Page 115 of Bad Cowboy, Tennessee

No.

Not this secret.

This was the one he was never supposed to know.

The one that isn’t mine to tell.

My heart felt like it had too much blood to pump.

“It wasn’tdaysafter I broke up with Lily, when I flirted with you. You were never meant to know. Lily and I… we wereneverwhat you think we were.”

Max’s eyes scanned my face.

Trying to decipher the secret. The one I swore I’d never tell him—but here I was, doing so many things I swore I’d never do, just for Max.

“Why the fuck was she with you?” Max asked, his voice a broken whisper.

Something lodged in my throat. Pressure flared in my temples.

I watched myself let out the truth, like a door that would never be closed again.

“My father paid Lily to be with me,” I said.

I could feel tears stinging at the back of my eyes, but I knew they’d never fall. I’d never let them out.

I’d vowed, long ago, toneverlet my father get to me.

Not like this.

“No,” Max whispered.

“Is that enough of an explanation for you? I haven’t told another soul. Lily doesn’t even know that I know.”

He frowned. “How is that possible?”

“Lily won’teverknow that I know.”

I turned toward the tall windows at the edge of the bedroom, looking out over the mountains and the field below. Under the moonlight, everything was in shades of black, white, and cool blue. The petals on the rose bushes below looked black.

“Remember when I told you that I found my dad’s burner phone, that one night? Found out about all the women he’s been having affairs with?”

“Yes.”

“There was one other thing I discovered. It was messages with Lily.”

“Don’t tell me my sister was involved with your father?—”

“Romantically, sexually? Fuck no. Lily wouldnever. She is a sweet girl, even if…”

“Christ.”

I shook my head. “She only needed money. It’s as simple as that. I saw messages between them where my dad would let her knowthe payment went through. They had screenshots attached sometimes. And… my father was paying Lily half a million dollars a year to be with me.”

“No fucking way,” Max breathed.

“Five hundred thousand a year to keep me interested. To keep me in a committed, heterosexual relationship.”

I turned to see him shaking his head. “Lily wouldn’t do that. She would never get involved with someone just for money.”

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