Liar.
He brushed his thumb over my other cheek. I never lie about a pretty girls face. Youre carrying so much tension in yours that I have to ask: should I be worried about you?
Im fine, I said.
Liar, Michael whispered back.
For a second, I could almost forget everything that had happened today: Genevieve Ridgerton; the coded message on the bathroom wall; the UNSUB butchering a woman and using her body as a prop to recreate my mothers death; the fact that all of this killers actions were designed to manipulate me.
Youre doing it again, Michael said, and this time, he ran the middle and index fingers of each hand along the lines of my jaw.
In the hallway, Agent Starmans took a step back. And then another, until he was almost out of sight.
Are you touching me just to make him uncomfortable? I asked Michael, keeping my voice low enough that the agent wouldnt overhear.
Not just to make him uncomfortable.
My lips twitched. Even the possibility of a smile felt foreign on my face.
Now, Michael said, are you going to tell me what happened today, or do I have to drag it out of Dean?
I gave him a skeptical look. Michael amended his previous statement. Are you going to tell me what happened today, or am I going to have to have Lia drag it out of Dean?
Knowing Lia, shed probably managed to pry at least half of the story out of Dean alreadyand with my luck, she would pass it on to Michael with embellishments. It was better that he heard it from meso I started at the beginning with Club Muse and the message on the bathroom wall and didnt stop until Id told him about the crime scene in Arlington and its resemblance to my mothers.
You think the similarity was intentional, Michael said.
I nodded. Michael didnt ask me to elaborate, and I realized how much of our conversation happened in silence, with him reading my face and me knowing exactly how hed respond.
The theory is that the UNSUB staged all of this for me, I said finally. It wasnt about the UNSUB reliving the kill. It was about making me relive it.
Michael stared at me. Say the second sentence again.
It wasnt about the UNSUB reliving the kill, I repeated.
There, Michael said. Every time you say the words reliving the kill , you duck your head slightly to the right. Its like youre shaking your head or being bashful or something.
I opened my mouth to tell him that he was wrong, that he was reading too much into that single sentence, but I couldnt form the words, because he was right.
I didnt know why I felt like I was missing something, but I did. If Michael had seen some hint of that in my facial expression
Maybe my body knew something that I didnt.
It wasnt about the UNSUB reliving the kill, I said again. That was true. I knew it was true. But now that Michael had pointed it out, I could feel my gut telling me, loud and clear, that it wasnt the whole truth.
Im missing something. The horror at the crime scene had been familiar. Almost too familiar. What kind of killer remembered the details of a crime scene so exactly? The splatter, the blood on the mirrors and the light switch, the knife marks on the floor
Tell me what youre thinking. Michaels words penetrated my thoughts. I focused on his hazel eyes. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a shadow in the doorway. Agent Starmans. Had he overheard us? Was he trying to overhear us?
Michael grabbed my neck. He pulled me toward him. When Agent Starmans glanced in the room, all he saw was Michael and me.
Kissing.
The kiss in the pool was nothing compared to this. Then, our lips had barely brushed. Now, my lips were opening. Our mouths were crushed together. His hand traveled from my neck down to my lower back. My lips tingled, and I leaned into the kiss, shifting my body until I could feel the heat from his in my arms, my chest, my stomach.
On some level, I was aware of the fact that Agent Starmans had hightailed it back down the hall, leaving me alone with Michael. On some level, I was aware of the fact that now was not a time for kissing, of the vortex of emotion I felt when I looked at Michael, of the sound of someone else coming down the hallway.
My fingers curled into claws. I dug them into his T-shirt, his hair. And then finallyfinallyI realized what I was doing. What we were doing.
I pulled back, then hesitated. Michael dropped his hands from my back. There was a soft smile on his face, a look of wonderment in his eyes. This was Michael without layers. This was Michael and meand Dean was standing in the doorway.
Dean. I forced myself not to scramble backward, not to lean away from Michael in any way. I wouldnt do that to him. The kiss might have started as a distraction, he might have taken advantage of the moment, but Id kissed him back, and I wasnt going to turn around and make him feel like nothing just because Dean was standing in the doorway and there was something there between him and me, too.
Michael had never made any secret of the fact that he was pursuing me. Dean had fought any attraction he felt for me every step of the way.