Risky Obsession (Wolf Security #3)

25. Kane

CHAPTER 25

Kane

T he night pressed in around me, and in the faint moonlight, the dense foliage cast long shadows across the dirt path like demons. My mind was a fucked-up mess from Tory’s—no, Lacey’s—confession. Every step I took away from her was weighed down with her fucking betrayal.

I couldn’t believe I’d trusted her. Not just trusted her; I fucking fell for her. She tricked me. Made a fool out of me.

Behind me, her sobs echoed to me like all the trees were on her side. I clenched my fists and continued marching along the dirt track.

I had no idea if she was following me, and I didn’t give a shit either. She could find her own way to town. Hell, she could take her bullshit back to Australia.

My heart ached, and I hated that I’d let her in. I hadn’t met a woman yet who didn’t try to fuck me over.

Why had I believed she was different?

“Kane!” Her strangled cry sounded like she was underground.

Ignoring her, I marched harder, determined to put distance between us.

I stumbled into a dip in the track but found my footing and stepped onto a slightly wider, more prominent dirt road that was obviously used more than the one where we’d dumped the BMW. With a bit of luck, I would be out of this country before that car was found.

“Kane! Please!” She yelled so loud it must have hurt her throat.

“Fuck you!” I roared at the trees around me.

Rage burned inside me like an inferno, dragging me back over twenty years to my sister’s brutal betrayal. I’d thought I could trust her, too.

Tory’s lies hurt a thousand times worse. I had started falling for her, and I’d thought we could become more than just treasure-hunting partners.

I reached the asphalt road, and the smooth surface felt hollow beneath my feet. Just like my heart. Fucking hollow.

Behind me, the drag of the suitcase wheels confirmed she was still on my tail.

“Kane, please! Stop!” Her pleas were desperate.

I didn’t respond. I’d said all I needed to say.

The half-moon was now visible over the tree line ahead, giving me a beacon to aim for. Dense vegetation lined the road and there wasn’t a single building in view. I’d only found this area by using the GPS and if I remembered correctly, I was about five miles away from the nearest homes.

“Kane!”

It was going to be a long fucking walk.

“Please, will you let me explain?” Her shrill voice drifted my way, but I focused on the rhythmic pounding of my boots on the pavement.

My breaths clouded with each exhale. Her lies cut so deep, that I wasn’t just cold. I was chilled to my fucking core.

I’d fought long and hard to heal the mental wounds my family had inflicted on me. Tory’s deceit had shredded those barriers.

Maybe some wounds could never heal.

Lacey’s shoes and suitcase thundered behind me. She was running to catch up.

I kept my pace, staring at the moon and clenching my jaw so hard my teeth hurt.

She sprinted up to me. “Kane, please, ask me anything. I’ll tell you the truth, I swear.” The anguish in her voice tugged at my resolve.

“I don’t want to know you.” I forced my gaze forward, refusing to look at her.

“But you already do. I’m still me. I couldn’t lie about who I really am, Kane. That’s who you saw.”

“I saw a lying bitch. That’s what I saw.”

“I know, and I’m sorry.” Her voice was raw with desperation. “I broke your trust. What can I do to fix what I’ve done?”

I glared at her. “Nothing. I don’t know who you are. And I don’t want to.”

The erratic beat of her suitcase wheels stole all other sounds as she somehow matched my strides.

“I never wanted to hurt you, and my lies are unforgivable. I need you to understand why I did it. Why I pretended to be Tory Parmenter.”

I sure as shit didn’t want to hear her bullshit, and yet I couldn’t make my legs sprint away.

“When I was a kid, I was a brilliant student,” she said. “My parents were constantly on my case to study harder and do something with my life that they could never do. The pressure to please them was brutal. I was put through an accelerated learning program and entered university when I was sixteen to study chemistry. I was studying day and night, forced to learn and do what everyone else expected me to do. I was trapped and felt like I was going to implode.”

The cold moonlight stabbed through the branches, casting shimmers of light over her tear-streaked cheeks.

“Kane, I’m sorry. Will you listen? Please?”

“Fuck off!” My breath came out in heavy puffs as I tightened my grip around the handle of Pops’ leather duffle.

Her ragged breaths shot in and out as she raced to keep up with my angry strides.

“When I was seventeen, I met this guy, Axel. He was twenty-six, and the leader of a motorcycle gang.”

I almost turned to face her, but I kept my gaze rigid, forcing my legs to stride harder.

“Axel became my life. I would do anything for him. He showed me how to have fun, and we partied hard. I thought I was in love, but I was a fool. He didn’t love me. He used me and even though I knew it was wrong, I used my chemistry skills to make drugs for Axel’s motorbike gang.”

I shot my gaze to her.

“Yeah.” She sighed. “I was fucking stupid.”

Her eyes pleaded with me, but I yanked my gaze away. None of that justified her lies.

“My best friend, Tory Parmenter, overdosed on my drugs, Kane. She died in my arms, and it was my fault.” Her voice broke with emotion .

The hurt in her tone clawed at my heart. I clenched my jaw and forced myself to keep walking.

She sucked in a shaky breath. “After Tory died, I wanted to stop but Axel wouldn’t let me. And I knew if I ran, he would kill me. I was trapped again, and for three months, I pretended to be okay when I was being eaten alive with guilt. I didn’t even know if Tory’s parents knew what happened to her. Finally, I escaped, and I went to the police to hand myself in.”

Her ragged breaths showed how hard she was working to keep up with me, but I wasn’t slowing down. The sooner I got away from her, the better.

“The police gave me a deal. Help them take down Axel and his gang, and I would get off with a lighter sentence. So I worked undercover with the drug squad. Axel and twenty-two other men were arrested. But the guilt over what happened to Tory crushed me.”

“So you re-invented Tory to fuck with me?” I snapped.

“No. I haven’t finished.”

“This is all bullshit, Tory. Lacey. Whoever the fuck you are.”

“Kane, look at me!” She gripped my arm with surprising strength. “I’m trying to explain who I am.”

The raw emotion in her voice threatened to break through my walls.

“You’re a well-trained liar, that’s who.”

She released a wild shriek of pure anger, hurled her suitcase forward, and stood in front of me. “My guilt has been driving me ever since Tory died in my arms. I worked my ass off to become a cop and then a detective. I do everything by the law, pretending to be innocent. And every day, my only hope is to keep moving forward. Because if I stop, my guilt will crush me.”

I dropped Pops bag and clenched my fists, trying to rein in my fucked-up emotions.

“I love my job. I love taking down criminal bastards who ruin lives. When my captain grounded me because of my stupid injuries, I thought my world would implode. Aria gave me a lifeline. That’s all it was. An undercover job that I thought would save me from my guilty spiral. I had no idea who you were. But when I got to know you . . .” Her face contorted with anger. “I hated myself all over again. I was stuck, Kane. Stuck between my duty and my feelings for you.”

I stared at the empty road ahead .

“Kane, please!” She squeezed my wrist as she sobbed, and the sound cut through me like a machete. “I never meant to hurt you!”

A bitter huff escaped my lips. “But you did.”

I picked up Pops’ bag and walked away.

The cold wind bit into my skin as my boots crunched on the gravel beneath me and her cries of despair carved chunks off my heart. Yet I didn’t look back.

I’d learned from my sister’s betrayal that liars never ceased to be liars.

I wouldn’t make that same mistake again.