Page 163 of Lush

My gaze flicked to the table beside me, where two plates sat, remnants of a meal still clinging to them. The silverware wasstacked, a half-full glass of wine and a half a cup of milk still waiting to be finished.

“Why are you really doing this, Nina?”

“I already told you,” she snapped. “You killed Conrad.”

“Has it been you the entire time?” My voice was quiet but steady. “The notes. The photos. The threats…” I swallowed. “The car crash?”

Nina’s expression filled with satisfaction. “You and your damn family, pushing him, controlling him, suffocating him until there was nothing left of who he was. You were his fiancée. Not me. And you never deserved him.”

My engagement to Conrad had been more of a formality—it had never been about love, not for me. But for Nina…

“Helovedme,” she hissed. “Not you. Never you.”

Oh my God.

“How long?”

Nina’s fingers flexed on the gun, her jaw tight.

“Longer than you,” she said. “Long enough for him toneedme before you ever got your claws in him.”

I stared at her, the pieces clicking into place.

Did Reese know? Pauline? Harold or Jennie?

My stomach turned. “When, Nina?”

Her lips curled into something almost smug. “Eight years ago.”

I felt the floor tilt beneath me. That meant?—

“And yet, you got to be the fiancée.”

“How? When?” I asked. Why hadn’t Conrad come forward with her? Why did he agree to marry me?

Nina began to pace in front of me. Swinging the gun back and forth in her hand.

“Two years before…you, he hired me as an assistant. I was just a nobody fresh out of school. But I was smart, and I wasgood, and he saw that.” Her voice dropped, turning almost dreamy. “It started slow. Late nights. Takeout in his office. A hand on my back when I did something right. Then one night,we were celebrating a big deal, just the two of us, I kissed him first. I knew he wanted me, but he wouldn’t cross that line—so I did it for him.”

I clenched my jaw, heart pounding.

“That night was the first of many. We were careful. Secretive. But when we were together, it was real. I knew him in a way you never did.”

“Then why did you both never take it public?”

“You think I didn’twantto?” she snapped.

I held her gaze, ignoring the way my pulse hammered in my throat.Keep her talking. Keep her distracted.“So why didn’t he?”

“Because he couldn’t. Harold made that clear. He had a plan for Conrad, and I was never part of it. Conrad had to marry someone with money, not a poor girl from Kansas like me. He told him—straight to his face—that if he married someone like me, he could kiss the company goodbye.” Her lips curled. “Butyou? You were perfect. Lush royalty. You had the name, the connections, the pedigree.”

The gun in her hand wavered slightly as she spoke, her fingers tightening and loosening around the grip.What a fucking bastard.

I shifted slightly in the chair, careful not to move too fast. “You think Iaskedfor the engagement?”

“Conrad had a plan. He was gonna get us out of here. He was giving me money… Then it stopped.” Her head snapped toward me, eyes narrowing. “The second he put that ring on your finger, he changed. Stopped calling. Stopped looking at me like I washis.”

“We were trying to find a way out,” I told her. “Reese and I.”

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