East Bound by Nana Malone (best value ebook reader .txt) 📗

positions. Despite myself, I leaned forward. She was right; those were the best positions.

"You think he'll have snipers?"

Nyla shrugged. "I have no idea. He knows we have no choice but to agree to meet him, but if he gets wind of this game, or he gets spooked, he might start shooting."

I didn't want to respect her or her intelligence, but she was smart. Which was what made her dangerous. And she was right. If Theroux was indeed watching us, we had to be very careful. "Nyla and I are going in together."

Her eyes went wide. "I don't think so."

I lifted a brow. "What, now you don’t want to work together?"

"No. We have a common goal, but it just doesn't make sense for us to go together."

"Are you afraid?"

She pressed her lips together in a tight line, and there was an urge that made me think about kissing it off her face. "No, I'm suspended, they've taken away my firearms at the moment, so I just have my bare hands."

Livy leaned forward and clasped her hand. "Something tells me that, even with only your bare hands, you're pretty dangerous."

Nyla smiled. "I'm decent. I can take care of myself. I’d still feel better with a weapon."

I don't know what made me say it, or why I volunteered, but the moment the words were out of my mouth, I regretted them and wanted to cut out my own tongue. "You won’t need a weapon. You’ll have me."

Nyla

It's not real. It is not real. Goddammit, it is not real.

I didn't know how many times I tried to mentally tell myself that East, with his arm around me, holding me close, nuzzling my hair, wasn't real. My body apparently didn't believe that massive lie.

As I curled into him, I placed a hand over his heart and wrapped an arm around his waist as we walked together to Grimwald Square, seemingly lovey-dovey, and my body believed it. She believed that after this, East and I were going home together, that East and I were going to tear off the sheets and make up for the last week of being cold and apart, make up for lost time, make up for it all. My body was a moron.

That was the only explanation. My body had a death wish. Because clearly, my heart couldn't take whatever the hell he was doing right now. And I needed to remember that. But oh no, I wanted what he was selling. His cologne hit me like a whiplash of sandalwood, and God, he smelled so unbelievably good. I just wanted to lean in and sniff. But that was dumb. I knew better. The last thing on earth I needed to do was to lean in and sniff the man as if I wasn't being punished enough already. This wasn't real. And I needed to remember that, otherwise I was going to groan.

“It's not real,” I murmured softly, but it didn’t escape East’s ears.

"What's not real?"

East's voice was husky, and the heat of his breath sneaked up my neck as I answered out loud, "Nothing."

"More secrets you're keeping?"

"For the love of God, East, if you don't—" I cut myself off. "It doesn't matter. But I do have to give you credit. The way you did it was spectacular."

He frowned down at me. Everything about his body language said, we were a couple in love on a romantic stroll on an autumn evening. But it was a lie. Just like everything else.

"Oh, you're giving me beef for the way I handled everything? It was best for both of us. Clean. But it seems like you found a way to stick around anyway. Ugh, we're not doing this now."

He was right. Now was the world's shittiest time to discuss it. But as he'd been avoiding me and we hadn't really had time to be alone, I took the chance to at least ask something. "Do you want to at least tell me what you were doing in my flat while I was gone?"

His step faltered. "I was picking up something I’d left behind."

"You could have just called me for it, and I could have left it with your doorman."

I felt rather than saw his hard swallow. "It was something I didn't want to be seen by anyone else."

"Are you going to tell me what it was?"

"Nope."

We were almost at the clock tower, and his grip on me tightened.

"So we're just going to pretend that nothing happened and that I didn't exist to you?"

He still didn’t answer me. Instead, his feet faltered just a little and he held me even tighter. "Something isn’t right."

"Yeah, it's not right. You can't just freeze me out, East. Not without a grownup conversation, at least."

It took me a moment to realize that he wasn’t talking about us. He meant that something wasn't right about the meet. The air. It was too still.

I halted alongside him and breathed deep. "We're being watched."

He nodded and dipped his head down. His lips were a whisper from mine, and I froze. Oh, hell no, he was not going to kiss me. Not fucking now.

But he clearly wasn't. Instead, he used the opportunity to whisper to me, "Not only are we being watched, but we’ve also got a tail. West exit. Obviously, I can't see behind me, but I'd bet the south exit too."

I did my own assessment, and he was right.

"Yep, I see him. In sweatpants and camo. Looks like he's stretching."

In our earpieces, Livy sighed. She was the closest to that exit. "Yeah, let me see if I can waylay him."

Ben's voice was loud and clear. "You will do no such—"

From what I could see, Livy was already on the move. Never mind what Ben had to say about it. I'd always liked her. Ben's curses rang loud and clear.

Bridge, from his position at the southeast exit where he was doing some light window shopping for some Prada bags, said, "What are we going to do? Do we abort? Do you think