Handing the empty glass back to me, she sashayed over to the sideboard. Ice cubes rattled against crystal. She pulled the top off the Macallan Lalique decanter and splashed three fingers as if it were some cheap rail brand. With the glass cradled between her breasts, she leaned against the sideboard and held my stare.
In the low light, her pale green eyes had little effect on me.
“Come on, Piercy. You used to trust me.”
I’d always hated that nickname. It made me sound like a lapdog.
“That time has long since passed, Skylar.”
She dropped her eyes to her drink. “Remember when we snuck off to Paris and pretended we didn’t have any money?”
Her voice had changed. The syrupy baby talk was gone. This was the Skylar I remembered from before—the one who could be reckless and real and actually funny when she forgot to calculate every move.
I ran my finger through the condensation on my glass. “You wanted a true bohemian experience.”
“We stayed in that dirty little hostel for a week drinking trash wine out of a jug and spent hours in the park playing Belote with the locals.” Her thumb traced the rim of her glass, and for a moment she wasn’t looking at me at all. She was somewhere else entirely. Somewhere we’d been happy, or close enough to it.
I said nothing.
The silence held for three, maybe four seconds. Then I watched it happen—her spine straightened, her chin lifted, and the softness in her expression sealed over like a wound closing.
She was back.
I rose and crossed the room to her, not missing how she held her breath the moment I got close. Reaching past her I set my glass aside. “I remember how you cheated by always dealing from the bottom of the deck.”
She adjusted my tie before running her fingertips over the expensive silk. “It’s a man’s world. A girl’s got to do what she can to keep an edge.”
I shifted away. “Well, you certainly did.”
My double-entendre clear.
Finally, after a long pause, she spoke. “You know, I loved Jameson too—like a brother, of course.”
There. Right there.
The hesitant pause.
I had always suspected there was something more between my brother and Skylar. But to ask would have implied I gave a damn, which I certainly did not.
Skylar moved closer and stretched out her arm to try and give me her drink to share. I raised an eyebrow but didn’t move to take it from her hand. She pursed her lips and took another sip. Her attention sharpened. “I talked to him that night, right before the accident, you know.”
I schooled my features. I actually hadn’t known. Although that probably explained how she knew about the video. Jameson must have said something that revealed he, not Madison, had been driving. And his cell phone was still missing from the accident scene.
She continued. “That townie bitch was breaking up with him. Can you imagine? A little nobody like her breaking it off with a Worthington? Really, I don’t know what he was thinking dating someone so poor. Did you know she actually works for a living?”
The corner of my mouth lifted at the thought of Madison’s little bookshop, Borrowed Time.
A clever name for a mystery suspense-themed bookstore.
I pinched the bridge of my nose, the events of the day and Skylar’s grating voice compounding into a headache. “Only you would consider working for a living a character defect, Skylar.”
Her eyes narrowed as she slammed the glass down on the antique surface, leaving a watermark on the priceless finish. “I’d be careful with the insults, Pierce. I was there in court today.”
She stood in front of me and folded her arms across her chest, pushing her breasts up. “Quite a convincing picture Madison made, pleading her innocence to anyone who would listen.”
I closed the small distance between us, towering over her. “Your point being?”
“I’m...I’m just saying you might not want to be making comments about me when you are clearly no better. You’re the one framing that stupid girl for murder.”
