A Thousand Cuts (Cursebreakers, Inc. #3)

4. Fix

Chapter 4

Fix

A loud knock on his window made him jump straight out of his seat, his head hitting the roof and making his brain vibrate in his skull.

Swearing and cradling his bruised scalp and pride, he turned his head to look and found Midas staring at him through the glass, the gentle breeze ruffling his long, shiny locks.

“Stalking?” Midas signed to him, his mahogany gaze as dispassionate as every flick of his fingers. “Is that what we’re doing now?”

Fix sputtered, trying to find the words to respond, but in all honesty, there was nothing he could say that would make his sitting in his car in front of Liam’s building sound innocent. So he just slumped in his seat and covered his hot face, peeking through his fingers.

Midas walked around the front of the truck and hopped into the passenger seat, filling the air with the scent of spice. And then he stared at him.

Fix wanted to squirm, but he held himself still, dropping his hands and turning to face it head-on.

Midas’s eyes were as sharp as a knife.

“How did you find me?” Fix asked.

Midas gave a dismissive wave. “Please.”

“Were you following me?”

“No.” Midas dragged the sign out to elongate Fix’s humiliation. “That seems to be your new hobby.”

“I’m not stalking him,” Fix said, but even to his own ears it sounded weak, so he didn't think his hands were any better at conveying conviction.

“Sure.” Midas adjusted his chunky gold earrings so they hung perfectly again. “What would we call this, then?”

“He has several active curses on him and he wouldn’t let me break them.”

Midas looked…interested was too strong of a word, but his eyebrow went up a smidge and he looked vaguely present. “Several curses?”

“That’s what he said. I didn’t catch the rest since I stupidly didn’t bring my kit with me thinking I’d just talk to him. The one I broke was a scarf trying to choke him.”

“Choke? Isn’t that Black’s territory, not yours?”

“It was like a self-tightening cast gone wrong. Dangerous, but not deadly.”

“Why wouldn’t he let you break the rest?” Midas asked.

“He didn’t have the money for it.”

Midas nodded. “Makes sense.”

“No, no it doesn’t,” Fix argued, turning his body to face Midas completely. “He looked scared and tired and he needed help. I could have broken them all and he would have been able to live his life free from them. Money doesn’t matter. I just wanted him safe.”

“Is that why you’re here, then?”

Fix nodded, refusing to go into too much detail with Midas.

“I don’t think you sitting here staring at his building is doing much. Just to let you know.”

“He sent me away,” Fix said with a heavy sigh. “Not much I can do about that.”

“Not with that attitude.”

Fix scoffed. “What do you suggest I do? Break into his apartment and force him to let me break his curses for free?”

“It’s not a break-in if you’re following protocol,” Midas said. Fix stared until he rolled his eyes. “Hart would be ashamed.”

“Just spill.”

“Cursebreaker rulebook, section fourteen, paragraph nine,” he said. “The law allows cursebreakers entrance to private residences against occupants’ wishes if the entrance serves the purpose of keeping the subject safe and protected from curses.”

“Never heard of it.”

“Amelia Marie Raynard,” Midas said. “Three years ago she was cursed to repel anyone who came close to her. She liked it so she never reported it. Until her nieces came to visit, ran at her to give her a hug, hit the curse, and got tossed across the backyard. Ended up at the hospital. Hospital reported to PUMA, PUMA called the cursebreaking team. Amelia locked herself in her house, refusing them entrance. PUMA allowed for a forced entry and cursebreaking on the grounds of her being a danger to her surroundings. Rulebook was revised after that to include the new rule.”

“You keep track of rulebook revisions?” Fix asked, incredulous both at the amount of words Midas just said and the fact that he knew the new rule at all.

“Please.” Midas waved dismissively again. “I know people.”

Fix wanted to ask what people. As far as he knew, Midas would appreciate a curse like Amelia’s for himself, but that thought was quickly overridden by the realization of what Midas had just told him.

“I can go in?”

“Yes,” Midas said before he got out of the car, rounding the front of the truck and heading toward the entrance of the building.

