Murder_ A Sinful Secrets Romance - Ella James Page 0,123

my pocket anyway. Maybe I could get my own gardenia plant and make myself smell the damn thing every day. Until I’m okay with it. Then Gwenna could bring hers back inside.

I drag myself to my feet, find the cake cover, and spend a few minutes engineering a transport so I can move the cake without ripping it apart.

Then I check on Gwen again. She’s sleeping peacefully. Which means she’ll never know what I’m about to do.

TWENTY FOUR

BARRETT

I look down on her for a moment. Watching her ribs expand with breath. Running my gaze along her soft form, cushioned by the blankets. Smelling the sweet, fruity scent of the air in her bedroom.

As I look at her, I try to look inward at myself. All I really see is the fury of desire I feel for her. It’s consuming, dangerous. I know this. From the first day I watched her, I felt things for her I’d never felt for any other person living on the other side of my crosshairs. Things I’ve never felt for anyone at all.

I told myself that there were reasons for that: all our parallels; her strength; her undeniable beauty, so much of which remains untouched, despite her worry to the contrary. I told myself that maybe right then, anyone would do. I’d been lonely before, and fucked up. But never like this…

I try not to think right now about those details.

Gwenna wants me. I want her—so much, my eyes are wet. My throat aches as I blink down at her.

I ask myself: if she knew…

If.

And the awful thing is, I trust in her goodness so damn much…

If Gwenna knew. I’m able to tell myself that maybe…

It’s possible she wouldn’t care.

She’s just so good. And kind. Forgiving.

There’s a voice that says I don’t deserve it, but there’s a louder one and it screams need.

I need her now, like air and water. More.

I think about it—not a whole thought, even, just a frame of memory, the sensation of my jaw clenching around the barrel of my 9mm. How cold it was. And how I couldn’t do it. Not there in the Ft. Bragg place I shared with Breck, with all his shit boxed up around me.

So I thought I could do this instead.

I turn away from her and hold my head. I walk through her office and lean against the doorframe, facing the living room. I don’t belong here, and I know I don’t. But…I can’t help myself. I’m bad, and maybe I can fight that by being good to her.

The whole thing—what I know— it would be a fucked up kind of self-flagellation on my end. Which I like. Which seems fitting.

I can make this up to her. Not really. But I can spend as much time as she’ll let me trying to.

With that thought pasted to the forefront of my mind, I touch my pocket, feeling the hardness of my phone. I look over my shoulder, as if I’ll find Gwenna waiting there, and when I don’t, I quietly go outside. Down her steps, into the woods between our properties. So I’m too far from her cams to ever be picked up, even the echo of my voice.

I call Dove.

It rings twice before he answers.

“Well, look who’s calling me. I must be special.”

“Fuck off.” I smile, even though my eyes are burning.

“To what do I owe this honor?”

“I’ve been tracking Blue.”

The line goes so quiet, I can hear the tinkling of the dry leaves blowing over the forest floor.

“I don’t know if you have, too—”

“Nah,” Dove says. “You know none of them like me too much.” None being the Unit’s support staff with the capability of tracing Blue’s phone. Dove pissed off their head girl years back, and they’ve all blackballed him since.

I nod. “Well, Blue seems headed my way. I want you to tell him something for me.”

“Yeah?” Dove is quiet, waiting, probably with bated breath, for what I say next.

I inhale slowly. “Tell him I’m not doing it.”

“You’re— What are you saying?”

“You heard me.” I blink and grit my teeth as a slash of wind sends moisture tracking down my cheek. Then I swallow, because fuck if I want Dove to know this shit. “I’m not doing it.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“I think I must be missing something,” Dove says. Silence fuzzes on the line. I shake my head.

“Changed my mind.”

He waits a beat, probably stunned. “After all that. Changed your mind.”

“That’s what I said.”

“Well, hell. So are you leaving town?”

“Not yet.”

I can see the wheels in