Total pages in book: 168
Estimated words: 169013 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 845(@200wpm)___ 676(@250wpm)___ 563(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 169013 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 845(@200wpm)___ 676(@250wpm)___ 563(@300wpm)
“She wasn’t supposed to see that.” His words scraped the air that had become acid.
Toxic.
“What? The proof of your treason?” It heaved like stones.
He stepped forward.
I gauged him, prepared to counter his attack, though for once, there was no aggression in his movements.
Just surrender as he lifted his giant hands.
“It had to happen. She blinded you,” Phoenix rasped. “I did it to protect you. To protect us.”
I felt like I was bound in barbed wire. “You went behind my back? Betrayed me? Because I fucking fell in love?”
“She was collateral,” he gritted. “Not to be touched by any one of us, and you fucking claimed her.”
A hoarse scoff left me. “And that gave you the right to do this? Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”
I wanted to crumble, but I took a menacing step forward instead. In it, I felt my heart splintering.
This was Phoenix. With me from the beginning. The one who was there the night everything changed.
“Give me one reason not to put a bullet through your skull.” I spat it, though it was thin and wheezing.
He barely shook his head. “Don’t you see it, Silas? This is a setup. She was there. It was her,” he emphasized low, angling toward me, trying to get me to see something that remained blurry.
“The fuck are you talking about?” I demanded.
His jaw went rigid. “It was her. The night we went for Kent.”
Flashes came at me in shockwaves.
The energy.
That connection.
I swayed, nearly fucking brought to my knees when it clicked.
Phoenix gripped me by the shoulder, leaning down to get into my face.
“And there’s no way it’s a fuckin’ coincidence that her brother didn’t have this thing planned. I don’t know why or how, but my gut tells me he’s gonna flip, and this whole thing is going to be an ambush. I had to stop him before it was too late.”
FIFTY-NINE
SILAS
FIVE YEARS AGO
“Are you fucking sure it’s them?” Phoenix hissed it beneath his breath where their bikes were hidden behind a giant spruce.
The sweeping darkness and heavy fog camouflaged the menacing metal, the powerful motors silenced two hours ago.
The two of them were concealed in the pitch under the cover of night.
Waiting to ambush the motherfuckers that Silas had been hunting for years.
“Every bit of info Trent provided confirms that it is.”
They were the only smugglers in the area of Crimson Creek during the time that his mother had been slaughtered, though their home base was there in San Jose.
A place he’d never visited before and a place he never intended on stepping foot in again.
Plus, he could feel it wafting back.
That same vile energy he’d felt every night as a teenager when he’d stupidly embarked on his runs.
“Five max?” Phoenix growled on a hush, grimness radiating from his being as he inclined his head toward Silas.
“It seems so.”
Though Silas knew this monster, Kent Ellison, was trying to make his play.
Expand and take over territory belonging to other dealers.
Silas needed to crush him before that happened.
Before he was too powerful and Silas wouldn’t be able to touch him.
Phoenix was the only one of the Owls bloodthirsty enough, or maybe just reckless enough, to take this on. That and the fact that Silas could trust him. He knew Phoenix wasn’t pussy enough to rat on Trent if things went south and it was discovered Silas was the one who’d taken Kent out.
Silas couldn’t ask Trevan because he would try to stop him.
Phoenix was down for this endeavor, even if they were throwing a fucking grenade into their lives.
Their lives were fucked, anyway.
What did it matter?
Only this.
This one fucking thing Silas had to see through.
Movement stirred in the stagnant air on the other side of the rock wall that surrounded the mansion.
Right smack in the middle of an upscale neighborhood.
Silas struggled to find oxygen, and thick, viscid blood thumped through his long-cold veins, this one need the burn that kept him moving.
“This is it,” he rumbled low.
“Yeah,” Phoenix agreed. A thunderclap of violence charged from his giant body, and his fisted hands tightened on his handlebars.
Through the foliage, they watched as the ornate gate swung open across the street and headlights came into view.
A second later, a black SUV rolled out.
Silas knew from his surveillance there was an armed guard on the other side of that gate.
He and Phoenix waited until the gate fully closed and the taillights nearly disappeared in the haze as it traveled down the street before they kicked over their motorcycles, their headlights cut as they picked up the SUV’s trail.
It’d be a whole lot easier to hit this bastard when he was outside his fortress rather than trying to get to him on the other side.
Silas’s mouth watered as they thundered down the streets. His heart running a manic beat as they tracked the beasts through the city.