Love & Lies

by Julie Johnson

  I thrashed and screamed but whoever had grabbed me was far too strong — there was no way to escape his hold. I never even saw his face before the trunk slammed shut and I was enclosed in the cramped, dark space. My cellphone lay uselessly in the bottom of the Prada bag he’d so easily taken from me.

  I screamed though I knew there was no one around to hear the muffled sound. The rest area had been practically deserted.

  The unmistakable rumble of the engine starting made my heart pound faster. Sweat began to bead across my forehead when I felt the car pull out of the parking space and merge back onto the highway.

  I kicked and clawed at the taillights, but they wouldn’t come loose. I bloodied my fists against the metal latch, banging until there was no strength left in my arms. With a scream of frustration, I was finally forced to accept the fact that I wasn’t getting out of this trunk until someone opened it from the outside.

  Reaching down, I pulled my Lady Smith from her holster. Five rounds were all that stood between me and… well, whatever unpleasant things my captor had planned for me. They’d have to be enough.

  We drove for hours.

  That’s what it felt like, anyway. In the dark, I had very little concept of time.

  I tried not to cry or panic. It was easier to keep my cool at first, with one hand clenched around my pistol so tightly I thought the metal would leave permanent impressions in my flesh. But as the minutes ticked on, the claustrophobia set in — as did the realization that wherever he was taking me, it was so far from civilization, we’d had to travel several winding roads off the highway to get there.

  I was haunted by the fact that no one would know I’d been taken. I’d said goodbye to my family with no promises to call when I got home safely. I hadn’t even told Lux or Conor that I’d be returning to New York.

  Essentially, I was an idiot.

  But the guy who’d snatched me — he was an even bigger idiot. And, if I had anything to do with it, soon he was going to be a big, dead idiot.

  Seriously, who kidnaps a girl without checking to see if she’s armed first?

  After an eternity, the car slowed to a stop.

  I listened to his door open, to his footsteps approaching.

  My grip tightened on the gun, my body was poised to leap from the space.

  The trunk creaked open…

  And I fired.

  Chapter 42

  Faith

  PRETTY LITTLE PISTOL

  * * *

  “Fuck!”

  I ignored his curse as I jumped headfirst from the trunk and hit the dirt. Instead of executing the perfect roll I’d intended — I mean, they did it in every spy movie, how hard could it be? — I literally landed on my face. This was no lithe, Catwoman-esque tumble. When I finally skidded to a stop, I was covered head-to-toe in dirt and had somehow managed to swallow a large clump of earth as well as several small pebbles. I moaned in both pain and mortification as I spat dust and grass tufts from my mouth. Scrambling to my feet, gun still firmly clenched in my right fist, I tried to stand tall as I spun to face my captor, but that was pretty hard considering I’d lost one high heel in my disastrous leap for freedom and was now wobbling on uneven footing.

  I figured he’d have either run for the hills, terrified by my unexpected bullets, or at the very least be cowering in fear, lest I shoot at him again.

  Sadly, I was mistaken.

  He was leaning against the car, his arms crossed casually over his chest as if he had not a care in the world. His breathing rate was perfectly normal, while I was still heaving in oxygen faster than a freaking vacuum cleaner. Not a speck of dust coated his black-on-black jeans and leather jacket combo, whereas I looked like the creature from the Black Lagoon. But it was that goddamned crooked smile, fixed so happily on his face as he watched me hack up globs of soil, that really tested the limits of my sanity.

  “You,” I spat, glaring at him and trying very, very hard to remind the less-forgiving parts of my psyche that first-degree homicide was a bad, bad thing that would send me to prison for a long, long time. The gun twitched in my hand.

  “Me,” Wes agreed, grinning at me like we were old friends.

  Yep. There was only one option here.

  I’d have to kill him.

