Free Deadly Sting by Jennifer Estep

of it as part of his apology to me for everything that . . . happened between us.”
    That everything had included Finn holding a gun on Owen while I cut Salina’s throat. Needless to say, Owen had been plenty pissed about that, mostly at me, for asking Finn to do such a thing in the first place. Still, it didn’t surprise me that he’d talked to my foster brother and had taken the tickets from him. Finnegan Lane could be exceptionally persuasive when he put his mind to it. Besides, what had happened that night had been my doing, no one else’s. The responsibility, the burden of that, was mine to bear, and so was the guilt.
    “Did he, now?” I murmured. “How considerate of him.”
    Finn had been so insistent that I come to the exhibit that I hadn’t thought too much about exactly why he wanted me here in the first place. Oh, sure, he’d said that Bria was busy and that he wanted to get me out of the house and have some fun, but I was beginning to think he’d had an ulterior motive in mind. Getting me and Owen into the same space was exactly the sort of sneaky, underhanded thing Finn would do and then claim it was for my own good. I loved my foster brother, truly I did, but sometimes his cheerful meddling made me want to wring his neck.
    This was one of those times.
    “Well,” I said, giving Owen and Jillian a bright smile. “Please excuse me. I really need to go see what Finn is up to. Jillian, it was nice to meet you.”
    “You too,” she replied.
    I looked at my lover, careful to keep my face blank. “Owen.”
    “Gin.”
    I nodded at him, and he returned the gesture.
    And that was that. Nothing else was said, nothing else was done, and nothing had changed between us. I wondered if this was the extent of my relationship with Owen now—cool, distant, polite, impersonal. I wondered if this was all we would ever be now.
    My heart clenched at the thought, but I forced myself to smile at the two of them a final time. My teeth ground together and my cheeks ached from the strain, but I managed to keep the expression fixed on my face until I stepped past them. Then I walked away, leaving them to their date.
    * * *
    I strode through the crowd, the sharp snap-snap-snap of my heels against the floor as loud as a series of firecrackers exploding, my wintry gray glare fixed on one man—Finnegan fucking Lane.
    He saw me coming and edged behind Eva. Please. As if that would save him. Still, I stopped when I reached the group and addressed everyone in turn.
    “Roslyn, you’re looking as lovely as ever. You too, Eva. Phillip, nice to see you.”
    The three of them murmured polite greetings to me. I looked past Eva and stared at Finn, who was still keeping the younger woman between the two of us.
    “Why, Finn,” I drawled in a voice that was as sugary-sweet as the summer sun tea I made on Fletcher’s front porch. “I didn’t realize you’d asked some of our friends to come here tonight too. You are just full of surprises.”
    Finn eyed me over Eva’s slender shoulder. “So,” he replied in a voice that was just as easy and unconcerned as mine, “are you planning on killing me right here in the middle of the rotunda?”
    I gave him a cool, murderous smile. “Sorry to disappoint, but I rather like the rotunda just the way it is, without your blood decorating the walls. It would be a shame to dirty up all this pretty gray marble, don’t you think?”
    “Absolutely,” he agreed. “Personally, I like my blood right where it is, inside my body.”
    “Besides, it would be so much easier to stab you to death in the parking lot, stuff you into the trunk, stop your car at the entrance to the covered bridge, and heave your dead carcass into the Aneirin River. No muss, no fuss, and no evidence for the cops to find when they finally fish your bloated, rotting corpse out of the water.”
    He winced. “I take it things didn’t go well with Owen?”
    “No, things did not go well with Owen, unless you think stilted