Page 23 of The Lies Of Omission (Without Limits #3)

THEO

“ C ome straight to the office after your shift,” Father said, voice clipped, final.

A decree disguised as casual over breakfast. It was never a request. It never had to be.

“There’s a meeting with the Langford board.

Another with the Zurich equity partners.

You’ll sit in. Take notes. Review them for tomorrow’s board meeting. ”

“I have work,” I replied carefully, keeping my voice flat, obedient. “Contractors are coming to price the marquee for the gala.”

His eyes lifted over his glass of orange juice—cold, amused, cruel.

“You have responsibilities , Theo.” The word meant to him . To the Astor name . To the legacy he forged in ice and steel and expected me to bleed myself into preserving. “I’m sure Colhoun can handle the drapes.”

I said nothing. There was no point. He always won the moment he opened his mouth. But I felt it. The leash tightening. The invisible collar around my neck, silk-threaded and barbed, always tugging me back into place.

It became harder to ignore the need—the ache —that clawed at me under my skin. It had a name now—Sinclair.

Every time I stepped into the country club, I told myself I was there to work. To serve some hollow parable about humility and “understanding the staff” as if it wasn’t just another form of punishment wrapped in gold leaf. Another gilded cage I was supposed to be grateful for.

But then I’d see him .

Carrying a tray of cocktails like he owned the place, like he didn’t care who saw him, wind-tossed hair, that smirk like a blade drawn at the throat of anyone who dared underestimate him.

And I forgot everything .

He was gravity, and I was always falling—helpless, weightless, undone. He barely looked at me these days. Not unless we were alone. He was angry. Distant. And I deserved it.

I’d treated him like nothing. The way he treated me. Every cruel dismissal that came out of my mouth tasted like my father’s voice. I hated it. I hated myself .

But when our eyes met across a ballroom, behind the bar, in the shadows—the fire was still there. Still ours .

I found him out by the east patio, wiping down tables while a cluster of board wives whispered through teeth too white and smiles too tight.

“Sin.”

He didn’t look up. Didn’t outwardly acknowledge me in any way. Just scrubbed harder at a spotless surface. “You shouldn’t be here.”

“I work here.”

“You don’t need to work here,” he snapped, still refusing to meet my gaze. “That’s the whole fucking point.”

I took a step closer. “You’re angry.”

“Gee, you think?”

“Talk to me.”

He turned then, finally, and it wrecked me. His eyes—those eyes that once looked at me like I was the only real thing in the world—were flat now.

“Why?” he asked. “So you can ghost me again after? Pretend none of it happened?”

“I haven’t?—”

“Yes. You have .” His jaw clenched, voice shaking. “You disappear. You vanish for days. Then show up again like I’m some part-time indulgence you can pick back up when you’re bored. And I’m supposed to just—what? Wait?”

“It’s not like that,” I said, but even I didn’t believe me. “My father?—”

“Your father isn’t the one fucking me , Theo.” His voice broke on my name. “ You are.”

The words hit with surgical precision, no warning, no armor to protect me, he’d stripped it all away. I staggered beneath them, breath catching in my throat.

“I’m not trying to hurt you,” I whispered. “You think I don’t feel this too?”

“I think you’re trying not to.”

I ran a shaking hand through my hair, my voice cracking as it spilled out. “I can’t breathe without you.” The truth. Raw and exposed. “But I can’t survive if I lose everything, either. You don’t understand?—”

“Don’t,” he cut in, stepping toward me now, fury rolling off him like a stormfront.

“Don’t give me that ‘you don’t understand’ bullshit.

” Voice cracked, eyes wild. “My whole life has been about understanding. What it’s like to be unwanted.

Controlled. Cut off like you’re disposable. Like you’re nothing .”

I stared at him, stunned, helpless. “You’re not nothing.”

“You sure about that?” he whispered, bitter and small in a way that tore me apart.

Somewhere behind us a door slammed. We both flinched. The world was always watching . Waiting for me to step out of line.

“I have meetings and obligations I can’t just walk away from,” I said, and every word tasted like poison. “But I can’t go without seeing you.” I stepped closer, desperation clawing at my throat. “Just…meet me. Behind the tennis courts. Nine o’clock. Please? ”

Sinclair hesitated. A muscle ticked in his jaw. One of the wives called his name, sharp and saccharine. He glanced over his shoulder, then back at me. His eyes softened—barely. He nodded and walked away.

