Lie to Me

by McAdams, Molly

Though I tried to avoid looking at him again, my gaze kept pulling toward him over and over again. If it hadn’t been, I might not have noticed the way his head snapped in my direction when Lala said, “Saw Nick this morning.”

  Brows drawn together. Eyes filled with some odd mixture of wonder and frustration and fear.

  And I didn’t understand it.

  Reed had dropped his head almost as soon as he saw me watching him, putting his focus on creating the pyramid of garlic bread. “Yeah?”

  “Didn’t stay long. Just stopped by to check on me and tried to sneak out without a plate of food since he wasn’t on duty.” Lala swatted at Reed with a kitchen towel. “You boys, I swear.”

  A smile threatened at the corner of Reed’s mouth but never fully formed. “You make him take one?”

  “Of course, and another for his wife.”

  Reed made a sound of disagreement in the back of his throat. “Other people deserve the food, Lala.”

  “Don’t you start with me today too. I’ve already had to fight one of you.”

  A sigh bled from Reed when he finished with the bread and turned to face Lala. It was obvious an argument was on the tip of his tongue, but then his head jerked back. “Where’d Nora go?”

  “She probably ran off to sit with Peter, and before you even try me, young man, I’ll just send Emma after you with a plate if you don’t take one.”

  Reed’s stare flashed to me and his mouth twitched. “Well, we wouldn’t want that.”

  After what I overheard last week . . . no, I wouldn’t.

  Without waiting, Lala pulled out some Tupperware and began loading it with food.

  Every time Reed tried to stop her, she added more until it was filled to the brim.

  With a defiant grin, she handed the container to Reed and accepted a kiss on the cheek from him. “One of these days, you’ll learn I get my way.”

  A breath of a laugh left him. “Learned that long ago, Lala.”

  She gasped suddenly and placed a palm on her cheek, eyes comically wide. “Oh goodness. I think . . . yes, I think I left the stove on.”

  “Lala, you’re in the kitchen—Lala,” I hissed when she walked from the room as if she didn’t have a care in the world.

  “She isn’t subtle,” Reed mumbled, staring at the container in his hands.

  “Not at all.”

  The sounds of the people currently in the house—talking, laughing, and eating—filtered into the kitchen and somehow made our silence louder.

  The tension between us thicker.

  The longing to be near him fiercer.

  The need to run stronger.

  “Emma—”

  “No, don’t,” I said quickly. “Reed, it isn’t just what you do. It’s men. It’s my life. It’s everything. I can’t do this—you have to let it go.”

  I wanted to take it back as soon as the words finished leaving my mouth, but I wanted him to leave just as badly.

  After a moment, his head dipped and he pushed away from the counter. But he hadn’t taken more than two steps before he stopped and looked at me again. “I don’t know what you’ve been through or what you’re going through, but I’ve never doubted that whatever it is, it’s hard. It’s taken its toll on you, I know. I see it in the way you look at me and talk to people and the way you hold yourself—I fucking see it. I heard it in nearly every word you just said.”

  My body went rigid against the counter.

  My lungs ached and screamed for air as I waited for him to continue.

  “I may not know all that much about you yet, but you’re not that hard to read, and your lies are your biggest giveaway. That last line about not being able to do this and wanting me to let it go?” His lips twisted into a smile that still managed to look defeated. “Bye, Emma.”

  No sooner had he left than Lala came strolling back into the kitchen, whispering the same words she’d told me the week before. “Reed Ryan has the purest heart of them all.”

  “Lala, stop pushing this. I can’t—”

  “That’s just it, you can.”

  Instead of getting into that argument, I just started clearing away the lunch pans she’d emptied out into Reed’s container and took them to the sink.

  Once I had all the pans cleared and the hot water running, I remembered Reed’s odd expression from earlier in their conversation.

  “Hey, Lala,” I began indifferently, “who’s Nick?”

  “Oh, that’s right, he hasn’t seen you since you’ve been back,” Lala said. “I wonder if he’d recognize you.”

  I glanced over my shoulder but didn’t have a chance to ask before she rushed to continue.

  “Not that I’m sure you ever met him. It’s just that he’s about your age . . . grew up next door.”

  My hands stilled with the pan halfway into the sink, quickly filling with hot water.

  A night filled with screams and terror unlike anything I’d ever known quickly flashed before my eyes.

  A night that haunted me in a way men couldn’t.

  Lala knew just as well as I did that I’d met Nick, though I hadn’t known his name before today. From the way she’d hurried to backtrack and then trailed off, she knew when and was remembering that night, same as me.

  I made some sort of noise in the back of my throat but didn’t respond otherwise.

  “Anyway,” she said after a few moments, “Nick, Reed, and Peter are the best of friends. Nick’s actually why the other two are here at all.”

  Reed’s best friend had been witness to one of the worst nights in my life, and at the mention of him around me, Reed had gotten uncomfortable.

  Shit.

  He knew . . . he knew.

  For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out why I still had to keep Reed at a distance. I couldn’t figure out why he hadn’t run.

  “They were on the same SEAL team,” Lala continued. “When they got out, Reed came here, needing time away. He never left. Same with Peter.”

