Lie to Me (36 page)

“I don’t know why you think I’m holding secrets from you.” With a huff, she’d sat on the sofa and glared at him.

“You have tells. Remember?”

“I don’t. You’re making that up.” She wanted to know those tells so she’d stop making them, or was he just good at guessing? “I’m not hiding anything.”

“Lie.”

“I want you, Stone.”

“Truth.”

“God, you’re an asshole.”

He’d smirked. “Sometimes, but you don’t believe it.”

“What? My
tell
tell you that?” She’d meant for that to come out sounding sarcastic, but instead she just sounded aggravated.

“Yes.”

She let loose a frustrated groan. “You know I’m leaving you at the end of our agreement. Maybe sooner.”

“I’m aware you’re torn over the decision.”

“I’m not torn.”

“Lie.”

Goddamn him, why’d he have to be right every time she stretched the truth. “I love you.”

He sucked in a harsh breath.

“Not so smart like you think, pretty boy. That was a lie.”

“It wasn’t, and you know it. That you’d try to fib about something so important hurts me.”

Hurting him crushed her, but she bit back her apology. Not because saying she was sorry would weaken her, or because she’d be admitting she’d lied, but because that outright confession would leave her much too vulnerable to him. Because she couldn’t hold his eyes knowing she’d wounded him, she picked at imaginary lint on her pajama pants.

Stone knelt in front of her, forcing her attention. “Trust me, sunshine, and I’ll give you everything you’ve ever desired.”

Kella considered his request. It’d be so easy to share her worries with him and all her treasonous acts. But putting her faith in him for a secret this big didn’t jeopardize only her, but too many others. Trusting him with their secret wasn’t her decision to make. “Good night, Stone.”

He’d sighed as she walked away from him. Closing herself off from him seemed to upset him worse than her dishonesty, but choices were limited. Too many lives were at stake to worry over his sensibilities.

Didn’t mean guilt didn’t eat at her this morning. She glanced at the clock. Nine forty-four. In just sixteen minutes, the virus Dutch uploaded to the hacked, Regency-owned newsfeed would engage, and the video would be distributed to all twenty Quadrants. It marked their first global attack. With only three clinics neutralized, and other Regents offering their clinics as backup, X-Ds would hit them in the public eye.

Had she been single, Kella could’ve traveled to those areas without suspicion, set the charges in an inconspicuous area, and Dutch could’ve detonated them at a later date, after Kella returned to Quad2. Stone complicated their mission. Just thinking about leaving him broke her heart, and she was reluctant to follow through with that plan any sooner than necessary, but she had no choice. She couldn’t choose her happiness over innocent lives that had no choice.

Across the room Judy knitted, while Lucy read a book, and Kella marked a couple of spots on her map that held potential digs near Stone’s Quadrant. Made no sense why she located them when she had no intention of returning with him.

“You should take up knitting, sweetie.” Judy worked the yarn.

“Thanks, but that’s not my talent, Mom. I’m more of a ‘stab a guy in the throat with the knitting needle’ kind of girl.” Kella swallowed hard when she realized what she’d said. She glanced at her mom, to discover her staring at Kella with a thoughtful look on her face. Even Lucy studied her with a different eye. “Just kidding,” she said, but she could tell neither bought it.

Neither of them knew the realities of her last eight years. Not that Reaper had trained her to defend herself. Not that she’d sold herself, or that her first kill had been a guy on the street who thought it his right to take her because he wanted her. They damn sure didn’t know her second kill came with her last john, because he’d marked her as his victim.

The television flipped on, and she glanced up from her atlases. Not having heard Stone enter the room, she was thankful for his interruption nonetheless. He scratched the scruff on his jaw as the video she and Dutch put together played.

“
Motherfuck
,” he muttered when the R.I.P. line flashed and detailed the death of the fourth Xeno. “Shit better not be real,” he said as the fifth girl finished detailing her resell, the doctor’s orders not to conceive again, but her new owners’ disregard for that order, and knocking her up.

She watched him as the video went on repeat, Stone’s agitation apparent. The feed was set on a loop until the government figured out how to shut down Dutch’s handiwork. He watched it three more times before shutting off the television and tossing the remote to the sofa.

He strode to the door, his strides brisk. “James!”

