Page 27 of Silent as Sin
The women tittered again, filling the air with their laughter, but all I heard was the rush of blood in my ears.
She didn’t need to say it out loud. Her look said enough:You don’t belong here.
Ashen had never touched me the way a man touches his woman. He hadn’t kissed me, hadn’t whispered anything soft. But he had saved me. Held me when the nightmares clawed me raw. Brought me into the daylight and reminded me what it felt like to breathe without fear. He had made me feel… normal again.
And now, watching this woman glide into the room like she’d been carved to fit at his side, doubt ripped through me.
Was she his girlfriend?
Would he look at her the way he looked at me in the sunlight?
Would I vanish the moment she curled her fingers into him?
I pulled the blanket tighter, until I was small again, smaller than Venom had ever forced me. But her eyes pinned me there, a knife through cloth, leaving no place to hide.
Roxy tossed her jacket off one shoulder, letting it slide down just enough to show the black lace beneath. She winked at one of the men leaning against the bar, laughing when he whistled. Her hand brushed his arm casually before she moved on, collecting attention like it was her due.
Jewel muttered something under her breath at the card table, biting enough to earn a quick laugh from Dusty. He shook his head, laying a card down, but his gaze flicked my way. Kind. Protective.Safe.
For the first time since Ashen had dragged me out of that darkness, I didn’t want him to walk back in. Not if it meant he’d stand tall in front of her, and smile, like he did me under the sun today.
The perfume, the whispers, the weight of her stare—it was too much.
I slipped from the couch, keeping the blanket wrapped tight, moving while they were all still clinging to her.
“You okay, honey?” Dusty’s voice stopped me mid-step. Warm, worn down with years but gentle. He pushed his chair back just enough to look me full in the face, gray beard catching the light, his eyes soft as faded denim. “Anyone bothering you? You can tell me.”
For a heartbeat, I almost did. Almost let the storm of shame and fear pour out of me.
But the words stuck.
I shook my head fast, no sound leaving my lips.
Before he could press, I hurried down the hall. Coward, I thought. Venom had carved it into my bones, and I could never scrape it clean.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THE MEETING RANlong, Warden’s endless streamof numbers and plans pounding into my skull until it all blurred together. By the time I shoved the war room door open and stepped into the main room, all I wanted was air, and her.
My eyes went straight to the couch where I’d left her.
Empty.
A hard knot cinched tight in my chest. I scanned the room quick, cataloging familiar faces—my brothers at the bar, the sweet butts gathered in their corner—then stopped cold.
Roxy.
She was back.
Leaning against the counter, laughing too loud, red lips gleaming in the dim light. Her perfume hung thick in the air, sweet and suffocating, sliding down my throat like poison. And when she saw me, her smile stretched wide, triumphant, like she’d just won a game nobody else had been playing.
“Ashen.”
She broke away from the women and crossed the room, every step deliberate. Her hips swayed, heels clicking against the floor, as if she wanted the whole damn place to watch her arrival. Roxy was a patch chaser to her bones and didn’t hide it.
I didn’t move. My gaze swept the room again, hunting for Wren, but she was nowhere. The knot in my chest twisted tighter, hot and mean.
Roxy reached me, her hand pressing flat to my chest without hesitation, nails dragging lightly over the leather of my cut like she had the right. “Miss me?” she purred.