Fix widened his eyes and followed him, jogging to catch up and grabbing him by the arm. Midas looked down at it with a dissatisfied curl to his lip and Fix hastily let go, watching Midas fix the nonexistent wrinkles in the leather.

“What are you doing?” Fix demanded.

“Speeding along the process.”

“He could be in there,” Fix said. “And even if he’s not, he could have left his dog there.”

“Give the puppy a treat to distract it.”

Fix snorted. “It’s definitely not a puppy. Think more along the lines of Wren’s idea of what is adorable.”

Midas tamed a glossy lock that was floating around his face as he weighed his words. “It’s white? Blue eyes? Has a chunk out of its ear?”

Fix was surprised. “How did you…”

“And your boy is blond? Long hair?”

Fix didn’t want to react to Liam being called ‘his boy’ but it was impossible not to. It felt so right that Fix could almost taste the words on his tongue, could imagine that it was reality. His chest puffed out. His shoulders squared. His hands flexed with the need to hold Liam close.

His boy. Fuck, but how good did that sound?

He could try to fool himself into thinking this thing with Liam was purely professional, but he knew himself. Beneath the genuine need to help him there was more.

He’d spent years learning what made himself tick, and having someone to cherish, protect, and pamper was it. All he’d ever wanted. Every failed attempt at a relationship in the past was a personal failure he took onto himself. He lived in if-onlys, regretted so much, and hoped for the future secretly.

Maybe once the curses were broken something could blossom?

Gwen was right, the best things were worth fighting for, and Fix just had a feeling about Liam that he desperately wanted to explore if Liam felt the same.

Could he ever?

Midas waved a hand in front of his face and Fix snapped back to reality, swallowing past the yearning. “Yes. That’s him.”

“They left before you got here, haven’t come back yet.”

“Why were you here?” he asked, stressing the words with his hands.

Midas didn’t reply, simply pushed through the front door that was still broken and unlocked, much to Fix’s annoyance. Fix followed after him, making a mental note to call the building manager or just straight-up bring a tool bag and fix it his damn self.

They passed a young woman who was coming down the stairwell to the left who missed the bottom step as she spotted Midas. Fix caught her arm as Midas kept on going without a care.

“Thanks,” she whispered to Fix, embarrassment making her hurry off.

Fix gave her a brief smile, settling at an ambivalent Midas’s side as he called the rusty elevator.

It arrived with a screech, the doors opening to reveal a guy dressed in dark clothes, the brim of his hat pulled low over his face. He hardly looked at them as he exited.

They entered and Fix pressed the six for Liam’s floor.

They arrived with a labored lurch and stepped into the dank beige hallway, Fix leading the way to the right door.

“This is it,” Fix said, only now realizing that they’d gotten this far without any plan for how they were getting into Liam’s apartment.

Or at least, so he thought.

Midas pulled a long golden hairpin from the inside pocket of his leather jacket. It was about two centimeters thick and had a ruby set into its handle.

“Will that pick the lock?” Fix asked, a little fascinated. He’d seen similar things in the movies Ash liked to inflict upon them.

Midas gave him a flat look that said many things at once as he took the pin and gathered his hair into a beautiful bun at the top of his head. One, that Fix was an idiot. Two, that Midas was judging him for it. And three, that Midas shouldn’t have to suffer such indignities.

“Sorry,” Fix felt compelled to say. Like he was apologizing for his entire existence up until that point.

Midas reached into his pocket again and pulled out a small leather pouch. He knelt on the floor in front of the lock and flipped it open. Fix glanced around them warily, but Midas didn’t seem to care as he selected a couple of the thin metal pieces and started in on the lock.

Only he paused.

“What?” Fix asked and signed, even though Midas wasn't looking his way.

Like he heard him anyway, Midas glanced at him. “Lock’s been tampered with before.”

Fix felt a lance of anger and fear move through him, his mind throwing a thousand scenarios at him, each worse than the last. He’d never gotten to ask any details about who was cursing Liam before he’d made him leave the first time. “Recently?”

“No way to really tell,” Midas said. “The building isn’t exactly secure. It could have happened before he even moved in and they didn’t bother to replace it because it wasn't broken. It could have been a robbery at one point. It could have been that they tried it and it didn’t work.”

