Page 28 of Lock Up the Darkness

He reached out for his dick, but Killian batted his hands away. “Not while you’ve got dirt all over your fingers, and my balls are still raging fire, you fuck.”

“Later then?” Jonah pressed, watching through hooded eyes as Killian tucked himself back into his pants and zipped up his fly.

“You could use the relief,” I advised.

Killian slumped back on the stool and pressed the peas back on his lap. “Fuck you both.”

“That sounds like a yes to me,” Jonah said, tossing him a wink.

Killian glared at him then turned his attention to me. “Are you done standing by and feeling out the situation now? Are you actually ready to do something about this?”

“Standing by in any situation isn’t what I do, you know that. And are you sore—pun intended—about the damage she did, or about the fact that she turned you down?”

Jonah cocked an eyebrow. “You wanna make her your fuck slut, huh, Pretty?”

“It’s about my bike, you shits!”

Lies.

Or denial.

Either was something for the weak and those lacking self-awareness, both dangerous positions to be in. Especially in our world.

“When you calm down and you are actually able to recognize the true reality here, don’t pursue that with her. Not alone. You won’t be able to handle her.”

“I… what?” he barked.

“It’s been proven twice now,” I reminded him.

“Because I’ve been acting with a hand tied behind my back, thanks to you!”

Our eyes locked.

With his anger fueling his actions, he foolishly tried to hold my gaze, to come out on top, getting very close to outright challenging me.

Unfortunately for him, no matter how hard he tried, his will would never overpower mine.

My mind was a formidable force to be reckoned with.

More than that, when it came to him, I knew who I was, what I was fighting for, and what I was prepared to do to achieve those ends.

While Killian, because of the role his father and mine had forced him to play since our later years of high school, wasn’t a whole. His was split between the façade he had to uphold and the part he’d had to bury, the real him that he wasn’t allowed to fully know.

That was also why he was unraveling now, piece by piece, mistake after mistake.

He needed help.

And he’d have it.

But to free him—and the rest of us by extension—I had to make damn sure I played the game strategically. Unfortunately, that meant going so far as to use the only two people I cared about as pieces on my proverbial chess board. They were functioning as assets to me at the moment, rather than the brothers-in-arms that they truly were. Allowing sentiment into it at this dangerous, volatile stage would end what I was working toward before it even truly began.

And then we would remain trapped beneath the boots of our fathers forever.

His steely gaze wavered, cracks in his bravado appearing, and then he dropped his gaze. “At least the footage was captured from the lot. Did you manage to edit it in our favor?” he asked me.

“No.”

“What?”

---