Page 20 of Filthy Little Fix
I hear the faint ping of the data transfer. I reach for my comms device and hang up, without waiting for his reply, tossing the burner phone onto the passenger seat. My secure comms device flashes with the incoming file. The address.Hisaddress.
He thinks he can play games with me? He thinks he can turn my life into a fucking circus? I'll show him a game. And he's going to beg to lose.
The address leadsme to a house so depressing and mundane it turns my stomach. A complex of gray, single-story houses,indistinguishable from thousands of others in that forgotten corner of the city. No grand estate, no high-tech lair. Just… average. A cage built of mediocrity.
How could a lunatic like him live in such a…domesticatedplace?
I cut the engine. My fingers wrap around the chill metal of my pistol. I don't need backup. This is personal. It'smine.
I slam the car door shut. This is so different from the controlled chaos of my world. I remember Luca's words. He works in an office. Almost a civilian.
This place is a betrayal. It makes Nyx even more incongruous, more out of place.
I stride up the short walkway. My gaze sweeps the muted exterior of the house. No lights. No sounds. Too quiet.
I won't knock. I don't knock for pests.
I aim a brutal kick at the door lock. The wood splinters, and the door frame gives way. The door swings inward, revealing a dimly lit, dusty interior.
My pistol is up, aimed, ready.If I have to, it'll be a single clean shot,I promise myself.
I step inside, my eyes scanning the small, cluttered living room. Cheap furniture, stacks of old books, wires trailing everywhere like a digital spiderweb. It smells of stale coffee and something chemical.
And then I see him.
Nyx isn't hiding. He's not cowering.
He's sitting on a worn armchair in the center of the room, facing the door. He's wearing everyday clothes; faded sweatpants and an old, stretched-out t-shirt that does nothing to hide the lean lines of his body. His messy black hair falls over his eyes, but I can see a familiar smirk forming as he sees me. The marks of my blows are still on his face.
He's holding a mug, steam curling from its rim. Coffee. He sips slowly, calmly, watching me as if I'm an expected guest.
"Took you long enough, mister," Nyx says, his voice soft, almost a purr. He doesn't move. Doesn't flinch from the pistol pointed directly at his head, nor does he pretend to be surprised.
The audacity. The sheer, infuriating audacity of him. My blood freezes, then boils. This bastard. He knew. He knew I was coming. He wanted me to come.
My finger flirts with the trigger. Every fiber of my being screams to pull it, to blow his brains out and end this farce.
But something stops me. The certainty that he wants me to do it. That he's waiting for it. The thought that even his death would be onhisterms, a sick reward.
"You think this is funny?" I roar, my voice filling the small room. "You think you can play games with me? Mess with my systems? Send me fucking plant poems? What's your problem, you freak?"
That irritating smirk fades. His face fills with a fury that surprises me. "My problem, mister? You think you can shove me into your fucking life and then throw me back into this bland, goddamn cage?" His voice, low at first, rises with each word, vibrating with a raw emotion that has nothing to do with pleasure, and everything to do with pure, unadulterated rage. "You had no right!"
He's seriously angry about beingfreed? He's not looking at me with lust like he did in captivity; he'spissed, as if I owe him something. He'saccusingme.
This is real. This is his raw, unfiltered rage, and his sheer audacity to yell atDante Volkovabout my right to do anything.
Fuck.
My control shatters. The pistol clatters to the floor, forgotten, and I lunge, grabbing his shirt collar with bone-crushing force. I yank him forward, dragging him out of the armchair. The mugclatters to the floor, shattering into sharp pieces of porcelain, and coffee spreads among the thin layer of dust on the floor. I don't give him time to find his footing. I slam him against the nearest wall, his head thudding dully against the plaster.
"Listen here, you piece of shit," I snarl, inches from his face. "We showed you mercy. What the fuck do you want?"
Nyx doesn't move. He doesn't even struggle to escape my hands. "I want to feel alive. You decided to send me back to hell. You think that's mercy?"
I push him harder against the wall, his smaller body hitting the plaster hard again. "You are an aberration! A pest! You think you can fuck with my territory, come back to it, just because your life is as shitty as you are?"
"You didn't throw me out, you discarded me!" Nyx snaps back, his voice hoarse, but unwavering despite the obvious injury to his entire body against the wall. "And the only reason you did that is because you didn't have the balls to put a fucking bullet in my head!"
