Page 22 of Man of Lies (Vendetta Kings #2)

Chapter Twenty-Two

MASON

Whiskey sat like poison on my tongue, acrid and bitter all the way down. I hated the taste of it, but more than that, I hated the slow, creeping warmth that dulled my thoughts. The quickness of my brain was how I survived; I never willingly slowed it down. But I swallowed the booze anyway, forcing myself to stay hyper-aware despite the buzz: the low hum of a jukebox playing to a missing audience, the uneven scrape of a chair leg as one of the thugs at the table shifted his weight, the oily, lotion-slick on the arms of the woman in my lap.

And Silas at the edge of my vision: the stretch of his long, denim-clad legs and the lazy way he regarded the conversation, like there wasn’t a single thing in this world that could unsettle him.

Like I hadn’t walked in on him with his tongue down a woman’s throat.

I’d been a lawyer long enough to know better than to judge a man by his record. Silas had never been shy about his criminal record, but despite that, I’d always believed he was one of the good ones. He was flirtatious, elusive, and impossible to pin down, but there was a reason I felt so safe with him. Whatever bad habits he couldn't shake, his core had always been solid as a rock.

But sitting here now, at a table stinking of sweat and cheap perfume, I felt like I’d been duped. I’d let myself be blinded by lust, by the way he touched me, and the way he could strip me with a single glance. He looked at me like he saw through my defenses, marked everything I tried to hide, and somehow liked me better for it.

How much of that was an act, I wondered. Silas lied effortlessly, not just with his words but his silences and omissions. He allowed criminals to operate from his bar, laughed freely with them, and behaved just like them. The way he moved through life, through this town, through me —it was calculated. He knew exactly what to say and where to push, when to let that gravel-edged voice go low and rough to pull a reaction out of me.

He played me every time he saw me…and I let him.

And yet, despite everything, I still couldn’t stop myself from turning my head to watch him.

To see if he was already looking at me.

He was angry. It was subtle, but I’d spent too long watching him not to notice. I felt it the way I knew a storm was coming before I felt the first drop of rain. He was sprawled back in his chair, shoulders loose, one hand casually draped over his thigh, but that was just the packaging. His body was unnaturally still, and his breathing was measured, but I caught the faintest twitch in his nostrils, like he was fighting to keep it that way. But his mouth was the dead giveaway. Silas liked to smirk, loved to talk, and habitually bit the edge of his thumb when he was thinking. But now, his lips were pressed together in a thin, bloodless line as if he were resisting the urge to grind his molars down to dust.

It wasn’t just about the woman tracing the edge of my collar and slipping the top button free with the tip of her finger. This was bigger than that. I’d interrupted something, shoved myself into business that wasn’t mine, and he was furious. Out of nothing but spite, I’d stomped all over rule number one—and for what? Because I couldn’t handle the terms we’d agreed on? Because as soon as I’d allowed him inside me, I’d started to imagine we had some sort of hold on each other? He could kiss or even fuck whoever the hell he wanted, and I had no right to care.

So why did it feel like I was choking on it?

I was watching so closely that I caught it in real time: the exact moment his patience broke.

He tossed back the last of his whiskey and shoved his chair out like a man with something to prove. That was the only warning I got before he leaned in and slapped a hand flat against my chest, cutting off the woman mid-performance. The conversation stalled. A display—for the men watching.

“You’ve had enough for one night, counselor,” he drawled, fingers flexing like he was debating grabbing a fistful of my shirt. “Let’s go.”

I was tempted to make him work for it. Resisting, just to be difficult and punish him for making me feel this way, almost seemed like the thing to do. But in the end, I didn’t. His hand found my bicep, and in an instant, he practically lifted me out of my chair.

Sylvia gave a protesting giggle and slid off my lap, the pout on her lips making it clear she wasn’t used to being dismissed so easily. “Aw,” she cooed, clutching her midriff as if she didn’t know what to do with her hands when they weren’t all over someone else’s body. “Taking my new toy already?”

“Sweetheart,” Silas rasped in a dark voice, “he was never yours to play with.”

Before I could react, he was slamming through the emergency exit and dragging me out into the empty parking lot.

The heat of the day still clung to the ground, rising in waves that carried the stink of something rank—piss or bile or blood. The lot was mostly empty, save for a few trucks and bikes scattered about like abandoned pieces after a game, but with a close look, signs of a struggle were evident: drag marks and a dark, wet patch glistening under the weak glow of the Dead End’s flickering neon.

