by Ella Miles
Fallen Love
Sinful Truths Book 5
Ella Miles
Copyright © 2020 by Ella Miles
EllaMiles.com
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Cover design © Arijana Karčić, Cover It! Designs
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No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Contents
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Truth or Lies World
Prologue
1. Siren
2. Zeke
3. Siren
4. Zeke
5. Siren
6. Zeke
7. Palmer
8. Zeke
9. Siren
10. Zeke
11. Siren
12. Zeke
13. Siren
14. Zeke
15. Siren
16. Zeke
17. Siren
18. Zeke
19. Siren
20. Zeke
21. Siren
22. Zeke
23. Siren
24. Zeke
25. Siren
26. Zeke
27. Siren
28. Zeke
29. Siren
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About the Author
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Truth or Lies World
TRUTH OR LIES SERIES:
Taken by Lies #1
Betrayed by Truths #2
Trapped by Lies #3
Stolen by Truths #4
Possessed by Lies #5
Consumed by Truths #6
SINFUL TRUTHS SERIES:
Sinful Truth #1
Twisted Vow #2
Reckless Fall #3
Tangled Promise #4
Fallen Love #5
Broken Anchor #6
Prologue
Siren
“I know,” Zeke says.
Those words haunt me. They dig deep into my heart, piercing my very soul. His words offer me everything I need and nothing I deserve.
“I know, Siren. I know,” he repeats again, stepping out of the darkness and into my bedroom aboard the yacht. The moonlight illuminates his face.
My bottom lip trembles. My eyes are watery, but I refuse to cry—I can’t cry. Not now. Not after everything we’ve been through. I won’t shed any more damn tears.
Zeke takes a step forward, and my heart wrenches. My pulse is in my throat.
His presence makes me tense. I don’t know how to feel about Zeke anymore. His hardened eyes are lost; he doesn’t know how to feel about me either.
I look down, twisting the ring Zeke gave me. A ring that represents forever.
A forever we will never have. A forever we both surrendered.
Zeke takes my hand, and I spot his matching ring. A ring that tells the world he’s my husband. He’s taken. He’s mine.
If only those words were true.
“Siren—”
“No,” I snap. I can’t talk. I can’t speak reason. I can’t listen to him explain why things ended the way they did. I don’t want to hear that he still loves me. Sometimes, love isn’t enough. It isn’t enough to survive on.
We need more than love. We need air and water and food. We need trust and truth.
We’ve both sinned too many times.
We’ve shed too much blood.
There is no coming back from what we’ve done.
We’ve wrecked more than just our love. We’ve hurt every person who has come into our lives.
Every.
Single.
One.
We are alone now. But not together.
Together we destroy. We ruin. Our love destroyed everyone else we love.
Our love has to end. We can’t keep being selfish. We can’t keep hurting others. We can’t keep sacrificing everything to save the other.
I squeeze my eyes shut, doing everything to keep my tears in—keep my pain in.
“I’m sorry,” I say. Sorry that I’m crying. Sorry that I hurt you—hurt them. Sorry that I saved you. Life would have been so much easier had I let Zeke die, had I finished my vow to Julian and then vanished myself.
Instead, I was selfish. I saved a man, knowing our love would destroy everything.
“I’m not,” Zeke says, pulling on my hand until I’m standing in front of him.
Face to face, hands gripping each other, knowing this is the last time we will touch. The last time we will be in the same room together. The last time…
“Our love was never meant to last forever,” Zeke says, his own tears dripping down onto our joined hands.
“But we promised. We vowed. We loved—forever,” I say, my words broken and painful.
“We kept those promises,” Zeke says.
I stare at him. Feeling more love than I’ve ever felt for another human being. More love than I knew was possible to love another man.
“I’m sorry,” I say. I grab his neck, my hand fisting his hair, and I pull him down into one last desperate kiss. A kiss to top all kisses. A kiss to survive on for the rest of my life.
Zeke’s lips remain closed at first. From shock. From trying to guard his heart. From trying to protect me. He thinks our departure will be harder if we kiss.
I don’t give a damn about what’s hard or easy.
I love Zeke Kane with all of my heart. I will never love again like I do now. Never.
This is it for me. This is it.
One more kiss.
That’s what I need to take with me.
It doesn’t take much to part Zeke’s lips. My tongue is suddenly inside his, feeling alive again for the first time in weeks. I’m floating on a cloud and doing battle at the same time. That’s what it’s like kissing Zeke.
Zeke’s hands grab my hips, holding me tightly against him until I feel every inch of his hardness. I memorize it all. Everything about him becomes ingrained in my memory, pushing all other memories out until I remember this moment, forever.
