Lessons in Corruption (The Fallen Men 1)

He smirked. “Only addiction I got is to bikes, books and babes.”

“Books?”

He laughed that gorgeous laugh right into my face. “You judgin’ a book by its cover?”

I blushed. “Sorry, a lifetime of shallowness has left me a little judgmental. I’m trying to change that.”

“Now you surprise me,” he peered at me, fingering a lock of my pin-straight hair and rubbing it between his fingers. “Pretty like a fuckin’ princess but smart like a queen.”

An enormous man, taller and broader than anyone I had ever seen in my life, appeared in front of us so quietly it was as if he had materialized there. He wore his long, glossy black hair tied back in a thick, messy man bun at the base of his brown neck, his plaid black and red shirt rolled up haphazardly over quilted forearms the size of one of my calves. The features he held in stern repose were roughly cut, a bump from a once or twice broken nose, cliffy cheekbones and a jaw so squared it created right angles under his ears. Even his mouth was hard, flat lined over a dimpled, scruffy chin and his eyes, though thickly lashed, were a flat brown. He was a brute, the poster child for the Canadian outback.

“Eugene,” King greeted warmly. “Sup?”

The man, inexplicably and horribly named Eugene, grunted in response.

King didn’t seem perturbed by the bartender’s lack of social grace. He angled towards the bar but slid a hand under my hair at the tender skin on the back of my neck and squeezed possessively.

“Listen, man, this lady doesn’t know her drink preference yet, if you can fuckin’ believe it. Do me a favor and bring us a selection of cocktails and beers you think she might like?”

“Sweet, sour, bitter or clean?” Eugene asked, leaning his trunk-like arms against the bar so he could look me in the eye. I tried not to flinch when I saw the sheer size of his hands. They were enormous, more animal than human. I had no doubt he could crush me with those hands if he wanted to.

“Um, not too sweet, sour and smoky, maybe?” I answered, still staring at those paws.

They flexed and then clenched into a fist the size of a baby’s head. My gaze snapped up to his to find him grinning, but even that expression was vaguely terrifying because it looked unused and awkward on his all-man face.

“Skittish one you got there, King,” he rumbled in a deep rough-edged voice.

King chuckled. “She’s new.”

“Yeah, to Entrance?”

“To livin’.”

Eugene pursed his lips and finally locked eyes with me. I was surprised by the intensity of his gaze, the scrutiny that made me feel he was giving me a full up-and-down even though he only looked direct into my eyes. He was turning me inside out to make sure I was good enough for his buddy. I let him, even though it made me squirm, because I liked that King had someone looking out for him.

“Good woman,” Eugene finally noted, somberly and academically as if he was reciting his doctorate thesis to the board. “Deserves a good man.”

I frowned at his odd emphasis on the word ‘man’ and so did King. He growled low in his throat, a sound that made me embarrassingly hot.

“If you’re gonna cock block me, get someone else to make our fuckin’ drinks.”

“No one’ll make ‘em better than me.”

“She wouldn’t know the difference.”

My head swiveled back and forth between them like I was watching a tennis match but a deep unease flickered at the back of my thoughts, a candle flame trying to illuminate the things that lurked in the dark.

King finished the stare-off by turning to me, blocking Eugene from my sight. Without thinking, I reached up to tug on a lone, perfectly formed curl in his riot of kinky and straight hair.

I felt his irritation fall away as he watched me watch the slide of his silky locks between my fingers.

“You wanna play with me, babe?” he asked.

I knew he was referring to pool, but it sounded like he could have been referring to something else, something more. A little thrill of fear and anticipation zipped up my spine.

“Can we do some shots first?” I asked.

He raised his brows at me. “You done ‘em before?”

“Once,” I said.

I’d done shots the one night I’d tried to deviate from my life path, at my bachelorette party thrown by my brother for just the two of us. The night I’d learned not to let my inner deviant out to play.

“Eugene, give us two shots of tequila too,” King called out without taking his eyes off me, then said, “I’ll let you get tipsy, babe, but just enough to loosen you up. You know how to do a tequila shooter?”

“Lime and salt, right?”

He grinned at me as the shots were put in front of us with a salt shaker and a bowl of limes.