Sharp Lies: Sleeping With the Enemy, #1

By Lexy Timms

You will never be good enough for the wrong person…

 

Lily thought she'd been through it all.

 

First, she lost her father. Then she fell in with a man who abused her—and was threatened by his father if she ever told.

She chose to leave town and get away from it all, leaving her mother behind to hold down the family business, and has been on the road, living a carefree traveler's life ever since.

 

She's just starting to think this might be the life for her when she gets the phone call she never wanted to get: Her mother has been in an accident and needs someone to look after her. Lily heads back to the town she swore she'd never see again to care for her mom, refusing to stay away when her mother needs her. But her ex hasn't forgotten his feelings for her. And his father isn't happy to see her in town.

 

Lily's barely back in town before she starts receiving threats again. Only this time, she has an ally: the ex-military neighbor who is not only bigger and stronger than her ex but also becoming fiercely protective over Lily herself.

 

When things come to a head and they find themselves getting closer than they meant to, Lily will have to face an important question. Is she scared enough of her ex to leave town? Or will she stay, with Warren beside her, and fight for her right to follow her heart and make a life with the man she never saw coming?

 

Sleeping With the Enemy Series

• Book 1 – Sharp Lies
• Book 2 – Clever Deceit
• Book 3 – Honest Neglect

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dark Shadow Publishing
• Release date: Oct 24, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223577973

Lexy Timms

"Love should be something that lasts forever, not is lost forever."  Visit USA TODAY BESTSELLING AUTHOR, LEXY TIMMS https://www.facebook.com/SavingForever *Please feel free to connect with me and share your comments. I love connecting with my readers.* Sign up for news and updates and freebies - I like spoiling my readers! http://eepurl.com/9i0vD website: www.lexytimms.com Dealing in Antique Jewelry and hanging out with her awesome hubby and three kids, Lexy Timms loves writing in her free time.  MANAGING THE BOSSES is a bestselling 10-part series dipping into the lives of Alex Reid and Jamie Connors. Can a secretary really fall for her billionaire boss?

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Sleeping With the Enemy

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Book 1 – Sharp Lies

Book 2 – Clever Deceit

Book 3 – Honest Neglect

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Sharp Lies Blurb

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YOU WILL NEVER BE GOOD enough for the wrong person...

Lily thought she’d been through it all.

First, she lost her father. Then she fell in with a man who abused her—and was threatened by his father if she ever told.

She chose to leave town and get away from it all, leaving her mother behind to hold down the family business, and has been on the road, living a carefree traveler’s life ever since.

She’s just starting to think this might be the life for her when she gets the phone call she never wanted to get: Her mother has been in an accident and needs someone to look after her. Lily heads back to the town she swore she’d never see again to care for her mom, refusing to stay away when her mother needs her. But her ex hasn’t forgotten his feelings for her. And his father isn’t happy to see her in town.

Lily’s barely back in town before she starts receiving threats again. Only this time, she has an ally: the ex-military neighbor who is not only bigger and stronger than her ex but also becoming fiercely protective over Lily herself.

When things come to a head and they find themselves getting closer than they meant to, Lily will have to face an important question. Is she scared enough of her ex to leave town? Or will she stay, with Warren beside her, and fight for her right to follow her heart and make a life with the man she never saw coming?

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Contents

Sleeping With the Enemy

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Sharp Lies Blurb

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 14

CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 16

CHAPTER 17

CHAPTER 18

CHAPTER 19

CHAPTER 20

CHAPTER 21

CHAPTER 22

CHAPTER 23

CHAPTER 24

Sleeping With the Enemy Series

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CHAPTER 1

LILY

DAMN, I JUST WANTED to go upstairs and go back to bed.

Like, I would have killed to just crawl up the stairs and climb back under the covers. And I almost never thought about killing anyone, so that was saying a lot. But right now, the entire universe seemed to have it in for me, and I was pretty much done with today.

Are you saying, Mr. Barker said sharply, that you’re a bakery–where your job is to bake bread–but that you’re not going to have any bread until tomorrow?

Heaven give me patience. Give me strength. And send a phone call to Mr. Barker’s phone notifying him of some sort of emergency at his house so that he’d get the hell out of the bakery and leave me alone.

Not at all, Mr. Barker, I replied, struggling to keep my voice calm and rational. I am saying, though, that we’re already sold out of sourdough loaves. And since our sourdough is on a twenty-four-hour-rise schedule, that means that we’re not going to have any more until tomorrow.

