Page 152 of Ruin Me With Lies

She’s got you all whipped and fucking blinded.

“You’re heard.”I wave him off and spin around on the breakfast stool.“You may go.”

Cora escorts him out.

My little liar knew exactly what she was doing when she wormed her way in with the Uppers and won them over.Now they’re her biggest champions.

Yesterday, it was Tazi telling me how Raya cleaned up her wound and calmed her down after she got hit.

Day before that, it was Jenkins, with a near copy of Sanders’s spiel: “Misunderstanding,” “didn’t mean to implicate her,” “it’s thanks to her help and knowledge that…”

And the morning before Jenkins, it was Elio—maintenance manager—taking full accountability for not reinforcing the southeast wall, not installing cameras or motion-sensor floodlights, not clearing the wild weeds like Raya had “repeatedly suggested.”

That bit I hadn’t known about.There will be consequences.

Gio walks into the kitchen, straightening his tie, and shoots me the same judgmental look he’s been wearing all week.He leans down and tries to peck Cora’s cheek, but she swats him away with a huff.

“Goddammit, Cora.This silent treatment’s highly unfair to me,” he says, indignant.“I’m not the one who confined Raya.I’m not the one who spent the weekend with her and refuses to fess up.”

I resist the goddamn urge to roll my goddamn eyes.“You know, you’ve been slinging shit at me all week, but you still haven’t said a word in Raya’s defense.”I take another bite of pear and lift a brow at him.“If you’re so sure she’s innocent, why not pull her out of confinement and put her under your protection?You’ve got just as much authority as Lo, so why aren’t you doing anything?”

“Maybe I’m holding a grudge.”He shrugs and grabs a slice of fruit from the lunch tray.“She chose you.Maybe I want her to feel what it’s like to get in bed with the devil.A selfish, narcissistic egotist who only cares about himself.”He tosses the fruit into his mouth, then gestures down his body.“She could’ve had Prince Charming.Instead, she picked the slimy frog.”

Prince Charming, my ass.

“There’s feelings, and then there’s facts,” I say.“Unlike you and Lo, I don’t think with my dick.”

“So, after all that territorial ‘she’s mine’ talk, you really don’t give a shit what Lo does to her?”he asks.“Is that what you’re saying?”

“I’m saying I don’t ever let my judgment get clouded, no matter who it is or how I feel.”

He leans in, eyes simmering with restrained anger.“I’ve known you my whole life, and not once have you laid claim to anyone.Ever.When we’ve both liked the same girl, you always stepped back.You don’t fuck whores, you don’t fuck strippers, you don’t fuck anyone beneath you.When you do entertain a woman, it’s because she serves a purpose.

“But now we’ve got Raya.This random, mysterious nobody with nothing to offer.She’s nothing special.She’s beneath you, by your own standards.And yet you didn’t step back this time.You wanted to beat my ass.You broke our agreement with Lo.You wanted to fuck her anyway.Own her anyway.You did everything unlike you, just to have her.”He flattens his hands on the countertop.“You wanna know what I think?”

“Thought you were already telling me,” I deadpan.

“I think you desperately want to be right about her being a plant,” he drags out.“Because you caught feelings for an average nobody, and now you’re running scared.Punishing her for being—”

“Call her an average nobody again, and I’ll knock your fucking teeth out.”

His smirk is daring.“She’s an average piece of—”

I’m on my feet before he can finish, driving him back against the wall with my forearm to his throat.

“Not one, not a single one of the bitches you’ve fucked, or ever will fuck in your pathetic lifetime, could ever come close to her,” I snarl in his face.“Cunt-governed, pussy-blind dumbfucks like you are so used to fake, gaudy baubles, you wouldn’t recognize a real diamond if it cut you.”I slam my forearm harder against his throat.“You will never know what it’s like to be with someone like her.She.Is.Fucking.Magic.”

“THEN WHY THE FUCK IS SHE BEING PUNISHED?!”he roars, face red, veins bulging.

And it’s in this moment, up this close, that I finally see it.

Hurt.Resentment.Rejection.

Stealing Raya hit him harder than he let on.He likes her.Genuinely.Far more than I realized.

And he just goaded me to drag something real out of me, an honest reaction.

“Yeah, Stefano,” he grits out.“You’re not the only one who caught feelings.”