12. Silas
12
SILAS
I waited outside the door of the motel room for Mila to come out.
It wasn’t hard for me to get my hands on her schedule at the restaurant, and I knew for a fact that she was off today, which was fucking good.
The more time I spent with her, the more addicted I got.
Perhaps Killian was right, and she would be nothing more than my weakness, but this was the one weakness I didn’t mind having. There was something about the girl that told me I needed to see this through.
She was going to hate me for what I would have to do eventually. We couldn’t stay in New Orleans for long, and I wasn’t fucking leaving without her.
Which left one solution.
I was going to have to take Mila back to Chicago with us.
Whether she came willingly, or kicking and screaming, didn’t matter to me.
No doubt she would put up a fight.
No doubt she would fucking hate me.
But perhaps I could make her hate me less. Or perhaps I could make the experience a little less traumatic for her. Getting plucked by three strange men would leave a mark. But by someone whom she had spent time with? Perhaps I could preserve the fire in her eyes, despite the circumstances.
I shook away my musings. I was never one to hesitate in my decisions, never accounting for how they would affect other people. I should have taken her that first moment, but Mila made me question everything.
Killian wanted to kill her. I was incapable of letting that happen. So the next best thing was to take her.
The door to her room opened, and I straightened from the hood of my car. She pulled up short when she noticed me. Her eyes raked me from head to toe. No one had ever taught this girl how to hide her emotions, because I could fucking see everything in those fascinating eyes of hers.
And, yeah, she could deny it all she wanted, but I knew desire when I saw it.
It was written all over her face. She must have been thinking about last night because a deep blush took over her cheeks, and she wouldn’t meet my eyes.
I used this moment to study her. She wore a plain white shirt today and some exercise shorts, though I doubted she was going for a workout. She probably grabbed her comfiest clothing before coming out of the motel room. Not that I was complaining, because I fucking wasn’t. That shirt seemed to have been painted on with how perfectly it fit her, showing off curves that a man like me would kill to touch, even if it was only for a small moment in time. And her fucking shorts. Fuck me, but they showed off her slim legs and the curve of her ass. They were short, too. Short enough that if I looked closely, I could make out the outline of her small pussy. I shifted, trying to get my hard-on to go down.
What the hell was she doing to me?
“What are you doing here?” she asked quietly.
“Waiting for you.”
Her surprised eyes met mine. “For me?”
I smiled. “Yup. Come on.”
I walked over to the passenger door and opened it for her. She eyed it hesitantly.
“I was told to never get into a car with a stranger.”
“And you’re a good girl who always does what you’re told?” I taunted her.
She glared at me and crossed her arms over her chest. I bit back a groan when my eyes went there automatically. My mouth watered as I remembered how she tasted.
“My eyes are up here,” she said dryly.
“And what fascinating fucking eyes those are,” I replied without thinking. She seemed surprised.
I shook my head. “Come on, angel. Get in and I’ll show you around the city. I bet you haven’t really explored, have you? And after what happened last night, I’d say we’re not strangers anymore.”
She blushed an even deeper red, and I laughed. I hoped she didn’t have any nightmares about that fucker, Lenny. I’d sure enjoyed my sweet time working him over.
She didn’t look like she lost a lot of sleep. In fact, I might even have said the fire in her eyes seemed to glow a little brighter than it did before.
She glowered at me, but I only looked at her, my eyes holding a challenge in them.
After a moment of hesitation, she got inside the rental car.
It was a cherry-red Aston Martin. We usually tried to stay under the radar when we’d go out visiting other places that weren’t in our territory, but I couldn’t help but want to impress her, and judging by the look in her eyes, she was impressed.
I closed the door behind her, wondering how Daniel Hayes had treated her growing up. Based on the cynicism in her eyes, I would say not very well.
The thought made me angry, and I suddenly wished I had the power to bring men back from the dead, only for the chance to kill the fucking bastard all over again. And I would take my precious time, too.
I got in on the driver’s side and started the car. It roared to life beautifully, and I was almost as turned on by the car as I was by the girl.
Fuck, but I couldn’t wait to taste her in the back seat of this car. That was my one and only goal for the day.
I pulled out of the shitty motel, and despite what I’d said about taking her out to see the city, I drove out of there too. A part of me wanted to keep going, leaving New Orleans behind and heading straight to Chicago. I didn’t do any of that.
She looked at me questioningly when it was obvious we were no longer in the city.
“Where are we going?” she asked warily.
