Page 67 of Lies Like Love

“If that’s what it takes to protect her.” His gaze moves once more to Fel, standing across the lawn. Her eyes haven’t left the casket. “She’s not like you—or like any of us. She has a chance to be better. But if you tell her what your father did. Or the real reason her mother killed herself, she’ll hang onto that pain until it eats her alive. Her grandmother and I are here now to make sure she lives a good, normal life. You need to let that happen. There’s still too much neither of you understand.”

“She’ll hate me.”

She already does, I feel it in the way she screamed the last time I saw her. The way her bloody hands shook. The way her eyes were oceans freezing over.

“She will.” The fact that he agrees makes my gut sink. “But it’s better than her hating herself.”

With a final slap on my shoulder, her grandfather walks away. And I’m frozen in place as her mother’s plot fills with people. The priest arrives, and even if I can’t hear his words, the mood in the cemetery shifts. Only then does Fel look up, her eyes finding me across the distance.

She holds my stare so long I feel every bone in her body breaking under the weight of losing her only other parent. I watch as everything we thought this could be shreds around us.

The girl in the library and the boy who thought he stood a chance in a world of monsters vaporize.

I stare at her long enough to feel her blame crawl like a being across the cemetery toward me. And I accept it. I can’t escape what’s happened. But she can.

And maybe someday, I’ll be able to help her understand why her grandfather is right.

I can’t stay if it means I’ll hurt her more.

21

Fel

Marenrarelycomeshomeon Friday and Saturday nights, so it’s playing with fire to invite Jude in. Knowing, the two of us alone is an explosion waiting to happen. Knowing, his suit is a mask for the wicked beneath.

So why do I widen the door enough for him to follow me? Tempting us both to get lost among the trees.

Jude closes the door behind him, and when I spin, I’m met with a smug expression.

“I’m still mad at you.” I strip off my coat and hang it on a hook by the doorway.

Jude watches my every move. His gaze wandering the full length of my body, before pausing on where my bare thigh peeks through a slit in the fabric.

This dress might be over the top, but I don’t mind the attention I’ve been getting in it.

“Could have sent me home.” He smirks. “So why didn’t you?”

The condescension. Always reading me easily, while he’s a closed book.

“Why?” I plant a finger on his chest, and the contact alone makes me feel out of breath. “Because hating you never changes anything, Jude. So why bother?”

“Meaning.” He steps in close enough that it forces my hand flat on his hard chest, and I have to drop it before I lose all composure.

Jude in a suit is temptation enough. But now, stripped of his jacket, sleeves rolled up to show off his thick, tattooed forearms, my head spins.

“You never stop playing games, do you? And I never stop falling for them.”

A truth that hurts more than I’d like to admit.

I could have sent him home; I could end our arrangement at the shop. I could stop putting myself in positions where there’s no escaping his magnetic draw. But I don’t.

“Is it really that easy for you to see me again after all these years and act like nothing ever happened?” I let out a defeated breath. “One minute you’re pinning me to a wall and kissing me, and the next you’re plotting in a corner with my grandfather. One minute you’ve got me naked in your bed and the next you’re slamming the door in my face.”

The last part stings because if I’m honest with myself, it hurt more than anything else. He got what he wanted—proof I’ve always been a mess for him. Evidence that no matter how angry he makes me, I can’t resist. Then he walked away.

I take a step back, but he steps forward to meet me. There’s never escaping quicksand.

“You done?” His tone is sharp when he has no right.

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