  I turned, all but forgetting the dishes. “Reed was a SEAL?”

  Lala sent me a look from over her shoulder. “I told you he has saved many people.”

  “You said he saved your life.”

  “And he did.”

  My eyes narrowed into an assessing glare. “Do you mean figuratively or literally?”

  She shrugged and turned back to the food she’d been prepping when I first came home. “Ask him yourself.”

  She and I both knew I wasn’t about to do that.

  As soon as I turned back to the dishes, Lala asked, “Does knowing that about him change your opinion?”

  I shut the water off. “Knowing what?”

  “Everything I just told you.”

  “Not in the least,” I said honestly and risked a glance over my shoulder. But Lala wasn’t looking at me. She was staring straight ahead, waiting for my answer. “You told me that first night about saving you and others. It’s why I thought he was a medic or fireman. As for being a SEAL, it just confirms one of my first observations about him.”

  “And which one would that be?”

  “He’s dangerous.”

  Reed Ryan was dangerous . . .

  For my heart.

  For my soul.

  For my already weakening resolve.

  The moment I stepped into the coffee shop the next day, my eyes were drawn to the side, where tables and chairs were clustered together.

  There, like a beacon, was the scornful girl who refused to leave my mind.

  Blonde hair piled messily on top of her head. Shirt hanging off one of her shoulders. Catching every man’s eye in the café without even noticing.

  It was last night all over again.

  A primal need to put my claim on her swelled inside me. To let every single one of them know she was mine . . .

  Except she wasn’t.

  I ordered a drink and paid. The entire time, my attention drifted to the far corner where Emma sat.

  She never looked up from the tablet she wa
s focused on. Never seemed to notice or react to the energy building and twisting and pulling between us.

  Tormenting me.

  Taunting me.

  Begging me to erase the space between us even though I knew what would happen when I did.

  She might give for a minute, but then she would shut down and push me away.

  Not that it would stop me from going to her. From trying to get past those walls again and again until she finally let me in.

  When I was a few feet from the table where she sat, she said, “I thought I’d be safe coming here in the morning.”

  Eyes still fixated on the tablet, finger still swiping across it while her other hand was poised over a notepad, pen at the ready.

  That she’d known I was there without ever acknowledging it had a smile tugging at my mouth.

  I slid into the seat across from her. “Meaning?”

  She sighed and put the tablet to sleep, her hazel eyes flashing fire and irritation and desire when they shot to me. “You told me you ran here every afternoon. Ever since, I’ve avoided this place in the afternoons.”

  I clutched at my chest. “I think that hurt.”

  “And yet, I can’t seem to get rid of you.” The words were pure tease, emphasized by the twitch of her full lips.

  I leaned over the table and lowered my voice. “You want to be rid of me, you know how.”

  That twitch transformed into a full smile, forcing one from me. “Enlighten me because I’ve been trying to figure out how to do exactly that for over a week now.”

  “Tell me you want me gone . . .”

  “I want you—”

  “And mean it.”

  Her smile slipped, and for a moment, she just studied me. “How do you know I’m not actually telling the truth these times you think I’m lying.”

  Because everything about you changes when you lie.

  “Not hard to read, Emma.”

  “You keep saying that,” she mumbled.

  “Because it’s true.” I nodded toward the tablet and notepad. “What are you doing?”

  Excitement slowly stole across her face, lighting her up in a way that made her look more beautiful than I’d ever seen her.

  “Research.” The word came out a breath, but it said everything.

  It explained her light mood and teasing banter. And it immediately dashed any hope I had that we were making progress.

  I swallowed back my disappointment and asked, “What for?”

  She slid the tablet over her notes when I tried to read her writing upside down. “Just something I’m working on.”

  “I can’t know?” I glanced up and knew in the set of her stare that I’d lost her.

  Guarded.

  Protective.

  Worried, as if I was about to take whatever it was she was working on away from her.

  “Right.” When I caught sight of my drink waiting on the counter, I leaned closer to say, “I’m not whatever guy you’re afraid of. I’m not whoever hurt you.”

  “Reed,” she called out when I started to stand.

  From her tone, she’d been battling herself on whether or not she should stop me. From her expression, she was struggling with what to tell me.

  Her shoulders finally lifted before sagging, and she placed a hand on top of the tablet. “I’ve had people try to take a lot of things from me. I just . . . I need this to be mine until the time is right.”

  I dipped my head in understanding. “Then it will be.”

  “Lala said something,” she hurried to say when I stood. “I want to know what she meant by it.”

  I gave her a pointed look. “Ask her.”

  Hesitation warred in her eyes. “She told me to ask you.”

  I folded my arms over my chest and waited, mind racing as I thought of the few things Lala could’ve told Emma that I would need to explain.

  “She said you saved her life and countless others’.” She dragged out the last words, pushing her unspoken question into the space between us.

  My arms dropped heavily to my sides.

  That hadn’t been one of the things I’d expected her to say.

  “Did she?” I murmured and forced something that might’ve resembled a smile, but it quickly fell.

