“Because you broke our promise. Which means that I have to kill you.”

My fear kicks up a notch. “You don’t have to do anything.”

“But you’re making me.”

“I’m not,” I hurry to say. “Look, I needed to ask you a question. That’s it. All I’ve done since that night is come here or stay home. Only one person has seen me in that time.”

“Plus everyone in the cafe.”

My eyes narrow a little. “You’ve been following me.”

“Umm, yes. Obviously. What else would I have been doing?”

“That’s fucking creepy.”

“You didn’t keep your word!”

The slight whine in his tone makes me laugh. “Now who’s hung up on small details?”

He looks at me expectantly, and it takes a second to figure out why he’s waiting. “You want me to apologize for that?”

“I thought we had an understanding.”

“You. Shot. Me.”

He has the fucking audacity to roll his eyes, and like his voice, I’ve clearly been thinking about him too much because they seem familiar too. “And now you’re making me do it again.”

I throw my hands up. “Can you wait a second? My brother’s missing,” I explain, and I don’t know why, but I actually have hope that I can win him over. “How would you feel if your sister went missing?”

Those eyes of his give away too much, but it’s clear he doesn’t like that.

“Yeah, it sucks. And I thought, well, if you had orders to kill me and instead told me to disappear, that maybe you did the same for Colin.”

It’s a long shot, but I’m desperate, and I hold my breath while I wait for him to answer me.

“I haven’t seen a Colin,” he says, and my hopes crash. “I didn’t even know you had a brother.”

I slump back against my desk, fear forgotten as hopelessness tries to take over instead.

The masked man stands and moves closer. “Wish I could help.”

“You’re sure?”

He shrugs. “Positive. My list of names isn’t long. I’m new.”

Finally, my laugh breaks free, and I swear his eyes crease up too. “Yeah. I could have guessed that.”

“Damn. Right where it hurts.”

“I’m sorry, are you telling me that I hurt your feelings?”

“And not for the first time.”

“You are really bad at this, aren’t you?”

With the hand not holding his gun, he pinches his fingers an inch apart. “I’m calling it a learning curve.”

Then the familiarity vanishes, and he lifts his gun my way.

All of the relaxed air sucks from the room as I stare at that barrel again.

“You don’t have to do this,” I whisper.

“Yeah, I do. You broke our trust.”

“To be fair, you probably shouldn’t be trusting complete strangers at all. Consider this a life lesson.”