The old man scowled, his bushy eyebrows and mustache bristling like he was some sort of insect. Or maybe a sheepdog. What does that mean, a twenty-four-hour rise?

It meant the same thing it had meant yesterday when he showed up too late for sourdough. And the day before. In fact, it meant the same thing it had meant for the last forty years, ever since my mom and dad opened this bakery.

But evidently I had to tell him again, because either he’d finally gotten so old that he couldn’t keep the facts straight, or he was just stubborn enough that he wanted to force me to go through it again.

It means the same thing it’s always meant, Mr. Barker. Ever since the day my mom started baking here. It means that once we set the dough out, it gets twenty-four hours to rise before we bake it. Once it’s baked, it’s all yours, but right now, it’s back there in pans on the counter, inflating its little heart out.

The scowl on his face deepened. Maybe because he could hear that I was being at least a little bit sarcastic. Why’s it got to rise so long?

I leaned onto the counter and gave him my best secret-keeping look. That’s what makes it taste so good. But you know I can’t tell you, Mr. Barker. That would be giving away one of our best-kept secrets, and my mother would never forgive me.

The scowl lightened a little bit, and I let my lips twitch, knowing that I had him.

So there’ll be sourdough tomorrow?

Loaves and loaves of the stuff, I confirmed.

Can you set one aside for me?

You know I can’t do that. But if you get here before 10, there’ll still be plenty left.

He cast me a bashful grin. Before 10. I’ll be here.

You do that. Do you want anything else while you’re here? Maybe a half-dozen croissants to tide you over? We have some on special.

He thought about it for a total of twelve seconds before saying that he guessed that would be okay–the same way he did every day–and then quickly made the purchase and walked out the door, saying he’d see me tomorrow.

He would, too. Because Mr. Barker and I danced like this every single afternoon, when he came into the bakery asking for sourdough that he knew we would have sold out of and walked out with half a dozen croissants that he got on special because I felt bad about the sourdough.

The truth was, I didn’t even think the man liked sourdough. I’d never actually sold a loaf to him, that was for sure. I’d decided a long time ago that this was just his way of getting croissants–which he definitely did like–on special.

But I’d never ratted him out. And I’d never stopped giving him discounted croissants.

Because that man had been my third-grade teacher, as well as the guy who taught me health and driver’s ed in high school. He was the town’s football coach and one of our oldest citizens. And I had a soft spot for anyone who’d been in my life that long.

The truth was, I had a soft spot for most of the people in my town. Oakville wasn’t a big place–we only had a population of one thousand or so–but it was a close community. Everyone knew everyone else, and if they didn’t know everyone else, then they’d at least heard of them or seen them around at some point. It was impossible not to get attached to people when you saw them every day and could probably name every member of their family. Hell, they’d probably taught you at some point or been taught by your mom. They’d bought flowers from you or dropped off a pie when you were sick.

They’d come into your bakery every day for the last forty years to see whether you’d started baking cakes yet, or if you’d share your sourdough starter with them.

And the truth was, I loved it. I loved my little life here, started by my mom and dad when they first moved to town. Yeah, it could be hard work. The bakery never made enough money for us to afford anything more than an apartment above the kitchen, and my dad had died years ago, which shoveled more of the work onto my mom and me. She had a second job at the tailor’s, where she made handmade dresses for little girls, and I had a second job as a waitress in the biggest diner in town. My parents hadn’t had enough money for me to go to college, and even now, we scraped to make ends meet.

But we were happy. And every day, I was surrounded by people who knew me and my history and wouldn’t hesitate to help me out if I needed it.

I pulled my head back into the real world and set to work reorganizing the display case, which was looking a whole lot emptier now that Mr. Barker had taken his half-dozen croissants. We were definitely running short on products today. Some of the sourdough hadn’t baked correctly this morning, and I’d been selling people French bread instead, which meant we were down to about half of what we’d usually have right now. I could bake more, but this late in the day, that might mean we had to close tonight without having sold all our stock. And no one wanted day-old bread from a bakery.

Which meant...

My mom was at her other job all day, and the bakery was mine to run for the afternoon. Which meant all the decisions belonged to me.

And if we ran out of bread, I knew exactly what I’d be doing: closing early and taking the afternoon off.

My heart jumped at the thought, and I glanced through the doors to the street, wondering whether I could go out there and sell things by hand, just to move them sooner. I was about to start piling stuff onto a tray to carry around when someone came skidding to a halt right in front of the bakery.