Fix took in a calming breath and blew it out through his nose before he nodded. He was definitely replacing the locks. The whole door. He wanted walls between danger and his b—Liam. His Liam. Fuck, he was losing it.

Midas got to work and in a matter of seconds he was getting back to his feet as the door popped open, dusting himself off like he did this every day.

Honestly. It didn’t seem to be a far-fetched assumption.

Midas gestured for him to go ahead and Fix wished he could say he second-guessed his decision. Liam’s safety was at the forefront of his mind though, so he pushed his way into the apartment without a moment’s hesitation.

He was all business.

They walked into the familiar living room and Fix looked around freely now that Liam wasn’t there.

The place suited him perfectly. It was colorful, but with tranquil tones that were comforting rather than stimulating. There was also an edge to the pieces chosen—packed full of personality, just like Liam.

“We don’t have time to swoon.” A hand pushed into his face and Fix broke out of his trance to face Midas’s exasperation. “Get to it.”

He nodded and placed his bag on the little sofa, opening it up and taking out several different markers and pens. All of them were caster-created and served a purpose in his diagnostics. Each ink color was infused with different magical substances and responded to curse signatures around him.

He took them one at a time, uncapping them and bringing the tips to the skin on his forearm. He pressed each one to the inside of his wrist, drawing a line that connected to the one tattooed on him in light blue ink.

His tattoo carried the magical ink to the cursemark on his shoulder, letting it detect the presence of curses around him.

Nuisance curses used everyday things to work—the wood of the furniture, floral ingredients in beauty or cleaning products, elements in a specific space. Things one would find in everyone’s home.

It was why they were trickier to find but so much easier to cast than any other kind.

Fix went through his process diligently, ignoring Midas’s impatient huffing as he waited. The oak ash infused marker reacted first, the line glowing bright on Fix’s skin before slithering up and lingering in the air.

It glimmered for a split second before settling over a rickety-looking chair tucked in front of the sewing machine.

One.

The crushed cotton flower marker reacted next, the glimmer flying out of the room. Fix followed it into the bedroom, where it latched on to the curtains hanging over the window.

Two.

Lavender was next, reacting the moment Fix touched it to his arm. It led them to Liam’s tiny bathroom and wrapped the glimmer around a perfume bottle.

Three.

The final one was an elemental marker. The water one. It stayed in the bathroom and wrapped itself around the shower head.

Four.

“Four active curses from what I can see,” Fix said, turning around only to find an empty apartment and Midas nowhere to be found.

“Oh for the… Skulking around like a movie villain,” he muttered under his breath as he packed all of the markers except a shiny white one away and unbuttoned his shirt. He had to break these curses as soon as possible and be gone before Liam got back.

He let the shirt slip from one of his arms, rolling his shoulder and taking a deep breath before uncapping the marker and pressing the glowing tip of it to his wrist again.

The white ink rushed up the tattooed lines on his arm, mixing with the cursemark for a moment before splitting into four thin tendrils of light that rushed out of his skin.

They went toward the cursed objects and wrapped themselves around the glimmers above them. They squeezed hard, then pulled until there was a soft crackle in the air as the curses began to break.

Fix closed his eyes and focused, a satisfied smile pulling at his lips as he heard the telltale whoosh of a curse evaporating from existence.

He opened his eyes again to see the white tendrils floating slowly back to him, slipping over his skin and dimming until there was nothing left but his cursemark and the dark tattooed lines extending from it.

He put his shirt back on quickly and gathered his things, rushing out of the apartment before he could allow himself to linger just to feel closer to Liam. This wasn’t what this was about.

He clicked the door shut and was wondering how he’d lock it when a hand appeared and did the job for him.

“Took you long enough,” Midas said, putting his tools away and leading the way out of the building.

“I wanted to make sure he’d be okay,” Fix said.

“As if you won’t be keeping watch anyway.”

Fix looked away because he didn’t want every emotion he was feeling to be on display. The thing was, he didn’t really think Liam would be okay even after Fix had done his job. There was something…bigger going on here. Something that went beyond a few silly curses he couldn’t afford to have broken.

