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“Desperately,” Tess agreed. In between nightmares of seeing Jack’s purple face and bulging eyes, she could never quite get the vision of the blood dripping down Lucas’s arm out of her head. “You weren’t supposed to get hurt.”
“No, but it’s for the best that I did. No one seemed to suspect either of us after that, hm?” He rubbed the back of her hair with his palm. “But that’s why you don’t have to worry about a thing. You were never in any danger. We planned every detail together and you knew exactly what to expect.”
“That’s what I mean,” she said, trying to explain. “I knew you were doing everything you could to make me look like the next target, but there were times I couldn’t tell what was real and what was fake.”
He tucked her under his chin. “You’re talking about having to be the one to find Sullivan’s corpse. Tessa, baby… if I could’ve saved you from that, you know I would’ve.”
“I know,” she said again. Because, honestly, Lucas would have. They both agreed that it had to be Tess who “found” the body to really sell her innocence, but it was one thing to know what she would find under the blanket, and another thing entirely toseeJack like that.
The purple face.
The swollen tongue.
The bulging eyes.
The rope around his neck—
Tess swallowed roughly, pushing the image out of her head as she focused on another memory from that first time in Hamlet. “It’s the same as when you left that note under my door. With the mocking nursery rhyme aboutJack-be-nimble, Jack-be-quick.I knew it was you, but that didn’t stop me from freaking out so much that I bolted into the woods, then got the shit scared out of me for real when Mase found me.”
For a moment, she didn’t know what it was she said. Holding her tight, their bodies pressed together, she couldn’t miss it when Lucas went stiff. His hand cradled the big of her head, his chin keeping her in place, but it was in the way his back muscles bunched that had Tess running the words through her mind again.
Was it the way she called Mason Walsh by the shortened version of his name? Even with the other man safely behind bars, far away from them, Lucas could rarely contain his jealousy when he remembered how the younger deputy made a move on Tessa in the days following Jack’s suspicious death. It didn’t matter that Lucas allowed Mason to be the fall guy for their plan out of that very same jealousy, or that Tess never had eyes for anyone other than Lucas after the day they first met. All these years later, he still thought Mason should’ve been killed instead of framed like Tess suggested.
But, no… jealous Lucas had a tendency to pull her closer, kissing her whenever he felt his hold on her slipping. Tess loved the way he needed to possess her if only to remind them both that they belong to each other.
This reaction was unusual—and that only added to her worries.
Tess drew away from him. “Luc?”
His expression darkened, and she knew instantly that she was right.
Something waswrong.
“Only a handful of people knew about the note I left you. Isn’t that right,cuore?”
He very rarely took that emotionless tone with her. When he did? It wasn’t because he was angry with Tess, but something else had set him off and he was seconds away from losing his control.
She had to do everything she could to help him keep in. Here, in Hamlet, where the dead refused to stay dead… she couldn’t risk him losing his control again.
“Um, yeah. Maria knew I found one, but she never asked what it was it said. The sheriff took it in as evidence, just like you planned. Remember? It made it look like I was the next victim and not in on the plot. I’m guessing Sly knew about it, too, and probably Willie. Oh, and Mason, of course.”
“Of course,” Lucas echoed.
Tess slid her hands up his chest, drawing the blank look in his pale blue eyes down toward the motion. “Luc, baby. You’re scaring me. What does that have to do with anything?”
He exhaled roughly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to frighten you.”
“I know, but something’s wrong. Tell me. Please.”
“You know how Sylvester said they found my business card in Ophelia?” When Tess nodded, he thinned his lips. “There was a note on the back. Rick told me and Willie Parker confirmed it. Handwritten, but another nursery rhyme. Achangednursery rhyme.”
Lucas’s memory was unmatched by anyone Tess had ever known. When he rattled it off, she had no doubt in her mind that he got it word for word.
“Okay,” she said when he was done, trying to hide how her fingers were suddenly trembling by twisting them in his black t-shirt. “What does that mean?”
“I don’t know, baby. But I’m sure as fuck going to find out.”
CHAPTERELEVEN
