Dangerous Lies (Lies 5)

He married me.

He protected me all the way to the end.

He loved me.

I take it back—hearing those words meant more to me than I realized. Hearing him actually speak the thing I’ve known all this time out loud proves that we should have been saying those words to each other since the first time we felt them, fuck the consequences and the broken heart. Knowing we’ve loved each other for years and not having said anything now that he’s gone is ruining me.

“I love you, too,” I whisper.

I squeeze my eyes shut as another heart-wrenching scream leaves my body. My heart is shattered. I will never love again. There is no way to repair the millions of pieces of my heart.

Say it again, Langston’s voice says.

I open my eyes and see a hallucination. Maybe it’s his ghost already haunting me?

Whatever it is, he’s floating in front of me with a glow around him.

Say it again.

“I LOVE YOU!” I scream at the top of my lungs. “I’ve always loved you,” my voice breaks. “Why did you leave me?” Then my voice leaves me; I open my mouth, and nothing else comes out.

“Only you would wait until I die to tell me you love me. But if death is the only way you’ll tell me you love me, then so be it,” Langston says.

My brain must have finally lost it because I’m pretty sure Langston is standing in front of me, very much alive.

“I’m going to kill you,” I murmur as my heart finally beats again.

25

Langston

I chuckle through my own tears.

Hearing her shriek and cry over my fake death almost broke me. Lying on the ground, covered in fake blood, trying not to move was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. I’ve never heard such pain. It was like a pack of wolves tore into my own heart as I felt her heartbreak ooze off her, knowing that the only way to save her is to be patient and let her feel everything.

If my plan hadn’t worked, I would have felt horrible forever. There would be no way that either of us would forgive me for causing her so much pain.

Thank god, it worked. She finally said the words, and she can’t take them back.

Despite the agony we were both in, hearing her say she loves me was the most magical sound I’ve ever heard. I would die a thousand deaths if that is the only way I get to hear that she loves me.

Liesel’s face is covered in tears, snot, and sweat. Her hair is matted to her head. Her body glistens with saltwater still clinging to her body. Or it might also be tears, snot, and sweat.

I’m not sure she has fully processed that I’m alive and not dead. I’m not a figment of her imagination; I faked my death.

I cup her face. “Huntress? Talk to me.”

“No,

get the hell away from me!”

She struggles with the ropes, trying to wiggle free. Seeing her naked body shimmy in front of me stirs my cock to life. Damn, do I want to fuck her senseless now that I’ve heard her admit that she loves me. Although I’m pretty sure when she gets free, she really will kill me given how angry she seems to be.

“I’m alive. It was all fake. I had to get you to admit you love me—”

“And pretending you were dead was the only idea you could come up with? You’re a monster!”

I grab her face, and she jerks her head away.