Page 25 of Obsessive Cravings

“Fuck you, Tides. Fine, but conditionally!” He was losing control and having him begging was almost as rewarding as having his sister come against my mouth. I hid the smile that thought caused and turned.

Mason was scowling like the pouting brat he was. “Conditionally?” I asked. “I don’t do conditionally. Let’s try this, Brinks. You fall in line and stay out of my territory. I’ll do the same, but you will fall in line behind me. You align with me, and we become the combined force of the province. It will ensure the others keep their noses out of our business and won’t dare try to move against either of us.”

He studied me. Mason was an intelligent man. I’d watched how quickly he’d risen to his position, gathering resources and power that had taken me years to gain. Until he finally took down the family that had run his city for decades. That kind of skill came naturally to him, just as it did to me, only I had been at this a lot longer than he had.

“Deal,” he said. “But if you cross me, Tides, I won’t hesitate to take you down.”

It was an empty threat. I held the true power in the province, and everyone knew it. “You weren’t successful the first time, so I’d keep that bravado in check or I’ll let your little problem fester.”

The muscles in his jaw were so tight it looked like they might pop.

“I’ll need everything you have on Randall. And I mean everything,” I demanded.

Tyson walked to the car and returned with a folder. I took it from him, flipping through the details and pictures. Clint Randall looked like trouble. He was nothing but muscle. His tattoos covered every inch of his arms and extended up his neck. His brown eyes held only contempt, and I wondered how Mason hadn’t seen past the sneer that screamed distrustful ass to me. I spotted the marking on his bicep and brought the picture closer to study it.

“You let a Bad Omen in your ranks?” The Bad Omen were a family I’d run out of Bridgeville twenty years earlier. They worked underground, infiltrating other families and taking them down from the inside. They were notorious and those of us who’d been around when they first formed knew what to look for. Mason didn’t.

He snatched the picture from me.

“The tattoo on his left bicep,” I explained.

“Fuck,” he grumbled before he shoved it back to me.

“So he got in and almost took you down. Didn’t think I’d see the day another family would take you down, Mason.” It was a compliment laced with an insult and he knew it.

“He didn’t take me down.”

“No, he didn’t succeed, but he almost did.” I flipped through, looking for anything on Riley. “I need to know exactly what he did to your sister.” I didn’t need it to find Randall, but I needed to know.

“What the fuck do you need to know that for?” Tyson barked.

“You want my help?”

“You don’t need to know those details,” Mason said.

“Then I don’t need to help you. If you let a Bad Omen escape and there’s a chance he’s in Bridgeville, I can easily turn that into a reason to turn on you, Brinks. Now tell me what the fuck he did to your sister.”

I didn’t play and my enemies knew it. That was one reason I was the most feared boss of the provinces. I didn’t hesitate to kill if anything threatened my business or my people.

“He manipulated her,” Tyson said, running a hand through his mop of brown hair. He seemed just as upset as Mason, and I wondered how close he and Riley were. Close enough to have slept with her? I looked between the two men, but they didn’t seem like that mistake had ever come between them.

Mason shot him a look.

“What Mace? He wants to know. Why not tell him?” He glanced back at me. “Seduced her?—”

“Fucked her?” A stab of envy jolted through me at the thought.

Mason growled.

“Wow, you really dropped your guard, didn’t you, Brinks?”

“Fuck off, Tides.”

“So your rat fucked your sister and used her to hurt you, hoping it would weaken you.”

“He didn’t weaken me. I found the prick.” He was gripping his hands so tight the veins in his arms were raised. “Found where he had her and…”

The emotion surfaced, and I knew the asshole had hurt Riley enough that there were scars. “Found her?” I asked, thinking back on her reaction when she’d first seen the furniture I’d given her. The fear in her eyes, the tears as she’d sat and cried.

---