Page 95 of His Fury

The first image was a grainy shot of Zayn shaking hands with a man in a dark coat, his face half hidden. But I recognized him; it was the same man from the laundering drop I wasn’t supposed to see—the older man, not the one who had looked at me like I was a weakness.

I clicked on another photo. My gasp echoed in the quiet of the kitchen. This one was a close-up shot of me outside Elixir. My face was slightly blurred but still unmistakable. My stomach roiled. Cold sweat trickled down my spine.

They’d been watching.Observingme. I checked the time stamp; they’d been watching me long before Julian approached me to ask if I could reach out to Zayn for help with his debt.

“He set me up.” The cold, hard truth lay before me. Hemanipulatedme. I’d seen enough. My hands trembled as I closed the folders, yanked the flash drive free, and dropped it onto the table as if it were on fire.

I stood quickly, backing away, needing air, needing distance?—

The front door clicked open. My heart stalled. For the first time in my life, I prayed it was Rye walking through the door.

The universe gave me another middle finger as Zayn strolled into the kitchen in a black suit, looking every bit the dangerous man I knew him to be. His eyes were sharp from the moment they locked on to mine.

I didn’t speak. Neither did he.

His gaze dropped to the laptop. To the USB beside it.

His whole body went still.

The mask of Zayn McCabe fell into place effortlessly. I recognized it now—that smooth, unreadable armor he wore like a second skin. Like his tailored suits and expensive watch, it fit him perfectly.

“Isla?” His voice was cool. Controlled. But I heard it, the undercurrent of something warmer, something steady.

Something safe.

I swallowed. My heart pounded, yet my voice remained firm. “We need to talk.”

CHAPTER 23

ZAYN

She lookedas though she had been standing there for hours. The laptop was closed. Her work was pushed away as if it had scalded her, and beside the laptop, something caught my attention.

A flash drive.

I glanced at it and then at Isla, who looked between it and me as if it were a loaded gun between us.

And Isla? Isla looked like she’d just seen the monster under the bed—and realized he lived in her house.

“We need to talk,” she said.

Four words. So simple. So sharp.

I didn’t react. I simply walked into the room, ready for anything. A habit. A reflex.

A necessity in my line of work.

“Where did you get that?” My voice was low, calm, and practiced.

She didn’t answer. Not right away. Instead, she stepped back, folding her arms across her chest as if it could shield her from a truth she already knew.

“Julian came by.”

There it was. The sour taste of his name bloomed instantly.

“He gave me that,” she said, nodding toward the flash drive.

I crossed the room slowly. “And what isthat?”

---