Whatever had gone down here tonight, it hadn’t ended well for someone…and Silas had gone along with it.

It turned my stomach.

Silas didn’t slow down. One second, I was finding my footing; the next, my back hit the side of the building with enough force to shock the breath from my lungs. Warm bricks radiated through my shirt, but it was nothing compared to the heat rolling off him. His hand bracketed the base of my throat, pinning me in place, holding me still with barely any pressure at all.

Just one touch and the will to fight drained out of me.

“What the hell was that?” he rasped.

His fingers were curled loosely around my neck, strong and callused and impossible to ignore. Not squeezing—just a reminder. His weight trapping me, the scent of smoke and leather, and the glittering dark of his eyes...it all left my body primed for sex.

I hated this. Hated him.

But most of all, I hated how betrayed I felt when we’d made no promises.

His gaze was fixed on the pulse pounding beneath my jaw, and I forced myself to swallow. “You were having so much fun with that woman’s tongue down your throat,” I said flatly. “Figured I’d try playing around myself.”

When Silas looked at me, it wasn’t with his usual half-lidded amusement. His gaze was colder and flatter than I’d ever seen, as if I were a problem he hadn’t decided how to solve.

“Have you forgotten the rules already?” he asked softly. “We agreed to keep this simple. No interference. No pretending either of us gives a damn what the other does when we’re not fucking.” His thumb brushed against the bottom of my jaw, tilting my head back just enough to remind me who was in control. “Unless you’re looking to change that.”

I didn’t move, not out of stubbornness, but because I was so damn tired. My body ached from a constant barrage of work and stress. It had all drained me more than I’d realized. I was running on fumes, and I didn’t have the energy to fight the one thing I wanted more than anything.

Stupidly, what I wanted most…was Silas.

Not just the sex. I wanted that desperately, but it was just a distraction. I needed more than that, even if I didn’t know how to name it yet. It was his steadiness, his confidence in the chaos. I craved something that felt solid. Something real. S omething that couldn’t slip through my fingers like everything else in my life. I wanted to reach for him and not feel like an idiot for doing it.

But that wasn’t how this worked.

Because, in the end, I didn’t trust him. I trusted only my brothers, a trust earned through blood and years of proven loyalty. Silas had never earned that from me. All that charm only told me he was a master manipulator, a man who could make anyone bend to his will with a well-timed grin and a few carefully chosen words. And I’d walked right into it, signing myself up for a contract with no strings or expectations. Just relief.

It should have worked.

Rules always made sense. They were the framework I needed to keep from losing myself in things never meant to last. But here I was, wedged between Silas and the wall, seething with silent fury because I’d dared to want something more.

The problem wasn’t the rules.

The problem was that I’d been na?ve enough to think they’d be sufficient.

“I remember exactly what we agreed,” I said hoarsely. “I just didn’t think it would feel like this.”

The air between us changed the moment the words left my mouth—and still, I didn’t take them back.

Silas searched my face with those dark, unreadable eyes. His fingers loosened, and he stopped touching me, resting his palm against the brick beside my head. He hung his head and chuckled, as if he’d finally gotten the punchline to some long, drawn-out joke at his own expense.

“Yeah,” he rasped, mouth curving in the ghost of a smile. “Tell me about it.”

When he raised his eyes to mine, it knocked the breath out of me. The teasing gleam I’d come to anticipate was gone. There was nothing slick or practiced about those dark, heavy-lidded eyes now, just something raw and reckless that made my stomach clench.

“Why her?” I forced out between clenched teeth. “Why now? With me in the back room.”

A muscle ticked in Silas’s cheek. His jaw flexed, like he was carefully picking through his words, as if the honest answer was on the back of his tongue, but he couldn’t offer it.

“You’re the only one I want, blue eyes,” he said gruffly. “But it’s not about what I want.”

What else could it be about?

“I want to kiss you,” I admitted hoarsely, squeezing the words out of my tight throat. “But I’m afraid you’ll taste like her.”

Silas took a slow breath, his chest rising and falling just enough to pull my focus there. Even without touching me, he felt too close. I could taste the whiskey on his breath, smoky and sharp, mixing with the scent of leather and motor oil. He smelled like late nights and bad decisions, like a man who lived in places most people only passed through.

It hurt, wanting someone like this.

He brushed his fingers across my jaw, tilting my chin up. His gaze never left mine, tracking every flicker in my expression, watching each reaction before he laid a hand on me, as if the wait was part of the pleasure.