“I saw it too,” James said when he joined them. “You think it’s all true?”

“Reselling is outlawed.”

Kella snorted, and realized her mistake when Stone eyed her. “Got something to add, sunshine?”

She circled a possible dig location on the map, not twenty wheels from the outskirts of Stone’s Quad. “Only that spooners don’t much care about the law. They’re there for us dregs, but are only guidelines for your kind.”

“Your kind too, Kella.”

“I’m not a spooner.”

He must’ve decided to dismiss that argument. Good thing because he wouldn’t win it with her. “The law is there for
all
, not just dregs.”

“Maybe in your Quad spooners have to follow the law, Stone, but don’t pretend other Quads are up to your caliber. And I know you’re not naïve enough to think other Quads operate the same way as yours.”

“This has your fingerprint all over it, holy terror.” Arms crossed, James settled a considering look upon her.

She rolled her eyes at Satan. “Because I know so much about hacking.”

Stone observed her carefully as he prodded, “As a kid you were always going on about ending Xeno slavery.”

“Because it’s
wrong
!” She looked him dead in the eye. “Wrong is wrong. And I won’t stop espousing that until all Xenos are free. But I wouldn’t know where to begin to hack into a newsfeed.” The freakin’ truth. Dutch was a hacker goddess, and the X-Ds wouldn’t be as far as they were without her expertise.

“Mom, Judy, leave us please.”

The second the two mothers departed the room, James said, “What makes you think it had to be hacked?”

“Wouldn’t it?” She glanced at Stone for confirmation. “How else would they get into the government-owned newsfeed?”

Stone nodded. “Unless they worked in the palace, yeah it’d require a good hacker.”

“Sorry to disappoint you, Satan, but I’m innocent on this one.” She blew him a raspberry for the sheer pleasure of taunting him.

The scratch of Stone’s fingers on his scruff drew her attention. Moisture surged from her core, and she clenched her thighs. Not that the movement helped soothe her sudden ache. She loved the way the bristle felt against her skin, especially between her thighs. Every single time before going down on her, he’d rub his jaw along her skin, and the scrape would arouse her further. She’d been trained like Pavlov’s dog, but instead of food, she craved Stone’s tongue and the pleasure he bequeathed.

“The bigger concern is are the claims true?” Kella kept quiet on that question as Stone ran his hand over his hair, tamping the longer strands on top down, his palm halting at his nape. “As Regent, it’s my duty to investigate the legitimacy of those claims.”

“Stone, your oyster is Quadrant13. Regent Jones governs this realm. His rules, his laws, and all that bullshit.”

“Let it lie, Stone.” Kella recapped her marker and set it on the map. “This isn’t your fight. Leave it to the dregs who started the revolution.” The X-Ds started this fight and were better equipped for the long run. They had everything to gain and nothing to lose. Stone would pay first with his safe, secure rank, and probably ultimately his life if he became embroiled in the uprising. All the more reason to walk out now.

Stone’s pale-blue eyes narrowed on her. “What do you know of the dregs who started the fight?”

“Goddamn, I can’t believe I’m agreeing with the holy terror, but those are wise words to heed, brother. This isn’t your fight.”

She shot James the middle finger for being a jackass. Enough said, no words required.

“Bite me,” he said.

“Since when do you recommend standing down when it comes to the rights of Xenos?” That intense stare of Stone’s reminded her of when he watched her come in bed.

She shook her head to wipe away the lusty thoughts. “Is that what you thought I recommended? I’m all about the rights of Xenos and their freedom to choose, but
you
are going to get yourself killed if you take it as your duty to investigate. What good are you to your people dead?”

Or to me
? She pulled that thought in close to her heart because she was having a hard time thinking of a future without him.

“You saying I can’t take care of myself? Or that James can’t protect me?”

“Satan is like Hell’s Cerberus, of course he can protect you.” Criticizing James wouldn’t get her anywhere, and she couldn’t dismiss his very real lethality. “I’m saying you have no idea how far these corrupt Regents will take this if you attempt to remove or hinder their control of Xenos in any way.”

“James,” Stone said as he moved toward her.

She waited for him to say more, but no other words were spoken.

James must’ve understood. “We’ll look into it, but quietly, and if I say the investigation ends, I mean it fucking well ends that second. Understand?”

