They have Margot. They’ve been watching Lexie.
They’re probably watching right now.
They know what she means to me, I realize, stomach plummeting. They know I still love her. Or—no, they suspect. They saw us behind the bar. They probably saw me come here last night. The only way to keep her safe is to keep her the fuck out of my life. I’ve already set up the pieces—but now, I have to knock them down.
I steel myself, turn my heart to stone. When I turn, I find Lexie just inside, watching me, arms wrapped around herself and eyes round and full of worry. I let myself take her in, just for that instant: beautiful and broken and perfect and totally, completely, everything I want.
Then I go inside.
“Everything OK?”
“Yeah. Fine.” I gesture at my shirt, clinging to her body. “Can I have that?”
She looks down at herself in surprise. “Oh. Yeah. Right.”
I brush past her and go back to the room, yanking on my pants and lacing up my boots. Lexie follows, changing in the bathroom. She emerges in a tiny black tank that hugs her body in the most absurd, mouth-watering way. I look away as she hands me my shirt, and yank it on.
“Jacket?” I ask gruffly. She goes to the closet and pulls it out, passing it to me without a word. I force myself to go to the door, not saying a thing as she trails behind me in what seems to be stunned silence. I stop on the threshold and look back at her. “Sorry for last night.”
She watches me, expression inscrutable, then nods. “I’m not.”
Fuck. The breath goes out of me and I force myself to not look pleased by those words, by all of the meaning they hold.Not sorry. Christ.
Instead I straighten my spine and make my face a mask, as cold and shut down as I possibly can. Then I look her right in the eye. “Yeah, well. It won’t happen again. OK?”
She is heartbreaking right there, like that: half-naked and morning fresh, her eyes huge and fathomless with sorrow and bracing reality. “OK,” she says.
“Bye, Lexie.” I close the door behind me, and don’t look back.
8
Lexie
Am I an absolute, complete, total fucking idiot?
I look at myself in the mirror, made-up, hair brushed. I’ve thrown on a sweater the color of blood, the one with a V-neck that sweeps low and makes me look five years younger and surprisingly well-endowed.
Am I stupid?
The woman who looks back at me in the glass is more fearsome than I’ve seen her in a long time, eyes keen and too bright, the set of her mouth cruel and triumphant. I don’t look so sweet anymore, or so innocent. I look fucked.Fucked. Like I made love, blindly and wildly, all night to the bad boy I’ve been in love with for so many years.
Am I insane?
I look the woman in the eyes. “No.”
My phone is ringing, and I don’t recognize the number. I debate turning it off, shutting everyone and everything down, diving into my research, forgetting everything but that limited, tunnel-vision world of crime and Jockey and history and how to fix it.
But there’s a prick at the back of my neck, hair standing at attention. My stomach goes leaden as I pick up, with a sudden determined thought:It’s Jockey. He’s going to come after me.But when I answer, it’s a girl’s voice, familiar but impossible to place.
“Lexie,” she says, and when I don’t reply: “It’s Marnie.”
Marnie.“Oh, my God. I haven’t heard from you in…”
“Years. I know. Sorry.” She laughs, a self-conscious, harried little titter. “Look. I know it’s weird, reaching out after all this time, but…OK, look, I’m gonna level with you here.”
I straighten up, the sudden seriousness in Marnie’s tone sinking my stomach. “Go ahead.”
“Have you seen Liam since he’s been back?” Her voice lowers ever so slightly, and I hold my breath, debating whether to lie to protect myself—and him—and Marnie takes my silence for confirmation. “Yeah, no worries, me too. You know I bartend over atBen’s?”