At first, his kiss barely touched my lips, featherlight, and gone before I could chase it. Then again, a fleeting touch, softer than the first. With every touch-and-go sweep of his mouth, my stomach tightened.

My hands twitched at my sides, aching to touch him, but fear had me in a chokehold. A quiet, wrecked sound slipped free before I could swallow it.

That was all it took.

Silas caught my mouth in a deep, relentless kiss, prying my lips apart and slipping his tongue between them, feeding me his taste. Then he eased up just enough for me to take from him, stealing the heat of his tongue, blending what was his and what was mine until there was no difference.

When he finally pulled back, it was only to let me breathe. His thumb stayed at the hinge of my jaw, his breath warm on my lips.

“Well?”

I licked my lips, chasing the lingering heat of him, and drew a breath that did nothing to steady my hammering heart. My mouth was open before I’d even decided what to say, but before I could speak, the crunch of distant tires caught my attention.

Silas tensed—not much, just a subtle squaring of his shoulders to better cover me—and subtly turned his head to glance over his shoulder.

A vehicle eased into the shadows on the far side of the empty lot. It was large, maybe a truck or an SUV, but I only caught a faint impression of the driver behind the sudden glare of a set of super-bright high beams that blasted us head-on. I threw up a hand against the blinding glare?—

Pop.

For half a second, my brain refused to place the sound. It sounded like fireworks. A flicker of memory: smoke curling over the cane fields, the sky lighting up in bursts of red and gold, the sulfur smell of gunpowder as Ben and I threw back our heads and laughed ? —

As if he’d been shoved from behind, Silas’s body suddenly slammed into mine. He let out a sharp hiss, and before I could react, his arm hooked around my neck and a boot swept my legs out from under me. I barely had time to register the ground rushing up before I hit the ground. Silas followed me down, throwing his weight on top of me. One hand pressed my head down, damn near grinding my face into the gravel while he shielded me with his whole body.

Bullets struck the building where he’d been standing, raining chips of brick dust on our heads.

“Stay down.” Silas’s breath was hot against my ear.

He shifted, a solid wall of muscle on top of me, and a gun appeared like magic in his hand. I’d been too busy eating gravel to catch him reaching for it. Guns were Dominic’s domain, whether the rest of us liked it or not, so I didn’t recognize the make or model. But I knew a semi-automatic, black and chrome and deadly under the spill of neon, when I saw one.

Felons couldn’t carry. I knew that, and Silas sure as hell did too, but the law didn’t seem to matter much with bullets slamming into the ground and pinging against the building where we’d been standing seconds ago.

Silas was breathing like he was in pain, short gasps between clenched teeth, but his focus was locked on the vehicle lighting us up. His eyes narrowed as he lifted the weapon to take a shot.

Something struck the ground an inch from my skull, sending up a violent spray of gravel that bit into my cheek. My body seized on instinct. I was dead. I couldn’t breathe, so I must be dead, but my fingers twitched toward my head just to double-check.

“Fuck!” Silas’s voice was all grit and fury, and before I could react, he tucked me tight against his chest and twisted. The world flipped, a sick rush of momentum pulling my stomach into my throat as he rolled, taking me with him seconds before another round of gunfire tore through the space where we’d been lying.

We were sitting ducks, but more gunfire didn’t follow, only the roar of a V-8 engine burning rubber. For several long moments, the only sounds were the sharp ringing in my skull and the rasp of Silas’s breath against the back of my neck. He was still shielding me, but the night had gone quiet. The vehicle was already disappearing down the highway, taillights swallowed by the dark stretch of asphalt leading out of town.

It took me a second to pull in a full breath. Another to let it out. The stink of burnt gunpowder hung thick in the air. Gravel was digging into my back, and I shifted—or tried. Silas was rigid and motionless like a weighted blanket on top of me.

That’s when I felt it. Wetness. It wasn’t sweat, and it sure as hell wasn’t just the sticky humidity clinging to our skin. It was warmer and thicker, spreading between us where our bodies met and soaking into my shirt.

My stomach sank.

“Silas,” I said urgently. “Move.”

There was a beat of hesitation that told me he already knew what I’d just figured out. I shoved at his shoulder, hard enough to rock him, and he let out a breath that almost sounded like a laugh. Thin and strained, but real laughter. That was a good sign. But when he finally shifted, pushing up just enough to put some space between us, I felt the drag of wet fabric peeling away from my side.

Dark fabric. Darker stain. His shirt was soaked with blood, but it wasn’t mine.

It was his.