Page 44 of Luke's Revenge (Walker Security - Lucifer's Trilogy 3)

Funny how my perspective has changed. Now, the party invitation is no longer about us. It’s about Michael Phillips protecting Michael Phillips. “He wants to appear to be our generous gift giver, and he wants the world to watch him do it. Because we won’t kill him while the guests watch.”

“Right,” Kurt says, lifting his cup again. “Only he’s wrong. I will, and then like I said—”

“You’ll leave again?” I challenge as all those emotions I punched down low are rising in a wave of something that threatens to become quite messy. This is exactly why I rotate on my heels and march toward the door opposite the garage, and end up in the massive foyer with a round table, and high ceiling. This house is too big, I think. There are too many places for enemies to hide, and yet not enough for me to get lost in right now.

I step to the other side of the table, hug myself, and try to get right in the head.

I feel Luke even before I turn to find him standing in front of me. “Hey,” he says, and when his hands settle on my shoulders, those emotions I’m battling shift and seem to reconstruct themselves into something calmer and far less disruptive, but no less intense. I love this man with all that I am, but life has taught me that love can be brutal.

But I can’t say I’d be better off without it. That would mean I’m better off without Luke and that’s simply not true.

“Smith and Dexter are about to arrive with a boatload of pizza, and I for one didn’t eat enough to do anything but get angry. Therefore, I say, there’s a private room and a pizza with our names on it.”

“Is that the excuse you’re giving me? I’m hungry so I’m angry?”

“Aren’t you?”

“Hungry and angry? Why yes,” I say. “I do believe I am.”

He strokes my cheek. “He’s not going anywhere. And neither am I.”

My mind travels back in time and I try my hardest to remember the day my mother died. The day my father died. All I see is Kasey, walking toward the Jeep Luke had driven on the day he’d taken him overseas, to die. That’s what it feels like. It was the day Kasey left and never came back. I’d felt it in these knots in my belly, even as I’d smiled and waved to Kasey as he’d climbed into the passenger seat.

Luke had kissed me then and said, “I’ll see you soon.”

“Take care of him,” I’d insisted.

“Kasey can take care of himself, but I got his back, baby. You know I do.”

And I did know. Because I’d known then what I know now. Luke loves me. And I love him. We would die for each other. The problem is too many people die on me.

I catch his hand. “Don’t die on me.”

He strokes my hair back from my face and stares down at me. “I won’t make a promise I can’t keep, but, baby, I will fight to the death to stay right here with you.”

That’s when I realize the hypocrisy of my anger toward Kurt. I say I want the truth. Well, his death was a lie, his leaving again, well that’s the truth. Kurt is not here to stay and therefore in his mind, nothing he does has consequences. It’s a state of absolute freedom.

It makes him dangerous.

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