Dirty Red (Love Me with Lies, #2)

by Tarryn Fisher

I wanted what Olivia had and threw away—someone who adores me even though my insides curl and lash like a poisonous snake.

I knew what a woman with a secret looked like; I stared at one in the mirror every day. Women wore their secrets in their eyes, and if you paid attention, you would catch glimpses of sharp emotion pooling through in regular conversation.

I had a second—no—a fraction of a second when I wanted to hug her. Then, it was gone and I wanted her to die and rot in the ground.

“Leah, go be with your husband, before he realizes that he’s still in love with me.”

I felt like he’d dropped me from the highest building. Shattered. Every part of me. He was a liar. He was a thief.

Caleb always said just enough to leave you feeling both incredibly charmed and wondering exactly what he was getting at. Seth spewed truth like it was Old Faithful: too much, too fast, too hard. No wonder no one ever spoke to him.

Human eyes are the sign language of the brain. If you watch them carefully, you can see the truth played out, raw and unguarded.

“I didn’t choose her,” his voice breaks. “Love is illogical. You fall into it like a manhole. Then you’re just stuck. You die in love more than you live in love.”

I file through all of the other emotional bombs I can drop on him. I have told so many lies that I have an entire buffet of shadiness to choose from. I pluck out the worst one and rub my chin on my shoulder. This one will hurt him, probably deeper than anything that I could do or say about Olivia. Ready…set…