  “She told me you were a SEAL,” she said, voice dropping even lower. “I want to know if it’s all true and what you did for her.”

  My head was shaking as I backed away. “She lied.”

  Before she had the chance to react in any way, I turned, snatched my drink from the counter, and left the shop.

  What she was asking . . . I didn’t want to go down that road. Not with anyone.

  Especially not Emma Wade.

  Because no one was ever just curious. They all had their reasons for wanting to talk about shit they wouldn’t understand. And, eventually, those reasons all made themselves known in one way or another.

  Some wanted to brag they knew someone who had done something they saw as heroic. Nearly all could be described in one word: Courtney.

  Besides, what none of them realized was I’d just been doing my job. But for every person I’d saved, there were others I hadn’t gotten to in time. That I’d failed.

  “Reed!”

  “Jesus,” I hissed and nearly lost my footing when I stumbled away from the unexpected intrusion.

  To my senses.

  To my mind.

  To my personal space, seeing how Courtney didn’t miss a beat when I shifted back, following me until she was practically pressed against me.

  It was like that saying: Speak of the devil, and he will appear.

  Except I only had to think of Courtney, and she would pop up like my own frenzied jack-in-the-box on speed and a strong-as-fuck love potion.

  “Can you believe it?” Her smile widened so much it looked painful. “Who would’ve thought we’d run into each other because I’m not on right now, I’m just coming to pick up my tips. And here you are!” She placed her hand on my arm, never noticing or not caring when I shifted out of her hold.

  “I, uh . . .”—I held up my cup even though it had been pressed between us—“just decided to swing by on my way home from running some errands.”

  “That’s what I’m about to do!” Her eyes brightened with excitement and hope. “How crazy we’re doing the same thing at the same time.”

  An uneasy laugh left me as I started stepping away. “Right. Uh . . . have a good day.”

  “Oh, you too, Reed!” she called out loudly. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “Jesus Christ,” I mumbled under my breath as I turned for my truck.

  Once I was inside, I pulled out my phone and sent off a message to Rowe.

  Me: Do me a favor and date Courtney.

  I only had to wait a few seconds before he began responding.

  Rowe: Ha. Fuck you.

  Rowe: . . . are you getting coffee because I’m about to head home and I’m pretty sure I’m dying. Coffee would help.

  Me: I’ll give you mine. No way in hell I’m going back in there.

  By the time I made it home, I was trying to figure out who I had pissed off.

  Because sitting on my porch was Hannah.

  I pocketed my phone and grabbed the coffee as I stepped out of my truck and tried to prepare myself for this.

  Hannah stood, already smiling as I rounded the porch to where she waited.

  “Hey,” she said easily, “figured you’d be back soon.”

  It didn’t register until then that she was just waiting for me. Because what if I hadn’t come back soon, how long would she have waited?

  If it had been Courtney or some of the other women in town, I had no doubt the answer would be forever.

  “Yeah, just ran some errands.” My phone vibrated in my pocket, but I didn’t reach for it. “What’s going on?”

  Her face fell slightly when I stopped a handful of feet away from her. She eyed the distance between us again and again before she shook her head and focused on me.
“Just haven’t really heard from you since last week, even though I know our schedules conflict a lot. But we both have the day and night off . . . and I was thinking—”

  “Hannah, I can’t.” I swallowed past the knot in my throat when her body visibly tensed and her eyes silently begged me not to do this. “The other night, I thought we were on the same page. I thought we both knew it was a night. And I’m sorry I didn’t realize before that it was different for you.”

  Funny how it was easier to stop her. To put an end to what she wanted, no question. Funny how it made me feel like the worst kind of asshole.

  But with women like Courtney, I was always dancing around the subject and struggling to find a way to let them down easy while never actually being able to.

  Maybe because nothing had ever happened with them, and I knew nothing would. Maybe because they had built me up in their minds to be this guy I wasn’t and turned it into an obsession, and their hearts weren’t on the line.

  Hannah’s head shook in fierce, quick motions. “It isn’t, it wasn’t,” she said adamantly. “It was just a night. I just thought we could, you know, have another one because it was fun.”

  If her eyes hadn’t turned glassy and her voice hadn’t gotten thick, I might’ve been able to believe her. But she couldn’t even hold my stare.

  “Hannah, I’m sorry.”

  Her head continued shaking as she pushed from the railing and turned for the stairs. “You shouldn’t be. I should have known you have a one-night limit.”

  “That isn’t it, I just can’t give you what you want.”

  She spun around, bringing us closer than we’d originally been. When she spoke, her voice trembled. “If nights are what you want, then I can give you that.”

  “I should have never let the other night happen,” I said honestly and hated that everything I said was crushing her. “I’m sorry for hurting you.”

  She started to leave again but asked, “Is it because of her?”

  My head slanted in question, but I didn’t ask who.

  “That girl everyone’s talking about right now.” Anger quickly replaced everything else on Hannah’s face. “Some of the fire guys said they saw you with her at Lala’s. Said it looked like you were really familiar.”

  Everything right then was because of Emma. But even if Emma weren’t in Colby, I wouldn’t want anything with Hannah.