On the left side of the loft was a small L-shaped kitchen, and a door leading to what I assumed was the bathroom was just beyond it.

Riley closed the door to the apartment behind us, locking the dead bolt and hooking up the chain. “Home sweet home,” he said as he walked in, tossing a bag and his jacket on the couch before making a sweep of the place. I knew he was probably checking to make sure the space was clear—a habit Gage had ingrained in him long ago. Seeing him do it now brought back so many memories of when he used to do it when we’d been younger.

After every job, his was the place we’d seek refuge in. We’d go to get cleaned up, and then to fumble in the dark, getting lost in each other for a while, both high on the adrenaline of the chase … of the fight.

I’d gone there at other times, too, when the things I’d been running from had nothing to do with Max or the crew. Riley had always been my home when I’d needed a reprieve from my life, though he’d never known why. And through it all, through every time I’d gone to him and every time I hadn’t needed to because he’d already been there, he’d been looking out for me, protecting me.

Too bad he couldn’t protect me from everything.

RILEY

The apartment Gage had set us up in wasn’t as small as I pictured from his description, but it was wide-open. That actually worked better for me—less places to hide, less space to comb to make sure we were alone. The bathroom was the only room in the whole place that offered any kind of privacy, which was going to be real fucking interesting, to say the least.

I’d been expecting a minimized version of a standard bathroom based on the rest of the apartment, but everything in here was full size. A vanity sat adjacent to the bathtub and shower, a door to the left of it opening to reveal a small closet filled with towels and sheets just shoved inside. The guy who lived here did laundry like I did, apparently.

When I was satisfied the place was clear, I went back out and found Evie sitting on the couch, her shoulders straight and tense, nearly up to her ears. Her hands were pressed together and hidden between her knees, her eyes focused on the black TV screen.

Even after all these hours of being with her, it was still surreal to look at her. To look over at her and see so much of the girl I’d thought was dead only twenty-four hours ago. Even more bizarre was to look at her and see a girl I didn’t know at all. Her long hair was pulled back into a low ponytail, and she looked tired—exhausted, really—the bruises under her eyes more noticeable than they’d been earlier. “You didn’t sleep today, did you?” I asked.

My voice startled her, and she jumped, glancing up at me. She shook her head, tucked an imaginary strand of hair behind her ear. “Not much.”

“That makes two of us.” I tipped my chin toward the bed right behind where she was sitting. “You can take the bed. I’ll crash on the couch.”

“Riley…” Her voice was hesitant and weary, and I knew what was coming before she said another word. “We should talk. Before you get too far into this, you need to know the whole story.”

“I’m not sure now’s a good time.”

“Then when is? Because I don’t see how this is gonna end anytime soon, and more than that, I don’t see how this is gonna end without a bloody fight before it’s all said and done. You deserve to know what you’re getting into. What you’ve already gotten yourself into.”

I blew out a breath and closed my eyes, tugging at my hair. She was right—so was Gage. But I also knew that hearing this, whatever she was about to tell me, wasn’t going to be easy. If it’d made her run in the first place, it was some serious shit, because Evie Masterson didn’t run from anything.

Knowing when to concede, I nodded and dropped next to her on the couch, leaning back into the corner, and glanced over to her, waiting for her to start.

Finally, she took a deep breath. “Earlier … back at my house, that wasn’t the first time I’d ever seen Frankie.”

Furrowing my brow, I stared at her, wondering what she meant. Frankie had come into the crew right around the time Evie had … Well, died wasn’t really apt anymore, but that had been when he’d started running jobs for Max, shortly after everyone had been informed of her death. “How did you see him before that? You run into him somewhere or something?”

She wrung her hands in her lap, picked at her fingernails—something that was so Evie, it took me aback. Blowing out a breath, she brushed her hair back from her face, tucked some escaped strands behind her ear, and said, “The last time I saw him, before earlier at my house, was the night he tried to kill me.”

Chapter Nine

EVIE

Silence descended around us after those few words left my lips. Riley’s eyes were narrowed, his jaw clenched hard, every muscle in his body taut, like he was ready to pounce or flee at any moment.

Finally, his voice rough and scratchy, he said, “I’m going to need more information than that, Evie.”

It was still odd to hear my name from his lips—hear my name from anyone—having been so long since I’d been called that. Gage and Aaron had always been diligent to use Genevieve anytime we’d had to speak over the years, making sure we’d lived up to every bit of the elaborate hoax we’d all created.

I took a deep breath and nodded, then twisted my body on the couch to face him, tucking my left leg under me. I rested my hands in my lap, fidgeting as I picked at my nails. “Do you remember me mentioning an accountant back then? Ned Richards? Who was supposedly skimming from Max?”

“Yeah.” Riley’s jaw clenched hard, his nostrils flaring. “We were told he grabbed the gun off one of the guys on the boat and opened fire. Story was that you were shot in the chest twice and fell overboard.”

I shook my head, heat blooming in my cheeks at how easily my life had been swept under the rug for them. To maintain compliance in the ranks of the crew, Max wouldn’t have told everyone the truth. Not the actual truth that I knew, or the lies disguised as truth that Frankie had no doubt told him. And the reason I knew Frankie had told Max some distorted version of the truth was that if Frankie had copped to me escaping, he’d be dead right now.

I’d never had a doubt there’d be a story of some sort—a spin on the truth—but I’d also never known what everyone had been told. I’d never asked Gage, not wanting those details. Not when I was trying to forget about that part of my life. Not when I was trying to start fresh as Genevieve Meyer.

“When Frankie got me on the boat, Ned was already dead.”

Riley froze, every inch of him going still. “He was what?”

I nodded, swallowing. “That’s what started this whole clusterfuck. Ned…” I shook my head and glanced down at my lap, then back up at Riley. “Roughing him up had been Frankie’s first job for Max, but no one else in the crew had known about it. I’d been the only one who’d known he had been brought in. The only one who’d known he was working that job.”

Thinking back now, I should’ve seen it coming. Should’ve realized something shady was going down—shadier than the shit we dealt with every day. Because Max only hid something if there was a reason for it. And there were quite literally a million reasons for him to hide this.

“Ever since Max had me digging up info on Ned, getting evidence of his betrayal, of him skimming money from Max, I thought something didn’t add up. So I did what I do best—I dug some more. And I found that Ned wasn’t actually the one skimming the money from Max. Max was skimming the money from Blaine Pruitt, and Ned was helping him cover his tracks.”

“Goddamn…”

I nodded. Blaine was a widely known and hugely successful businessman in Chicago. As such, he made a lot of friends. Made a lot of enemies, too, and because of that, he was one of the top guys who kept Max in business.