I stare at him, and he stares back, his gaze strong and steady. Is he lying? Telling the truth? I don’t know what to believe.

“Listen, first thing tomorrow I want you to go to Sam. I want you to tell him you saw me talking to Sienna. Say you didn’t make the connection until tonight, when I told you it was the same woman.”

“You want me to turn you in?”

He nods.

“Why the sudden change?”

“Because I’ve been thinking about it, and this was my blunder. I won’t have you paying for following my lead, for saying something you knew was untrue in an attempt to protect me. You said it yourself. All it would take is one person who happened to be rolling by in their car, or some nosy neighbor who spotted us through an upstairs window, and we’re caught—both of us. This way, you beat them to the punch.”

“What about you? Sam will arrest you on the spot. I don’t know what the punishment is for lying to a cop, but—”

“Five years.” Paul’s shrug is going for nonchalant, but it doesn’t quite get there. “I probably wouldn’t get that long, but this is a capital felony case, so they’d have to give me some jail time.”

My stomach churns, and the back of my neck goes cold. Five years. That feels like an awful long time. “How do you know?”

“I talked to an attorney.”

This surprises me, though I suppose it shouldn’t. Paul, with his methodical thinking and color-coded to-do lists. Of course he’s talked to an attorney.

He squeezes my hand. “At least think about it.”

“I am thinking about it, and I don’t like it one little bit.” I snatch back my hand, drop it onto my lap. “Five years. Why did we lie?”

“I already told you. I panicked.”

“Yes, but why? Why are you running around like it’s your job to save Jax? What am I missing here?”

He clicks the top of a ketchup bottle up and down a few times, then scrubs his face with both hands. “Jesus, this is all such a clusterfuck.”

“I’m not an idiot, Paul. I know there’s more you’re not telling me, a lot more. You promised me answers.”

“I never said you were an idiot.”

“No, but you’re doing a damn good job of making me feel like one. Every time I turn around, I’m learning some big new secret.”

“I don’t keep secrets from you. It’s just...stuff I haven’t gotten around to telling you yet. Like the fact I love green asparagus but can’t stand the white kind, or that when I was nine, I fell out of a tree and got fifteen stitches in the back of my head. It doesn’t mean I’m keeping it from you.”