Chapter 6 #2
Valor’s face changed, looking too cold and predatory for a so-called Hero. “And that is exactly why you need to learn your place. You are stiff and cold. You look at me like I’m something you scraped off your shoe.”
“I have no reason to act any other way,” I snapped back. “Our relationship is a PR stunt. The contract does not require me to actually submit to you.”
His eyes narrowed, the gold around his emerald green eyes flashing. “The contract requires you to be mine for the cameras. Right now, you barely tolerate my presence.”
Valor moved and suddenly he was in my space. His hand clamped around the back of my neck and his thumb pressed into the pulse point at my throat as he dragged me flush against his chest.
“This is how you are to behave,” he murmured. His voice shifted to the tone he used to manipulate crowds with his power, concentrated solely on me. I could feel him trying to press into my mind and force compliance. “You look at me like I am a god. Like you are desperate for my attention.”
I kept my expression deliberately blank and fought the urge to flinch away from the suffocating warmth of his power. “Let go of me. Now.”
Valor glared down at me.
“You think you are untouchable because you work for Havoc,” he said, giving me a cruel smile as his fingers dug into my skin.
“Out here in the dark, you are just a fragile little human. I could snap your wrist and tell the press a League member ambushed us. I could drag you back inside crying and the world would still think I was the Hero comforting you. They’d believe whatever I told them without question no matter what you said to them.
All I would have to do is tell them not to listen to you and they wouldn’t hear a word you said. ”
The terrace suddenly felt incredibly isolated, the distant hum of the party miles away.
“I said, let go.” Each word came out clipped. “Or I promise you, you will regret it.”
“The only thing I regret is not putting you in your place on day one,” he whispered. He leaned in until his lips brushed my ear. “Now, put your arms around my neck and smile for me. Show me you know how to behave.”
“Trouble in paradise?” The voice drifted from the shadows, smooth and cold. “Your girlfriend looks like she’s not enjoying your company all that much.”
My stomach plummeted. Please no.
Cipher.
I twisted in Valor’s grip, my mind racing. This was catastrophically bad.
“Let me go. Now.” I kept my words hushed and urgent. “Valor, please.”
Valor let go of the back of my neck, but his other hand clamped harder onto my waist as he turned toward the doorway.
“Well, if it isn’t Havoc’s little Nemesis,” Valor said. His voice dripped with condescension. “Shouldn’t you be plotting something predictable in a basement somewhere?”
I knew Cipher’s casual stance all too well.
To anyone else, he looked perfectly relaxed with one shoulder propped against the doorframe and his hands hanging loose at his sides.
But I could read the tension coiled in his body.
His jaw was clenched tight, a muscle twitching just beneath the edge of his mask.
“Valor,” I said, trying to inject some warning into my tone. “Let’s go back inside.”
Cipher smiled. “She wants to leave. I suggest you listen.”
“I don’t take suggestions from League trash,” Valor replied.
“Valor,” I hissed. “Stop talking. This isn’t some junior League member looking to make a name for himself. He’s Havoc’s Nemesis.”
“I don’t fucking care,” Valor replied.
Cipher took a step on to the terrace. “Take your hands off her.”
I shoved hard against Valor’s chest and stepped out of his grasp, putting myself between them.
“You can’t do this, Cipher. Not here. Valor is an idiot junior member who doesn’t know any better. The Alliance would come down on you hard for attacking him, especially at an event like this.”
“Bishop,” Valor warned.
“Shut up,” I snapped. I kept my eyes fixed on Cipher’s masked face. “He isn’t worth it, Cipher. He’s just a Hero with more ego than sense. This isn’t the time or place for whatever you’re thinking.”
I felt Valor bristling behind me.
“Move, Bishop,” he commanded.
I ignored him.
“Cipher, please,” I said quietly. “Walk away.”
“I said move.” Valor’s hand clamped onto my shoulder, his fingers digging painfully into my skin as he yanked me backward.
Cipher moved with terrifying speed. One moment he stood five feet away. The next, he was right in front of me. His fist collided with Valor’s jaw and a sickening, bone-jarring crack echoed across the empty terrace.
The force of the blow lifted the Hero off his feet. His face went slack as he crumpled to the floor in an ungraceful, unconscious heap.
“Oh fuck.” I stared down at Valor’s motionless body.
Cipher tilted his head. “Your boyfriend should really learn some manners.”
“He’s not my—,” I started automatically, then caught myself because it didn’t really matter anymore. “You shouldn’t have done that.”
“He shouldn’t have put his hands on you.”
“You just assaulted a junior Alliance member,” I said, exasperated.
Cipher reached out and I tensed as he brushed his thumb over the exact spot on my shoulder where Valor’s grip had been the tightest.
I had spent months hiding behind Alliance rules, convincing myself I was a highly functional, independent person who didn’t need Cipher at all. One brush of his thumb against my shoulder proved I was just a liar with a severe touch-starvation problem.
A desperate ache opened up within me, consuming every part of me I was trying to protect.
His lips parting slightly as he slowly stroked the spot again. A ruinous craving clawed at me. I wanted nothing more than to lean into his grip and let the monster devour me whole.
He slowly tilted his head. “If he ever grabs you like that again, I’ll kill him.”
I hated how much I liked the dark promise. I hated him even more for making me feel this way after what he did to me. I grabbed onto the rigid safety of rules to try to give me the distance I needed from him.
“You broke the rules of engagement,” I reminded him, hating how breathless I sounded. “The party was neutral territory tonight.”
Cipher shrugged. “Since I’m already damned, let’s do it properly.”
Before I could ask what he meant, he scooped me up.
“Cipher, no!” I struggled against his grip. “Put me down right now!”
His arms tightened around me as he moved toward the terrace’s edge.
“You don’t understand what you’re doing,” I hissed, twisting in his grasp. I knew the rules of the Nemesis contract. The one rule Havoc had insisted on was that I wasn’t to be kidnapped by Cipher. If he did that, then the whole contract was void.
I needed to stop him before he ruined everything, before he crossed a line that would wreck what he’d worked for. I brought my cuff up against his neck and discharged it.
Nothing happened.
Cipher gave me that maddening smirk. “Now’s not really the time for foreplay, Annie.”
“It’s supposed to stun you, you arrogant ass!” I tried again, jabbing my cuff against him harder. Still nothing.
“Unfortunately, I’m immune to your cuff.”
“Cipher, I swear to god, if you don’t put me down right now—“
“Save your threats for when we’re somewhere private.” He stepped onto the terrace ledge, adjusting his grip to hold me more securely against him.
“You stupid, reckless—” My words were cut off as he launched us into the air, the ground dropping away beneath us with sickening speed.
“Son of a bitch!” I screamed into the wind as the city lights blurred below us. “Do you have any idea what you’ve just done?”
A dark shape materialized in the sky ahead of us, black metal gleaming faintly under the stars as some kind of cloaking technology disengaged.
Cipher’s airship.