Page 39 of Liar's Heart
Ender chuffs a laugh. “To a meeting that puts him in the same space as Lennon? Yeah, Ro’ll be there.”
My eyebrows lift in surprise. “So it's like that, huh?”
A devilish little smirk forms on my husband's lips. “Well, for him, it is. He said he made a pass at her at the wedding and was shut down hard.”
That makes me giggle. “I'm not surprised at all. She's, uh, a wild one for sure. But if it's more than just a hookup, she loves a good game of cat and mouse. She'll string him along just to see what he does.”
Ender hums. “Noted.”
“Are you gonna tell him?” I ask.
“And spoil our fun? Absolutely not.”
I give him a playful little nudge with my elbow, which makes him laugh. His abs flex as his chest shakes, and I can't help but drink in the sight of him. This man is mine. All mine. Every glorious, inked inch of him. Which reminds me… “What’s up with the sphinxes?”
He looks a little confused, probably due to the abrupt shift in conversation, so I clarify, “Your tattoos. The painting in your office. They mean something to you.”
Ender clears his throat. “Yeah. Sphinxes usually guard crossroads, stopping travelers to ask them riddles. If you answer correctly, you're allowed to pass. Answer incorrectly, and the sphinx devours you. The tattoos are for my mom and Ox. Two times, I couldn't answer the riddle, and it cost me a life.”
My heart hits my ribcage, and a pang shoots through my chest. “It wasn’t your fault. You know that, right? It's not your fault they died. It’s his.”
“It is his,” he agrees. “But I still have to live with it. I still have to wonder if there was anything I could have done, anything I missed that I shouldn't have.”
I roll over and wrap my arms around my husband's chest, hugging him fiercely. “We're going to end this, End. We're going to put his heart on our mantle as a reminder he can't hurt you or anyone else ever again.”
His arms wrap around me, squeezing me back just astightly. He tucks my head under his chin and says, “We'll put it under glass with a little plaque. Make a whole display out of it.”
He says it with confidence, with that light, almost bored tone he wields so well. But it's a long time before either of us lets go of the other.
I stare down the dark screen on my phone like I'm sizing up a new opponent. It's sitting on the coffee table in front of me, innocuous as ever, while I sit on the couch and try to will myself to pick it up and call Len. As confident as I was when I told Ender she'd be fine earlier, I’ve still been dragging my feet to make this call all day. But it's early evening now. Ender's gone down to the gym to give me some privacy, and I have run out of stalling tactics. I have something to drink. I'm in comfy clothes. I don't have to go to the bathroom.
Time to grow a pair.
Before I can talk myself out of it, I snatch the phone up, pull up Len's contact, and hit the call button. The phone rings twice, and I start to wonder if I'll have to work up the nerve to do this all over again when she picks up. “Hey, Mer. What's up?”
I swing my legs around to tuck underneath me. “Hey. I need to talk. You got a minute?”
“Yeah, just…” I hear rustling in the background. “Let me get to my room. I just got in and want to change.” I'm sure that's true, but her room is also private. She's trying to get somewhere she can speak freely.
“No problem.” While she walks, I stick with safe conversation. “I'm so excited to see you. Youhave no idea.”
“Bitch, I do because I'm just as excited to see you. It feels like it's been six hundred years.”
Her dramatics always make me laugh. “Maybe we should find you a dick-straction to take your mind off my absence if it's that bad.”
She scoffs. “I've found plenty of those. Don’t you worry about that. There's not enough dick in the world to console me from the loss of my daily Mer-bear fix.”
“Maybe you need to find better dick,” I counter.
She barks a laugh. “Probably. Okay,” she says, and I hear a door close. “I'm good. What's up?”
Len's the one person in this world I don't have to worry about softening the blow with, so I don't. “Ender and I are together.”
“So you fucked him?”
“Yes.”
“Are you going to give me details?” I can hear the smile in her voice.