“I just think I have to keep an eye out for him.”

Midas clasped his shoulder once before stepping back. “You should also do something about that lovesick look in your eye while you’re at it.”

“I do not have a lovesick—” he started, but Midas gripped his hands mid-sign to stop him from finishing.

“You absolutely do,” he said. “It’s gross. Ask him out on a date or something now the case is done and spare us the melodrama.”

With that he turned and just walked away, leaving Fix to deal with his emotions on his own in the middle of a street he absolutely shouldn’t be seen on. Scratching his beard and the back of his neck, he worried his skin red raw as he walked to his truck. He peeled out of there as fast as he could, struggling to get his own thoughts in order.

Wren felt like he should protect Liam.

Midas was of the opinion he should go for it.

And Fix…well he pretty much agreed. He was sure of what he was feeling. There was a pull inside him that kept tugging and leading him Liam’s way. He knew what he wanted. What he craved.

It was a long shot to hope Liam wanted the same.

Someone to care for him. Someone to take some of the weight off his shoulders. Someone to ease the burden of existing for him. Fix had seen how he reacted to direct instruction, but he couldn’t assume anything with any confidence.

He needed to ask if Liam wanted a daddy.

He parked in front of the headquarters and skulked to his office to pretend to do paperwork while his mind kept replaying every moment he spent with Liam on an endless loop. When he couldn’t even fake focus anymore, he gave up and decided to go home until the next call came in. He was useless anyway.

“Fancy seeing you here.” Taylor’s drawl carried through the doorway to Fix as he turned the corner from the hallway into the front lobby.

He pulled up just short of being spotted, peeking around the potted plant blocking him from view. It was a gamble walking into the lobby of a cursebreaker building. You never knew what was about to greet you.

Fix instantly recognized the head of strawberry blond curls that were shining amber under the overhead lighting above the reception desk. Round wire-rimmed glasses glinted as they were nervously adjusted by long fingers.

Avery Undergrove.

Avery was the Curator and Archivist for the Slatehollow Warehouse, where all good cursed objects, and some magical, went to die—meaning classification and safeguarding. Fix had visited the warehouse a number of times—sometimes the line between cursed objects and nuisance curses that were cast on objects blurred. The previous C&A had been a surly man who’d only acknowledged things with grunts until his very last day, when he’d declared “good riddance” and walked out.

Avery, on the other hand, was as sweet as a box of candies and…eccentric.

It was the only polite way to put it without outright calling the caster weird.

Admittedly, Fix didn’t know too much about him other than that he was surprisingly young to hold such a high title. Only twenty-four. But that added to his eccentricity. Curation and archiving were never any caster’s first choice. Being stuck cataloging objects and sitting around all day was usually what a caster aging out into retirement chose to do with the rest of their working days—like the previous grump.

Avery had been bright-eyed and freshly graduated when he took over two years ago, and appeared to be absolutely delighted by the job to this day. Rarely did he venture outside the confines of his warehouse. Rain or shine. Day or night. Emergency evacuation orders be damned. (Yes, there had been a news report about the strange caster caught cradling cursed objects instead of following safety instructions.)

There was only one thing in the world it seemed that was able to draw Avery from his cave.

A very particular interest.

“This is for Midas. To finish the reports on the items he brought in,” Avery mumbled, holding out a stack of papers the thickness of three books and haphazardly put together.

“I see.” Taylor eyed it with an amused air, making no move to take it with her freshly painted nails. Fix could smell the acetone in the air. “Is the fax machine still broken?”

Avery bit his lip, pink blooming on his cheeks and making his freckles stand out. “Yes. It’s the strangest phenomenon, really.”

“I’ll say. Over a year now and they can’t find the problem and fix it.” Taylor pouted in sympathy. “And your email?”

“Completely unrecoverable still.”

“How frustrating.”

Avery cleared his throat, pulling the paper stack back to his green sweater-vested chest for support so he could use one hand to adjust his glasses again. “Quite frustrating. A mystery, truly.”

