Page 8 of Killian's Vengeance

When she started crying that she wasn’t Lily, that we made a mistake, rage roared through me like a hurricane. Rage that she would even try to deny who she was and what she’d done. Rage that she tried to avoid accountability and that she would stand in the way of us getting vengeance for Mac.

Rage that a small, insane part of me wanted to fucking believe her.

It was that small part, that crazy part, that made me pause. Made me doubt.

Fuck, she was too good. I had to get away from her and get my fucking shit together.

I threw myself down on the large leather couch and tipped my head back wearily. We were in the basement of The Red Room, a sex club that Cullen and I had provided security for. We were good friends with the owner, Logan Galloway, and he didn’t bat an eye at letting me use one of his rooms to interrogate Lily. He’d also known Mac, knew that he’d been like a brother to us.

The door swung open and Cullen entered. He sat in a chair across from me and pinned me with his intense blue eyes, his jaw like granite, his short, brown hair sticking up on top, as though he’d run his fingers through it several times. I could smell the whiskey coming off of him from here. He’d been like this since Mac died—drowning himself in alcohol and sex. I was full of anger, but Cullen was bursting at the seams with it. It was one of the reasons I had to handle all of the interactions with Lily. I didn’t trust Cullen not to lose it and just fucking kill her, especially if he was drunk.

“So? Did she give it up?” he asked, his voice steady but impatient.

“No.”

“No?” he parroted incredulously.

I sighed. I was still trying to process my interaction with Lily and having to explain it to Cullen was distinctly uncomfortable and annoying.

“She’s being…difficult. Unpredictable.” I didn’t want to give away my strange reaction to her, how I felt when she breathed in my scent as I hovered over her, how it created this serene expression on her face that made my dick as hard as concrete. No, I couldn’t mention any of that.

“Difficult?” he repeated again, shooting me another disbelieving look. He’d seen me disarm and neutralize some of the most dangerous, most deranged, and most intimidating men in the world. Seeing me struggle with one small female was no doubt a bit mystifying.

“You getting soft because she’s a woman?” he accused lightly.

I scoffed. “I’ve handled women in the field. You know that’s not it.”

“Then what’s the fucking problem? You want me to go in there with her?” He cracked his knuckles, anticipating the opportunity to use them on Lily Jensen.

“No, I don’t need that.” I paused, the pressure to voice the one doubt rolling around in my head pushing the words out of my mouth. “She claimed she’s not Lily.”

Cullen snorted derisively. “Of course, she did. She’s trying to save her ass without giving up any information. It’s not the first time you’ve heard a target say shit like that.”

I nodded. He was right, of course. It was practically the first thing most people said when they were caught. It wasn’t me, you have the wrong guy, I have a twin—I’d heard it all. The only problem was, they weren’t remotely believable. I knew they were lying. With Lily—or whoever that girl was—she sounded sincere. Believable.

That was what made her so fucking dangerous.

“Don’t worry. I’m going to get something to eat and go back in there and hopefully wrap this fucking thing up. Then, we can take care of the motherfucker who killed Mac.”

He cocked his head at me, his expression thoughtful and suspicious. He was fucking questioning my ability to handle her. A part of me didn’t blame him, but I sure as fuck couldn’t say that.

I shot him a ferocious scowl. “Stop fucking looking at me like that. I’ll fucking handle her. By this time tomorrow, we’ll have our hands on Mac’s killer and Lily Jensen will be history. Literally.”

Chapter 6

Willa

My body throbbed in misery, every movement sending needle-like pains through the tender, flayed skin of my back and shoulders. It was hard to focus on how to escape when every move was so painful. But I really needed to find a way because that guy was not fucking around. I figured admitting I wasn’t Lily would be my saving grace, in terms of torture, if not death.

Wrong.

I imagined that most people, when caught and accused of heinous crimes, immediately claimed that they had the wrong person. He wouldn’t listen to me, no matter how vehemently I protested that this was a case of mistaken identity. Since he already thought I was a murderer, lying was pretty small potatoes in comparison.

What I needed was evidence. I needed to prove I wasn’t Lily. This would be easy enough if I had my license or student ID on me, but it didn’t seem as if my captor was prepared to give me the benefit of the doubt while I ran back to Lily’s apartment and grabbed my wallet.

But I had to find a way to convince him, and maybe if I explained how I planned to prove it, he would let me try.

My stomach rumbled, and I was almost glad for the pain in my back because it kept my mind off how hungry I was. I wasn’t sure what time it was or how long I’d been here, but I could tell it had been a long time since I’d eaten. I was also getting a cold, now only wearing a small pair of shorts in the dark, cool environment of the room that was rapidly coming to feel like a prison cell.

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