The Girl's Got Secrets (Forbidden Men 7)

And that’s when I spotted it. A latex mask hanging from the footboard of her bed. A mask with Sticks’s face on it.

I snatched it up and immediately sneezed. But instead of flinging it aside, I curled my fingers around it, holding on tight.

In the doorway, Jodi had gotten her phone and was pounding out a text.

I sniffed and shook my head. “No,” I told her. “Oh, no you don’t. I didn’t get any fair warning about this, so neither does she.”

Jodi guiltily dropped the phone to her side. “She never meant to—” she started, but I held up a hand, stopping her.

“I don’t want to hear it from you. I want Remy to explain...everything.”

Worry lit her face as she bit her lip. “What’re you going to do?”

With a harsh laugh, I shook my head. “No idea.”

My mind wouldn’t stop spinning. I didn’t think I was pissed exactly. Well, some pissed, but mostly just confused.

I couldn’t figure out why...why would she pretend to be a guy? It didn’t make any sense. And why hadn’t she felt like she could tell me? I thought Sticks and I had gotten close enough that he—she—could confide in me the way I’d confided—

Oh, hell. I suddenly remembered all the shit I’d told her since we’d met. Most of it was probably stuff I wouldn’t have admitted to a woman, like how much I love eating pussy and—oh, Jesus! I’d treated her like I would one of my guy friends, calling her fucker and loser, and asshole. Holy mother, I would never call a woman any of those names.

And then I remembered telling her about Incubus shirt girl. My head really went all over the place with that one. I’d talked to her about her! Why hadn’t she said anything? She knew how I’d reacted to Incubus shirt girl, how I’d looked for her for months. Or, wait. Had she known how I’d looked for her? Maybe I hadn’t mentioned that part. I’d only tried to convey how much I wanted to be over the entire ordeal, so maybe I’d made her feel as if she couldn’t tell me because I’d made her believe I’d wanted nothing to do with her—as a woman.

But none of that explained why she’d gone incognito as a man in the first place.

Down the hall, the apartment door came open and someone called, “Hey, hooker. I’m home, and I come bearing food. Double chocolate fudge ice cream. You are so helping me eat this.”

I blew out a breath. That was definitely Remy’s voice. All my questions were about to be answered. Jodi and I silently watched each other as we listened to footsteps move to the kitchen, probably to drop off the ice cream.

Then Remy called, “Jodi? Hello? You home?”

“Uh...yeah.” Jodi cast me a leery glance as if she thought I’d slit her throat or something if she answered wrong. “In your room, puta.”

“What’re you doing in my room? Doesn’t matter. I’m glad you’re there. You need to help me come up with a way to tell Asher—”

She rounded the corner to enter her room and gasped when she saw me, skidding to a halt and clutching her chest.

I had no idea what I’d been expecting, maybe that she’d be dressed as Sticks with the mask on, even though I held the damn mask in my hand.

But the very last thing I did expect to see was...Elisa.

My mouth fell open, my jaw worked, but no words came.

Her wild-eyed panicked gaze darted to Jodi, then back to me. When her attention fell to the mask I clutched in my hand, she turned back to her roommate.

“He already knows,” Jodi whispered with a sympathetic wince.

Remy, Elisa, or whoever the hell she was, whirled back to me. “Asher...” she started softly, her eyes crinkled in apology as she took a step toward me.

I lurched backward and held up a hand, warding her off, trying to make sense of what was going on.

But, shit, fuck, hell, and damn. This changed everything. When she’d merely been a girl, masquerading as a man, that was one thing. I hadn’t been too awfully mad then. But tricking me as Elisa too, deceiving me until she’d tumbled me right into bed with her...

“What the fucking hell is going on?” I demanded. “I go into work tonight and learn you’re not only a girl, but THE girl I wrote a song about and had been seeking for months. And now I see you walk into this room, and you’re Elisa too? Who the hell are you really?”

Oh, Jesus, I hadn’t realized until that moment, I honestly didn’t know her real name.

“I...I’m Remy,” she answered in a small voice.