I grinned, but didn’t look at her. “Don’t sound so worried. If I wanted to kidnap you, I would have done it already.”
She didn’t need to know I was planning on doing just that when the time presented itself.
I felt her eyes on me.
I pointed to the back seat. “We’re going to Couturie Forest for a picnic.”
She seemed surprised at that. “Like on a date?”
My smile widened. “A date.”
I supposed this could be considered a date, though I hadn’t really thought of it as such. I just wanted to take her somewhere alone. Away from my brothers’ gaze, away from the city and the problems. I wanted to take her somewhere that didn’t care whether I was Silas Tiernan, one of the three heads of the Tiernan crime syndicate, and where she wasn’t just Mila Hayes, Daniel Hayes’ daughter.
Where we could just be us, and that would be okay.
She was silent the rest of the drive there, and when I pulled up to a spot overlooking the scenic forest view, with a bench and table to boot, I parked the car.
She looked around. “You know, this would be the perfect place to commit a murder.”
I bit my lip and shook my head, hiding my amusement. “Are you planning on murdering me?”
She turned to me, not answering right away. As if she was really contemplating it. “We’ll see, huh?”
I laughed and got out of the car, reaching for the picnic basket in the back seat.
She got out too, and we met at the hood of the car. She eyed the picnic. “You know, this isn’t what I thought would happen when I got in the car with you.”
“What did you think would happen?” I asked, letting my voice drop to a seductive tone. She got it and blushed in a way that made me want to keep saying things to provoke that blush. I shook away the whimsical thought, playfully tapped her chin with my free hand, and headed to the picnic bench. “Come on, naughty girl.”
She gasped with an outrage that made my smile widen as she followed behind me, muttering to herself.
I shook my head. I didn’t think I had smiled this much in—I couldn’t remember.
I set down the basket on the table, and she came over, opening the lid a little to take in the contents.
“You really went all out, didn’t you?” she asked.
I laughed. “I had someone pack it for me.”
She shot me a curious look. “You had someone pack it for you.” She eyed me head to toe, then looked at the car before looking back at me once more. “You’re rich.”
She didn’t sound impressed anymore. She said it matter-of-factly, and I supposed that made sense. Despite the huge shit pile of debt the club was in, her father wasn’t exactly hurting for money.
I had no doubt the bastard hid most of his fortune away, saving up for when he would need to go on the run.
“Does it matter?” I asked.
She surprised me when she answered, “Yes. I don’t like rich people. Rich men, particularly, who always think the world owes them something.”
I moved a little closer to her. She didn’t take a step back. Instead, she tilted her head up and stared right at me. Brave girl.
“You’ll like me,” I said.
“You’re rather cocky, aren’t you?”
“I much prefer the term confident.” I grinned at her.
She rolled her eyes but didn’t say anything. Instead, she started to unpack the food. I probably should help her, but even the way she did the most mundane things utterly captivated me.
Mila Hayes was a dangerous woman.
There was no denying that.
She shot me a look when she got the last item from the basket—a container of grapes—knocking me out of my wonderstruck haze, so I moved the basket out of the way.
I took the seat next to her and sat down as close as possible. Our eyes met, and I knew mine dared her to say something about it and move away.
She stubbornly stayed where she was. I grabbed a triangle turkey sandwich and handed it to her.
“Thank you,” she muttered, taking it from my hand and nibbling on the bread delicately. “Aren’t you going to eat?”
I nodded and looked away from her, grabbing a sandwich for myself.
“So, what are we really doing here?” she asked after a moment. I looked down at the half-eaten sandwich in her hand.
“Didn’t I tell you?”
“You said you were going to take me around to see the city.”
I shrugged. “The city’s not that interesting, anyway.”
“Silas, be serious.”
I opened the container with the grapes and pushed it closer to her. Then I watched as she plucked a grape from the stem and took a bite. The juice leaked from the corner of her lips, and I knew my eyes darkened in desire.
My expression was surely one that even someone innocent couldn’t miss.
She blinked as if surprised, looking away from me and wiping her lips with the back of her hand.
“I am being serious,” I answered, grabbing hold of her wrist and pulling it away from her face. She didn’t say anything as I moved my thumb over the skin coated in grape juice. Fuck me, but I really wanted to kiss her again.
The memory of her taste was so deeply embedded in my mind, I wanted a repeat. I licked my lips, and she moved back from me, shaking her head. “You’re not distracting me, so don’t even think about it.”
I smirked. “No? You’re telling me you don’t want to?”
