Page 171 of Lust & Lies

“Let me guess, she started crying.”

Aiden chuckled. “The way she turns those tears on and off is a skill.”

“Yes! It always amazes me. What happened after the crying didn’t sway you?”

“She insisted that they were just friends. Then, I threatened to show those photos to grandpa if she didn’t divorce me. That’s when she finally changed her tune. She agreed to the divorce after telling me how much she hated me and how her boyfriend was a real man, and I was just a little boy that only you would like.”

Typical Ellie.

“How did you keep your grandpa from finding out about the divorce?” I asked.

“He never checked. He was preoccupied a lot around that time. You say you believe he’s the one behind the leaks in your mission. I think he was too busy plotting that to focus on me as much as he used to.”

The bastard!

“Back then, you wouldn’t tell me anything,” Aiden said, voice barely above a whisper.

But I could hear the pain lacing his words. Guilt threaded through me as he continued talking.

“I wouldn’t have known about those leaks if Gertrude hadn’t told me.”

Damn it, Gertrude. I thought you were on my side.

“I nearly lost my mind when she told me you’d had two failed missions and they both seemed suspicious, like someone had leaked your information to the enemy. It was then that I knew I had to do something to get you out of my grandfather’s clutches.”

“So, that’s when you put your big plan together?” I asked.

“I had no choice. You’d almost died twice...”

“I’ve almost died a lot of times. It’s just that those two times felt like set-ups.”

“Either way, you’d almost died. I wasn’t about to let it happen again. Since I couldn’t go to you without you trying to kill me, I sent Ellie to you.”

“You sent the person I truly wanted to kill to me. Smart choice!” I said sarcastically, rolling my eyes.

“Hey, I had a plan. She was supposed to show up with her boyfriend and tell you the truth about what happened back then. Then she was supposed to tell you that I wanted you to come with me so I could keep you safe while we figured out who was out to kill you. I never expected her boyfriend to drug you andfor you all to get into a wreck. And then she lied and saidyoucaused the wreck.”

“Nope. I was still too out of it to cause the wreck.”

“The fact that someone ran you off the road means someone knew you’d be on that road.”

“Exactly.”

“When Ellie called and told me about the wreck, she said it was the people in the car behind them who called 911. She and her boyfriend were gone by the time the ambulance got there.”

Damn, she hadn’t even stayed to make sure her sister was okay. That didn’t surprise me. What bothered me was how much it stung to hear that.

“I’m guessing the arrival of that good Samaritan is what drove the killer away. If I’d known about the killer earlier, I could’ve had someone looking into them all this time. Fucking Ellie!” Aiden hissed.

“Calm down,” I said, rubbing his chest. “We’ll find out who they are. The only way they could know we were on that road was if they’d tapped into Ellie’s phone.”

My sister wasn’t as suspicious of others as Aiden and I were. She probably never checked her phone for spyware or her home for cameras, which was why I never discussed things with her over the phone.

“I remember my sister being antsy that night,” I told Aiden. “I think she thought someone was after her. Before I passed out, I remember her boyfriend asking if she thought you were behind the wreck. She said it was possible because you were just as cruel as your grandfather. That makes me believe she and your grandfather had fallen out or something. Something happened to make her realize he wasn’t as kind as she thought he was. Perhaps that’s why she and her boyfriend wanted new identities, because they were trying to escape him.”

“It all comes back to my grandfather,” Aiden stated, staring up at the ceiling. “He’s my grandfather. My blood. Yet, I feel no bond with him. It was there when I was younger. But over the years, it started to fade. I started to see him more clearly.”

Same!