We didn’t say anything while we ate.
I didn’t mind much. I had lived most of my life in silence, considering my companion for most of it had been Micah, and that fucker was about as talkative as a fucking tree.
Once I decided to move away from Sacramento, I found myself in even more solitude than before, and though it took some getting used to at first, I found I liked the silence a hell of a lot better than talking just for the sake of talking.
It had been something else once I joined the club.
Things weren’t just loud, they were chaotic.
Finally, she put her fork down and leaned back against the chair. She closed her eyes and started rubbing her belly.
I wanted my hands to take over for her, but I doubted she would want me to touch her right now, so I kept my hands to myself, like a good boy.
One eye peeked open at me, and then another, until she was looking me over, those grays set in curiosity.
“How did you know?” she asked quietly after some time.
“Know what?”
“That it was me. That I was the one who recorded you and sent it to the prosecutor.”
Technically, her old man did most of the work. I knew it as much, and I wondered if she was wording it this way, trying to protect him from me.
“There are cameras all over the streets near that club. We had your identity mere hours after we found out there had been a witness to the case.”
“But I didn’t see anything.”
I shot her a look. It didn’t matter what she saw or didn’t see. She was still the one that recorded the entire thing, recorded my voice.
Jesus, I didn’t know when I had ever been so fucking talkative during a kill.
“So you waited all this time before you…”
She trailed off and looked to the side.
I watched her, taking in her profile, and for the first time, I had a hard time discerning what she was thinking or feeling.
“Being the judge’s daughter allowed you some protection. You weren’t just a random woman off the streets.”
“So instead, you decided to seduce me and take me.” Her bottom lip trembled. “How cruel.”
I frowned at her. “Ryleigh—”
She shook her head and pushed away from the table, standing up. “I’m tired,” she said. And then I watched as she walked back inside the bedroom and closed the door behind her.
I didn’t follow her right away, even when everything in me said to.
Instead, I gave her some time to think and for me to calm down.
Of course, she would have thought I set out to seduce her as some sick game of revenge.
That would have been far easier had it been the case.
I didn’t set out to seduce her or use her.
I had set out to kill her.
Then I saw her and…
