Tangled Web: A Small Town Romance (The Cortell Brothers Book 6) by Giulia Lagomarsino (an ebook reader txt) 📕

“Right, because you want to do it standing. I gotcha.”

I took a deep breath and tried to calm my shit down, because right now I was feeling like there was another murder coming on. “Is it open already?”

He opened the door for me and swept his hand in a wide bow for me. I passed, stomping up the stairs, only to hear him shout, “Head is always a good apology.”

I paused momentarily, ready to turn around and yell at him, but he was already gone. I shook my head and kept climbing. Why the hell would he think I came here with flowers and baked goods only to seduce him? What kind of person seduced someone like that? If I had shown up in a short dress and high heels, I could see how he might get that idea.

Stopping outside the door, I took a calming breath before knocking. I heard something crash inside, then a ton of swearing before the door finally swung open. Andrew stared at me in shock, looking past me like he was expecting someone else to be there.

“Uh…what are you doing here?”

“I came to apologize. I brought pastries and some flowers.”

He looked at the flowers and then back at me. “I need a minute.” Then he slammed the door in my face.

Andrew

I slammed the door in her face and looked at all the papers scattered around the living room. I had a fucking whodunnit board on my wall, and it all pointed to her. I couldn’t let her in and see all this shit. Then I was for sure going to end up dead. I hobbled over to the cork board and yanked it off the wall, then tossed it in my room and went back for the paperwork. It was fucking everywhere, and I vowed that after she was gone, I was going to do a better job at organizing all this shit. I slammed the lid on my laptop and carried all the stuff into my bedroom and shut the door.

I was panting from hobbling everywhere by the time I got back to the door. I swung it open and tried to appear as normal as possible. She didn’t look like she was here to kill me, but then again, I didn’t think she was trying to kill me the other day. Yet, I had a wrench thrown at my head and was almost killed by a tub.

Lorelei: 2

Andrew: 0

If I didn’t learn how to play her game, I was going to end up dead for sure. I thought about calling Derek and asking for protection, but he would probably laugh in my face. I even considered talking to Eric about it, but he worked for her, and I didn’t want him to lose this job if my suspicions were all wrong.

“Are you going to let me in?” she asked coyly.

“Uh, right. Sorry about that. You caught me at a bad time.”

“Oh, did you want me to leave?”

“No, it’s fine. I just had to put some work away.”

“Oh, what do you do?”

Shit, I had to bring up work, and if I could do it from home, that was even harder to lie about. “Um…I’m a computer programmer.”

“Oh, that’s sounds kind of boring.”

I shrugged. “Yeah, you know, boring, but brings in good money.”

She nodded and looked around the place. “Do you have a vase where I can put these?”

I glanced at the flowers again and a shiver ran down my spine. Was she trying to tell me something? She brought me lilies, the funeral flower. Yeah, this was definitely a message. She was going to have me killed. That had to be it, either that or a warning, like mind your own business and you won’t need these.

I swallowed hard and pulled a large plastic cup from the cabinet, one of those giant ones you get at sporting events. That was the closest thing I had to a vase. She laughed slightly and took the cup from me.

“Why don’t you go sit down and put your foot up. I’ll take care of these.” Space, that was a good thing. I turned, but she stopped me. “Oh, and I brought you pastries. Mary Anne said these are your favorite. She also said something about next time the tub should happen at the bakery? Do you know what that means?”

I looked down at the box she was holding out to me and slowly took it from her. “Um…everything happens at Mary Anne’s bakery. She says that my brothers and I should go there more often because we always bring in business.”

She tilted her head, like she wanted more information, but I couldn’t give it. I was too busy staring at the box, wondering what she had done to the pastries on the way over. Had she poisoned them? I would need to look up what poisons were undetectable during an autopsy.

I hobbled over to the couch and sat down, opening the box of pastries. I couldn’t just eat one. That would be stupid. If she poisoned them, I wouldn’t stand a chance. I glanced up, watching her move around my kitchen looking for something. Then she pulled out a long knife and turned to me, the steel glinting brightly at me. I swallowed hard, watching her every move with the knife.

“Aren’t you going to eat them?”

I nodded and pulled out a pastry, watching as she took the wrapping off the flowers and then started slicing into the stems of the lilies like she was cutting meat. Smooth and precise, her movements were obviously very practiced. I tore a piece off my scone and tossed it in the corner of the room, then started moving my mouth like I was chewing.

“How are they?”

“You know, I think Mary Anne changed her recipe. Can you come try this?”

She smirked and walked over, knife still in hand as she bent over and opened her mouth. Her tongue darted out, running along her bottom lip as