Page 85 of His Forbidden Alliance

Again, he waited to speak. “Don’t yell at me, but are you absolutely sure he’s lying?”

Anger burned in my chest. “What the fuck, Dante? Are you on his side?”

“No, you know how much I care about you. But I also don’t want you to make a mistake. Is there a possibility he was telling you the truth? Do you think he said all that shit because he thought he had to?”

I took a shaky breath. I was so fucking confused. “I don’t know.”

“What do you think if you let yourself get past the hurt? Take a minute to consider everything else you know about him.”

I looked up and met his eyes. “I thought you wanted me to stay away from him.”

He laid a hand over mine. “Rafe, if you’re in love with him—actually, really in love with him—then I want you to have that. I want you to have what Alex and I do. But if Zach really did use you, he’s going to hurt for it.”

I shook my head. “I don’t want you going after him. I just want him out of my life.”

“Why wouldn’t you want revenge?”

“I don’t know what to believe or what I’m supposed to want.”

“Were there signs that you missed?”

“Dante—”

He took my hands in his. “Think about it. What does his behavior tell you? Was he faking it, and you just hoped he wasn’t? Or was he sincere?”

“How the hell am I supposed to know? I’m not any good at this relationship bullshit.”

“Rafe, you read people well. That helps make you good at what you do.”

I frowned. “You think I’m doing a good job?”

Dante huffed. “Of course I do.”

“Zach said that too.”

“What? That you were doing a good job?”

“Yeah, that too, but he said I read people well.”

Dante tilted his head. “Interesting.”

I tried to draw in a deep breath, but my lungs felt constricted. I didn’t want to think about all the ways Zach had convinced me he cared, but I couldn’t stop myself. “He bandaged my hand. He wouldn’t let me do anything with it. He kept fussing over me, and I thought…”

“That meant he cared.”

I nodded.

“What else?”

“He stepped in front of the blade when he was going to kill me. He watched me torture the guy last night and smiled. He didn’t try to stop me or tell me he couldn’t be part of that or anything. He said I was fine just as I am.”

“Mmhmm. Now, tell me about times when he showed a different side—when you thought he might be lying to you.”

I thought back over the time we spent together. “At first, I thought he only wanted a way into my top game so he could cheat his way to a lot of money.”

“Before you knew he was FBI?”

I nodded.