  * * *

  “Give me one reason not to shoot you,” I growled, my eyes narrowed on his face and my hands wrapped firmly around my gun as I aimed it at him. I tried to keep my gaze cool, clinical, but damned if he wasn’t even better looking than he’d been three years ago — a realization that pissed me off beyond measure. Light five o’clock shadow dusted his jawline, making it seem even more chiseled. His hair was slightly longer than it had been last time I’d seen him. I didn’t look in his eyes — I couldn’t bear to see what emotions they held — so I watched his mouth instead.

  “Do you even know how to use that thing?” His smile was condescending.

  Without taking my eyes off his face, I fired a shot into the dirt, missing his boot by mere inches.

  “I don’t know,” I said, batting my lashes like a bimbo. “Do I?”

  He lifted his hands in surrender, though his grin stretched wider. “So, the kitten grew some claws.”

  “You think I’m joking around?” I took a step closer and my voice went arctic. “You ruined my life. I would be all too happy to shoot you. Honestly, it would be poetic justice.”

  His eyes dropped to my torso, as though he could see through my clothes to the ugly, circular scar that lay beneath.

  “Eyes up, asshole.” I gripped my gun tighter when his gaze lifted and met mine for the first time. It took all the strength I had not to react when our eyes locked — dark chocolate flashing against caramel, the connection instantly making the air around us sizzle with electricity. I felt a physical jolt move through my body, like I’d stuck one finger inside a socket, and all the fine, feathery hairs on my arms stood on end as my gaze, full of rage and distrust, burned into his dispassionate one.

  His face was a mask, that happy grin he wore concealing every real emotion, just as smoke and mirrors hide a magician’s slight of hand. I could read nothing in his expression.

  Some things never changed, I supposed.

  He took a step closer to me and opened his mouth to speak. “Listen—”

  “Stay back!” I shook the pistol as I moved away from him, keeping a distance of about ten feet between us.

  “If I wanted to hurt you, I would have already.” His voice was exasperated.

  “You kidnapped me,” I snapped, swallowing forcefully and trying to gather my composure.

  “Well, considering you’ve got a gun trained on me right now, you can’t exactly blame me,” he pointed out. “I knew the only way I’d get you to listen was if I cornered you.”

  “Except you didn’t ‘corner me.’ You threw me in a trunk.”

  “You say potato, I say—”

  “Shut up.” I waved the gun menacingly and he stopped speaking, though his grin grew even wider. I took a deep breath. “You were right about one thing. I have no interest in listening to anything you have to say.”

  I backed away from him until I reached the driver’s side door, which he’d left ajar. He didn’t shift from his spot against the trunk, though his eyes tracked my every move. When I looked inside and saw the keys were missing from the ignition, I lifted my gaze to glare at him.

  “Is there a problem, officer?” he mocked, raising his eyebrows.

  “Do you have a death wish?” I shrieked, taking several steps toward him.

  He shrugged.

  I held in a scream. “Give them to me.”

  “What, these?” He held up the keys. “No. Not until you listen to what I have to say.”

  I couldn’t contain it anymore — the scream escaped, a screech of sheer frustration and anger. “Ruining my life once wasn’t enough for you? You really came back for round two?” My voice was borderline hysterical. “God, what don’t you understand? I don’t want to talk to yo
u, or listen to you. I hate you.”

  Something flickered in his eyes, but it was gone far too quickly for me to read it.

  “Still stubborn as a fucking ox, I see,” he muttered under his breath. “The thing is, I don’t give a shit what you want. You’re going to listen.”

  I stared at him, fuming. Adjusting my grip on the gun, I tried not to let him see that my hands were trembling with effort to remain in control.

  Just looking at him ached like a bullet wound to the stomach. It was like seeing the ghost of everything I’d ever wanted in life, come back to haunt me. I stared at the man I thought I’d loved, at the lie I’d so easily fallen for, and I felt myself slowly bleeding out inside. Blood filled my chest cavity as my shrapnel-shredded heart was ripped open again for the first time in three years. It was a miracle I managed to stay standing as whatever scar tissue had managed to heal over was torn away like paper, the old wound made fresh once more.

