He was too calm. It was making me angrier, and my energy spiked so quickly I heard Stella yelp. “Because of this,” I said, grabbing the photo I’d printed and shoving it in his face. “Look familiar?”
He took the image to examine it. “There is a resemblance. I agree with you on that.”
“A resemblance? He could be your twin.”
He shrugged and handed it back to me. “I wouldn’t go as far as that, but again, he does look like me. Or I him as that painting is quite old.”
I narrowed my eyes, searching his face for any signs he was bullshitting me. I saw none. “So, you’re sticking with that story then?”
“There is no story, only the truth. That is not me.”
“What are you guys talking about now?” Stella asked, taking the photo from me. “Holy crap, Ember, he has your mark… and your eyes. But he looks like you, Liam. Holy crap.”
“Holy crap is an understatement. I had printed this and was about to call your ass,” I said to Liam, “right before someone knocked on my door and bashed my face in. I wake up to find my laptop stolen and you in my house. Why are you even here anyway?”
“That’s on me again, sorry,” Stella said. “I stopped by because we haven’t seen each other in a while, and I found you and your phone was ringing so I answered it and it was Liam and I was crying and he came over.” She’d rambled it all out so quickly it was like one long word.
I wrapped my arms around her. “It’s okay, Stell, calm down.”
“You’ve clearly been researching your mark,” Liam said. “But I don’t believe that’s why you’re being targeted or why they stole your laptop.”
“Yeah, I agree. But why weren’t you attacked? Why wasn’t anything of yours stolen?”
He shot me one of his smirks. “Would you fuck with me?”
“Well, I might, but I’m not typical—in any way, shape, or form. I know what you mean though, so, if I were anyone else, no, I wouldn’t.” I heaved a sigh. “One more reason to love being Ember Steele. Kill me, kill the curse.”
He didn’t acknowledge my pity party, and again I was thankful for it. Isaac always wanted to fix whatever bothered me, Liam seemed content to let me deal with my shit myself. I liked that about him, even if I wasn’t sure about him as a whole.
“My thought is they wanted to make it look like a random robbery, but…” he paused, looking around my house.
“But I have nothing else worth stealing so they only took my laptop.”
“Precisely.”
His theory was a good one since my attacker ransacked my house. I knew he hadn’t found anything worthwhile, but he’d left a huge mess that I’d have to clean up.
“The only question remaining is why didn’t they kill you?”
“Your guess is as good as mine. Unless it was an actual robbery at a coincidental time.”
He grunted, suggesting he didn’t agree. “I assume you have a backup of your work,” he said with a half-smile, making me realize I was staring at him.
It was my turn to smirk. “I have backups for my backups. That’s not the point. That laptop was meaningful to me.”
He tilted his head and furrowed his brow.
“It was the first big purchase she made with her book money,” Stella said. “That was a fun day.”
A little peeved that she had just shared that with Liam of all people, I didn’t return her smile. “Yeah, so I’ll just have to get another one. Maybe not one as nice as that, but if I can type on it, it’ll be fine.” I made a decent living writing books, but I wasn’t bringing in the Stephen King bucks just yet.
Stella glanced at her watch. “I’ll go with you now if you feel up to it?”
“No, it’s fine. You need to get back to work. I’ll go in a little while.”
“You’re sure?” she asked.
“Positive. Go, before you get in trouble for being late.”