Page 31 of My Beautiful Sin

Regina Taggart.

I tell myself it’s a coincidence. But as I watch—as her body turns while she watches Devlin walk to his car—I can’t help but fear that I’m wrong.

We end up getting the rest of our food to go since we can’t risk being overheard. Lamar heads out first, leaving Brandy and me to take care of the check. He’s parked about two blocks away, so that’s fair, and the plan is that we’ll meet at Brandy’s place. As soon as we’ve taken care of the bill, we head out onto the street with the take-out bags.

“You could’ve gone with Lamar,” I point out. She’d walked to the restaurant and is now hitching a ride back with me. “You’d already be there by now, getting us all set up and ready to eat.”

She shoots me a sidelong glance. “Right. Because we have absolutely nothing to talk about.” I shrug as she continues. “Are you sure we’re understanding Devlin right? Maybe he was drunk? Maybe he was being ... I don’t know, stupid.”

I circle Shelby and pause at the driver’s side door. “No, we understood right. As for him being stupid…” I trail off, because I want to believe in both Devlin and Lamar, but I can’t deny that the door Devlin opened scares me.

Brandy lingers at the passenger side of the car. Then she pulls open the door and slides in. I do the same, settling in behind the wheel. “I don’t get it,” she says. “I mean, Lamar is a cop.”

“Yeah,” I say. “I noticed.”

She tilts her head as if in admonishment. “Don’t be glib about this.”

I take a deep breath and try to relax. “I promise you, I’m not being glib. I’m trying to process everything. I trust Devlin. And I trust Lamar. And I want this. I want to be able to talk to him. Is that so bad?”

“Of course not! It’s just, well, you realize there’s no statute of limitations on murder, right? Surely, Devlin didn’t really mean you should tell Lamar everything.”

My stomach twists unpleasantly, and for a moment I think I might be sick. But I square my shoulders, because I believe what I told her. I do trust Devlin. And I do trust Lamar. And I know that they both love me, and that neither of them would hurt me. But, yeah, I’m scared, and I tell her so.

“So, what are you going to do?”

I draw in a deep breath then let it out slowly. “I’m going to tell Lamar the truth, just like Devlin said.” I shift more in the seat so I’m looking at her directly. “It’ll be okay. Don’t you think it will be okay?”

I can see from her face that she’s unsure, but then she slowly nods. “Yeah,” she says, not entirely with conviction. “Of course it will. Lamar would never hurt you, and he knows that screwing with Devlin would do exactly that. Friendship tops everything, right?”

I nod, because she’s right. But I also hear what she doesn’t say—but does everything include the law?

I answer the unspoken question aloud. “Yeah, friendship wins. It has to.”

I turn forward and grip the steering wheel, wondering how much I truly believe what I said. Do friendship and love and family always win? If I had known what Uncle Peter was doing all those years ago, would I have stayed quiet? After all, I’ve stayed quiet about the fact that Devlin killed my uncle.

It’s different, though. What Devlin did was shocking, but understandable. He killed to save me. That’s an easy call, and I don’t feel any guilt holding onto that secret.

Peter, though…

He was stealing money and getting people hooked on drugs. And he was doing all of that for no reason other than his own profit.

Still, I’d loved him. Would I have turned him in? Or would I have kept his secret?

I don’t know, and my uncertainty bothers me. Thankfully, it’s not a question I have to face. Uncle Peter is dead, and exposing those secrets now doesn’t bother me.

The bigger question for tonight is how will Lamar feel once he knows the truth. Will he protect Devlin’s secrets, knowing that it would destroy me if he revealed them? Or will the oath that he took as a police officer take precedence?

Devlin’s surely thought about that, too, and I know that he must believe my friendship is strong enough with Lamar to ensure that he’d never do anything to hurt me, including revealing a crime. So how is it that I’m suddenly doubting? How is it that I’m suddenly scared?

It’s a rhetorical question, of course. I’m scared because even though I know Lamar well enough to know how he’s going to react, until the moment he tells me it’s okay, there’s always the chance that everything will go south.

Brandy seems to realize that I’m lost in my own thoughts and says nothing during the short drive back to her house. Lamar knows the key and alarm code to her place, so he’s already inside when we get there. I see him, and my stomach curdles when I realize that I can’t read his expression.

Then he smiles at me and holds out his arms and holds me close, giving me a hug. “I don’t know what it is you’re going to tell me, but you know it’s going to be okay, right?”

“Yes,” I lie. “I know.”

Brandy’s right behind me, and she quickly moves to the kitchen and starts plating all the food we brought in from Cask & Barrel.