Page 80 of Cunning Lies

VI

Hours go by.I call Uncle Jay but it goes straight to voicemail. My throat is dry and I don’t know what to do.

I check Kenzo’s office again, wondering if there will be a sign that I’m doing the right thing. A hint that it’s okay to lie to him because he’s the worst kind of criminal. But it’s locked, and that’s another bolt in my chest.

Kenzo doesn’t trust me, and I know his judgment is right.

But screw it.

Screw the job with our client. Screw our beach house. Screw it all. I just want to leave Vegas and forget that any of this happened. I want to go back to researching and not think about how a yakuza man turned my entire life upside down.

I grab the handle to the front door, but it doesn’t budge. The keypad above the doorknob flashes red.

Kenzo locked me inside of his penthouse.

Did I lose my last chance to run?

This time, I scour the nightstand drawers, the shelves, the boxes, digging for an extra phone to unlock the door. I even try my own device, but nothing works.

I’m trapped.

What am I supposed to do?

The front door clicks, then swings open, and Kenzo’s singing floats through the air. For a brief second, I’m relieved—he’s in a good,normalmood—but then I notice the differences. The beat is off, a bit too slow to be natural, and his key is higher than usual. It’s like he’s thinking about something that’s troubling him, but he’s pretending like everything is fine. Which means he’s lying to himself.

And that scares me.

He pulls off his white jacket and throws it on the back of the couch. Blood splatters his dress shirt. My skin is clammy and I’m faint. I know what that means, and god, I don’t want to face what I’m guilty of.

Did the owner of Legendary Analysis die because of me?

“What happened?” I whisper.

Kenzo angles away, like he doesn’t want to pay attention to me, and it hurts. Does he know I lied? Is he willing to look the other way, or does he still suspect me? My throat is as dry as a desert, my senses on alert.

“Business as usual, babe,” he finally answers. “Look, I want to give you the benefit of the doubt, but you need to make it easy for me.”

Babe.He never calls me ‘babe.’ ‘Baby,’ yes, but not ‘babe’. I’m screwed.

He knows I lied.

Anger swells in my chest. No. I don’t deserve this. I didn’twantto be a mafia bride. I didn’t want to do this jobagainstthe yakuza. And I never wanted to give up the name of some random company, but I did what I had to in order to protect my family.

“What happened?” I demand, this time with a stronger tone. Instead of dismissing me, Kenzo locks onto my gaze. His brown eyes are level, but haunting. I bite my lip. I can’t back down now.

“Here’s the thing. Legendary Analysis is the least of my problems right now. You, on the other hand,aremy problem. So tell me,wife,who hired you?”

“The least of your problems?” I repeat. “Why do I get the feeling that you’re hiding something evil?”

“Jesus,” he mutters, rubbing his head. “Hiding something? What do I have to hide from you?”

My lips part, but everything inside of me is locked up, too shaken up to do anything.

“Kenzo, I—”

“I didn’t kill your fake contact in Legendary Analysis. Happy?” he barks. “You want to know why I didn’t? Because I know you lied. Now, you’re stuck with me. Until death do us part.”

He walks past me, his gait rigid. He unlocks the office and disappears behind the doors, but he leaves the door cracked. He’s not cutting me off, but he’s not inviting me in either.