Page 67 of Tainted Truth

My brows pinch. “As long as I’m here? Do you think I’m going to leave?”

“I think it’s your instinct, and instincts are hard to fight.”

He’s pushing again.

“I think you’re afraid, and I think it’s because of Rachel.” His body tenses at my accusation, letting me know that I’m right. “You don’t have to tell me who she is, but don’t make me pay for her sins.”

He closes the distance and lightly brushes his lips against mine, then rests our foreheads together. “Sometimes it feels like you see too much.”

I chuckle. “I feel the same way about you three.”

We jump apart when there’s a pounding on the door. Asher grabs the kitchen knife while Rio and Zane jump from the couch, each with handguns at the ready, before moving to peek out the front window.

“We got a runner,” Zane observes, then bolts out the front.

“Shit,” Rio shouts as he jumps over something on his way out.

I dart around Asher and run to the open door. The sun has begun setting and is right in my eyes, causing me to squint down at the dark lump on the front steps.

“Spencer!” Asher shouts from behind me.

“Oh my God,” I gasp and throw a hand over my mouth, holding down the bile threatening to make an appearance.

On the steps is a bruised and bloodied teenage girl. There are two bullet holes in her body.

One in the heart, one in the skull.

“No,” I whisper.

Asher grabs my shoulders and turns me around. I bury my face in his chest and squeeze my eyes shut, but the image is branded in my brain.

The girl is young, maybe in her teens, and holding a bouquet of purple hyacinths with multiple knives sticking out of her stomach.

CHAPTER 27

RIO

Tonight is not going how I imagined it. We were supposed to have a calm evening with dinner and maybe a nice fuck fest to soothe Spencer after the shit show outside the FBI. But no. Now Zane and I are chasing some motherfucker down the street who dropped a dead body on our doorstep.

Way to ruin the mood, pendejo.

The idiot dashes down an alley. Zane follows, which means it’s my job to cut him off. I double my effort, lengthening my stride.

Should’ve done more running with Spencer.

I turn the corner and come up to where the alley spits back out onto a main street. Thankfully, the perpetrator emerges in front of me. On my next step, I launch myself forward and tackle the guy to the ground. We roll a few times when the sound of a click echoes on the street. Zane stands over us with his gun pointed at the guy.

“Fuck! I think you broke my arm!”

“Don’t be such a baby; I highly doubt it’s broken. If we’re complaining, then you got Spencer’s favorite pants dirty.” Iwrestle him under me and get his hands behind his back. I stand and pull him to his feet with me.

A streetlamp gives us little light, but the big “13” on the back of his neck in gothic script stands out like a damn neon sign.

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me! MS-thirteen?”

Zane moves to stand next to me to get a better view. “Fucking Gabriel.”

“I highly doubt he knows about this.”

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