“It’s too dangerous not to,” she argued, that militant Mackay gleam of stubbornness brightening her gaze as her hands went to her hips in determination. “We can’t go on like this, Graham. At least I can’t. I want this finished.”
His teeth snapped together furiously. “Are you in that big of a hurry to leave me, Lyrica?”
She flinched as though the question were a lash laid to bare skin.
“Is it a requirement that I leave once this is over, Graham?” Her hands slid from her hips and moved instead to clasp in front of her. “I wasn’t aware there was a deadline.”
He stilled then.
Was there a deadl
ine?
What the fuck was he going to do once it was over?
He could see the questions raging in her eyes as he stared at her, but he couldn’t make himself answer the question.
—
Lyrica swallowed tightly.
She’d known, she reminded herself. She’d known flavors didn’t last long in Graham’s life. She’d just so hoped he’d become fond of her particular taste, perhaps.
“I see.” She forced herself to say it softly, her chest clenching painfully as her eyes suddenly felt raw, the pressure behind them actually hurting as she forced herself to hold back the tears that would have filled them. “Well then, at least I know now.”
“Dammit, Lyrica,” he snarled then, anger tightening his features. “I didn’t say any of that.”
“No, you didn’t,” she agreed. “This has gone on long enough, Graham. I won’t hide any longer. I told you I couldn’t go on like this. Now it’s over. Get Mom out of there and I’m going in. I’m not hiding anymore.”
“And just what made you come to this harebrained conclusion?” he bit out furiously.
Oh, that was it.
“Harebrained?” Keeping her voice soft, well aware that Elijah was still on the other side of the room, still on the phone, she went on. “Well, excuse me for being harebrained, Graham, but it’s my life that’s on the line and on hold here, not yours.”
And it wasn’t his heart breaking in two at the knowledge that she’d never had a chance at having her love returned.
No, that was hers.
Stupid little Lyrica, always looking for rainbows where none existed.
He stepped closer, his expression tight, the gold in his eyes more subtle, like chips of gold ice. “No.” He repeated the word succinctly, pure arrogance filling every line of his face. “I will not risk you so needlessly. And don’t test me on this, sweetheart, because I can and I will lock your ass in a room somewhere until this is all over.”
Would he?
Drawing herself stiffly upright, her hands curling into fists at her sides as she shot him a disgusted look, Lyrica turned and stalked furiously from the room.
She’d be damned if she would let him order her about. That was the second time he’d threatened to lock her in a room somewhere, and she wouldn’t give him the chance to do so.
Slipping quickly to the kitchen doorway, she slid the keys to Graham’s pickup from the peg on the wall, praying he was more involved with something other than the surveillance screens on the computer monitors. If she was lucky, he wouldn’t have a clue that she’d stolen them until she was gone.
She knew the doors and windows were all electronically keyed to alert him if they were opened. But what he didn’t know was that Kye had found a way to bypass the one on her window. For Kye, slipping out of the house had been the same as slipping out from Dawg’s eagle eye had been for Lyrica. Just to see if they could get out and back in, without getting caught.
Unlike Lyrica, Kye bragged she had never been caught.
She had described to Lyrica exactly how she’d rigged the window to hold the alarm at bay and how she reconnected it once she returned.
Lyrica had no intention of returning.