Page 124 of Tangled In Lies

“Come on, I wanna show you.”

Reluctantly, I follow him downstairs to his domain. Holden’s pride and joy. I let him have full rein, and he transformed the room closest to the garage into a state-of-the-art security office, complete with an entire wall of monitors. When we enter, Niko and Darrell look up from their chairs, mumbling greetings.

Holden nods toward the door and says, “Time for a coffee break.”

They hurry out of the room with a curt, “Yes, sir.”

Holden points toward the middle screen in the top row, but I’ve already found her.

Eve is in the music room, sitting at the piano. And she’s playing.

“She’s been in there for the past hour.” Holden sits in one of the unoccupied chairs, leaving me to stand alone.

“Can you turn it up?” I stare at the screen, unable to tear my gaze away from her.

“Sure. One sec.” He clicks some buttons until music fills the room.

The melody is unfamiliar, but I’m immediately captivated by it. It’s different from anything I’ve ever heard before. It starts sad and heavy but evolves into a happier, lighter tune. The music stops, and Eve takes her hands off the keys to write on a piece of paper. Then, she’s back to playing the same melody as before but with a slight change toward the end.

My head snaps to Holden. “She’s not just playing but composing?”

His grin is answer enough, but he nods anyway. “It seems like it.”

My lips part, and I’m back to staring at the screen.

We’re both quiet, content to watch her.

But Holden wouldn’t be Holden if he could keep his mouth shut for long.

He clears his throat. “Something is different about her this morning. She came downstairs to get food before she practically skipped into the music room. Even when she was slamming the door in my face, she kept smiling and bouncing on her feet like an excited kid on Christmas morning.”

I smile at his description, having witnessed Eve like that before.

He scoffs. “She must have had areallygood night for her to be in such a good mood.”

Last night wasn’t just really good but incredible. Life-changing. For both of us, and for more reasons than just mind-blowing sex. I can’t even describe it, nor will I try to explain it to Holden, but something big happened. I still feel it.

“We had a good night,” I ignore his snort, “but her behavior isn’t about that. This is about her music. She’d get like this whenever she had an idea for a new song. It lights her up from the inside, and she can’t fully contain it. Some people are meant to shine like that.”

This time, Holden doesn’t give me a snarky reply, so I look at him. He’s wearing an odd expression, like something I said upset him.

He lets out a sigh. “Yeah, I know what you mean.”

The way he says it makes it sound like there’s a storybehind it, but movement on the screen catches my eye before I can dig deeper.

Eve stands and stretches her arms overhead, leaning from one side to the other.

“What the fuck?” I see red and yank open the door to run upstairs. Why does she have so much skin on display?

I get to the music room just as Eve opens it. Her eyes go wide for a split second until she realizes it’s me, and she gives me one ofmybroad smiles. It brightens her whole face, and it’s pretty much impossible to be mad or irritated with her.

Before I can say anything, she jumps into my arms. “Hey.”

Everything is forgotten the moment I catch her.

With her body flush with mine, my fingertips find the bare skin of her thighs. Eve is busy devouring my lips and digging her hands into the hair at my nape. It’s wild and chaotic. Exhilarating. It’s everything.

I walk us forward until I find purchase against the wall, needing to feel her even closer. I want to crawl under her skin to ensure my blood runs in her veins as strongly as hers runs in mine.

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