“That’s what this is about? You want me, physically, and that’s why you’re trying so hard? Did New Orleans run out of women or something?”
“None of them are you.”
“What’s so special about little ol’ me?”
I shrugged, unable to put into words the hold she had on me. I didn’t fucking know, and I didn’t want to analyze it. All I knew was that I could no more let Killian kill her than I could let her go.
Love at first sight was a fucking joke, but it was undeniable that she affected me way more than she should have. And I had made it my life’s goal then and there—I would become the center of her universe. Just as she had so irrevocably become mine.
“I don’t think we should do this,” she said.
“Why not?”
“You barely know me. I don’t even know you.”
I plopped a grape into my mouth. “What do you want to know about me?”
She shrugged. “I can’t just ask questions about you on a whim.”
“Why not?” I repeated. She was making this way more complicated than it needed to be. Sure, there were things I couldn’t tell her—specifically, full details about my job—but I would be an open fucking book with her concerning anything else.
I had already decided there would be no secrets between us. I would own everything about this small, fragile girl in front of me.
She sputtered but didn’t answer.
I turned to her. “I’m the youngest of three. I’m very close to my brothers. Very close.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Okay?”
I laughed before lowering my voice and adding, “So close, we share a lot of things.”
I circled my arm around her waist and pulled her even closer to me. Her breath hitched, but she didn’t pull away.
“S-so you’re good at sharing.” The tremors in her voice and her dilated pupils gave way to her feelings.
“You have no idea, sweetheart.”
I was fucking hard just thinking about sharing my new toy with my brothers. Fuck me, but she was making this so hard.
“Do you have any other family besides them?” she asked.
“An uncle in Las Vegas. We lived with him and his family when our parents died. My cousin Finley and I are the same age, and we were close growing up.”
Though I hadn’t talked to Finley in a while. Hadn’t talk to anyone from the Las Vegas Syndicate since my brothers and I left to take back what was ours.
“Both of them?” she asked. I nodded. “At the same time?”
I shook my head.
“How did they die?” she asked.
“My mom met the wrong person.” My dad. “My dad, the same thing.” Her dad.
She shuddered from the coldness in my voice, and I softened my tone when I said, “My brothers are the only ones I have left in this world.”
She nodded. “It must be nice to have someone you can depend on.”
There was a wistfulness in her voice that surprised me, though it shouldn’t have. Mila was all alone in the world. Even when she had been living with the club, I supposed she still had no one she could depend on.
For some stupid reason, I wanted to be the man she could depend on.
That thought was nothing more than a fucking joke. I wasn’t someone she could depend on. I was the monster starring in her nightmares.
Obviously done with feeling sorry for herself, she changed the subject. “What do you do?”
“I run a business with my brothers.”
“A business?” The suspicion in her voice was unfounded. She was right to be suspicious—of course—but there was no reason for it.
My smile widened. “A family business we inherited from our father. Admittedly, things had gone to shit at the beginning, but now, everything seems to be picking back up to where it’s supposed to be.”
“And this business?”
“We owned various nightclubs and restaurants, but mostly we’re in the transportation of goods.”
“Transports?”
“Yes.”
“Sounds lucrative.”
I laughed. She should know all about that. After all, her father was in the same business.
I turned sideways in my seat, facing her, so close, our fronts touched. Her breath caught.
“What are you doing?”
“Don’t you think talking like this is more fun?” I asked, letting my hands roam over her back. She shivered as I played with the knobs of her spine.
“Silas.”
My name sounded less like a protest and more like a plea. And fuck me, but how could I deny her when she sounded like this?
“Yes, angel?” I skimmed my lips up and down her jaw, watching as her eyes fluttered shut.
I pressed a kiss on the corner of her lips. She was just as fucking sweet as I remembered.
“You are entirely too addictive, sweetheart.”
“I am?” she asked, sounding breathless. I pulled her onto my lap, her legs on either side of my waist. Like this, my dick was pressed up against her pussy.
She gasped, her hips moving slightly. Was she even aware she was doing that? I didn’t fucking know.
“You are,” I confirmed. So fucking addictive.
I leaned down to deepen the kiss when the shrill ringing of my phone cut through the space surrounding us and brought Mila abruptly back to reality. She scrambled so quickly out of my lap, you would have thought there was lava there or some shit. Her breathing was erratic. She watched me as I took out my phone. Maverick’s name flashed on the screen.
I answered it with a scowl.
“Someone had better be fucking dying,” I said by way of a greeting.
“No,” Maverick answered mildly. “But close. Get your ass back to the hotel.”