Page 45 of Tangled Lies

“I don’t know. A contract of some kind. I think it has to do with the casino being torn down. Is that related to what you are trying to figure out?”

If I were ever allowed to be surprised I’m pretty sure my jaw would have dropped. In fact, I could see it in my boys’ eyes. None of us saw this act coming.

“Why did you come up here?” I asked. I needed a specific answer right now.

“You said you needed information. My uncle has it. It might have backfired a little. I didn’t know I would be offered up for the contract. My fiancé is supposed to be getting me a doppelganger, but in the meantime?—”

Jett’s lips were on hers in a single second and fucking hell. Yeah. I got it. She hadn’t betrayed us. Hell, she was trying to help. In all the years of knowing that her uncle had broken the engagement agreement with the Barone family, I’d never once been sad. I knew the reason for the marriage. Her parents wanted her protected from the enemies her father had made.

I’d known for some time that Senator Harrington had been behind the car accident killing the lawyer and his wife and leaving my future bride in the wrong hands.

I hadn’t wanted the marriage. But Barone wanted loyalty. I still wasn’t offering up what she’d been promised, but I was intrigued.

“Get Jett off of her.” Talon reached for Jett and pulled him away with only a small protest. “Pretty girl, there’s more where that came from at home.”

She blinked.

“Home?”

He was smiling ear to ear. Shit. If she won him over we were fucked. I couldn’t break his heart. Hell, I wasn’t sure he had one until now.

“Yeah. Home. You’re ours now,” Jett said.

I hung my head, pulling the asshole to his feet and feeling a new surge of anger. He’d touched my girl.

I froze. My girl? Not just mine as in contractually obligated. But mine as in I was downright fucking pissed anyone would think to hurt her.

“Jett, you can’t just go around telling girls they live with us,” I said behind clenched teeth.

He turned to me.

“But, Ronnie, she was always supposed to be yours. Can’t you share? We have extra rooms if that’s what you’re worried about.”

I glared at Margaux, but not because I hated her, because I knew I was going to lose.

“Little bird, come here.”

She looked at the others before she finally started my way. I handed her a large knife, one that had been concealed beneath my suit jacket, right next to the gun.

“You want a home with us?”

She nodded. Why was this so easy? Shit.

“Alright. Then prove your loyalty to the Barone family.”

She took the knife and then looked at me, the floor, and the room.

“It’s going to be messy, isn’t it?”

I laughed at the unexpected question, and so did Talon and Jett. Knox, however, slid next to the guy and grabbed him from me, dragging the man’s feet on the ground behind him while he coughed and wheezed once he was free from my hold.

Without saying a damn thing Margaux followed Knox to the bathroom where he tossed the guy in the bathtub.

“I already have two guys on their way up to clean up. Now what will you do with him?” Knox said to her as I walked into the bathroom.

She took the knife, and damn. The crazy in her eyes had my cock hard, but maybe it should have shriveled, because what she did was next-level mean.

“I told you, I don’t suck random guy’s dicks.” And she stabbed him once, right where his tiny dick probably was in his pants. It was hard to say, but he screamed and blood pooled as she yanked the knife free.