“My name came up?” I let that sink in. “Like someone wants me dead?”

“Not someone.” Arlie’s gaze flicks toward Luther’s office. “Run. Go. Now.”

“B-but … he’s a doodle dad …”

She turns a disgusted scowl on Everett. “What the fuck does that mean?”

“Nothing that will probably make sense to us,” he replies. “She’s right, Perry. You’ve got to get out of here before he sees you. Go through the back. We’ll distract him.”

“But—”

“Now, dimwit!” Arlie snaps.

I’m about to tell her that you catch more honey with bees than flies—or flies and honey? I don’t know—when their intensity sinks in. My vibes are gone. They’re acting like St. Clare and Lars were, and now I’m starting to feel a bit, well, stupid. Am I too trusting? Do I need to reassess my whole dog theory?

“He’s still not moving,” Everett says.

Arlie grabs the front of my hoodie and pushes me so hard I almost go ass over.

“Easy!”

With a growl, she pulls out a gun and points it straight at me.

My hands fly up. My heart takes off thrumming, and I glance between her and Everett in complete fucking betrayal. “W-what are you doing?”

“Don’t tempt me. It’d be the easiest shot I ever took.”

“But we’re friends,” I whisper.

“We are.” Everett pushes her gun away from me. “Which is why you need to get the fuck out of here. I won’t tell you again. I’m going to count to three, and if you’re still in view, I’m going to let her shoot you.”

“Ev—”

“One … two …”

I get the fucking message. I stumble backward over my feet but am still in clear view as he’s about to say three.

But a door opens just down from us before he can.

And a voice I very much don’t want to hear cuts in.

“I heard you wanted to see me, Perry.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

ST. CLARE

“He should be back by now,” I mutter, refreshing my social media feed for the third time in the last minute. I have no idea what’s actually on my screen when I’m so in my head, but every minute that ticks by is another minute of nervousness I need to sit with. “Maybe we should have gone with him?”

“Why? So we could hand whoever is after you an easy kill?”

When he puts it like that … “Isn’t that what we did with Perry?”

Lars pauses whatever he’s doing on his laptop. He can say he hates Perry for trying to kill me all he likes, but we both know that Lars is a good guy, and when it comes down to it, he doesn’t want anyone to get hurt. Plus, Perry is growing on him. I know he is.