Even if I wasn’t head over heels for her, I couldn’t find a single sketchy word in her story. It’s credible andexactlywhat we surmised from the mounting evidence. Things we didn’t quite have hammered out, she smoothed out for us.
When she eventually runs out of things to share, only one question remains for me.
Part of me doesn’t want to know the answer, but I ask regardless. “Why did you agree to the dates with me? It’s the only thing I can’t reconcile with what you were going through. It doesn’t make sense unless you wanted me to find out. Yet if you wanted me to know, you could have told me at any time. I’m out of guesses.”
She laughs morosely, letting her head flop onto the sofa cushion. “You aren’t gonna believe this.”
I caress her chin, lovingly tilting her face in my direction. “Try me.”
“Your sister encouraged me to do it. It was her idea. I put up a fight the entire time.”
Pow. My mind is blown. “No shit?”
“Yep. The same person who lied to us to keep us apart five years ago was the one who all but shoved me into your arms. Unbelievable, right?”
Well, that makes no fucking sense. You’d think Kenzie would want to keep us apart to avoid the risk we’d find out about her deceit. I say as much.“I would have expected the opposite from her. What reason did she give?”
“You probably aren’t gonna like this. Since we’re putting all our cards on the table, here goes.” She mumbles under her breath, “Big girl panties, Lila.”
I desperately want to kiss her. Not only because I’m so damn proud of her for telling me everything. I just want to kiss her. Even if she’s talking about the crimes she was coerced into committing, she’s fucking precious to me.
Before I act on my impulse, she stiffens and faces me head-on. “She thought that we could use information from you to barter with Silas.”
“Barter for what?”
“My freedom. I’d give him what I found out about your investigation in exchange for the evidence he had on me. He might let me walk free. That was the plan.”
Despite the credibility of her words and the logical approach to her predicament, it sucks to hear her admission. More than all the other shit she’s revealed, this one cuts the deepest.
It’s as if I wanted her to say that she agreed simply because she wanted me and hated the distance between us. That she needed me in her life, even knowing I was convinced she was guilty.
That she loved me enough to risk it all.
Dammit. I needed her tochooseme.
What the hell is wrong with me? My reaction is infinitely baffling.
After all, I alreadystrongly suspectedshe was working me over in the same way I was doing to her. Given the full picture, I can’t fault her for doing it.
Yet I bleed from it all the same.
Unable to face her, I lean back and let my eyelids close.
The silence pounds violently in my ears. Tension pours over me in a breaking wave that tries to drag me under. Finding air becomes a challenge as I kick for the surface.
A battle wages under my ribs. My instinct toshut down and wall off my emotions roars against my love for Lila.
In my mind’s eye, that vapor appears in front of me. The same one I use on the job. Only this time, I didn’t consciously initiate its appearance. The mist is doing it on its own accord, aiming to spare me the realization that Lila didn’t choose me.
And if I hadn’t parked myself in her path, we’d still be miles apart.
That cloud grows insistent, drifting closer to me with each passing second. I fight the pull of my self-preserving instincts, attempting to displace it with logic. The facts are crystal clear.
I already knew she was using me.
I was using her too.
She didn’t think she had a choice in the matter.
