Perfect Lies (Mind Games 2)

“And your family . . .”

Her eyes get tight and she snaps her head to look outside. Not in a tragic, I’ve-been-ripped-away-from-them way. I tap tap tap tap a finger on the counter. She wants to be here, I can tell. Hmm. I will tread carefully. Super careful.

Ha ha ha ha, as if.

She clears her throat. “I lived with my grandma until she died when I was thirteen. Then I got saddled with my dad who’d sooner raise hunting dogs than a teenage daughter. So.” She claps her hands together, smile too wide and eyes too bright. “I get to come to the great big city and do great big things, and he gets to take the sheets off the couch that doubled as my bed. Win-win!”

Am I supposed to hug her? Console her? (Annie would know what to do. Would have. Would have.) “Well, screw that. Let’s go dancing.”

She frowns as though trying to hear something better, then shakes her head and jumps off the stool. “That, I can do.”

My phone buzzes and I pull it out. Text from James. Stuck in meetings.

Late dinner? I can eat twice if it means we can talk.

Eating with my father. Sorry. Will make it up to you tomorrow.

I narrow my eyes at the screen, tap tap tap tap on it. I need us to move, to do, to start this wheel spinning until it flies off its axis and destroys everything around us. I hold James’s face in my thoughts, imagine his arms around me. Imagine his voice whispering “patience” in my ear before I elbow him in the stomach because I hate it when he tells me that.

I take a phone off the counter, where someone set it down to go get a refill.

“Did you just steal that guy’s phone?” Pixie asks as we hunch our shoulders against the chill. She has her own phone out, looking for a nearby club.

One can never have enough phones, I think at her. She gives me a secret smile in return.

ANNIE

Three Months Before

I’VE BEEN VENTURING OUT MORE NOW THAT RAFAEL got me a white cane. Coming and going as I please is a luxury I intend to take advantage of. It’s strange—for so long I hated seeing the future because it didn’t belong to me. It belonged to Keane. Now I have my own future, and no idea what to do with it. Fia was always supposed to be with me. She’s not.

I feel lost.

As I trail my fingers along the hall wall I hear voices. I pause—both are hushed but clearly angry. Taking a few steps forward, I lean near a doorframe and listen.

“—you know I’m right!” Cole.

“I don’t! And you don’t know, either. I’m tired of arguing with you.” Sarah sounds exhausted.

“What about Annie? There’s no reason for her to stay here. She can’t accomplish anything. She sees even less than you do, and she’s a huge target. She needs to be placed somewhere else.”

I flinch at the tone of his voice. I didn’t think Cole liked me, but I had no idea he wanted me gone that much. Rafael decided not to set me up somewhere else with a real life and a new identity. He wanted me close.

I was flattered, but lately I’ve realized I’m useless here. It makes me feel pathetic and small, but Cole’s right. There’s no reason for me to stay, other than to be protected.

I’m tired of needing other people to protect me.

“That’s not our call,” Sarah says.

“That’s exactly what I’m talking about! Why isn’t it our call? Why does he get to decide who stays and who goes?”

“You start bankrolling this operation and you can have more say,” Sarah snaps. Something thuds to the ground, too small for a body, and then Cole swears.

“What is this?”

“Give it back.”

“You’re taking these?”