I remember the way Zeke feels pushed against me. How hard and strong and protective he feels.
Another snap remembers how his wet lips shoot tingles of electricity through my body. How his tongue on my tongue hits me deep to my core.
I will never forget how his hands hold me like he can’t ever let me go.
But then Zeke does let me go.
He ends the kiss, effectively ending us.
We both take a step back; it’s the hardest step either of us has ever taken, but it’s necessary.
We both know what comes next. We both know our future. We both know this is the last time we will ever be together.
We both touch our rings.
Zeke walks out the door, never to return. I’m alone.
Zeke’s gone.
The love of my life is gone.
We promised forever.
What a forever it was.
I don’t regret it.
Even if I should regret it, at least for the sake of those who were hurt by our love.
I hoped our forever would last longer, but from the moment it started, we were always destined to end. We wouldn’t last a lifetime.
We wouldn’t have kids and grow old together.
I stare at the engraving on my ring.
I promise…forever.
Zeke kept his forever promise.
Our forever just ended sooner than we could have ever imagined. Love saved us, and in the end, it destroyed everyone we love.
1
Siren
Death is only the beginning.
Isn’t that the saying?
Maybe that’s true for some, but it’s not what I’ve experienced. Death is definitely an end. An end that may lead to a new beginning, if those who are left are able to start again.
But sometimes death is just the end. Sometimes death breaks those who are left so deeply, and there is no coming back. There is no starting over. There’s just nothing left to do but wait for death to take you as well.
Watching Lucy die in my arms was the hardest death I’ve had to endure. I thought she was my enemy. I thought of her as the villain. Watching her sacrifice herself, with a cure in her grasp, was the most selfless thing I’ve ever witnessed.
She died protecting us all because the cure her mother created also happens to be a contagious cancer that could wipe out continents. If any of our enemies got ahold of it—Julian, Bishop, anyone—they could use it to control the entire planet.
Lucy was the only thing preventing them from getting what they wanted. Lucy protected it. And Zeke protected her. And I protected Zeke. In a way, we are all connected. We are all the reason Julian and Bishop don’t have the viles, the research, the key to controlling the world.
“Promise me,” Lucy says, as she lays in my arms.
I suck back tears. Lucy isn’t crying. I’m not going to let the last thing she sees be my blubbering face.
“I promise,” I say, even though I’m afraid I will never be able to keep it. It’s a huge promise I just made. A promise that requires sinning and lying to a lot of people, something I’ve only just managed to be able to do.
Finally, I can’t help it. A tear pools in the corner of my eye, threatening to reveal the pain and fear I’m feeling inside as I hold Lucy in my arms, laying out on the grass in whatever country we were taken to. We’re looking out at a beautiful lake, thousands of stars shine overhead, and the moon makes the night sky seem lighter than I’ve ever seen it.
Lucy finds my hand. I hold it, and she smiles up at me.
“Don’t be sad for me,” Lucy says, raising her frail hand up to try and wipe my tear. The one tear rolls down my cheek with the speed of a freight train. And then all of my tears are cascading down my cheek.
“How can I not? This shouldn’t have happened. You should have had more time. I should have made sure Zeke chose you, not Kai. I should have—”
Lucy coughs. I stroke her back, trying to get more oxygen into her lungs, even though I know her time is dwindling.
“No, I didn’t want Zeke to have the burden of watching me die. Someone who loved you, like we loved each other at one point in our life, shouldn’t have to be here to see me like this. I want him to remember me as I was, not like this.”
I nod, understanding. When my time is up, I hope Zeke isn’t there. I couldn’t stand for him to be there. I don’t want him to ever have to remember me as anything but the woman who loved him deeper than he’s ever been loved.
I squeeze her hand tighter. “I’m happy to be here.”
Lucy smiles. “Who wouldn’t want to watch their competition for the man they love die?” She teases.
I hug her tighter in my lap. “If you had wanted Zeke, you would have won. I can’t think of a more incredible woman.”
She nods. “I know. But I fell in love with Palmer. I don’t want you to think Zeke was the love of my life; he wasn’t. Palmer was. Zeke is just an incredible best friend.”
“I know.”
“Tell me about Palmer,” I say.
Lucy does; she tells me everything. Without a doubt, Palmer was Lucy’s love. As much as it might have hurt Palmer to have to watch the woman she loves die, she should have been the one here.
“Palmer,” Lucy says, looking up at me. She’s been out of it for the last hour, hallucinating and barely catching her breath. Her pulse is weak, her face is sweaty, and I swear she only takes a breath every minute or so.
