Page 35 of A Lethal Game of Trust

“Counted them. They’re all cheap, nasty brands, too.”

My dad was silent for a second. “She’s never… alcohol hasn’t been a problem for her before. At least it’s not spirits, that’s when I’d interfere. I’ll talk to Isabel and see if this is an issue.”

She had at least started a second bottle last night, but she seemed… sorry for herself. Not depressed or reliant. But what did I know?

I’d been avoiding her for months and months.

“Dad, has Leonie spent any of her inheritance?” I asked. Jared had wanted her to spend it on a house with him and the idea repulsed me, but at the same time… with how in love with him she kept on saying she was… why hadn’t she? She might have said it was all a ruse, but I’d seen the way she looked at him. I’d loathed the way she looked at him.

A long pause this time, more shuffling of paper. “She hasn’t spent any of it.” There was an awkward silence, then his words were quick, “Now, the other reason I called—”

But my phone screen changed as the door opened and Mia slipped through, closing it behind her. The second it was closed, my phone rang.

“Sorry, Dad, I’ve got to go.”

And I hung up to take Leonie’s call.

“Speak to me.”

“Speak to me?” she shrieked. “Tell me that’s not how you answer every number you don’t have saved.”

“That’s how I answer every call, full stop.”

Of course I had her number, though I wasn’t surprised she didn’t have mine. Our online connections were Facebook and Instagram and only because we had never unfollowed each other from when we were teenagers.

“Right,” she said with a hint of disbelief. I pressed the button for video call, eager to see her face. “Oh, one second.”

The phone crackled as she moved before a beep and then her tanned face filled my screen. Ghost’s pressed up to hers, his blue eyes twinkling.

“Here he is!”

Normally, he would run a mile. He just looked at her as if she was mad.

She was.

“So what am I grabbing?” she asked. “Mia’s left for yoga. She was asking after you.”

I quietly closed the car door and walked briskly down the short path to my house. “Go to the back of my wardrobe,” I ordered. “Pull out a box at the back and get out the new one.”

“The new one?” she asked absently as she put Ghost down and placed her phone on the side so I could see her rummage, her ass bent over as she searched.

Then, she withdrew, pulling out a small box, her mouth open. “Dom—”

“Open it. Batteries are in the drawer of my bedside table. Get ready for me.”

“Get ready? Dom, not here, not when Mia—”

“Don’t care,” I said, using my phone to get through the gateto my drive.

But by the way she bit her lip and her brows furrowed, she did. It would only be a minute before I would make her change her mind.

“I’m not using a sex toy intended for your girlfriend.”

“How do you know it was intended for her?”

She went to speak and stopped, started and stopped again. I liked her flustered.

As I jogged up the steps to the porch, she looked to her left, hearing me coming. And a wicked idea formed in my head. “Let’s play a game, Leonie Lion.”