Page 29 of Rio (Redcars #3)

TWENTY

Rio

I saw Robbie come down the stairs scanning the space as if he couldn’t get to where he needed to be fast enough.

He was wrecked—pale, shaky, and exhausted—but determined.

I knew then what had just happened. As he’d discussed with Enzo and the rest of us, he’d told Lyric his story.

I didn’t know how much, or how it had gone, but he’d done it.

Enzo was there before I could move, catching Robbie around the waist and tugging him into his chest. Robbie sagged into him immediately, as if he’d been holding himself up by force of will alone. Enzo whispered something I couldn’t hear, but Robbie nodded, his arms curling around Enzo’s middle.

I couldn’t read either of them—Enzo’s face was all protectiveness and silence, and Robbie had his eyes squeezed shut as if he didn’t want to be anywhere but where he was. That gave me nothing. Not a clue as to how Lyric had reacted. Did he hate us now? Did he know what we’d done in explicit detail?

And why did I care so much about what he thought? It wasn’t supposed to matter, but somehow it did—more than it should have.

I didn’t wait to be told. I passed Enzo and touched his arm before gesturing upstairs, and got a slight nod in return.

The door to Lyric’s room was ajar. I pushed it open, heart already pounding.

He was sitting on the sofa, arms resting on his knees, head bowed. He didn’t look up when I stepped in.

“So now you know,” I said quietly.

Lyric’s eyes were bright with something raw—betrayal, confusion, pain. He was broken in a way I hadn’t seen before, as if all the edges he’d been holding together had finally fractured.

“Why didn’t anyone tell me?” he asked, voice hoarse. “Why did I have to hear it from the goddamn victim!”

“He’s a survivor, not a victim.”

“Fuck, Rio!”

“Look, it wasn’t our story to tell,” I said, stepping farther into the room. “It was Robbie’s. Only ever his.”

Lyric exhaled, his shoulders tight. “How did you kill them?”

I froze. Not because I wouldn’t—because I could. Because I would if he asked me. But I wasn’t sure what he needed to hear. The truth? The blood? The moments between choices?

“I’ll tell you,” I said. “Because it means something that they’re not breathing anymore.

” I took a deep breath and exhaled. “Vinnie was first, he was just this wannabe who thought he was something, and who fucked me over back in the day when he was my manager, he was going to hand Robbie over to the assholes who’d kidnapped him for money,” I said, the words were ash in my mouth.

“The gang he was involved with never wanted him, held him, and Enzo shot him. Clean. Quick. He didn’t hesitate. ”

Lyric’s eyes didn’t move from mine.

“Mitchell… we hurt him bad,” I went on. “We wanted answers. We needed him to feel it. I—” I swallowed, lifted a hand to my neck. “I half-strangled him. I wanted him gone. Jamie set him alight, but it was Enzo who ended it before the man burned.”

Lyric didn’t even flinch.

“And Lassiter…” My jaw clenched. “He was di fferent. Calculated. Sadistic. We set him up, isolated him. Then we tortured him. Stripped him of every ounce of power he thought he had, and hurt him the worst. And when he was nothing but fear and blood and silence, Jamie set it so he burned alive.” I didn’t apologize.

I wouldn’t. “They all got what they gave, only slower.”

Lyric stood, his gaze still locked on mine. “Good,” he said, voice steady, low, and fierce.

Then he crossed the space between us, no hesitation in his steps, just heat and something burning beneath his skin. He reached up—past the Carters’ sandwiches and drinks in my hands—and cradled my face. His palms were warm, firm, grounding.

“Good,” he said again, with more weight this time. As if he needed me to hear it, to believe it.

He was so fucking fierce I couldn’t breathe for a second. Whatever lines he’d drawn in the sand before, they were gone now. This—him standing in front of me, holding me—wasn’t forgiveness. It was alliance. It was war.

And he was on our side.

For Robbie.

We ended up sitting on the sofa, side by side, the untouched sandwiches and drinks on the table in front of us. Neither of us had much of an appetite. The silence wasn’t uncomfortable, but it was heavy. We were both lost in our own heads.

After a while, Lyric spoke, his voice low. “I need to take that software down. Kessler’s system—LyricNight—it’s still evolving. I might need him alive to do it. At least for a little while.”

I turned my head to meet his gaze. “You’re asking us to hold off?”

He nodded. “Just until I’m done. Then you can do whatever the hell you want.”

I exhaled through my nose, dragged a hand down my face. “I can’t speak for Enzo, but we all want Kessler wiped off the face of the Earth. I’ll work with you to make sure you take LyricNight down first. But once that’s done…”

“I know,” Lyric said, eyes fixed forward. “I won’t stop you. I won’t stop any of you.”