  I dragged a deep breath through my nose. “There’s nothing you can say that will affect me or my life.”

  His grin faded a bit. “Well, then there’s no harm in hearing me out, is there?”

  I fought the urge to roll my eyes at his logic. “If I listen, you’ll give me the keys?”

  He nodded.

  “Then get it over with.” I somehow found the strength to make my voice steady, when inside I was falling apart. “I’d like you out of my life again as soon as possible.”

  “Fine.” His jaw clenched tighter. “I’m here to tell you you’re in danger.”

  I tried not to scoff.

  “The mission in Budapest three years ago — I was there for a man named Szekely. He’s an arms dealer, but not the kind who fucks around with old army regulation AK-47s and sawed off shotguns. He’s next-gen. Heat-seeking missiles, drones, biological warfare. My protocol was to gather intel on his front company—”

  “Hermes,” I muttered darkly.

  He nodded. “I planted cameras and got eyes inside—”

  “By using me,” I supplied, my voice venomous.

  “You know, for someone who said she wanted this over as soon as possible, you sure have a lot of fucking interruptions,” he noted pointedly.

  My mouth snapped shut.

  “I was looking for a prototype. When we raided the Hermes offices, we also raided Szekely’s compound. There was nothing — and no one — inside by the time we got there. The entire place was cleaned out.”

  I felt my eyebrows go up in curiosity, though I still didn’t understand how this translated to me being in danger.

  “Someone tipped him off. Someone on my team.” His anger was apparent, suffused in every word that escaped his tight-pressed lips. “Szekely has a lot of money. His bribes have carried him a long way.”

  I couldn’t keep myself in check any longer. “And this matters to me because…”

  His eyes locked on mine and the expression on his face was so serious, I felt my stomach flip in foreboding. “Because, in the past year, everyone who was even remotely involved with the Szekely operation — from the couriers to the men who raided that facility by my side — has wound up dead.”

  “What?” I breathed in disbelief.

  “They’re dead — the girls you worked with, the men on my team. Someone is hunting them down and killing them. A professional — the hits are clean, execution style.” His voice was low, each word intent. “You are in serious danger. Trust me, I wouldn’t be here if you weren’t.”

  Trust him. Trust him. Was he freaking kidding?

  I stared at him, torn between laughter and tears. His words seemed ludicrous, but they had their intended effect — I was scared, even if I didn’t fully believe him. Each word he spoke, each expression on his face was so convincing, it made me falter for a moment.

  But then I remembered this was the same man who’d deceived me once before. The man who’d fooled me so thoroughly, so successfully, I’d thought I was in love with him.

  “I don’t believe a damn word you say.” My voice was cold. “You’re a liar. You’ve proven that in the past. Who’s to say you aren’t lying now?”

  “I’m not lying.” His words were adamant. “You think I was the only one watching your house, waiting for you to slip up and come home? If they know where you are, you’ll be dead before you can so much as reach for that pretty little pistol you keep waving around.”

  “I heard what you had to say.” I stared at him blankly, careful to conceal all the pain and heartbreak that was tearing me up inside. “Now, give me the goddamned keys before I shoot you with this pretty little pistol. It might be small, but it shoots straight and true. And its bullets will kill you just as quick.”

  He stared at me for a long moment before nodding and tossing the keys by my feet. “Fine. It’s your funeral.”

  Without taking my eyes or my gun off him, I crouched down and scooped up the keys.

  “I’ll stay here for another day, in case you change your mind. There’s a cabin in the clearing just through those woods.” His words were flat as he gestured to the copse of trees off the dirt road. “If you come back before tomorrow at midnight, I can keep you safe. If you don’t…”

  He didn’t finish the thought.