“Yes?” I ask, blinking back my tears. I can be Palmer. I can love her in her last moments on this earth.
“I love you,” Lucy says.
“I love you, too,” I say back. I don’t have to lie. I love Lucy. Maybe I’m not in love with her. But damn, do I love her strength, her courage, her selflessness. It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
I kiss her on the cheek.
I watch Lucy take her last breath. I watch her eyes close. I watch her heart thump one last time, and then she’s just…gone.
I’ve seen death.
I’ve taken lives before.
I’ve killed.
But I’ve never seen anything so peaceful as Lucy’s death. I hold her body in my arms for a few minutes. A crack of thunder startles me back into reality.
I stare up at the sky, and I see clouds rolling in. The storm had been waiting until Lucy took her last breath, allowing her final few minutes on this earth to be filled with beautiful landscape.
I gently roll Lucy off my lap and stand to gather wildflowers nearby. I form a bouquet and rest it in her hands. Maybe I should have negotiated with Julian and Bishop to take her body back for a proper burial, but I don’t think Lucy would have wanted that. She would have wanted to feel free, not buried deep in the ground.
I carry her body to the edge of the lake and softly push her floating body out into the water as the storm rolls in. She looks like an angel before she disappears under the water, the pouring rain forcing her down.
I’m thankful for the rain; it hides my tears as I hear Julian Reed approach and turn to face him. I wish I had more time to mourn Lucy, but there’s work to be done to keep my promise to her.
“So, you won? You get to have control of me?” I ask.
“There wasn’t anything to win. I’m in charge. Bishop works for me, just like you. He will continue his work training your mind later, but first, we had a deal,” Julian says, holding his hand out to me.
Julian is wearing dark suit pants, with a rain jacket over it. He looks put together and proper, even out here in the middle of nowhere. Even as the rain pours down, he’s unfazed.
I look up into his eyes, and I see what he wants. It’s what he’s always wanted—me.
I swallow my pride. I push down the desire to punch him in the balls. I made a deal with the devil. I agreed to give him myself in exchange for making sure Lucy died with dignity and love. I don’t regret it, and I won’t renege on my end of the deal.
I made a promise. I’ll keep it.
I always have. That’s the main thing Zeke and I both agree on. We keep our promises. If we don’t have that, then we’ve lost our identities.
So I take Julian’s hand, surrendering myself to him. I pray that whatever was keeping Zeke away before has been defeated, because I need him to come. I need him to save me, even though I’ve told him not to before. I told him I’m not worth saving; I don’t want him to save me.
I’ve never wanted Zeke to save me, especially from Julian, because every time Zeke saves me, it risks Zeke finding out the truth.
But without Zeke, I won’t survive this time. This time, I need him. This time I need Zeke to save me…
2
Zeke
My shoulders are throbbing and tense, that’s the first thing I notice before I even open my eyes. My left hand is numb, that’s the second.
I open my eyes. A dizziness and splitting headache hit me next.
I blink. I’ve dealt with all of this before, it’s nothing new. I’m not going to let an injured arm and a headache keep me from doing my job. My job is simple: protect those I love.
I quickly take in my situation in a matter of seconds. My wrists are tied, stretching me wide over m
y head in a V. My left hand is crushed, which is why I can’t feel it. And my shoulders are sore from being stretched. I’m not wearing a shirt, and sweat is falling down my neck and forehead.
Drugs are still pulsing through my system—that’s why I’m sweaty and my head is so foggy. My ankles are also tied with thick chains bolted to the floor.
I kick, testing the strength of the metal—it’s heavy-duty. It’s going to take a lot of effort to break free, especially in my state.
I survey the room as well. I’m underground, most likely in a basement from the lack of windows and unfinished floors. There is a lamp in the corner, but otherwise, I’m in the dark.
But I’m not alone.
I can hear the breathing of another person; the breath speeds as the person realizes I’m awake. He or she can now question and torture me.
My brain quickly puts all the pieces together. I was in Julian’s house. I was going to get Siren and Lucy back. I went down, into a tunnel, and then a crash…
A boulder trapped me in the tunnel. A woman stepped forward from the darkness.
I look up, and the same woman is standing in front of me now.
She’s a small woman, much smaller than Siren. She’s probably five foot nothing. Her muscles are thin and long, not like the bulky brutes that normally inhabit my world. It’s clear she doesn’t usually carry a gun or weapon. She has no skills in martial arts or fighting. I can see it all in the way she carries herself. In fact, she looks like she’s about to cry as she looks at me.