Maybe Never (Maybe #2) (5 page)

I open the door to her red Mercedes, feeling exhausted and tired. I just need to go home and sleep. Everything will make sense after a good night’s sleep. Even though it’s two or maybe three in the afternoon, it feels like two or three in the morning to me; that’s how exhausted I am. I just need to sleep for twenty hours straight, and then I’ll wake up and realize this was all a dream.
 

I move to slide into the passenger seat, but something makes me stop. I don’t know why I look behind me, but I do. It’s just a feeling that I have to look before I get into the car.
 

When I look up, I realize why I had the feeling as soon as I see Killian standing just outside the jail building. He intensely looks at me, like he always does. His dark brown hair looks a little unkempt on top of his head, and it’s obvious he hasn’t shaved since the last time I saw him. He’s dressed in a suit, much the same as he has been almost every day I’ve spent with him. Every day, except for the one day he took me on a date, but it wasn’t really a date. It was just a way for the other agents to try to get information from me. It was just a hoax.
 

I feel my anger bubbling inside me, I slam the door, and my feet begin moving toward him before I even have a chance to think about what I’m doing.
 

“Kins?” Scarlett asks hesitantly.
 

“I’ll be right back,” I say as I continue to walk toward Killian.
 

He keeps his intense eyes on me, his face not showing me any emotion or giving anything away as I walk to him. When I get close, he indicates for me to follow and then begins walking away from the building. We walk two blocks before he ducks into an alleyway and stops, turning to face me.

“You okay?” he asks.
 

I roll my eyes. “I’m fine.” I’m annoyed that everyone keeps asking me that. “Why are we here?”
 

“We couldn’t have this conversation in front of the jail. Too many cameras and witnesses.” He pauses. “I’m not supposed to speak to you. It’s not good for the case.”
 

“I see. Then, why are you?” I raise my eyebrows.
 

He innocently looks at me. “Because I couldn’t stay away.”
 

I open my mouth to speak, but Killian’s lips crash with mine, and I stumble backward in shock. He easily catches me in his arms, as if he was expecting that reaction. His lips are brutal against mine, demanding more from me. Even though our last kiss was just last night, it feels like we haven’t kissed in years. The kiss feels like home, something I’m desperate for after spending a night in jail.
 

Those feelings quickly go away though as thoughts of last night creep back into my head. I try to lose myself in the kiss again and pretend that there is nothing wrong. That he wasn’t the reason I just spent a night in jail even though I had done nothing wrong. I want to love him, but instead, I hate him.
 

I try to push him back to get him to release my lips so that I can show him that I hate him, that I no longer care about him. He doesn’t budge though. He just kisses me harder, making it even harder to resist. Every kiss brings me closer to just giving in to him and forgetting my hatred. So, instead, I decide to attack back with my own defiant and brutal kisses. I bite and nip and pull at his lips as my hands claw at his back.
 

He doesn’t fight me. He lets me take my anger out on him, as if he thinks he deserves the pain I’m inflicting. He does. He deserves worse after lying to me and my family. He deserves a whole lot worse.
 

I bite down hard this time, hard enough to draw blood and for him to let go of me. He touches his fingers to his lips and then removes his hand, looking at the blood. His eyes then look to me, and I see the lust still in his eyes. He still wants me, but he doesn’t love me. He doesn’t care about me. If he did, he would have told me what was going on before he had me arrested. He wouldn’t have let me get so invested in him when he wasn’t being truthful. He was just using me.
 

“What was that?” I ask.
 

“It was a kiss. It was—”
 

“Stop. I don’t want to hear it. We are over. It doesn’t matter what it was.”
 

He sucks in a breath but doesn’t argue with me.
 

“Why have you been investigating my family?”
 

He blankly looks at me but doesn’t say anything.
 

“What did you find?”
 

Again, he stands stoic and doesn’t answer.
 

“Why did you propose to me? Why did you try to become CEO? Why was I in jail? Why? Just…why?”
 

He doesn’t answer me or show any reaction to my questions.
 

“My family did nothing wrong. Not my grandfather. Not me. And especially not my father.” I don’t know why I feel the need to defend my father now that he’s dead, but I do. I think I feel even stronger about fighting for him because I loved him more than anyone, and he’s not here to defend himself. I won’t let his memory become tarnished.
 

“How long have you been investigating? The full five years you have been working for the Felton Corporation?”
 

He doesn’t answer me, but there is one question that he might answer. One question he owes me.
 

“What is your name? Your real name?”
 

I wait for Killian to answer, to say anything about what happened.
 

He doesn’t. He just looks longingly at me.
 

I shake my head as I begin pacing back and forth in the small alleyway. It must have rained last night because I notice a small puddle of water as I walk through it.
 

“You owe me your name, don’t you think? We slept together. You proposed to me. Don’t you think you owe me your name?”
 

His eyes soften and sadden at my words. I’ve affected him but not enough for him to talk to me or tell me anything.
 

“If you’re not going to talk to me, then why am I here?”
 

He isn’t going to tell me anything. I really wasn’t anything to him. Just someone he could sleep with to make his time undercover more enjoyable.
 

He moves his hand to touch me, but I brush it away. He doesn’t get to touch me again if he’s not going to talk to me.
 

“I came to say good-bye. I won’t come speak to you again—at least, not outside of a courtroom or FBI building.”
 

He hesitates, and I feel tears welling in my eyes at the thought that I might never see him again. Even now that I know the truth, it doesn’t stop me from getting emotional at the thought that I might never see him again outside of a courtroom or interrogation room. It won’t be like this again.
 

“And I came to say I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt you or to let you get so emotionally invested. I was just trying to do my job. I never wanted this. You understand why we can’t be together? Why we have to say good-bye now?”
 

