Page 91 of Masked Sins
I find an engagement ring and lose my shit, and then I decide to solve things bykissingOrion?
I grab my purse and keys, walking into the hallway and stepping into the sandals from earlier. Just as I press the button for the elevator, Orion comes around the corner and stops when he sees me.
“I need some fresh air,” I tell him, jamming the button harder.
“In this weather?” he asks, crossing his arms and frowning.
I ignore his question. “I’ll be back soon.”
“Fine. See you later,” he says, eyes on mine. His voice is cold. Unfriendly. But there’s something behind his eyes, some kind of hurt or betrayal or?—
With a pang, I recognize the look on his face.
Fear.
Stark and vividfearglitters in his eyes.
The elevator chimes, and the doors slide apart. “Yeah. See you later,” I mutter, keeping eye contact until the doors slide shut.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
THE DROP
Orion
Six Months Ago
Everyone claps as I finish my best man speech. Liam pats my back, raising his champagne to my water, and we drink to his impending wedding with the delightful Zoe—who is watching me with misty eyes.
Thank you, she mouths, smiling and holding her glass up from where she’s seated next to Liam. The wedding is tomorrow, and as I look around at my brothers and their spouses—except Kai, who will probably belong to God forever—something empty and unfulfilling slithers through me. It’s not that I want to be married tomorrow, but I’d like to do this whole song and dance with someone one day. I’d like to have a rehearsal dinner where everyone is laughing, and we can joke and be a family.
I sit down next to Liam and force myself not to look across the table, but it doesn’t matter. Regarding my stepsister, it never matters how much I try to stay away.
It never works.
I take her in and let my eyes soak everything up. She’s talking to Juliet, sitting next to Chase, her husband and my brother. Stella, Miles’s wife, is on the other side of her, and the three of them gab like they’re all best friends. Layla throws her head back and laughs, and it takes me a second to realize the three of them are holding tequila shots. A smile plays on my lips as I watch Layla lick the salt off her hand. She brings the small glass of amber liquid to her mouth and throws it back without making a face, even as she sucks on the lime.
“Layla is a fucking superstar,” Stella says, her British accent slightly slurred.
Layla smirks. “I can hold my alcohol… unlike you, it seems.”
Stella swats her shoulder before all three of them laugh together.
“Another,” Juliet says, holding another shot up.
“It’s a good thing you live so far away. You’re a bad influence,” Stella says, and the three of them throw back another shot.
“Something interesting catch your eye?” Chase asks, having grabbed a chair and moved over between Liam and me sometime in the last twenty seconds.
“Fuck off,” I mutter, sipping my water.
“It’s nice to see them all together, you know?”
We watch as Zoe walks over to Layla, Stella, and Juliet. The four of them do another shot, and I can’t help but envision a future where all four are sisters-in-law.
Except that’ll never happen.
It doesn’t matter how much I want it to happen or how often I dream of the day when Layla looks at me with anything other than contempt.