I tipped my head, surprised. Who the hell was driving fast enough that a stop like that was even necessary? And come to that, who drove a car like that? The thing was flashy and bright red and looked fast as hell. Exactly the sort of car you’d see in the city, not here in a town all the way out in the middle of nowhere. Tourists, maybe?

I glanced at the sky, thought, and shook my head. This little town in the middle of Illinois didn’t get much in the way of tourism to start with, and right now, in the middle of the rainy season? Definitely not.

But that car belonged in Chicago, not Oakville.

When the driver stepped out, however, I knew exactly who it was. Tony McCarthy. Son of the local real estate tycoon and the man who’d come back to town thinking he was going to build a big development in the corn fields that stretched between here and Chicago. Tony’s father had grown up in Oakville and lived here part-time, but he’d never bothered us with any big development.

Tony, on the other hand, had moved home with big ideas in mind. He’d gone to high school in Chicago and then moved on to Dartmouth, and from what I’d heard, he’d made plenty of trouble at school. Lots of rumors that things had been rocky and only his father’s money had saved him. I hadn’t had anything to do with him yet, but no one had been happy when he moved to Oakville and started throwing his weight around. He wasn’t a local. He hadn’t grown up here.

And by all accounts, he didn’t fit in.

By the looks of him, I thought those accounts were right. He was tall and almost too handsome to be legal, his dark hair sweeping over his forehead in a swoop that must have taken a whole bottle of hair gel. Green eyes and a square jaw–with a dimple in his chin–completed the picture, and with those broad shoulders and narrow hips, plus the obviously expensive suit...

Yeah, the guy was good-looking enough to stop a girl in her tracks.

When he turned and walked into the bakery, I felt a chill run down my back. I didn’t want trouble in here. I’d just been planning an early afternoon.

But when Tony turned and looked at me, his mouth caught in a crooked smile, that chill turned into something a whole lot warmer. And when his eye met mine, butterflies exploded through my stomach.

Coffee? he asked, his voice deep and gravelly.

Um, I croaked. I cleared my throat, horrified at the sound, and gave him my best smile. Of course.

He wasn’t a native, I reminded myself. He was a troublemaker and was trying to build a big development outside of town. We didn’t like him. We wanted him to go back to Chicago.

But somewhere between turning around to hand him his coffee and the electricity that jumped up my arm when our fingers brushed, I sort of forgot about all of that, and before I knew what was happening, I was looking for him when I was out and about. Going out of my way to pass him when we were both in the market at the same time and grinning like an absolute fool whenever he came into the bakery to get coffee and a cinnamon roll. Tony flirted outrageously with me every time I saw him, acting like no one else was in the room except us and leaning close to whisper things in my ear.

And with each of his breaths rushing across my skin, I fell deeper under his spell.

When he finally asked me out about a week later, after several mornings spent talking over coffee in the bakery, I said yes without a second thought.

And only afterward, when I forced myself to consider it, did I remember that the rest of the town didn’t like him and that they thought he didn’t fit in here, with those of us who actually belonged to Oakville.

I put the thought away and went upstairs, already trying to figure out what I was going to wear and how I was going to manage through an entire dinner of conversing with Tony McCarthy, who was the son of a rich man and a graduate of an Ivy League university.

I’d graduated from high school with top marks but hadn’t gone to any university.

Still, I was thinking that if he liked me as much as he’d been saying he did, he wouldn’t mind if I didn’t know how to talk about rocket science or advanced physics. At least I hoped not.

CHAPTER 2

LILY

Four Months Later

I FLEW THROUGH THE house, trying to get everything that I’d done that day put away and organized. I’d done the laundry but hadn’t put it away yet, and I’d unloaded the dishwasher without putting the dishes in the cupboard.

And I’m sure you’re saying to yourself, ‘Well, you got laundry and dishes done! Well done, you!’

Right?

The problem was that wasn’t as right as you might think. Because in this household, getting things halfway done was almost worse than not starting them at all.

I slid into the bedroom, started folding clothes, and tried to remember how to breathe. Beyond that, I tried to remember how lucky I actually was.

Because I was really, really lucky, despite the rules about finishing the projects I started. I was living in a freaking gorgeous house that I never would have even dreamt of six months ago. Gone was the tiny apartment that I shared with my mother. Gone was the kitchen so small I could pretty much reach every cupboard and the fridge without bothering to take a single step in any direction. Gone was the tiny bedroom with no windows, the living room that only had enough space for a couch too small for both of us to sit on at the same time.

I mean yes, my mother still lived in that same apartment, because she was stubborn and insisted on taking care of herself rather than accepting money from me.

But me?

I