“Surely they should send someone out at this point? I’m going to call and give them a piece of my mind, honey, don’t you worry.” She made a show of reaching for the phone and Avery made a sound not unlike the rodents who’d been living in Fix’s desk.

“NO! No, don’t trouble yourself,” he rushed out, holding his hand protectively over Taylor’s handset. “I already called them. They’re on their way…t-tomorrow…maybe…um…next week…um…”

Taylor hid her smirk well, but Fix caught it lurking underneath her concerned veneer like a wolf in sheep’s clothing. “Well, only if you’re sure.”

Avery bobbed his head up and down so hard Fix was surprised the glasses stayed on his face, relief making his shoulders sag, the papers against his chest slipping lower and revealing a small oval amulet in rose gold.

“It’s still too much though. That you have to come all the way over here in person and risk seeing Midas’s miserable face,” Taylor said, and Fix rolled his eyes, thinking she was laying it on a little thick now.

Avery noticeably twitched at the sound of Midas’s name. The undeniably cute ears that stuck out away from his head turned a deep red that bled down his neck. His fingers tightened on his papers as he fought for nonchalance and landed squarely in enamored territory.

They’d seen many similar cases over the years in this building, in that exact same spot. Fix had caught another one just this morning at Liam’s building.

“Is he in?” Avery asked shyly, fidgeting in his knee-high argyle socks and brown loafers. The bony knees sticking out from his tailored shorts were quivering.

Taylor hummed, already knowing full well Midas was out. “Let me check.”

She began clacking on her computer, and Fix could see she was typing in a shopping website. She hummed to herself as she clicked through pairs of heels, a serious look on her face while Avery died of anticipation.

Fix decided she’d had her fun by now. Torturing Midas’s fan club was the price she demanded for having to be on the front lines of it, dealing with calls, emails, letters, and impromptu visits to declare fealty and devotion at Midas’s feet.

But Avery didn’t really do any of those, save maybe the last one.

The difference was that Avery and Midas knew each other. Avery probably saw Midas just as much as they did, maybe more. So, it was less crazed and more…loserish and sweet. Which Fix felt on a deeply personal level. He’d had his share of crushes that had crashed and burned in the flames of unrequited love. And he was currently drowning in a sea of emotions for someone he had just met and who he wasn’t sure felt the same.

Fix pushed it all away and cleared his throat.

Avery peeked hopefully toward the hallway. He jumped in place when he saw him before casting his gaze beyond, like Midas was miraculously hiding behind him.

Fix was large, but Midas wasn’t exactly small either. Or prone to lurking. He simply appeared and left whenever he felt like it, regardless of manners or situation.

Fix strode toward the desk with a sincere smile. “Hi, Avery. How are you?”

“I’m well,” he replied, returning the smile. “I just got finished cataloging those marbles you brought in last month.”

Fix shuddered remembering them. “So no more tripping?”

Avery laughed a little, green eyes shining. “Well you could still trip on one normally. It doesn’t just happen in the movies! But those particular ones are safely put away for now. Did you know that marbles used to be used as bottle stops as well as toys? They’re really quite fascinating, you know?”

Fix didn’t know. Fix didn’t think he’d ever know what Avery saw in these things. Maybe he was jaded. Maybe he didn’t have enough of the right screws loose. Either way, he did his best to allow Avery his quirks. Different strokes for different folks, after all.

“I think I’ll stick with the normal ones and just avoid stepping on them. My tailbone still hasn’t recovered,” Fix said, laying a hand over the offended area.

Avery laughed again, but his gaze kept drifting longingly to the hallway.

Fix felt bad for him, so he immediately said, “Midas is out of the office today, I’m sorry. But I can pass those along and tell him you stopped by if you want?”

The naked disappointment that overtook Avery’s face was a little too much to stare directly at.

“Oh…um…it’s okay,” Avery said, mortification and embarrassment now warring for space. “I should have called ahead before I came over. It’s my mistake. I’ll just go. I’m sorry for intruding. I know you’re busy and here I am, just taking up time—”

He turned on his heel as he rambled, blindly moving toward the door and slamming straight into the leather-clad chest of none other than the object of his devotion. An explosion of papers accented the collision, giving it a cinematic flair Fix was almost impressed by.

