Page 29 of Their Arrangement

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A command.

Or a promise.

My mouth went dry.

I looked around again.

Still no one.

Then I pulled the cap free.

The color was richer than blood.

Velvet-dark.

The kind of red that belonged on lingerie and lips pressed to wrists.

The kind that said everything I wasn’t brave enough to ask.

I held it in my hand like it might vanish.

Then—

Ding.

A message appeared on my screen.

Not HR.

Not Loyal.

Not any contact I recognized.

UNKNOWN:

Reapply every time you see one of us.

No name.

No explanation.

Just that.

My chest tightened.

My thighs shifted.

My fingers curled around the lipstick so tightly it could have snapped.

I stared at the message.

Then at the screen.

Then at the lipstick again.

I closed the message.

Opened it again.

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