Page 15 of Darling Wildfire
“Yeah, I showed Atlas,” he said before falling quiet again. I finished loading and pinned up a target before sending it out into the range. I shoved a clipinto the gun but still felt him staring at me.
“Spit it out, Nyx,” I grumbled.
“I saw your face out there—and you had the ‘North is going to do something stupid’ look.”
I frowned at him before throwing on protective eyes, then tossed him a set of noise canceling ears before donning my own. They allowed us to hear each other clearly but muffled the gunfire.
“A recruiter for what?”
“Atrox Gaming,” he said.
“Never heard of it.”
“That’s intentional,” he smirked. “One of those private, invitation only things.”
“Well, I decline whatever this is,” I said.
“Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way.”
“I’m going to follow the plan.”
Sometimes I hated how well Nyx and Atlas knew me. None of us could hide from the other—but then again, that was my fault because when we’d started to descend into the madness of the nightmare, I’d made it very clear that hiding wasn’t an option. We would face it all head on, together. They’d taken the order seriously and to this day it was something we held each other accountable for.
“That’s what you say now, but hearing his voice after all this—”
I cut him off by unloading the entire clip rapid fire at the target, my anger surging. I ejected the clip and turned to him.
“I’ll do what I need to do,” I growled. “This has been over a decade in the making—you really think I’ll do something reckless to endanger that?”
I shoved another clip aggressively into the gun.
Nyx shrugged. “And Kaelin?”
“Nothing changes,” I snapped, still irritated.
“Are you ever going to tell her how you feel at least?” Nyx asked.
He looked like he was trying to hide a smile which just pissed me off more. I unloaded the clip again, unable to hold back. When I ejected the clip this time, I slammed it down on the table.
“Can you be brave for me, baby?”
“I love you…”
“I don’t do love,” I said harshly.
Nyx raised his eyebrows and scoffed. “That’s not what I see.”
I rounded on him angrily and he just raised his hands in surrender but still looked amused. I turned back and started reloading the two clips, trying to center my thoughts.
“Have you heard from Deathwing recently?”
“No,” I said flatly.
Now was not the time to think about the fact I hadn’t heard from Deathwing in months. If I thought about that situation now…no, I told him I’d trust him to execute and while it was the hardest thing I’d ever done, I’d honor my word. I pushed all of that away for now.
“I’m just saying, shits about to get heavy and she’s involved—” he said, giving me a pointed look. “You need to tell her what she’s getting into or you need to leave.”
I slammed the gun down. “Nothing is going to stop me from finishing this,” I said in a deathly calm tone. “Nothing. I warned you all in the beginning and by staying you understood the sacrifices I would make if it came to that.”
