Page 70 of Under the Lies

“I’d love to.” He stares at Sayer, who’s shaking her head furiously. He walks across the room and scoops the thing up.

“No, absolutely not.” She shakes her head.

“Non-negotiable. I don’t like animals, remember?”

“You don’t like me either,” she reminds me.

Oh, that’s where she’s wrong. There’s a lot that comes to mind when I think of Sayer Brooks and not liking her isn’t one of them.

I ignore her, focusing on my men. “Take her back to my place.”

The look Sayer gives me is full of defiance as she crosses her arms over her chest, rooting herself in her spot. “You can speak like I’m in the damn room.”

Keep fighting me, Sayer, I’m going to love watching you break.

“Fine.” I give her my hard stare. “Take Sayer here back to my place.”

Reeve snickers as they move to flank either side of her and she steps away from them. Toward me.

The rest of the distance between us erases with my steps. “Do you even want to go back there? To your apartment where a creep with a hard-on for taking pictures of you can get in? To the place where you desperately ran away from?”

She shivers, not denying it. I see the moment she lets go of the fight inside her, letting the exhaustion of the day take over instead. Her tense shoulders deflate and the worry lining her face shifts to fatigue.

I reach up to cup her cheek, touch the fallen strands of her hair, I don’t know—I never get to find out. Without another word she turns and leaves my office, Gabe and Reeve right behind her.

She goes quietly and willingly but the look in her eye as she does?

A kiss of retribution will be waiting for me when I get home.

No more than twenty minutes later I’m closing out of my computer. Shit hasn’t gotten done since Sayer left my office.

Ten minutes ago I got a text from Gabe that said they made it to my place and she was in a mood. Reeve apparently wouldn’t stop taunting her about taking her cat.

They’re gone now and Sayer’s alone in my place.

I slip out the back entrance, down a cramped, narrow alley, the same time my phone rings.

“What?” I bark in answer.

“Why did I just hear that you moved Sayer into your apartment?” Thea sounds concerned on the other line and I’d bet five grand it isn’t for me.

“Because I moved Sayer into my apartment.”

“Noah…”

“Don’t want to hear it, Thea.”

“Well tough shit.”

Oh, she sounds angry. Keeping the phone pressed to my ear, I unlock my sports car and slip in.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

“Killing two birds with one stone. Someone’s after her, Thea.”

She’s quiet, already aware of this. I’ve had her pull up surveillance around Sayer’s building. I had hoped that was what she was calling about. Not to give a heavy, judgmental sigh in my ear instead.

“You’re going to break the poor girl.”

---