As Eve walked through the unlocked door, she saw the satisfaction pass over Maria’s expression. She stood from her seat on an old box and waved. Darius, behind her, was alive and cuffed to something.
If Eve hadn’t been boiling with rage at the man between them, she would have cried in relief.
“Oh, Evelyn, how sweet,” Maria started. “You really do seem to love the detective. Oh dear, I guess Mitchell was indeed just a match of convenience. Scott is going to be so upset when he finds out he was played like this. Especially when he thought his brother was the one playing you.”
She giggled.
Eve ignored her.
She had taken a few steps inside the warehouse, the door closing behind her. She had no weapon. No way to defend herself. No foolproof or safe plan to free Darius and escape unharmed. No way to trap, disarm or make the secret mastermind behind the investigation that had consumed Eve’s life over the last year willingly give themselves up.
Which might have been for the better.
Because the second she saw Jon, she was suddenly the same little girl she had been when she had seen him last.
Eve locked eyes with Jon.
The only human she had ever hated.
When her voice came out, not even Eve recognized it.
“What was the last thing I told you, Jon?” she growled out.
Darius said her name.
Eve took a step forward.
“Don’t tell me you’ve already forgotten,” she added. “Not after I made sure to make it memorable.”
Jon’s nostrils flared. She could see that clearly even from the hundred or so feet she stood away from him. Just like the scar at the side of his face.
It was small, smaller than the one on her hand. Much smaller than the one on Darius’s back.
“You’ve got some nerve,” he bit out.
Eve rolled up her left jacket sleeve. She did the other one next.
“You’rethe one with the nerve, Jon. Not even Fate would have been stupid enough to put us back together. That had to be you.” Eve shared a quick look with Maria. Her mouth hung open in a confused smile. “Let me guess. He saw something about me or Darius in the news and begged to be a part of your unnecessarily complicated scheme to frame and kill us. And you decided,why not?”
Maria’s smile faded, but her words still held confidence as she responded.
“So Jonwastelling the truth,” she said. “He has a special relationship with the two of you. How interesting.” Maria took a few steps back so she could see both of them more easily. Her shifting gave Eve a clear view of a body on the floor near the opposite wall.
Toby.
His shoes weren’t Italian leather, but she recognized them all the same.
Eve didn’t have time to linger on him.
Just as she didn’t have time to look at Darius.
Instead, she doubled down on a plan that might get her killed.
“If you really want to hear something fun, ask him how he got that scar,” Eve poked. She tapped the side of her face. The same spot Jon was touching with the hand not holding a gun.
A gun that Eve was sure he was about to be itching to use.
Maria, ever a gossip, was already locked in.