There was ice in his voice, yes—but more than that; he’d made a choice and wouldn’t be moved from it. His hand brushed mine, and without thinking, I linked our fingers together.

Pressure built beneath my ribs, sharp and sudden.

I leaned in, my face tilting toward his.

Just close enough to breathe him in, to feel the air shift between us.

His eyes flicked to my mouth, and I thought—maybe—we were going to kiss, and then he stood and stalked to the door, and my heart stopped, and my stomach swooped in disappointment.

He grabbed the chair on the way past, then forced it up and under the handle, locking us in.

“I don’t want interruptions,” he said, and waited.

Was he waiting for me to argue? To push back? I didn’t. I went from disappointed to hard in an instant.

“I’ll kill anyone who steps inside that door,” I deadpanned.

“Even Obsessed and Pyro?” he asked me, and I smirked at the nicknames. Pyro, I’d heard before when it came to Jamie, but obsessed hit close with Enzo.

“Yep.”

“What about sweet Robbie?”

“Clearly not,” I said, and chuckled as he stopped in front of me.

He grabbed the hem of his T-shirt and dragged it over his head in one smooth motion, baring lean muscle and pale skin.

The line of his abs was cut, the V of his hips arrowing into loose grey sweats that didn’t hide a damn thing.

He was hard, and he didn’t give a shit that I saw it.

My eyes caught on a scar low on his hip—one I’d noticed before but hadn’t let myself think about. Now, it pulled at my attention. I didn’t know what had left it, but I wanted to trace it with my fingers, my mouth.

He came in close again, looming, and I stayed exactly where I was—sinking back into the sofa as if I belonged there, watching him, breathing him in.

“Who did this?” I asked, my fingers finding the scar. I pressed in a little, not enough to hurt, but enough to make sure he felt it.

Lyric’s breath hitched. He didn’t step back.

His eyes dropped to where my hand touched him, then slid up to meet mine again—dark, defiant, but something flickered there. Not vulnerability. Not exactly. But a crack in the armor.

“Does it matter?” he asked, voice rough.

“It does to me.”

His jaw flexed, but he didn’t pull away. My thumb traced the jagged edge of the scar, the raised skin warm beneath my touch. His abs twitched under my hand, and I knew he wasn’t unaffected.

“I don’t remember all the details,” he admitted.

“Think it was contract four. Maybe five? He was motivated, had a deadly throw, and he wanted to carve me a little before he took me in. Typical bad guy shit, let his guard down, I turned the knife on him. Heh,” he snorted a laugh. “Almost got caught that time. ”

A pulse of heat and fury shot through me.

Not the kind that made me want to fight.

The kind that made me want to protect , to wrap myself around him and never let anyone close again.

But I didn’t say that. I leaned in instead, brushing my lips to the spot just above the scar.

Soft. Deliberate. His whole body tensed as if he was holding himself still by force alone.

“No one lays a fucking hand on you again,” I said, my voice low, every word edged with promise.

He raised a brow, testing. “Ever?”

I met his gaze, deadly fucking serious. “Never.”

Something shifted in his face. Not shock, not even disbelief—just this deep, bone-deep awareness that I meant it. That if someone tried, they’d have to go through me.

He frowned, then smiled.

It wasn’t all hearts and flowers or a declaration of love, but it was loyalty, obsession, devotion—all of it coiled in my chest. The idea of anyone hurting him again made my blood burn.

And I wasn’t sure if I wanted to kiss him or destroy the world for him. Maybe both.

My fingers flexed above the scar, and I let my other hand curl over his stomach and the warmth of him soaked into my skin .

“Ready?” he asked. He nudged my knees apart with his own, slow and sure, never breaking eye contact. I let him. I wanted him to.

Then he pushed his sweats down and under his balls, baring himself with a confidence that made my mouth go dry.

His cock was thick and flushed, heavy where it curved up from his body—veins ridged along the shaft, the head glossy and pink.

It was beautiful , in a way that felt dangerous. A challenge.

I couldn’t look away.

Instead, I focused on the scar again, tracing it with my fingers, because if I didn’t hold onto something, I was going to drown in him.

“No touching,” he ordered, voice dark and rough, a sharp command sending heat straight to my gut. He circled his cock, stroking slowly, twisting his wrist with a confidence that made it clear this wasn’t about seduction—it was about control. About claiming .

He leaned forward, out of reach, the corner of his mouth curling. “Big Man’ll do anything I want, right?”

I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t move. My body was already answering for me.