Page 43 of Lie to Me

And no matter how much I tell myself he doesn’t matter; I know it’s a lie.

Despite everything he just said to me, there’s still a part of me that clings to the man he has been the last six months. The man who took care of me, the man who kissed my forehead and whispered sweet nothings in my ear. The man who actually treat me with respect. The man who was my damn lifeline.

But the man I believed him to be was a lie.

It was all a fucking lie.

The time we spent together, the conversations we had, the secrets we shared, all nothing but lies.

Lie to me, Marco.

My whispered words from the night we first spoke play on a loop in my mind and I curse myself for my stupidity. I guess this is my fault as much as it is his. After all, I’m the one who started this game between us. I’m the one who asked him to lie to me, he just took it further than I ever could have imagined.

Chapter Twenty

Marco

Present

He’s late.

Finn has been coming to meet us at our warehouse for the last few weeks whenever we’ve needed to have meetings regarding business. It started off as some sort of show of good faith, then it just became a regular meeting place.

And not once has he ever been late.

I don’t have too long to ponder over it, though, because just as I’m thinking about it, the man himself strolls in the room to find me and Luca sitting on the couch waiting for him, a fire burning behind his eyes.

“Sorry I’m late,” he grunts. “Sloane was catching me up on what’s been going on.”

I nod silently, thankful she finally decided to tell her brother what’s been happening.

“You pissed we didn’t tell you?” Luca asks.

Finn seems to think the question over for a moment before shaking his head. “No. I know my sister and she’s stubborn as hell. You did the right thing, thank you.”

We both nod, and just like that, the topic is dropped.

We update Finn on what happened that night at the docks that resulted in me being shot.

Spoiler alert—being shot fucking sucks. Luckily, I was only shot in the shoulder and it didn’t do any permanent damage. It’s painful as hell and I don’t have my full range of motion back yet, but it’s getting there.

The first few days were a struggle. My family adamantly refused to let me work; Enzo and Robyn even going as far to come and stay at my place with me for the first two nights I was home, no matter how much I told them I would be fine.

I didn’t like sharing my space, but I knew they were trying to make up for the fact that the bullet was meant for Enzo, with Robyn thanking me profusely and my brother not letting me out of his sight for the first few hours, constantly telling me I was an idiot, to which I told him his wife and baby needed him more than anyone needed me.

He refused that, too, of course.

We tell Finn about what Izzy found regarding whoever hired the guys to deliver the notes to Sloane and attack us, and we decide that while Izzy will continue to attempt to trace the online payments, we’ll all keep diligent. Finn also tells us that he has guards on Sloane, which I’m fucking thankful for. I don’t know if she noticed anyone looking out for her these past few days, but I couldn’t just leave her to fend for herself.

We’ve had a deal in place with Finn for around six months now. We provide him with firearms and weapons at a discountedrate in exchange for him keeping an ear on the other organizations, to make sure they don’t get any stupid ideas about trying to go to war with us again. And if they do, we’ll have Finn and the rest of the Irish on our side.

Just as we’re closing the meeting, Finn gets to his feet and runs a hand through his hair, looking out of the window with a sigh before shooting me a pointed look.

“I’m going out of town tonight for a few days for business…” He trails off and me and Luca shoot each other a look, silently asking why the hell he’s telling us this.

“Did you know it’s supposed to storm tonight?” he asks, and with another look in my direction, he spins around and leaves the room, leaving me and Luca to stare at his retreating form.

“Did he really just start talking about the weather?” he asks in disbelief.

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