Page 104 of Desperate Crimes

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My guy goes quiet for a beat. Then, in a lower voice, “Should we alert Mrs. Fury? Tell her to return inside?”

I look at the screen again, at the garden.

At her.

The woman who makes even this wicked world feel like it could be beautiful. Who softens the monster in me without trying.

“No,” I say. “You never tell her anything. That’s for me to do.”

And I will.

Just not yet.

Let them come.

Let Adrik rage.

Because when he looks into my eyes, he’ll see it—that I’m not some reckless boy chasing a girl.

I’m a Fury.

And I don’t let go.

Not of her. Not ever.

Chapter Twenty-Seven-Leanna

“I don’t understand why you couldn’t meet me at the house, Lee-Lee,” Mom says.

Her tone is soft, but I can hear the edge—the familiar thread of disappointment curling beneath it.

Not anger.

It’s worse.

She’s hurt.

I swallow against the guilt tightening my throat.

“I just have a lot going on, Mom. Sorry.”

“Give her a break, Sof,” Aunt Destiny cuts in, her voice warm and sharp like peppermint tea. “She’s got a life to live. She’s only twenty-four.”

“Twenty-five next week,” I remind them with a weak laugh, even though I feel like I’ve aged a hundred years in the last seven days.

My fingers twist the edge of the silk wrap I’m wearing, one of the many pieces Nico had waiting for me in that ridiculous closet.

It clings to my skin like a second secret.

God, he dresses me better than I dress myself.

And even though I’ve packed up most of my apartment and brought it over—boxes labeled with careful handwriting, little bits of the life I built for myself—there’s a strange, almost shameful truth I can’t ignore.

I like what he has for me here better.

The clothes in Nico’s closet—my closet now—are softer, richer.

The fabrics glide over my skin like a whispered promise.

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