Page 15 of Lock Up the Darkness

But I could. Dirty was not only what I did best, but what I thrived on, what everybody expected from me. And when it came to the Infidels, what they needed from me.

It wasn’t like him to slipup at all. That had been real worrying.

He’d sworn to Asher that he would be okay going forward, that it had just been a one-off. But he could’ve just been playing it off. Him and me had a different relationship, one built on equal ground. Asher being the big man out of the three of us, we couldn’t have that with him. The buck stopped at him and he had to make the difficult choices.

But asking Kill if he was gonna be good going forward was gonna have to wait, because he’d clearly come in here pissed as shit.

“What’s happened? You came barreling in here like a bat out of hell.”

He shoved a hand through his hair. “Asher put me on a fucking leash earlier.”

“Why?”

“Over Aurora Blackthorn.”

I raised an eyebrow. “The fresh meat?”

He nodded. “The girl he’s had his eye on ever since she set foot in town.”

“You’re saying he protected her?” I scoffed. “Asher?”

“Doubtful it was some noble act.”

“More like impossible.”

“Right. But it’s for some master strategy he’s got in the works, no doubt. One he hasn’t let us in on.”

“He always has his reasons, Kill.”

His lips twisted. He hated that, hated being kept in the dark.

Me, on the other hand, I was all right going with the flow.

Asher had never steered us wrong.

The problem with Kill was that all the celebrity and power he had in public often got in his head and made him want to play that big man when it came to the Infidels too. There was a difference between fantasy and reality, though. Between what was manufactured versus what was real. And, as biting as it was, that’s all Kill’s big man identity was—fake as all fuck. He wasn’t a dumb shit, he knew it. Deep down. Didn’t mean he could admit to it, though. Hell, it wasn’t exactly an easy thing to do. Especially when he’d never wanted any part of that fakeness. His old man—Samuel Carmichael—and mine and Ash’s had different ideas though. Different plans. And nobody fucked with those. Not even us.

“Always,” a deep rumble sounded, and we both looked to see Asher leaning against the door frame, his arms folded across the chest of his tailored suit jacket.

Even in that deceptively relaxed and casual pose, his presence was as imposing as ever. It was like he was sucking all the energy from the room and drawing it into himself to maximize all that he was.

He looked his usual hot and sinful self, decked out in his go-to all black. His jean-clad legs were set in a wide stance, giving way to a pair of Louboutin’s. His silver chain with the wolf’s head pendant shimmered under the overhead lights, nestled in the open collar of his dress shirt. Even at the tail end of the day, his inky black hair was still styled as perfectly as it had been when he’d first hit the bathroom this morning, shaved short on the sides and lightly tousled and kept in place with some strategic mousse application.

He eyed his silver Rolex and lifted his head at Kill. “You’re later than normal.”

“I was riding,” Kill told him, the clear edge there making me wince. Asher wasn’t gonna take well to it.

“And yet you didn’t get your agitation out of your system.”

“You leashed me!” Kill cried, stepping forward.

I threw out my arm, holding him back, my muscles bunching to keep him at bay while he was riled up.

Asher wasn’t the least bit worried, because the guy lived on another plane of existence to the rest of us most of the time, and he pushed off the wall, telling Kill calmly, “I told you to merely interact with her, to function as the first point of contact she had with us.” He twirled his finger. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but what I didn’t tell you to do was to feed her your cock?”

I swung my head behind me at Kill. “You did?” He’d had another slipup? Already?

Kill rolled his eyes. “No. He’s being hyperbolic.”

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