“He’ll hurt you too, if you stay.” He bends, sweeping my shoes. “Dump. Replace. Drive.” He bundles me up and forces me forward. “He’s an extremely powerful, limitlessly wealthy, and connected man. And you’re the only person standing between him and what he wants. The fact you’re still alive is a fucking miracle.”
“Because you didn’t kill me?”
“I was not sent here to end your life, Nova. But the next guy will be. Let’s go.” He practically lifts me off my feet, carrying me through his home and bursting into the living room. “The next guy you’ll meet… he’s known only by the nameTank.”
My heart gallops with fear. “Tank?”
“Yeah, because he’s big, he’s dangerous, he’ll roll right onthrough your defenses, and at the end of this war, he’ll still be standing while everyone else is lying dead in the dirt, soaked in blood and clueless at how they got there.” He grabs the door handle but doesn’t yank it open yet. “Go home, pack a bag, and be gone tonight while it’s still dark.”
“No, I?—”
“Listen!” He shakes me until my teeth rattle. “I’m your fucking enemy, Nova. I’m one of the bad guys. But there are worse men out there, and they already know your name. They know your face. They know where you live and work and who your friends are. Luckily for you, you have no family left for them to hurt.Unluckilyfor you, that means they’re gonna come straight for you. Get your shit and go.”
“B-but my home. My job. My?—”
“You don’t work there anymore. You don’t live in that house anymore. Tomorrow is my deadline, and he’s not the patient kind.”
“W-what about you?”Stop shaking! Stop stuttering. Stop being afraid, dammit. “If you don’t give him the numbers?—”
“I’ll take care of me. You need to take care of you.”
“He’ll kill you.” A squeezing pain strangles my heart and empties my lungs. “You’re warning me away. But if you don’t deliver, he’ll do to you what he did to that other guy.”
“And if you stay, you’re as good as buried.” He drags me to my toes and slams his lips to mine. It’s rough and needy. Feral and mean. But it’s tender and caring, desperate and devastated, too. He’s my enemy… but not. My brother’s killer… but not. My heart aches for him, but it aches because of his existence, too.
He breaks our kiss with a noisy exhale, staring down intomy eyes. Then he swallows and tilts his head toward the door. “You can hate me, Nova. You can scream and hit and lose your fucking mind because I’ve broken your trust. I’ve searched your home while you were at work. I’ve taken your callswhileinside your house. I intended to seduce you. Trick you into trusting me. I messed with your power box, hoping you’d call me to come and fix it.”
Treacherous tears fill my eyes and swell over.
“I don’t need a home loan. I already have a home. I have a job. I have a life elsewhere.”
“W-what about Scarlett?”
Surprised, his hand twitches and crushes my arm. “What?”
“Your sister? Is she real? Or was that a lie?”
“She’s real.” His eyes soften. “She’s everything I said she was. She’s amazing and smart and way too fucking special to get caught up in this world. I’ll take care of her. But I need you to take care of you. All that other stuff I said about the military? The stuff about Ryan telling me stories about you?”
“Lies…” I tremble, angrily swiping tears from the edge of my jaw. “It was all fake.”
“I never met him. I never knew him, except through all the stories you’ve told. But I got to knowyou,” he groans, sliding his tongue along his bottom lip. “And him through you. I know without a doubt, he’d have killed me on sight—on that first day, if we’d met while he was alive. He’ll probably still come find me in the afterlife to punish me for what I’ve done to his sister. But if all else was equal,” he studies my eyes, “if he were here, and I could have met you some other way, I’m certain I would’ve liked him. And IknowI would’ve fallen for you.”
“Lincoln…”
“You’re so pure. So perfect and kind and silly and naïve. You’re agoodperson, and you deserve so much better than all this. But now you need to go. Once the sun rises tomorrow, this is gonna get so much worse.”
“Worse than my brother being dead?” I whimper. “Worse than you being a liar? A traitor.”
He nods, his lashes coming down to kiss his cheeks. “Even worse than that. Because tomorrow, Tank might come looking. And once he’s here, it’s kill or be killed. Once he’s in town, it’s war. And while I’ll fight for you, I need you to not make it so fucking easy for them. Hide, Nova.” He lifts me to my toes and takes my lips with his. “Don’t come back.”
He yanks the door open and glances out into the darkness, scouring what is merely pitch black to my eyes. Frowning, he scans the shadows, ensuring we’re alone. Finally, he pushes me out the door, past our untouched dinner, and down the porch steps. With his hand wrapped tightly around my wrist, he tosses my shoes through my truck window, then he jerks the door open and places my keys in my palm.
“You have a right to hate me.” He towers over me, bringing his hand up to stroke my neck. “If I’m lucky, you might spend the next few years sitting on the porch of that house you absolutely willnottell me about. You’ll rock on your chair and cuss me out every single night as you stare up at the stars. You can loathe the very thought of me. Remember the lying prick you met that one time, and vow revenge. When you meet someone else, someone better and more deserving, your hatred will make him jealous. Because hatred is still an emotion, which means I crawled into your heart, too.”
Tears stream onto my cheeks. “Lincoln?—”
“Hate me for the rest of your life. Make your new man hate me, too.”
