Free All of the Lights by K. Ryan Page A

but I'm not biting tonight.
    "Please," she tries again. This time, her voice is softer, more urgent, and that raging determination is at the forefront now more than ever. "I just want to explain and then I'll leave. I promise. Just one minute—that's all I'm asking for. Besides," she waves a hand around my near-empty bar, "it looks to me like you've got some time to kill."
    I blow out a deep breath and mull over my options. Unfortunately, she kinda has a point and I have a feeling that she really will leave if I just give her the one minute she's asking for. Shit. Now I'm just annoyed she was able to convince me so quickly.
    A beat later, I tip my chin at Cal.
    "Why don't you step outside for a smoke."
    He just lifts a shoulder, takes one more long gulp of his beer, and pushes off his stool to head toward the door. Once the door shuts behind him, my gaze shifts to the current bane of my existence and I lift an eyebrow at her. The ball's in her court now.
    "You've got 30 seconds and then you either get out or I'll throw you out."
    Rae's jaw clenches and for the first time since she walked in, she falters. Her hands tremble around the edge of the bar top, she inhales sharply, and if I look closely enough, I could probably see her lips quiver ever so slightly. Then, everything changes again on a dime. Her back straightens, her chin tips up, and her eyes meet mine dead-on. It's like this girl is afraid of nothing. Jesus, maybe she really does have a death wish.
    But when she finally opens her mouth, it's not to tell me she's sorry for playing my stupid ass on Friday night.
    "I want to get Sean out of prison."
    Wait a minute...what? My head rears back and shakes from side to side. There's no way I heard her right.
    "What?"
    That's all I've got.
    She seems to take my response as a good sign, but she's wrong. If my blood was simmering before, it's cranked up to a boil now. My head just needs a little time to catch up with my emotions.
    "I know he wasn't the one who..." she trails off, her eyes still blazing green with a grit I just can't reconcile right now. "I know he wasn't the who hurt me. I think I've always known it—I just never knew what to do about it until now."
    "You tell the fucking truth from the start, that's what you do," I snap back at her.
    Rae winces from the impact, but I don't care. She can't come up in here and spew this kind of bullshit seven years too late.
    "I'm so—"
    "Don't," I lean forward as I growl again, inching just close enough so she can read the menace on my face. "You're not sorry. If you were sorry, you wouldn't have done it in the first place. Get out of my bar."
    "Please," her eyes widen and her hands spread out in front of her in a futile attempt at getting any sympathy from me. "Just listen, okay? I know you hate me—"
    "Hate you?" I cock an eyebrow at her and fold my arms across my chest. "Sweetheart, hate doesn't even round the corner of what I feel for you. There isn't a word in the dictionary for what I feel for you."
    All the blood drains from her face and I smile, relishing in this maliciousness, as Rae's mouth parts long enough to suck in a quick breath.
    "You have every right to feel that way," she whispers. "I get it. I'd hate me too—I do hate myself for what I did, but I want to make it right. Please...just listen."
    I guess I have to give her a little credit for trying.
    "Why should I believe a word you say?" I shoot back. "You're a documented liar. Daddy taught you well, didn't he?"
    Her eyes squeeze shut and when they snap open again, they've glazed over into a watery mess of a forest. Good.
    "I saw two people that night," she soldiers on and wipes at a stray tear with the back of her hand before I can get a good look at it. "I saw someone else first, right before I got hit. It was definitely a guy...someone with dark eyes. I didn't get a good look at him, but he wasn't Sean."
    "Lemme guess," I surmise as I prop my elbows on the bar. "Sean was the guy you saw after you got