“I call the shots, not you.” Stone surprised her when he cupped the back of her neck and tugged her against his rock-solid frame. “I love that you’re worried about me, sunshine.”

“Of course I worry.” In her head she finished that sentence with, ‘
I love you
.’

He gave her a slow kiss, and she curled against him. Against her mouth, he said, “I also know some of what you said just now are fucking lies. You know more than what you’re admitting.”

“What’d I miss?”

Saved by her best friend, she kept her sights sealed on Stone.

James caught her friend up to date. “Stone’s dick is making the decisions, so we’re all going to die. Probably bloody and sooner than we’d like.”

Kella busted out laughing.

Stone growled at Satan. “Don’t be an asshole.”

“Satan can’t help it.” She ran her fingers across Stone’s abdomen, delighting in the way his muscles twitched beneath her touch. “It’s in his hellish genes.”

“You’re lucky you’re Stone’s wife or I’d turn you over my knee and blister your ass.” The lopsided grin on James’s face nullified any real bite to his threat.

The phone rang, and Stone grabbed the handset. “Regent Emmerson.” A long pause, and his eyes found hers. “We’d be honored Regent Jones. We’ll see you this evening.”

“What was that about?” Reaper leaned against the arm of a chair.

“Kella and I have been invited to dinner with Regent Jones and his wife. He wants to discuss the newsfeed.”

Kella’s heart sank into her stomach.

––––––––

A
few hours later they sat at Regent Jones’s dining room table. His gaudy home failed to impress, but Kella had expected this type of over-the-top decor. The false politeness made her teeth ache. Jones never spoke to her unless he planned to screw her over somehow. And the last time they’d conversed he’d been wielding an electrical wand and demanding she become his sex slave, all while he knew to whom she legally belonged. She’d rather be anywhere other than here.

If tonight ended on a positive note, she’d eat Stone’s cock...she meant
sock
! What a Freudian slip. She wanted to eat his cock, but he had denied her that treat too.

Fucker
. He had her so sexually frustrated she could barely concentrate on mundane tasks and found herself daydreaming about him far too often for her peace of mind. Maybe if she fucked him, she’d be able to walk away without wanting to split her wrists open.

The small talk grated on her nerves, but she grinned and bore it. As they waited for the entrée to be served, Stone laced their fingers together and lifted her hand to his lips. She gazed at him as he pressed a kiss to the tender skin on the inside of her wrist. His hot gaze told her everything. He wanted her.

“How romantic.” Jones’s wife, Miranda, clasped her hands together and mooned over them. “Your story is like a fairytale.”

“Indeed.” Jones sipped his wine, eyeing them with a snarky grin. “Almost too good to be true.”

And here it comes
. Kella waited for what would follow.

Miranda smacked her husband’s arm. “Don’t listen to him. He’s not a romantic.”

Kella couldn’t decide if Miranda’s parody was a distraction for Jones’s benefit or if she really was this starry-eyed. Either way, she trusted Miranda as much as she did Jones.

“Not all that romantic, darling, if Kella here actually fled from Regent Emmerson rather than the story he fed me.”

She heard the dull thud of Reaper drawing closer—his steps thumped harder than James’s or Stone’s strides. After a few paces he halted, and she could picture his intent stare.

Stone’s fingers tightened on her hand. “Is that why we’re here, Regent Jones, for you to accost my wife? Accuse me of lies and her subterfuge?”

Jones set his glass on the table. “I asked you here for a couple of things. One, I have it on good authority that your story is inaccurate. Your wife left you, was never kidnapped, didn’t lose her memory, but ran from you, and you’ve just found her after eight years. I knew of her identity before you did. How does it feel to be cuckolded by a woman?”

James drew close enough Kella spied him from the corner of her eye.

“Your dogs aren’t necessary.” Jones waved them away, but neither man stood down.

“That’s my call to make.” Stone leaned his elbows on the table. “You’re telling me you believe a vague source over the word of a fellow Regent? And by your own omission you withheld the identity of my wife from me.”

“I know my source personally. I don’t know you all that well, Regent Emmerson.” Jones accepted a window pad from a servant. “Your unique style of leadership is very well known to me however, and I wanted to see how long it took you to determine her real identity. Just so you know, I put bets on Mack.”