Page 173 of Tell Me Pucking Lies

Koa stands abruptly, pacing across the porch, his boots heavy on the wood. “You want to run her again? Hide her somewhere else? What’s the point? Eventually, someone finds her. Eventually, this catches up.”

“The point,” I say carefully, watching both of them, “is leverage.”

He stops pacing, turning to face me fully. “Leverage for what?”

“For when Gilbert and Vincent finally kill each other.” I say it plainly, laying the truth bare. “Someone’s going to be left standing when this war ends, and I plan for that someone to beus.”

Koa shakes his head, scoffing, and there’s disgust in the sound. “You sound just like him.”

That stings more than it should. More than I want to admit. Because he’s right—I do sound like Vincent. Strategic, calculating, using people as pieces on a board. When did I become this? When did I stop being someone who cared about right and wrong and start being someone who only cared about winning?

Atticus turns finally, a slow pivot that brings his full attention to the conversation. He’s smirking, that half-smile that says he knows something we don’t. “Then maybe it’s time we act like him.”

The three of us stare at each other in the dim light—quiet, calculating, measuring. There’s no real alliance left here, just temporary convenience. We’re not friends. We’re not even really partners. We’re just three guys trying to survive in a game none of us fully understand, using each other until we can’t anymore.

From down the hall, I hear a door open. Lexi’s footsteps are slow, uneven, still weak from the drugs. She walks into the living room where we can see her through the window, and she’s pale, silent, her eyes darting between the three of us with wariness and confusion.

“What?” she asks, her voice hoarse but defiant. “Why are you all looking at me like that?”

Koa doesn’t answer. Atticus smiles faintly, that predatory curve of his lips. I just glare.

She shakes her head and walks into the kitchen. The three of us watch those long legs move. I catch Koa’s eyes first and then he stares at me, daring. Then Atticus glares. I realize we’re in deep shit with each other. We all wanther.

The silence that follows is worse than shouting. It’s heavy with implications, with the weight of decisions none of us are ready tomake. The air feels thick, charged with tension that could snap at any moment.

I glance down at my pocket, feeling the phone still warm against my thigh. One name sitting behind glass could end all of this, could change the entire game.

Gilbert Kane.

And for the first time since this started, I’m not sure whose war I’m actually fighting. My father’s? My own? Gilbert’s? Or am I fighting for something else entirely—something I don’t want to name because naming it makes it real, makes it vulnerable?

I look at Lexi walking back to her brother with a bottle of water and chips, exhausted and terrified and still somehow defiant, and I realize with uncomfortable clarity that the answer might be simpler and more complicated than I thought.

Maybe I’m not fighting for territory or revenge or power.

Maybe I’m just fighting for her.

And that realization terrifies me more than anything my father ever did.

39

Lexi

Iwalk into the bedroom as my heart races. I sit on the bed and hand Axel the bottle of water.

“Here.”

He sits up and grabs it. “Thanks.”

I hand him the bag of chips. “All they have.”

He lays back down and stares at the ceiling. I don’t know what’s running through his head, but I hear the voices trailing from the living room, and like a siren, I leave the bedroom. I quietly close the door behind my back and my eyes immediate slam into Koa’s. I blink a few times, trying to find my breath.

For a moment, we just stare at each other. My blood boils hotter with every second that passes. I feel my hoodie for the string, keeping my eyes on his. I pull one side until the string fully removes itself. I gather it in my hand as I walk down the hall with easy determination. This motherfucker has no idea what’s about to happen.

When I walk in the living room, Atticus and Revan watch me closely.

“What the hell is he doing here anyways?” I gesture at Koa sharply, my voice rising. “Isn’t this a Reaper safe house?”