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She looked away, and I thought she was going to lie.
“Not at first.” She said finally. “I thought she was a threat. I thought she was responsible for Brennan’s death. I loved him too, you know. He was one of my best friends. And then I thought… I mean, she reminds me of our moms.”
We had only talked—reallytalked—a few times about our mothers.
Once was when we were just kids. Teresa had planted herself between her raging father and her mother, and her father had backhanded her into a wall.
I’d cleaned up the cut over her eye. She couldn’t stop crying, her shoulders shaking, and when I tried to tell her we’d get revenge—even though I couldn’t stop my own father—she’d blurted out that she hated herself, because she couldn’t stop him.
“I hate myself too,” I’d told her. Time had stopped for a second because that confession was so frightening.
“And sometimes I hate her,” she had sobbed.
That night, we’d talked about everything we saw in our houses. The way we listened for footsteps to know if they sounded angry. The way we hated our fathers and simultaneously wanted their love. The way our own mothers sacrificed us sometimes to keep the peace.
We never talked like that again, after that night. Those things were too private. Too close to our hearts, like weeds growing through the cracks.
“Does she remind you of your mom?” I asked. “Or does she remind you of a version of yourself you’d like to think you buried?”
Teresa’s gaze met mine, wide and furious.
I knew she felt betrayed. I would’ve felt the same if someone had accused me of seeing my own weakness in Amelia’s.
It was still fucking true, though.
“Fuck you, Stone.” Teresa threw the cell phone on the bed and got up, pacing toward the door.
“Going far?” My voice was casual.
Teresa stopped in the doorway, her back still to me. “You know I’ll still be by your side, you absolute dickhead. When you need me.”
She sounded pissed, but that was still a declaration of love and friendship.
Then she stormed off.
CHAPTER22
Amelia
I wokefrom uneasy dreams about Brennan. They were strange dreams where he haunted me like a ghost, but when he cornered me, he trapped me against a wall only to cover my throat in kisses, his fingers playing through my folds and stroking me to an orgasm where I came shuddering against the cold cement.
I woke with an ache between my thighs and a sense of restlessness. Shaw slept beside me, his arm thrown over his eyes. The hard angle of his jaw, covered in stubble, contrasted with his soft lips and I was tempted to wake him up. But instead, I just leaned over and pressed a kiss to his forehead before getting up and leaving the bedroom for the living area of the suite.
I’d been nervous about Shaw paying for such luxurious accommodations, but he’d shrugged and told me Stone would know where we were now anyway. “You can’t run from him,” he’d told me. “You’re going to have to face him… and he’ll have to face you.”
In the main living area, Liam was pacing.
I came to an abrupt stop. I was heated from the dreams, my nipples tenting the fabric of my t-shirt—Shaw’s t-shirt—and felt I exposed coming face to face with Liam like that.
He sensed me and turned, his gaze meeting mine.
“I tried to stay out of your dreams,” he told me as he walked toward me. “But I couldn’t keep myself from knowing….”
“I had the strangest dreams,” I confessed.
Liam took my hand, surprising me, and drew me to the sofa in front of the fire. “Tell me about them.”
“I dreamt Brennan is haunting me.”
