Page 9 of The Next Lie

His face is pale beneath the streetlamp, but his mouth stays firm. “I do when you can barely stand.”

“I’m standing.”

“You’re shaking.”

“So what?”

“So I’m not letting you walk back into a room full of predators while you’re bleeding out.”

“I’m not bleeding.”

Shiloh’s gaze flicks to my palm. My fist closes again.

He looks back at my face. “Not there, Yank.”

The words hit their mark. I hate him for knowing where to aim.

A black truck pulls up to the curb. I don’t know when Ever called for it. Maybe he didn’t. Maybe there is always someone waiting when men like Nash Blackwood own the night.

Ever opens the back door.

“I’m not leaving Nash in there with Deacon,” I say.

“Nash can handle Deacon,” Ever says.

“That’s not the point.”

“It is right now.”

My laugh comes out broken and mean. “You all keep deciding what the point is for me.”

Ever absorbs that without flinching. Shiloh doesn’t. His face twists for half a second before he smooths it out. He reaches for me, slower this time, giving me room to refuse. His fingers close around my wrist, careful of my palm.

“Yank,” he says, voice rough. “You can hate us in the truck.”

I stare at him. Then at Ever. Then at the black mouth of the open door.

The heat presses against my back. Music leaks from the club each time the door opens behind us. Somewhere down the block, a siren wails and fades. New Orleans keeps breathing around me, careless and damp and alive.

With a sigh, I climb into the truck.

Shiloh climbs into the front passenger seat. He does not close the door until I am fully inside and Ever has me tucked against him, one arm around my shoulders, my knees drawn up toward my chest.

I let it happen.

That might be the worst part.

I let Ever pull me in. I let my cheek rest against his shirt. I let my breath hitch against his ribs. I let the truck door close between me and the club, between me and my sister, between me and the man—men?—who should have told me everything before we ever got here.

Nobody speaks as the truck pulls away from the curb.

The city moves past in streaks of gold and red. Wet pavement. Iron balconies. Tourists laughing too loudly on corners where they don’t know any ghosts. A woman in silver heels carrying her shoes in one hand. A man asleep in a doorway. A street preacher with a sign no one reads.

I watch it all through the window and feel none of it reach me.

Ever’s thumb moves once against my upper arm. A reminder.

Here. I am here.