Page 1 of Pay for Your Lies

1

Thayer

“Justlike that, love. Fuck, you’re killing me.”

The voice startles me. I straighten, standing upright from where I’d been bending over, stretching out my sore hamstring.

Even before I turn, those words let me know who I’m about to come face to face with.

I wish I could admit that his voice leaves me unaffected. That it sounds just like every other voice to me and doesn’t stand out in any way, but I can’t.

The first time he spoke to me, his voice slipped into my ear and, carried by the tiny blood vessels in my brain, spread its irresistible, intoxicating poison everywhere it could.

We were arguing, pretty much like we have been every conversation since we met, but it didn’t matter.

He’d dirtied me forever with his voice alone.

It's not because his voice is special tomethat it’s made a home in my brain and fucked me from the inside every conversation since.

No, no. He just has an exceptional voice, anyone would agree with me.

It’s the kind of voice that gets an actor hired to record romance audiobooks; its silky, rumbly tenor able to get women around the world unspeakably horny with just a few carefully delivered words.

But it’s also the kind of voice that can silence a room with barely a word uttered. The kind that people listen to.

The kind they obey.

Now, whenever I hear the rich tone, the velvety smooth British accent, and the rough, dry delivery, it lights me up like a battery.

Add to this his quick wit and constant bantering and my poisoned brain powers to life, ready to engage.

And that’s the worst idea in the world.

For a few reasons, most notably that I have a boyfriend and Rhys’ words are rarely anything but obsessively filthy and, importantly,—

I don’t obey.

I turn and get confirmation that it really is him. He’s standing fifteen feet away from me, looking irritatingly attractive with his arms crossed over his chest and his hips casually resting against one of the metal dividers that separate the field from the spectator section with its rows of elevated bleachers.

He watches me silently for a beat before unfolding his arms to reveal a hand clasped around a green apple. He brings it to his lips and takes a large bite, the crunching sound ripping the silence like a knife stabbing through a tapestry.

“What?” I ask.

The lazy open mouthed smirk he gives me as he chews his apple draws my gaze to his defined jaw.

Annoying.

“I didn’t mean to interrupt.” He says, the smirk morphing into his trademark playful grin. “I quite liked the view before.”

It’s the smutty voice.

That’s the only reason my body temperature heats ten degrees at his words.

When I know I’m going to speak to him or interact with him in any way, I can usually control my reactions and try to keep a clear head.

But right now I’m unprepared, and that’s a problem.

I’d been miles away in my mind thinking about a biology paper I needed to hand in tonight and hadn’t braced myself for a potential interaction as my warm up was ending.