Midas grasped Avery’s arm to prevent him from falling to the ground in a weird facsimile of what Fix had done for the girl on the stairs as papers fluttered around them. A few strands of Midas’s dark hair escaped the pin he had secured it with earlier to brush his high cheekbones as he looked down into Avery’s surprised face.

There was hardly an inch of space between them, their noses almost brushing.

Avery looked like he’d ceased to be on this plane of existence, staring at Midas in wonder, heedless of the chaos surrounding them. It was like he’d just witnessed the descent of a shooting star, not the near-flattening of his own person.

“Midas,” he murmured, hands deadweight and not signing, even though he knew how. Midas’s eyes moved to his lips to catch it, and Avery’s cheeks bloomed anew, even brighter than before.

“Sorry,” he scrambled to sign in the small space between their chests, before finishing with a coy tilt to his finger placement. “Hello. How are you?”

Midas regarded him for a steely moment before responding with a short, “Good.”

Avery smiled like Midas had just given him a five-page soliloquy.

Midas stared at Avery for one more suspended moment before he turned his attention to the mess at their feet, face still blank. Weirdly, he was still holding on to Avery’s arm, like he was afraid he would topple over as soon as he let go. Fix furrowed his brow, again thinking of how Midas had shrugged him off for even touching his jacket.

Avery followed Midas’s gaze down, finally breaking his stare, and flushed. “I’ll clean it up,” he said and signed with frantic fingers, bending down to do just that.

Midas finally released his grip, and Fix was sure he was about to walk away and escape the awkward encounter while he had the chance.

Only…he didn’t.

In fact, he bent as well to start gathering the papers slowly and precisely.

Avery’s head snapped up in surprise, glasses falling down the bridge of his nose. The papers he’d already started gathering fell uselessly to the floor again.

Fix bit back his laugh. It really was kinda cute. Avery was arguably one of the most intelligent people he’d ever met—his knowledge of casts and curses in his purview was unmatched—yet in front of Midas he turned stupid and foolish.

Midas gathered the papers while Avery stared at him gathering the papers, and together it was cleaned up in a few moments. Midas finally looked up and offered the stack to Avery.

Which broke him out of his daze. He signed. “They’re for you.”

Midas looked down at them with disinterest as he got back to his feet. Avery hopped up after him like an eager rabbit, clasping his hands together at the small of his back. One of his long socks had slipped down his calf.

Midas flicked his eyes back up to Avery under his lashes and nodded, signing a simple, “Thanks,” before taking the papers and continuing on toward the hallway.

Avery stared after him with stars in his eyes, craning his neck to make sure he got every last glimpse while he could.

Fix shuffled toward Taylor, who seemed equally enthralled by the turn of events.

“I’ve never seen him stick around like that before,” she murmured out of the corner of her mouth.

Fix shook his head. “Nope.”

“Was he in a good mood this morning? Woke up on the bright and cheery side of the bed?”

“Not that I’m aware of.”

Maybe breaking and entering was the key to Midas’s happiness?

“I’ll be going now, um, have a good morning…afternoon…day of the month…” Avery rambled dreamily, barely paying them any notice as he nearly walked into the doorframe on his way out.

“Have a good day!” Taylor called after him in a faux-sugary tone. “Come again soon!” Then she said to Fix, “Definitely strange. You should check him for curses immediately.”

Fix didn’t think it was that bad, but then he remembered Hart and shuddered. “I’ll do it now. Anything for me while I’m here?”

“Nothing, Daddy.”

“I told you—”

“FIX!”

They both spun toward the door to find Liam silhouetted there like an avenging angel, his pale hair catching the sun and creating a burning glow around him.

“YOU brOKE INTO MY APARTMENT AND brOKE MY CURSES WITHOUT MY CONSENT!”

Fix grimaced as the words echoed around the space. He could hear office doors opening farther down the hall. Mary could probably hear it in the basement.

“Scratch that,” Taylor said cheerily. “I have something for you.”