Page 16 of Devious Lies

The bar is dark, but there are ambient lights. This man is just the right height and build to remind me of Matteo, so maybe that is why I can’t move.

I flinch when he’s about to make contact. Then, suddenly, he’s lurching backwards. Like some invisible force has taken hold of him and is pulling him away.

I exhale.

Then I focus.

That force I mentioned. It is not invisible. I squint, peering past the stumbling man’s image.

That’s when I see him.

Luc Batiste.

Only, he doesn’t look like the Luc I know.

His face is twisted in a feral sneer. His posture is stiff. Like his body is wound tight.

Coiled.

Like he’s about to explode.

Then, I watch in total and complete shock as he does just that.

“Don’t. Fucking. Touch. Her.”

Each word is punctuated with a punch to the face.

Spoken between gritted teeth.

Luc growls, as he drags the man away from me.

“Get the fuck off me, man,” the stranger says, trying to break free as blood flows from his nose.

But he can’t.

Luc has him by the neck, like the stranger is some errant child.

His steel eyes flash to mine, then he turns, fast as a snake, and continues pummeling the holy hell out of the drunk man.

My eyes widen. I watch the unmitigated violence I had no idea Luc was capable of take over.

His features shift. His steel eyes glitter. He changes from the quiet, careful man I thought I knew to something else. To a predator.

A viper.

True, I’ve only spoken to Luc a handful of times since I came to the Vipers’ Den, looking for work, and more.

I returned to New Jersey after six years, thinking if I could get someone powerful to take me under his protection, I would be safe.

I thought the king was that man.

But Nico isn't mine.

And I have yet to feel anything other than anxiety about being back in my home state.

Only, right now, as I stand there watching Luc beat the crap out of that drunk stranger, I think maybe I wasn’t looking at the right man to begin with.

I was wrong about Nico. And it looks like I am wrong about Luc.

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