Left me standing there, alone. Watching him disappear. Something I’d done to him too many times. Every time I promised it was the last. But we both knew my promises were hollow.

By the time nine p.m. rolled around, I was soaked in exhaustion and resentment. That once quiet voice inside my head was now screaming at me to get out and save myself while I still could… but how?

My father had paraded me through three separate meetings. All sharp suits, iced whiskey, and dead-eyed men laughing at nothing. They spoke in their own coded language—mergers, asset realignments, bloodlines—while chasing inflated profit margins that would line their pockets from people’s suffering.

What they really meant was: control . What they really wanted was me under their thumb. He’d said it again. “Your future isn’t yours. It’s ours.” He always said ours like it was a gift. Like I should be grateful to be owned.

But when I saw Sinclair waiting behind the courts, head tipped back as he exhaled smoke into the night air, I felt something shift inside me. I wanted to drop everything and just run to him. Not for sex, not for rebellion, but because the ache of being without him was becoming unbearable.

He didn’t see me at first. His body was relaxed against the wall, his shirt untucked, cigarette glowing red between two fingers. He looked like he belonged to another world. One where people didn’t get packaged and sold off like investments.

“Hey,” I breathed, stepping closer.

He didn’t answer. Silence. He looked at me, but didn’t really see me—not yet. I reached out and touched his wrist. He tensed, then yanked it back like I’d burned him.

“You don’t get to just show up when it’s convenient.”

The words hit harder than I expected. I swallowed around the lump in my throat. “I know. I’m sorry.”

He stubbed out his cigarette with the heel of his boot, eyes glittering like flint. “I’m not a fucking secret, Theo.”

“I know,” I said again, voice hoarse.

“I’m not disposable.”

My throat closed. “I know .”

It was pathetic, how little I had to offer in response. Every time I tried to claw my way out of the life my father built around me, I ran straight into a wall. I wanted more —for me, for us. For him. But I didn’t know how to fight in a war I was born to lose.

I stepped forward again, this time pulling him to me. He resisted, but only for a breath. Our mouths collided—fierce and desperate. We didn’t kiss to feel something. We kissed to survive . Every pull of his lips on mine was a reminder that I was still alive. Still me . Still his—I hoped.

He shoved me hard against a red oak, our bodies tangled in shadows. My hands gripped his hips. His nails scratched down my spine through my shirt. I kissed him like I was starving. Like I hadn’t tasted him in years, not just days.

“I hate that I keep doing this,” I muttered into his mouth.

“I hate that you only come when you’re desperate ,” he shot back, breath ragged.

“I don’t know how to be what you need.”

“Then stop pretending I don’t matter.”

I buried my face in the curve of his neck, breathing him in like oxygen. “You matter more than anything . That’s the fucking problem.”

The kiss we fell into then was brutal—more pain than pleasure, more fire than heat. Hands everywhere, mouths devouring, teeth clashing. Copper burst across my tongue and I welcomed it in all its savagery. A war in the shape of a kiss.

We stumbled deeper into the trees, swallowed whole by shadows, by silence. Hidden from the world. From expectations. From everything but us.

Clothes were yanked, shoved, torn in our frenzy to touch skin—hot, bare, aching skin. A seam ripped, fabric gave way, but neither of us cared. We were already lost to desperation—a hunger so fierce it made my hands shake.

His fingers trembled as they dragged across my ribs, settling over my chest like he was trying to memorize me with his palms. Mine wouldn’t stop clinging to him, terrified he’d vanish if I ever let go.

The oak behind me scraped across my spine—splinters and bark biting into skin—but I welcomed the pain. It grounded me. Anchored me to this moment. To him.

“I need you,” I breathed, panting into his mouth as his tongue tangled violently with mine, all teeth and desperate need.

Sin nodded against me, wordless, his breath catching as I released my grip on his hair and began to fumble at the buttons of his shirt.

We spun, and this time it was his back against the tree as my mouth devoured a path down his throat, teeth dragging over his Adam’s apple.

He swallowed a moan, but I felt it quake through him.

I licked down his chest, tasting the salt on his skin, feeling the steady thrum of his heartbeat against my lips.

My mouth wrapped around one nipple, sucking until it peaked under my tongue, then switching to the other, all while Sin growled low, fingers tangled in my hair like he might pull me apart.

Then I dropped to my knees.