  I didn’t speak another word as I backed away from him toward the driver’s side door — I had nothing left to say and, frankly, I wasn’t sure I could even form words. My anger was wearing off and the brave face I’d worn for the past fifteen minutes was splintering with each passing second. Seeing him was simply too painful — the ache of it overrode every other sensation, until I was crushed beneath the weight of my own broken heart.

  I climbed into the car and immediately locked the doors behind me, not releasing my gun as I shoved the keys in the ignition and started the engine. My eyes were trained on the rearview mirror, watching to see if he would try to stop me.

  He didn’t.

  He stood on the dirt road, hands shoved deep in the pockets of his jeans, and stared at me through the glass with a look on his face that almost brought tears to my eyes. That careful expressionless mask he always wore slipped as he watched me leave, and his eyes swirled with something that looked a lot like regret. Maybe even longing.

  I forced myself to look away, with an internal reminder that nothing he said, did, or showed me was trustworthy. Once a liar, always a liar.

  Right?

  So why was my stupid, foolish heart begging me to stop the car and go back to him, even as I raced down the road and left him in a cloud of tire dust?

  Chapter 43

  Weston

  OUT OF MY MISERY

  * * *

  I replayed it over and over in my mind as I watched her car disappear down the winding road, back toward the highway.

  Her eyes flashing hotly, her expression pinched with anger as the words flew from her mouth.

  God, what don’t you understand? I hate you.

  She hated me.

  I hated me, too.

  Standing there, watching her drive back out of my life, I almost fell to my knees in the dirt. Almost lost it completely.

  It had been hard enough to hold it together when she was standing in front of me. Now that she was gone, my cocky facade slipped entirely and I felt myself spinning out of control.

  I bit down hard on the inside of my cheek, pressed my eyes closed, and counted until my breathing rate returned to normal. This time, it took far longer than five seconds to regain command of myself.

  Seeing her again — no matter how pissed off at me she’d been — was like breathing fresh air for the first time in years. Like stepping into a pool of sunlight after a lifetime spent in the darkness. She was even more beautiful now — her cheekbones were sharper, more angular, framing those catlike eyes and making her soft mouth look even more inviting.

  I tried to block out memories of that mouth, hot as hell against my own — in a cable car, in an alleyway, on a hardwood floor, in her bed. I tried to shut out thoughts of her hands threading into
my hair, pulling my lips down on hers in a kiss so bruising I worried I’d hurt her with the strength of it. I tried to ignore the tightness that settled in my chest when I noticed her curves, the full-bodied curves of a woman, beneath the tight-fitting clothes she wore.

  Gone was the girl in cut-off shorts and flip flops — whatever traces of youth had remained when I’d met her in Budapest were long vanished. She was a woman, now — dressed to kill in stilettos and a skirt that hugged her ass so tightly it made my mouth go dry and my cock twitch in my jeans. Thoughts of the luminous white skin I knew lay beneath those clothes drove me to distraction the entire time she stood there glaring at me with a gun aimed at my chest.

  I half-hoped she’d shoot, just to put me out of my fucking misery.

  Looking at her and knowing I’d never have her again was worse than any torture my enemies could ever come up with. But it wasn’t just unfulfilled lust driving me insane. It was the realization that she was different.

  Budapest, meeting me… it had changed her.

  The stylish clothes and darker hair were new. So was the gun.

  But the thing that hit me like a fucking sledgehammer was the change in her eyes.

  They were no longer wide with wonderment at the world. They weren’t the eyes of a naive, young girl with an eternity of possibilities laid out before her. There was no excitement or blind trust in their depths.

  Now, they looked like mine. Narrowed with suspicion. Wary of everything and everyone.

  And the thought that Faith — that the hopeful, happy girl I’d loved since before I could even recognize the emotion — was less like herself and more like me — a coldhearted bastard with a bad attitude and no redeeming qualities — was the biggest fucking tragedy of all.

  She’d said it best — I ruined her life.

  She didn’t want my help.