“Why give them to me?” she asks, looking back up. Anytime she even so much as looks into my eyes, my heart starts beating out of control.I’m pathetic.
Here’s to hoping neither one of them is armed.“The department has been investigating you.”
She raises an eyebrow. “They’re always investigating”
I shake my head. “No. Serious investigation. They have evidence piling up. That,” I say, pointing to the folder, “isn’t a department investigation. That’s personal.” Ryder and Les share a look like they know something. “What am I missing?”
“Go get those other files, please,” Les says to Ryder. You can tell he wants to argue, but whatever is on her face right now, he thinks better of it.
He gives me one last scathing look before storming from the room.
“What happened outside, Les?” I ask gently when we’re alone.
“Nothing,” she replies too fast, then sighs. “Look, I appreciate everything you’ve done with the shooting and now this, but this doesn’t change anything, Zane.”
“Why not?” I demand.
“Because,” she says harshly, “you lied to me, and you became the enemy. I moved on.”
“Did you?” I challenge, sitting up in my chair. “Why are you lying to yourself that what we had wasn’t fucking real?”
“Because if it were real, you wouldn’t have lied to me the whole fucking time we were together,” she grits out. “You wouldn’t have betrayed me. Or your dad.”
“I was trying to get us out!” I half yell. “I was doing it for you.” I stand up from my chair and take the risk of walking around her side of the desk. “Everything I did was for you,” I say again, spinning her chair around so I can lean down on the arms, caging her in. “I loved you, Les, and I didn’t want you to live this life.” She sucks in a breath at my admission about loving her because we never exchanged those words, there were too many unknowns between us, and she was too fucking young. “Tell me you didn’t love me too.” I’m leaning so close to her face that I can see her pupils expand and feel her breath dusting across my lips. It would be easy to lean down and capture her lips with mine.
“I didn’t,” she whispers.
“Stop lying,” I grit out. “Why can’t you tell me the truth?”
“What difference would it make?” She shoves at my chest, and I don’t budge. But I know if she wants me out of her space, she will make that happen.
“It will make all the difference in the world, Beautiful.” I lean closer so my lips rub hers when I talk. “Tell me you feel this,” I beg her.
“I don’t feel anything.”
“Your mouth is saying one thing, but your body is saying another,” I tell her, watching goosebumps pop up on her arms, her nipples hardening behind that thin excuse for a tank top. I run my lips up her neck. “Tell me the truth.”
“I can’t,” she half moans, her knuckles turning white from her grip on her chair, so she doesn’t reach out to me.
“Because of them?” I ask. I don’t wait for an answer; I already know. “They give you what you need?”
“Yes,” she moans again when I rub my lips on her neck again. I forgot how fucking responsive she is; my cock is hard as a rock, throbbing behind my zipper.
“I could too,” I whisper, and her body arches toward me.
“What?” she says, finally losing her battle and gripping my forearms. Just that little touch zaps through me like electricity.
“I could give you what you need too, Beautiful.” I’m saying exactly what she thinks I’m saying. I’ll share her with those assholes if means I can have her back in my life.
“You have to stop,” she breathes when I kiss at her erratic pulse jumping in her throat. She shoves at my chest again, and I stand up this time, not even trying to hide what she does to me. I hear Ryder’s boots stomping through the house and take several steps back, leaning against the bookshelf behind me.
He shoves the door open, narrowing his eyes on me again. Les’ cheeks are still red from what I was doing to her, but she mostly collected herself. Ryder slaps the folders against my chest before walking to Les, putting his body between us.
I take the folders and return to my chair. I flip open the first one, and it’s filled with the same kind of pictures I had. “Where did these come from?”
“Someone put some on Dex’s truck a while back, then on Gage’s a little bit after that. Now every time we go out, they appear,” Les answers, watching my face.
I hold up one that has the word ‘mine’ scratched across it in red. “Mine?” I ask.
