Page 140 of Resist

“What’d you do?” Preston says through a laugh, followed by a loud exhale to match the cigar smoke clinging to the air. “Fool her into believing that she meant more to you than a good lay?”

Fight or flight, Vaughn.

Frozen in time, I don’t even realize I’m crying until I taste the salt of my tears hit my lips. I was played. He wound me up. He made me believe. And now? And now I know the truth.

“You’re a cruel and brilliant fucking bastard,” Carter says.

“So they say.” Ryker chuckles, and every part of me crumples from its sound.

“You better not be playing me, Lockhart.”

“Playing you? Not you, Preston. You’d see right through it. Everybody else, though? Definitely.”

Words are exchanged. I can’t quite make them out. But I don’t need to. The smug laugh Ryker emits is just the twisting of the dagger.

“Like I said, it’s the least I can do, given the circumstances.”

“Pass the pussy, please,” the senator says, and both men laugh as bile threatens in my throat. “How do you know she’ll go along with it?”

“Tell me the time and place, and I’ll have her ready and willing for you. But first you’ll need to give me—”

“Just make sure she’s defiant. I love it when they fight.”

Fight or flight.

I should walk right out that door and leave and never look back. Gather whatever dignity I have left and flee to salvage what I can of my pride.

Ryker doesn’t deserve my wasted breath.

He doesn’t deserve anything from me.

But for some reason my feet are moving forward. Toward the voices. When I clear the corner, Ryker and Carter Preston are sitting on stools with their backs to me, cigars in their hands and drinks on the table in front of them.

Fight.

“Not going to happen.” Words tumble out of my mouth without thought, and the minute they are in the air, I can see both men tense.

Carter turns immediately, eyebrows lifted and a smug smirk sliding onto his lips as his eyes drag over every inch of my body. Ryker, on the other hand, takes his time turning to face me. He sets his cigar down, takes a measured sip of his drink, and then slowly looks at me.

“Vaughn. Perfect timing. Were your ears burning, babe?” Ryker asks, his eyes meeting Carter’s and his silent nod loaded with arrogance, almost as if he’s saying I’ve got this.

“Babe?” I ask, my voice breaking but chillingly calm as I rein in the emotions rioting within me. I won’t give him the satisfaction of knowing he’s affected me. “Babe?”

“Yeah.” He shrugs, the nonchalance in his tone and indifference in his posture throwing me almost as much as his words.

“I’m not yours to share.”

“You took the money, so technically, you’re mine to do with as I please.” I blink my eyes rapidly as I try to comprehend what he’s just said. As I try to come to terms with the fact that I’ve been played this whole time. Pursued for the sake of pursuit. Fucked for the sake of selfishness. Hurt as a pawn in his egotistical game. “It’s not like you’d say no to me.”

Our eyes lock, feud, and every question I have is thrown his way, but he doesn’t give me any indication that he means differently. His expression is just as ice cold as my voice is.

“I don’t—I can’t—how . . .” I stumble over words, overconnecting my thoughts, struggling to remain stoic as I stand there and stare at a man I thought I knew but obviously don’t. As I try to fathom how I trusted him. How I was so gullible to believe he really cared for me.

How I thought I loved him.

“Did you really think I had changed this much for you?” Ryker scoffs, earning a chuckle from Carter that has tears of humiliation burning in my eyes. Tears I won’t give him the sick pleasure of seeing me shed. “Did you really think I want something permanent? Something that can be defined? That you were the exception?”

And for the slightest of seconds I wonder if I’m misunderstanding something, if I’m walking in on a situation that’s causing Ryker to betray my trust.