Page 69 of Liars and Liaisons

My gaze drops to her outfit, the first bit of non-black clothing I’ve ever seen her wear. The scrap of fabric seems wholly out of place on her, a size too small and so short that I can practically see her pretty pink pussy from across the room.

Suspicion clouds my judgment. “Where did you get that dress?”

Nathaniel turns his head, brows angling together. “Do you even know who this is?”

It’s on the tip of my tongue to inform him that I have intimate knowledge of his vexatious ex. I’m even tempted to point out that the sounds he heard on the night of the intervention were hers as I buried my head between her legs.

My mouth parts, ready to ask if he remembers how delectable she tastes—because I certainly do.

Only she beats me to it.

“I-I came for you.”

Pink crawls across her face, like a sunset settling into the sky.

Violet covers her mouth with one hand, as if shocked by the words that came out.

I’ll admit, I am a bit too. Especially since we had a fuckingdeal. He’s supposed to know she resides here, that she’s been here for weeks now. The nature of her visit is supposed to be the part we keep secret because I want him to think the absolute worst.

I want it to wreck him, the way his relationship with Sydney wrecked me. Only when a man is utterly devastated from the throes of love can you ruin him for good.

“Jesus, babe.” Nathaniel lets out a strained laugh, seeming to shake out of his state of confusion. He stalks across the room, scooping her into his arms and lifting her off the ground in a bear hug. “If you wanted to see me, you didn’t need to come all the way out to Duris. This is, like, a seven-hour drive from Aplana.”

“Five and a half.” I watch them, watchher, as they continue their embrace.

He toys with one of her onyx-colored braids, dusting the end over her nose, even as she tries to remove herself from his grasp.

After a second, Nathaniel seems to notice I’ve spoken. “How do you know that?”

Fire rains down my throat. I don’t take my eyes off her. “I counted.”

Remorse flashes in her beautiful brown gaze, but she doesn’t voice an apology or regret. Instead, she doubles down on the lie, and nausea stomps around inside my stomach like an elephant with a vendetta.

“Your brother told me you’d be here, so I thought maybe we could talk.” She smiles—no,beams—at him. Her face brightens like the sun itself, and I feel the impact of it deep in my chest.

“About what?”

She shifts her focus from him to me, her attention undoing something vital within me.

It’s over in seconds. Through long, lowered lashes, she blinks up at him. “Well, we didn’t exactly leave things on the best of terms, and I thought—”

“What are you talking about?” He squints at her, genuine confusion marring his features. “What bad terms, Vi? We didn’t break up.”

When her head jerks back in surprise, it happens in slow motion. Like a car crash you can’t help watching. She frowns, and, God, I fucking hate that look on her face when it’s directed at anyone but me.

As much as I want her smiling and laughing, I can’t deny the pull of her ire as well. It makes my pulse beat out of rhythm and my dick hard as fucking steel.

Nathaniel’s words take a moment too long to settle in since I’m too busy ogling the raven-haired sprite. She glances at me from the corner of one eye, and it drives a knife clean through my stomach.

“We didn’t break up.”

Red flags wave a chaotic trail in my mind, blurring my vision so everything is bright crimson. The color of my Little Echo’s lips and the color I’d like to make her turn for fucking lying to me all this time.

I stand and stagger back a step, my hand catching on a sideboard to keep me from falling. That obscene, haunting melody roars like angry water between my ears, drowning out everything else, except the knowledge that this might have all been some sort of ploy on their part.

Of course she’d be in on whatever my brother’s grand scheme is. Her initial willingness to come here should’ve been the first obvious sign.

That’s probably where the money I gave her went. Right back to lining his filthy pockets, as if he wasn’t philandering with my student and using her to fuck me over less than a year ago.

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