Lia’s lie skated close enough to the truth that even with security footage, they would have trouble arguing her interpretation. Sloane had been agitated from the moment we’d entered the store. Sloane had gone outside. Sloane had come back in. All true.

“Victor.”

The head of security looked up. The rest of us turned toward the door of his office. Aaron Shaw stood there, looking every bit as self-possessed and in control as he had the day we met him.

“Aaron,” Victor greeted him.

Not Mr. Shaw, I noted. When it came to the hierarchy at the Majesty, it wasn’t entirely clear which one of them came out on top.

“Can this wait?” Victor’s tone made that sound more like an order than a question.

“I was just checking in on some of our VIP guests,” Aaron replied. “These girls are staying with Mr. Townsend in the Renoir Suite.”

The words Renoir Suite had Victor stiffening. Big spenders, leave them be, Aaron might as well have said.

“Let me do my job,” Victor told Aaron.

“Your job is harassing teenagers with anxiety issues?” Lia asked, arching an eyebrow at him. “I’m sure a variety of news outlets would find that fascinating.”

Once Lia had given life to a creative interpretation of the truth, she was fully committed to it.

“Why don’t we hear from the girl in question?” Victor said, narrowing his eyes at Sloane. “Were you, as your friend claims, having a panic attack?”

Sloane stared at the front corner of the man’s desk. “Patients with panic disorders are more than ten times more likely to be double-jointed than controls,” she said clearly.

“Victor.” Aaron’s voice held a note of steel. “I’ll take care of this. You can go.”

After a tense moment of silence, the head of security walked out of the room without a word. Clearly, Aaron held the upper hand here. I might have breathed a sigh of relief, but when Aaron closed the door behind the man, he turned back to us.

“Let’s chat.”

Aaron took a seat on the edge of Victor’s desk instead of behind it. “What’s your name?” he asked Sloane quietly.

Beside me, Sloane opened her mouth, then closed it again.

“Her name is Sloane.” Lia’s chin jutted out as she answered on Sloane’s behalf.

“What’s your last name, Sloane?” Aaron’s voice was gentle. I thought of the way he’d responded to Sloane’s statistics with a smile the day we met him. And then I thought about the brief, heated exchange we’d seen between him and Tory.

“Tavish,” Sloane whispered. She forced her gaze up, her blue eyes wide. “I meant to steal that shirt.”

I groaned internally. Sloane had no capacity for deception whatsoever. Then again, I thought, she’s sitting here across from her father’s son, not saying a word.

“I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that,” Aaron told us, a smile tugging at the edges of his lips. It was hard to reconcile the man in front of us with the one we’d seen in the alleyway.

You know Tory. She knows you. Emotions were running high—I was struck, suddenly, by a possibility. Maybe you really know Tory. Maybe Camille wasn’t the one you were looking at that night at the sushi restaurant. Attraction, affection, tension—maybe you were watching Tory.

What if Tory had chosen the Majesty for drinks that night because she wanted to see him? She’d lied to Briggs and Sterling about choosing the restaurant.

What if she’s not afraid of Aaron? What if she’s afraid he’ll leave her? Or afraid someone will find out they’re involved?

Someone, I thought, like Aaron’s father.

“Tavish.” Aaron repeated Sloane’s last name back to her, then paused, like his mouth had gone dry. “My father had a friend once,” he continued softly. “Her name was Margot Tavish.”

“I have to go.” Sloane bolted to her feet. She was trembling. “I have to go now.”

“Please,” Aaron said. “Sloane. Don’t go.”

“I have to,” Sloane whispered. “I’m not supposed to be here. I’m not supposed to tell.”

She wanted him to like her. Even panicked, even trying to get away from him, she wanted him to like her so badly that I could feel it.

“We have the same eyes,” Aaron told her. “They call them Shaw blue, did you know that?”

“A chameleon’s tongue is longer than its body! And a blue whale’s weighs two-point-seven tons!”

“I’m sorry,” Aaron said, holding up his hands and taking a step back. “I didn’t mean to scare you or to spring this on you or to put you on the spot. It’s just that I found out about your mother right after I graduated high school. I went to see her. She said there was a child, but by the time I’d confronted my father, your mother had overdosed and you were gone.”

Gone. It took me a second to do the math. Aaron would have graduated high school around the same time that Sloane was recruited to the Naturals program.

“You can’t know about me,” Sloane told Aaron softly. “That’s the rule.”

“It’s not my rule.” Aaron stood up and walked around to her side of the desk. “I’m not like my father. If I’d known about you sooner, I promise I would have—”

“You would have what?” Lia cut in protectively. Sloane was our family, more than she would ever be his, and right now, she was vulnerable and raw and bleeding. Lia didn’t trust strangers, and she especially didn’t trust this stranger—who we’d seen fighting with Tory Howard—with Sloane.