I nod. “I understand that you never cared about me and were only doing your fucking job!” Anger escapes my mouth with my words. I was trying to hide it because, as long as I was hiding it, he wouldn’t know how much he truly hurt me.
 

He winces, feeling hurt by my words.
 

I close my eyes, trying to calm myself before I speak again. When I open my eyes, I say the only words I have left to say, and I say them without any emotion, despite the pain I feel inside, “Good-bye, Killian.”
 

“Good-bye, princess.” He opens his mouth to say more, but then he stops himself. He turns to walk back to where we came from, but then he stops and walks back to me, like he’s changed his mind again. “Take the deal they are offering you. You don’t deserve to go to jail. I don’t want to have to testify against you. If this goes to trial, you will go to jail. Take the deal.”
 

“You’re incredible. You don’t tell me anything. You lie to me the entire time I’ve been with you, and then you tell me to give up everything I’ve ever known. You’re just trying to get me to testify against my grandfather. I won’t do it.”
 

“You have to trust me on this. They will nail you. They have the evidence they need, and your grandfather will go to jail, no matter if you testify or not. So, take the deal. There is no reason to sacrifice yourself just to be loyal to a family that has never been loyal to you.”

I shake my head. “No.”
 

He grabs my shoulders. “Please, just listen to me.”
 

“Why should I? You won’t answer any of my questions. Not one single question. I don’t even know who you are.”
 

His eyes look sad. He removes his hands from my shoulders and runs one hand through his hair in frustration. “That’s what I thought.”
 

I look at him for one second longer. Just long enough to remember everything. His intense brown eyes. His lips that hardly ever smile. The rough stubble of his five o’clock shadow and every muscle flexing against his suit jacket.
 

And then I walk away without saying another word. I begin walking back down the street to find Scarlett when I feel his hand on my shoulder.
 

“Wait.”
 

I turn and look at him. He pants, catching his breath.
 

“My name is Liam Killian Byrne, but everyone calls me Killian.”
 

His eyes tell me he’s being honest. He’s not bluffing. I studied him long enough at the poker table to know when he was lying or telling the truth, but I don’t thank him for offering me that one piece of truth. Instead, I just turn away from him and continue to walk to Scarlett’s Mercedes. He might have told me his real name, but that’s not enough for him to earn my forgiveness. I won’t ever forgive him if my grandfather goes to jail and my father’s company is lost in scandal.
 

“You okay?” Scarlett asks as I open the car door and slide in.
 

“I’m fine,” I say for what seems like the millionth time.
 

Scarlett hesitantly steps on the gas.
 

I’m not fine though. I just said good-bye to a man my heart is still beating for. I said good-bye to a man I still love, despite everything.
 

I shake my head. I chose Tristan, and it was the worst mistake of my life. I chose Eli, but he couldn’t stand up to my family’s scrutiny. My father chose Killian, and now, he’s going to tear our family apart.
 

I don’t know how to choose my future. And I don’t trust my family to choose either. I don’t even know what my choices are. All I know is, I have to keep my grandfather from spending the rest of his life in jail. And I have to keep the Felton Corporation from being torn apart by the FBI. I will have to spend the rest of my life alone. I can’t face the possibility of choosing wrong again.
 

I walk back into the FBI building across the street from the jail we were holding Kinsley in. I’m surprised to be welcomed with hooting and hollering when I walk inside.
 

Several people shake my hand and congratulate me as I walk through the lobby. A building full of people whom I hardly know and have hardly worked with at all in the last five years, but they feel the need to congratulate me.

I continue walking through until I reach the door that says
Agent Bisson
on the door, my boss’s office. I knock before entering and find him sitting behind his desk. When he sees me, he stands and walks over to me with a smile on his face.
 

“Excellent work,” Agent Bisson says.

I nod and attempt to move my lips up into a smile, but instead, they just move straight back.
 

“You’ve more than earned a promotion that will be coming your way.”
 

“What?”
 

“You’ll be promoted to senior agent after this is all over. You’ve more than earned it.”
 

“Thank you, sir.” I blink rapidly as he walks by me.
 

I’m not sure what to think. I’ve worked for five years to get this promotion. My father will be more than proud. It’s always what he wanted out of a son, but when my boss told me I was getting a promotion, I felt nothing.
 

That’s not a normal response to a promotion. I should feel excited or happy or proud, not indifferent.
 

I hear him talking about what my promotion will entail, but I don’t really hear him. I’m lost in my own world and thoughts again. Lost in Kinsley and what should have been.
 

I should have gotten more time with her. More time to earn her trust and make her fall for me. I’ve fallen for her. I fell for her almost three years ago when I broke up her relationship with Eli, but it wasn’t until I met her, not until I had her, that I realized how hard I had fallen.
 

I thought I had time. Time to allow her to fall just as hard for me. So hard that, when I told her the truth, it wouldn’t matter because she’d know I loved her. I thought we could make it work and that she would never really be arrested. Now, I’ll never know.
 

“You’ve more than made up for your past indiscretions, Agent Byrne.”
 

“Thank you, sir.”
 

“You going home over your four weeks off after the trials are over?”
 

“Yes, sir.”
 

“Good. I wish we could give you longer than four weeks. You deserve longer after five-plus years, but it’s all I can give you right now. We have too many open cases and not enough undercover agents.”

I nod somberly.
 

“Cheer up, son. You’re a hero around here right now, and you’ll be able to leave on break soon. If their lawyers are smart, they will negotiate a deal when they see the evidence you collected against them. With any luck, it won’t go to trial, and you will get to take your break in a matter of weeks. If not, you should be able to go in a few months once your testimony is done.”