep and let it out through my nostrils.

“Sure, we are.” I have no idea what she’s getting at.

“Would you like to come to the in-house theater tonight? Watch a movie with me and Bree? You’ll love her; I promise.”

“Maybe.” After this long day, do I want to continue it by being social? “Any way you could show me to the guest room?”

“Oh, sure.” She stands up and leads me out into the hallway. “You’ll have your pick of suites.”

I’m a little surprised by how ornate and fancy everything is at the Burke mansion. I know Gray doesn’t have any money issues, but this is evenmorethan I thought..

Walking through the house and seeing just how high the ceilings are, just how fancy all the furniture. Individual suites instead of guest rooms? It’s crazy.

There are portraits on the wall, a big one of Gray’s mother, who has his green eyes.

I look up at it, and Lara hums in the back of her throat.

“She’s so beautiful, right?” she murmurs, looking up at the portrait. “I’ve always been jealous that Paige looks more like her than I do.”

I look up at the portrait, at the matriarch’s long, slender frame, the elegant way she holds herself. She’s got a perfect bone structure that’s reflected in Lara’s face.

“You do look like her. You’ve got the same nose, same bone structure.”

Lara beams at me. “You really think so?”

“I do.” I smile back at her, and she looks up at her mother with the most intense expression of longing I’ve ever seen.

I open my mouth to speak, to ask if she’s okay, but then she just moves past me and opens the door to one of the suites.

I peer inside.

The king-sized bed sits in the corner of the room, and there’s a desk on the opposite wall with a full PC. There’s also a flat-screen television hanging on the wall opposite the bed, and when I walk further inside, I notice a walk-in closet and ahugebathroom with a big clawfoot tub and a half-shower.

“This is perfect,” I murmur, and Lara grins at me.

“You haven’t even seen the others. There’s one closer to the pool?—”

“I don’t have to. This is wonderful. Thank you, Lara.” I clear my throat. “I should go, do some packing.”

“Would you like me to come with you? I could meet the little one.”

I think about it.

It would certainly be nice to have someone to help me carry things and watch out for Ciara, but I don’t think I want Lara to meet her before Gray does. He’s the one going to all this trouble.

I shake my head. “I need to talk to her first. You know, prepare her for meeting new people, being in a new space.”

“Oh, of course.”

Lara walks me downstairs to the door and waves at me from the porch as I get into my car.

I leave the mansion with a sense of something like dread washing over me.

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