Page 62 of Until She's Mine
Chapter 29
Lucian
The penthouse is dark, lit only by the city’s lights through floor-to-ceiling windows. Evelyn stands frozen, her silhouette rigid against the faint light, her breath shallow and uneven.
“You knew.” Her voice is raw. “About Claire. About the forgery. All of it.”
Slowly, I set down my coat and turn on the lights. I gave Evelyn 15 minutes on our way home to compose herself after the confrontation with Tobias, to process and breathe. To understand that I’ve known for a long time.
“Your university’s security footage was surprisingly easy to access. I deleted the footage from the system, of course.”
She doesn’t know I kept a copy of the dorm security footage. I’ve watched it a hundred times. I’ve memorized the sight of herstanding at that window, so still, so quiet, long after Claire hit the pavement.
My perfect girl. My perfectliar.
Her breath catches.
Evelyn thinks Tobias covered all leads, but there was so much more he never knew about. The security footage was just the beginning. I’ve collected every thread of evidence Tobias missed—the police reports with their convenient gaps, the forensic analysis that was never completed, the witness statements that were mysteriously filed away. All of it was carefully collected and destroyed.
I step closer, trailing a finger down her arm. She’s still shaking from the adrenaline crash. From the lie unraveling. “You looked so innocent in that yellow dress, standing at the window. Sostillafter Claire fell.”
Her back hits the floor-to-ceiling window. The storm rages behind her, turning Manhattan into a smeared watercolor of light and shadow.
I cage her in, palms flat against the window on either side of her head. “Did you think I wouldn’t check?” My lips brush the shell of her ear. “That I wouldn’tdiginto the woman who caught my brother’s eye?”
“You’ve had this the whole time? You knew… and you still let me into your life? Into your bed?”
“You think a little blood on your hands would scare me away?” My teeth graze her jaw. “Love, I collect broken things. I cherish them.”
Evelyn’s pupils dilate. Her nails bite into my wrists.
“I saw the footage,” I continue. “I saw you standing there after she fell. The way your hands didn’t shake. How methodically you wiped down the windowsill before calling for help.” I yank the pins from her hair. Chestnut waves tumble down her back like acascade of silk. “You fascinate me, Evelyn. Every perfect, deadly inch of you.”
She swallows hard, her throat working beneath my lips as I trace the frantic flutter of her pulse. “You-you’re not disgusted?”
“Disgusted? I’m enthralled.” My knee parts her thighs. “You did what you had to do to survive. To protect yourself. Claire was a threat, and you eliminated her. It’s survival of the fittest, Evelyn. And you? You’re a fighter. A survivor.” The first button of her blousepopsbetween my fingers. “You’re exactly what I always knew you were.”
She arches into me with a gasp. The window rattles as I lift her, as her legs lock around my waist. A thousand lit windows, a thousand unseen eyes sprawl beneath us.
Her teeth sink into my lower lip. Copper blooms between us. I groan against her mouth, the pain only fueling my desire. Her grip on my hair is savage, her body pressed flush against mine. There’s a wildness in her now that wasn’t there before, an unleashed hunger that matches my own.
“Liar,” she breathes. “I’m a liar.”
My lips graze the curve of her neck. “The worst of you is still the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. Every secret, every lie, every twisted corner of your soul—they’re mine to unravel.”
Liar. Thief. Murderer.
The words should make me recoil, but they only stoke the fire burning in my veins. I’d always known there was something darker beneath Evelyn’s good girl exterior, something that mirrors the shadows within me. And now, here it is, laid bare.
Evelyn wraps her legs around my waist tighter, her breath hot against my ear.
“I am yours, too.” I pull back slightly to meet her gaze. “There was never going to be anyone else for me, Evelyn. From the moment I saw you, I knew. I’ve always been yours. Every broken piece of me.”
Her eyes darken, a flicker of vulnerability breaking through the mask of defiance. “Then take me. Take all of me.”
I don’t need further invitation. My mouth crashes into hers, demanding and possessive, as if I could devour every last shred of her secrets and make them mine. Her hands tangle in my hair, pulling me closer as she kisses me back.
The storm rages on outside, but here, pressed between the cold glass and the heat of our bodies, nothing else exists.
