Before leaving, Ness said, “I’m sorry I jumped to an unfair conclusion, Nikki.”
I was drowning in too much anxiety to honestly care about her awry judgement.
“What was that about?” Liam asked, once the door shut.
I lifted a brow as I walked over to Storm and sank onto the floor beside him. “Ness assumed I was a hussy. Lucas too, for that matter. And from the way you looked at me back at the graveyard, I’m guessing your thoughts aligned with them.”
A nerve feathered his jaw.
“I may not beyourgirl, Liam, but I’m also certainly not Grant’s or anyone else’s.”
His already dim expression darkened further.
Storm picked up a book filled with textures and climbed on my lap, brandishing it excitedly. I took it from him and opened it to the first page. As he ran his fingers over the scaly leather insert on a cute green dragon, Liam dropped onto the couch and leaned forward, propping his forearms on his spread thighs and linking his fingers together.
“What are you going to do to Grant?” I turned the page for Storm, who grabbed fistfuls of the pink fur sticking out of a fat, fluffy cat.
“Kill him and his accomplice.”
Horror raced up my spine as I flipped to the next page.
“Unless you’d rather do it,” he said slowly.
The fuzzy yellow duckling Storm was stroking blurred. I’d known the second I carried the evidence back to Liam that I was condemning Grant, but I hadn’t thought I was condemning him to death.
“If he’s not the one who pulled the trigger, then—then—” I swallowed multiple times but couldn’t get my throat to work and beg Liam to alleviate the punishment.
Liam sighed, then got up and came to sit on the floor beside me. Storm glanced over at his dad but made no move to leave my lap.
I wiped my eyes. “I hope I’m wrong. I hope he didn’t start that fire.”
Liam slid his arm around my shoulders and pulled me against him. “You do understand that if he did, I cannot let him get away with it, right?”
I rested my head on his shoulder and let the tears glide down. “But death?”
“Death is kinder than many other punishments.”
Storm squirmed on my lap, and Liam reached out to flip the page.
“That asshole doesn’t deserve your pity,” Liam said in a voice so low and rough it raised the hairs on the back of my neck. “Or a single beat of your heart.” He slid his palm over my wet cheeks, catching my tears and smearing them, stripping my skin of Grant’s scent, replacing it with his own.
Storm yanked at the board book, trying to turn the page himself since I was doing a substandard job. When I didn’t provide the requisite help, he pressed his palm against my cheek to redirect my attention.
“Sorry, baby,” I murmured, stamping a kiss to his open palm before turning the page.
As Storm stroked the feathers stuck to a peacock’s cartoonish backside, Liam stroked the side of my neck. “You’re wrong, by the way.”
“About what?”
“About not being my girl.”
I picked my head off his shoulder to stare up at all the soft slopes and hard bones that made up his face. “Being the girl you bed and bathe doesn’t make me yours.”
His fingers tightened, along with the line of his mouth.
“You’re not on the market for a girlfriend, remember?”
The door flapped open then, putting an end to our conversation.
