Hitman's Secret Baby: A Bad Boy Romance Read Online Free PDF Page B

disappear again.
    “Shower’s yours if you want it,” I told him lightly, grabbing my purse and jacket.
    He came to join me at the door, his arms folded, an immovable looking frown carved into his face. “This is a pointless idea, Taryn.”
    “ You know that,” I tried to explain. “I don’t. I can’t just trust your word. I can’t. ”
    Mason’s expression shifted in surprise, like that hadn’t even occurred to him. “Okay.”
    “Okay, then.”
    “I can’t stay here.” He’d sorted out his appearance in my absence, tidying his hair and fixing his clothes, covering himself in that dark leather jacket like an armor. I couldn’t see the man I’d just slept with at all anymore, nothing desperate or yielding or regretful about the person in front of me. No anger and no passion, no emotion whatsoever. It was, somehow, both easier and more difficult. “I have to make some calls, get in touch with some of my guys. I have to know why Ethan’s on that list.”
    “Does it matter ?” I asked faintly.
    “If he’s like his father, of course it matters.”
    “If he is then the police will handle it. Not you, not your guys.”
    “Taryn,” Mason sighed. “Please. Just let me work, okay?”
    He held the front door open for me, an oddly chivalrous gesture, and I stepped through it with a reluctant nod.
    “I won’t mention you to the cops,” I said, a parting offering of peace, and he acknowledged it with a half-smile, before walking away without another word.
    He left the area on foot as I watched with a yearning under my ribs for some show of domesticity we hadn’t even earned yet—a kiss goodbye, a hug, something . All of them stupid things to want from him and I couldn’t fathom why I would even crave them.
    Outside, the day was bright—too bright for my stormy mood. Sure, the sex had been great, even better than before, but Mason was still such an anomaly. His apologies rang in my ears, resonating with certainty, and I wasn’t sure what to do with that.
    I considered his truths today, what he’d told me about Ethan. It implied he might be hanging around for a while.
    It meant I had to find some way of being near him, balance my hurt and my plain old lust.
    I wondered if I could somehow find my way onto the road to forgiving him, but there was no frame of reference in my whole life for a betrayal this huge.
    A therapist would have a field day with us.
    As I drove through my small town, parking up at the local police station, a lump formed in my chest. How would I begin to broach this with the cops? I knew I had to do something, but my resolve could only carry me into that place. The words were a whole other matter.
    I walked up to the wide blue doors, wringing my hands. I was doing the right thing, I knew that, and the police would fix this mess without Mason having to get involved at all. He could leave, go back to wherever it was he’d been for a decade, and I could get on with my life, pretend all of this was just a strange dream.
    That was what I wanted, wasn’t it?
    “Can I help you, miss?” the man behind the front desk asked, and I startled. I must’ve been stood there a full minute, blankly staring at a wall poster.
    If you suspect a crime, report it! We’re relying on you!
    “Yes,” I said shakily. “I’d like to report a murder that’s going to happen.”
    The man arched his eyebrows. “Really?”
    “Really.”
    “O-kay,” he drawled slowly, turning to yell over his shoulder, “Sheila! You better get out here. Bring a pen or something.”
    “It’s my friend’s husband,” I explained, already sensing this wasn’t going well. “Ethan Foster.” The man’s eyebrows climbed higher and I nodded, taking a deep breath. “He’s going to be killed.”
     

 
     
     
     
    Chapter Four
Mason
     
    Taryn wasn’t home.
    And yet—
    I knew where she left her spare key. It was the same place she used to leave her parents’ keys for me, back before me and my sister had officially