Page 34 of Death By Chocolate

What have I done?

The cold metal of my Glocks finds my palms as if magnetized. I draw them in one fluid motion, muscle memory from countless hours of training. The weapons feel alive in my hands, extensions of my rage and grief. I level them at Corso, the tritium night sights steady despite my internal trembling. My fingers curl around the textured grips, finding home on the triggers. A DeLuca welcomed me into his safe haven, but Xeno was my home.

“Dani. No,” Silvio bellows, charging straight at me.

I don’t want forgiveness as I prepare to violate every protocol, every promise, every oath I've ever taken. For Xeno, I will kill Corso DeLuca. I will kill them all.

“He’s tranq, Dani. Not dead,”Silvio snaps, his voice rough and on edge. “Lower your guns. Damn the two of you, fucking insanity.”

Silvio's speaking rapid-fire into his comm unit. I focus on the rise and fall of Xeno's chest, shallow but steady. Threetranquilizer darts protruding from his chest—no blood. Only accusations. Maybe, Corso hadn't killed him.

"Dani, put your guns down,” Corso orders, his gun now trained on me. “I’ll drop your ass right next to him,” he threatens.

The next minute is a blur of chaos. Youric storms into my apartment, his blades trained on me and everyone else. He looks at his brother naked and unmoving, and then stares directly at me, disdain burning in his eyes.

"He'll be fine," Corso says, holstering his weapon. His voice carries the steady assurance of a professional, but I catch the slight tremor in his hands as he lowers his gun. "Just knocked out."

Silvio moves to help Youric get Xeno on his feet, their movements precise and controlled, but their eyes dart between Corso and me on a repeating cycle. They both know what I know—I’ve crossed a line today, one we can't uncross.

“Stay the fuck away from my brother,” Youric says loud enough for all of us to hear, but I know the arrow hits me the hardest. Guilt assails me, but then I remember the conversation from the night before.

“Shut the hell up, Dr. Strange, “ I hiss, taking a page from Xeno’s book of fictitious characters. “he can tell me himself when he wakes up.” Silently, I pray to a god I’m unsure exists that Xeno will forgive me. “

Youric shakes his head. “He’d be a fool.”

Maybe.“Fuck off, Youric.”

They load Xeno onto a gurney, checking vitals with practiced efficiency. His face looks peaceful in unconsciousness, almost vulnerable. It's a lie. Xeno Voss has never been vulnerable a day in his life.

I follow them to the clinic level of The Governor’s clinic, my heels clicking against marble in a rhythm that matches myracing heart. The sound echoes off the walls, a metronome counting down to something I can't name. House whispers a statistic in my ear—estimated time until the tranquilizers wear off. I let the Alexa-ish answer wash over me, an information shield against the chaos of emotion threatening to break through my carefully constructed walls. Love is baffling, and I still struggle to reconcile my actions with my feelings. I could deal with Xeno being away from me, but not like this.

This wing of the clinic is all sleek modernism and subtle wealth, like everything else in The Governor. I've been here too often lately—first with my own gunshot wound, now with Xeno. The thought sends a spike of guilt through my chest. He told me he loved me, and this is how I repaid him.

I’m wearing a path in one of the clinic’s exam rooms an hour later. My House interface keeps trying to regulate my breathing—elevated heart rate, increased cortisol levels, signs of acute stress response. I override the protocols. I need this edge of panic, this sharp reminder of why I chose duty over desire. Why I had to end it before he could end me.

Your trust in a machine is your weakness, his words echo in my head. But machines don't lie. They don't make promises they can't keep. They don't make you feel things you can't afford to feel.

“Dani?” The blonde nurse who seems always here appears, tablet in hand. She's weird—too watchful, too available, too everywhere. Her scrubs are pristine, her smile professional, but something niggles at the back of my mind. “I thought you might like an update on Mr. Voss?"

Relief floods my system that someone is speaking to me. Momentarily drowning out the warning bells about the nurse, I return her smile with one of my own. "Yes, please."

“Okay,” she beams, tapping the mini-tablet with her index finger. “According to this, he’s going to be just fine. See.”

She gestures for me look at the scene. The computer-generated image of my uniform on the screen has my brows dipping low in confusion. My eyes narrow just as the compression sleeves in my uniform activate, crushing my chest.

“He’s fine, bitch. You’re not.”

The needle slides into my neck before I can react. Ice floods my veins as I spin. No. No. Not House. She has hacked House’s command interface functions. The nurse's face blurs, transforming into a predatory smile as she steps back. My hand reaches for my weapon, but my movements are already sluggish, anduncoordinated.

"Shh," a familiar voice soothes from behind me. Through dimming vision, I see Rhys step out of the shadows. My teammate. My former lover. The man who's trained beside me, worked under my leadership. He pulls the nurse into a deep kiss before turning to me, and the betrayal hits harder than any drug.

"Nothing personal, Dani," he says, catching me as my legs give out. His arms are gentle like they've always been. Like they were when he held me down for this bitch to change my dress. Or was she? "Just business."

The world tilts sideways as he lifts me. I try to fight, but my body won't respond. House's voice in my head grows staticky, anddistorted. Security breach detected. Unauthorized access to... System malfunction... Connection lost...

Then silence. The constant hum of House in my ear, my constant companion for years, goes dark. The loss feels like drowning, like falling without a safety net. In my last moments of consciousness, I see the nurse pulling off her wig, revealing close-cropped dark hair. She speaks into a comm unit, "Package secured. Extraction in progress."

Rhys carries me past empty corridors—how did they clear the building? How deep does this betrayal go? I want to scream, tofight, to understand why. But the darkness is pulling me under, inexorable as the tide.

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