Page 45 of Man of Lies

"Gator and his crew have been working both sides for over a year," I pointed out skeptically. "No way you'd let that slide unless you're taking a cut."

Dominic's face curled in disgust, his lips pulling back like I was something he'd scraped off his shoe. He shook his head slowly, like I was a child without the smarts to ask the right questions.

"No man can serve two masters," he said condescendingly. "But that hasn't stopped Gator from trying."

"Why allow it?" I pressed.

Dominic shrugged and glanced over his shoulder, checking in visually with the silent bodyguard. When he turned back and met my gaze, he looked impatient. "For the same reason you've been looking the other way," he said grimly. "I want information. I want the shot caller."

I let out a slow, cautious breath. His façade was thinner than I'd expected. He didn't have the grip on this town he pretended, and he was no clearer on the truth than I was. We both might have suspicions, but we were stuck without proof. Damn near helpless to stop it.

"So, what do you want from me?" I asked roughly.

Dominic's expression shifted, and the smugness faded—just for a moment. His jaw, usually sharp enough to cut glass, relaxed slightly, and the tight set of his lips loosened into something almost like a grimace, though it didn't quite reach his eyes. The lines around his eyes, always tight with calculated control, softened, revealing a flicker of something almost human, just long enough for me to catch it.

Still calculating, but changing the approach, making it more personal.

When he spoke, I finally got the unvarnished truth, or a version of it, and that was enough to make my gut tighten. "I'm trying to help my brother," he said bluntly. "I want you to close your case, and then I want you out of my parish. You're not doing Mason any favors by playing around with him. He doesn't roll like that. You'd have to be goddamn blind to think he does."

Guilt gripped me by the chest, a jagged ache radiating out from my ribs, squeezing until it hurt to breathe. I'd told myself I could keep it all compartmentalized, blow off a little steam with Mason, and then cut and run once my job was done. But it was a lie, and I'd known it from the moment I'd first laid eyes on him. I'd just wanted him too much to care. I wasn't just watching this shitshow unfold from the sidelines anymore. I was balls deep in it.

I kept my face locked down, but Dominic eyed me coldly, weighing my expression for reactions I refused to give him.

"I'll give you what you need on the girls," Dominic said. "But you need to wrap this up before it's a mess neither of us can fix. And you leave my operation alone. That’s the deal.”

Every part of me instantly rebelled. It felt like making a deal with the devil. I didn’t trust him—I’d be an idiot if I did. But I’d seen too many girls disappear, girls whose names I remembered and whose faces I saw when I closed my eyes. Girls who had looked at my bar as a safe haven, and who’d been fed into a system like chum for sharks. I needed that location more than I needed to arrest a backwoods Louisiana drug kingpin.

So I nodded. Once.

That was all it took.

He gave me a drop site in rural Mississippi, just over the state line; one of the waystations they'd been using to move girls west. Clean. Remote. Disposable. The kind of place that vanished off maps once it served its purpose.

When he was finished, Dominic started back toward the Jag. Purpose served. But before he slid behind the wheel, he stopped and looked back.

"Get out of town,Donnelly. You've got what you came for, and you’ve overstayed your welcome. Don’t mess with Mason’s head by dragging this out."

He staredme down with eyes flat as stone.

"I sawit when he looked at you tonight. He’s in love with you."

Chapter Twenty

SILAS

The Dead Endwas almost a ghost town tonight, the kind of quiet that came after the rowdies had stumbled home and the real degenerates hadn't slunk out yet. Hendrix crooned from the jukebox, masking the faint hum of the dying ceiling fan and the clink of glasses as I washed up.

It should've been a slow night—the kind I could pass off to Hank and spend catching up on some sleep, but he'd called out sick, so I was stuck manning the bar all evening. Exhaustion was starting to tug at my eyelids. I'd been running on fumes all day, but even though this was just a cover job, I took pride in how well I ran the place.

The truth? This slow-drip southern life suited me; from the fresh, damp haze that hung over the parish every morning, to the po'boys and grilled catfish, and the way the sun set heavy over the swamp, turning the sky warm and amber. A place where time barely mattered, and the world would keep turning without any particular person there to push it along.

It was more comfortable than the rat race of the Bureau, hopscotching between field offices while everyone climbed overeach other to get to the next rung on the ladder. I could never stand that shit. It could be how I grew up, but bikers and roughnecks were more my speed. No fake smiles, no bullshit politics, no one trying to impress anybody. Just folks living their lives with a little more grit and a lot less ambition.

That's what made me so good at what I did. I was comfortable in the margins and the raw, messy parts of life. Here, there was no need to show up with a suit and a smile, knowing damn well all anyone cared about was how much I could do for them.

In another life, I might've stuck around and kept the Dead End running. No aliases, no secrets. Just the bar, the open road…and Mason. The kind of life that never asked for more than I could give. But maybe that was the burnout talking. It was easy to fantasize about a life where the only thing to dodge was a bad review instead of a bullet.

As I rinsed suds from the last pint glass, the creak of the open front door brought my head up fast. A gust of damp air swirled through the room, thick with the scent of swamp, and a small, dainty woman stepped inside.

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