Page 144 of Cruel Lies

"Why don’t you go back to where you came from, Harper?"

"Fuck you, you self-righteous prick. I didn’taskfor you all to care. I didn’t ask for you to save me. And I sure as fuck didn’t want any ofthis!"I threw my hands in the air and stormed away, hating the traitorous tears that spilled from my eyes the moment he could no longer see their existence.

Rowan didn’t follow me when I fled the rooftop. Obviously, if what we had was so easily shattered, perhaps it was better it ended this way. Maybe it was good that it had finally come to a head.

Happily ever after couldn’t last forever.

The walkhome alone was a lonely one. If I stayed a second more in the hospital, I would have broken apart, and as much as I hated what Rowan said, a part of it felt like a self-fulfilling prophecy.

I broke every single one of my own rules, and here I was, sad about the consequences that were the whole reason I’d made the fucking guidelines for my life all those years ago.

Loving the Blackwood boys brought you nothing but trouble, pain, and sadness when it all came tumbling down.

I ended up back at the Blackwood estate somehow, though if pressed, I’d tell you I didn’t remember taking a single step in this direction. My feet simply carried me on autopilot, back to the place I’d been so scared to step foot in after my mother died. My hands fell to the pistols I’d tucked into my waistband after liberating them from the hospital security, patting them for reassurance. Each one had five more bullets loaded and ready to go, and though I knew it was dangerous, I hadn’t bothered to put the safety on.

I was prepared.

I came back here for something specific. One thing, and one thing only.

A blade with my name on it.

The house was encircled in police tape, and though in an ordinary town there would be cops crawling all over the place, in Port Wylde, it was just another night. Only two officers were on site, and one of them, I recognized from the rendezvous with Lilly when we were setting up the lojack software to unearth the Blackwood secrets.

"Detective McCoy," I called out, waving him over with a look of indifference on my face. I had to school my features, so as not to give away the death spiral my brain was currently gearing up for.

The cop wandered over alone, leaving his colleague to take notes on the crime scene outside. His relaxed demeanor did nothing to calm me.

"You’re Lilly’s little protege, aren’t you?" he asked slowly, staring at the smeared face paint and my still-bloody jacket. "Thought you’d be at the hospital."

"I came back for something I left behind in the chaos," I replied dryly, ducking under the yellow tape line.

"Lead the way," he said simply, not a trace of sarcasm in hisvoice as I strode with a purpose through a police crime scene, uncaring of the stares and confused looks thrown my way.

Keehn McCoy stopped at the door to the study, his eyes anywhere but on me. "You here to clean up the blood or something?" he joked, clearly uncomfortable. I didn’t respond, grimacing as I knelt next to the desk and lifted a matte black blade from a puddle of blood.

Nash’s blood.

Nash’s blood.

Fuck.

Don’t fall to pieces yet, bitch. Keep it together. You’re not done yet.

I wiped the blade on my pants and waved it in Detective McCoy’s direction, feigning a half-ass smile. "Forgot my blade. You won’t mind if I take this with me, will you?"

His eyes fell to where one of my hands rested over my now-throbbing wound, which I was sure I’d reopened. "You get that checked out at the hospital?"

"No need," I muttered, gently shoving past him. "I wasn’t the one who was hurt."

"Look pretty hurt to me."

Keep your nose on your face, pig,I wanted to say. I wanted to tell him I didn’t need his sympathy or his concern. Instead, I just shrugged, leaving him standing alone in the hallway as I made my way out of the house of fucking horrors of my past and down the parkway into the night, nothing more than one more shadow, one more ghost.

FIFTY-SEVEN

ROWAN

I spenta few agonizing days at the hospital, waiting for my brothers to wake up. Multiple days of beating myself up over their condition. Several long days of nothing but my own thoughts to keep me company.

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