All the Little Lies (English Prep 1)

now. It’s not gonna work. I have cartel men trying to kidnap me; we need all hands on deck.”

“There doesn’t need to be four out of the five of us looking at the same document.” Eric sighed, flipping through another paper without looking up. “Plus, you lived through it. There isn’t anything in this report that you don’t already know. We need fresh eyes.”

Hayley didn’t say anything for a few moments. I watched her tiny body go from angry to calm in a matter of a few seconds. She didn’t like being pushed away or told what to do, but in the end, she knew it was the truth.

“Let us handle this part, okay?” I said softly, reaching out for her hand again. Hayley’s head dropped a fraction, but then she squeezed my palm and nodded once.

“Fine, but as soon as we’re done making food, I’m back in the ring. Got it?”

“Yes, ma’am.” I winked at her.

A small piece of relief fell upon my shoulders, but it did nothing to take away the dull ache in my stomach.

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Hayley

I fiddled with the locket around my neck as I silently sat at Christian’s lunch table. Everyone was talking around me, except Christian, Ollie, Piper, and Eric. We all five remained quiet, wondering what our next move was.

It’d been several days since Piper and I were chased, and just a few hours ago, the five of us sat around Christian and Ollie’s breakfast bar, staying up way too late, trying to come up with some out-of-thin-air idea to get a drug cartel off my back. We were in over our heads. There was nothing a bunch of teenagers could do. In fact, there wasn’t much anyone could do. The cartel had been around for many, many years, according to the information Ollie had gotten off the internet, and not even the FBI had been able to stop them.

Jim said there was some sort of undercover sting going on, and I couldn’t help but feel like I was in the center of it all. I felt like I was the missing piece. I was the shiny, golden ticket that the FBI was dangling in front of some of the world’s most dangerous men.

I didn’t know what to believe.

I didn’t know much of anything, other than my father had fucked with the wrong people, and his daughter was about to pay for his sins.

“You’re almost eighteen. They want their settlement.” Those words. They kept coming around, full swing, in my head. My mother’s nails-on-a-chalkboard voice scratched the walls of my brain. Why now? Men like the ones who killed my father and who worked for a drug cartel wouldn’t wait until I was of age to kidnap me for vengeance unless it had something to do with my age. It had something to do with me being eighteen. It was significant for some reason, and I was pretty sure there was only one person who I could ask that would know.

I just didn’t know how I was going to get to her without Christian knowing.

It wasn’t that I didn’t want him by my side at all times. I did. I just knew that if he went around her again or saw where I used to live—the living conditions—he’d go nuts. His temper would get the best of him. What was that saying? It was better to ask for forgiveness than it was to ask for permission?

I didn’t need his permission to go see my mom, but I had a feeling the boy who held my heart in his hands so delicately wasn’t going to see it like that.

He wanted to protect me at all costs, and that was exactly why he couldn’t come with me.

My eyes sliced over to Eric’s for a brief second, and when he caught my gaze, he silently tilted his head in question.

Eric.

Yes.

“Absolutely not.”

“Eric, please. I know what I’m asking of you, but it’s either you go with me or I go alone. I can’t bring Piper. I need someone who’s going to look threatening enough so that no one bothers me while I try to fish information out of her.”

He threw his hands up and raked them through his dark hair. Eric’s looks were dark and mysterious, and I wasn’t sure if I’d ever seen him smile. He was brooding, much like Christian. He stood tall—at least six feet—and he was built wide. He drew attention to himself, but not the good kind. Eric looked like a bad boy who wasn’t afraid to knock someone on their ass. Which was precisely why I needed him. “Christian will fucking kill me, and he’s my best friend. No fucking way. I can’t betray him like that.”

“Even if it means saving his girlfriend in the end?” I countered.

That had him thinking, so I kept going. “If I bring Christian, he will lose it with the first rude remark my mother makes, because he’s already going to be trying to keep it together when he sees where I used to live. You know this; I know this. His temper will get the best of him. He’ll drag me out of there before I can even ask my mom about the settlement.” I dropped my voice, remembering that we were in the library. “There is something significant about me being eighteen. Otherwise, it doesn’t make sense, and if I’m going to be dangled right in front of the cartel by the FBI, I want to know why. I need to know what I'm walking into. I turn eighteen tomorrow! It’s obvious they’re going to keep coming after me.”

Eric sighed and rested his back along one of the bookshelves. “How the hell will we even pull this off? And if Christian kills me, it’s your fucking fault.”

I almost squealed and wrapped my arms around his neck in relief. Eric and I barely knew each other, but there was something about the two of us that worked. He was level-headed, and I liked that about him, and not to mention, we both cared about Christian, so there was that.

“How do you feel about skipping school?”