Where Lightning Strikes (Bleeding Stars #3)(68)

Never again would I allow him to control me.

With my head dropped, my lips moved soundlessly, as if I were sending up a silent prayer. Reaching for a buoy. A petition to find truth in the words that would allow me to remain afloat.

You are strong. You are nobody’s slave. He only has power and effect if you give it to him. And you won’t let him have it.

Blowing out a breath, I donned that stoic, lofty mask, lifted my chin, and went back to work. The whole time I pretended as if I wasn’t painfully aware of him standing there in the haze of light suspended above him. As if I didn’t feel the heat of his unfaltering gaze searing into me.

Stark, disbelieving laughter shook my throbbing chest. For a fleeting second, my armor dropped, leaving me vulnerable to his sharp stare.

Why now? Why after two weeks would he show his face when I’d caught nothing more than a glimpse of the back of his head in all that time? It had been as if he’d calculated his every move, ensuring he’d evaded, avoided, and eluded any sight of me.

So easily forgotten.

Dirty.

I could feel the break in the air, the shift, and I knew he’d followed Ash and Zee over to the secluded booth where they liked to hide out. Away from prying eyes and their rock-star fame. Although truthfully, they really didn’t seem to have that many issues around here. Most of the locals’ tastes slanted country, and they came to the bar in droves on the nights the more popular country bands played.

But that didn’t mean the guys didn’t garner attention on their appearance alone.

Girls out looking for a good time couldn’t resist these boys who looked so bad.

Trouble and disorder and a mind-blowing good time.

Pain stabbed at my stomach as I pictured Lyrik leaving here with one of them. Or more likely, with two. That always seemed to be his style. Images of the side of the boy I really didn’t know flashed through my mind, the lusty gleam in his sinful eyes as he was draped in all-too willing women.

I couldn’t shake the fear he was out for one last hurrah in the tiny city of Savannah before he left it all behind.

Before he left me behind.

He’d promised he would.

But I’d never imagined it’d be on these terms.

“Hey, Tamar.” Sophie broke into my tortured thoughts when she called to me from the other side of the bar. She craned her head back in the direction of the isolated booth. “Your friends are here.”

As if I hadn’t noticed.

“The cute blond one is insisting you take care of them. He said something about it being an emergency. Of course he did it with a smile on his face, so I’m not so sure what could be so urgent, but I figured you wouldn’t mind all that much considering you normally go running that direction the second they step through the door.”

Running?

Had it really been that way in those weeks when things were so easy between Lyrik and me? Had I really gone to him so readily?

Just another ignorant lamb willingly led off to the slaughter.

God, I was stupid.

No more.

Strutting across to the boundless array of liquor lined up on the back bar, I grabbed a bottle of vodka. I barely glanced over my shoulder to respond. “Well, I do mind.”

She hiked both her shoulders to her ears and began to back away. “Sorry…too late…I told him you’d be happy to.”

“Well, then go tell them I’m not happy to.”

Nervously, she shuffled on her feet and bit at her bottom lip, so transparent and full of guilt. “The blond one kinda sorta invited me back to his place after work tonight if I delivered the message.”

Exasperated and fighting the rumbles of fear, I rubbed at my forehead.

She had to be kidding me.

I turned back to her. “Thank you for throwing me under the bus. And in case you wanted to know, the cute blond one is Ash.”

There was no missing the bite to my words. But come on. Selling me out for a night with a rock star? Not cool.

She gave me a pleading look. “I’m sorry, Tamar. Really. But he was so insistent.”

I guess I had to give her a break. She’d only been working here for a month. And even I knew those dimples were deadly. The guy could probably talk a vegetarian into joining the steak of the month club.

I heaved out a breath. “Fine. I’ll take care of them.”

An apology crinkled her brow. “Thank you. And for the record, I thought I was doing you a favor.”

I scowled. “Please don’t do me any more of them.”

So maybe I was being a bitch. But I couldn’t help it. I couldn’t help the way agitation churned in my gut and skimmed across my skin, bristling against the raw, potent energy already saturating the thick air.

Stealing myself, I strode to the end of the bar and slipped out into the main room, strutting across the wooden floorboards on my super-high heels. The vibration sent a rush of shivers up the backs of my legs, like a steady boom, boom, boom pulsing through my body.

The sound only increased the closer I got, that energy going wild as my heart hammered and my stomach both lifted and fell.

Those foolish childhood butterflies decided it was the perfect time to take flight when Lyrik’s steely gaze landed on me.

Those sinful eyes seemed to flicker between lust and regret. The spark of need in the flare of his nose and the distress in the pinch of his brow. As if it hurt to look at me.