Chapter 7
CIPHER
The airship door sealed behind us with a hiss, cutting off the howling wind. I set Annie down, and she immediately shoved away from me, stumbling back until she hit the opposite wall of the airlock. Strands of her hair had escaped from their careful styling, falling across her flushed face.
“Do you have any idea what you’ve done?” She looked murderous, chest heaving. “You just violated your Nemesis contract.”
“I didn’t violate anything.” Part of me wanted to tell her how fucking gorgeous she looked when she was angry.
“Are you serious? The one clause Havoc insisted on, the one thing that would void the entire contract, was you kidnapping me.” She jabbed a finger in my direction. “And what did you just do? Kidnap me!”
“Technically, I can’t kidnap Havoc’s Keeper.
” I took a step toward her, watching her tense.
“But you weren’t at the party as his Keeper, were you?
You were there as Valor’s date.” I couldn’t keep the disgust from my voice on that last word.
Date. As if that fucking asshole deserved to stand next to her, let alone touch her.
“Remember? I asked very clearly if you were at the party as a Keeper or as something else. You made it clear you were there as something else.”
Annie looked ready to launch herself at me, fingers flexing like she was considering strangling me with her bare hands. I should have been focusing on damage control, on the dozen operational concerns that came with an unplanned abduction.
Instead, all I could think was how much I’d missed her.
Not counting my fuck-up at the Nexus, it had been three months, four days and two hours since I’d last been this close to her.
Since I’d breathed the same air. It was like drowning for all that time and suddenly breaking the surface.
Having her pressed against me during the flight had been its own special kind of torture.
She was so close and yet completely untouchable.
“You know what your problem is, Cipher? You think you’re so goddamn clever that rules don’t apply to you.”
I smiled. “One of my many problems, I’m sure.”
“You’re splitting hairs over a technicality to kidnap me!”
“I’m not splitting hairs. I’m working within our arrangement.” I let my voice dip lower, suggestive. “Something you used to appreciate about me.”
Before I could say another word, Annie launched herself at me, a blur of red fabric and fury.
I caught her wrists mid-swing as she tried to hit me with one fist then the other.
“Let me go,” she snarled, twisting in my grip.
“No.” I pulled her closer, eliminating the space between us until her body was against mine. The scent of her perfume filled my lungs, achingly familiar. Her warmth seeped through the fabric of her dress, and I could feel every heaving breath, every tremor of rage that ran through her.
“Fuck you,” she spat, struggling harder. The muscles in her forearms tensed as she tried to break free, but I held her easily, careful not to bruise. “Fuck you and your technicalities and your goddamn games.”
Once, I would have reminded her what happens when she threatened me. Would have backed her against the wall and shown her exactly how thin the line between her anger and desire really was.
But as I looked down at her flushed face, at the fire in her eyes that had haunted my dreams every night we were apart, I said the only truth that mattered.
“I’ve missed you, Annie. Every fucking day.”
Her whole body went rigid. For a moment, she looked like I’d struck her.
“You’ve missed me?” Her voice trembled with rage. “You don’t get to say that. Not after everything you did.”
Her fury was almost tangible. I felt like I could have reached out and touched it, if I wasn’t certain she’d attempt to break my fingers for trying.
“You don’t get to kidnap me, insult my intelligence with your contract loopholes, and then stand there telling me you’ve missed me.” Her voice rose with each word. “Like I’m just supposed to what? Blush and forgive you? Go fuck yourself, Cipher.”
I pulled her toward the corridor. “We’re not doing this here.”
“Let go of me!”
I ignored her protests, scooping her up and carrying her down the hallway toward my onboard office. This conversation needed walls. Soundproof ones.
She fought against me every step of the way, and I couldn’t really blame her. But beneath her familiar vanilla scent was a cloying layer of sandalwood and synthetic citrus. Valor’s cologne.
I set her down inside my office, the door sealing automatically behind us. Annie immediately twisted away, putting the desk between us.
“You smell like him,” I growled. “I should tear that goddamn dress off you and fucking burn it to get rid of his stench.”
“You lost the right to care about who touches me,” she shouted. “You think you can just grab me whenever you want? That I’m some possession you can steal when you’re feeling territorial?”
“Better me than that Alliance fuckboy.” I leaned against the door and crossed my arms, fighting the urge to cross the room and make good on my threat. “At least I know how to touch you properly.”
Her eyes flashed. “Fuck you. You don’t get to comment on who touches me anymore.”
“And yet here I am, commenting. Kidnapping, even.”
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?” Annie’s voice cracked. “You didn’t kidnap me to save me from Valor. You did it to torment me.”
“Torment? That’s a bit dramatic.”
“Is it? Look at you!” She gestured wildly at me. “You’re gloating.”
She wasn’t entirely wrong. Seeing her this angry, this alive, it was intoxicating after months of emptiness. Each flash of her eyes sent electricity through my veins.
“You orchestrated this whole thing,” she continued, pacing behind the desk. “You’ve been watching me, sending me food, and now you’ve got an excuse to get me alone.”
“If I wanted you alone, Sparks, I wouldn’t need an excuse.”
Her eyes narrowed dangerously. “Don’t call me that.”
“Would you prefer I call you what Valor calls you? Sweetheart?”
“At least he’s honest about using me,” she shot back. “Instead of pretending to care.”
That stung more than I wanted to admit. “Keep going,” I said. “Get it all out.”
“You think this is therapeutic? That I need to vent my feelings at you to move on?”
“I think you’ve been bottling up how much you hate me. So let it out, Annie. Tell me exactly how much you despise me.”
“Fuck you.”
“You already did. Repeatedly. Enthusiastically.” I leaned closer. “And I remember every single time you begged me for more.”
Annie’s eyes blazed with a fury I’d never seen before. It was fucking glorious.
“You think I don’t know what you did?” she spat. “You sacrificed me. You were willing to let me die to get what you wanted.”
“Let you die?” The words exploded from me, raw and jagged. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
I crossed the room and Annie scrambled back until she hit the wall.
“I wasn’t willing to let you die. I fucking came to save you!”
Annie flinched but held her ground.
“You think I didn’t know what Dread was? What he could do? I watched him tear through Supers during the season. What you saw him do at the Season’s opening night? That was fucking child’s play for him. I knew exactly what I was walking into.”
The memory of that night flashed through my mind. The shadows writhing around Dread like living weapons, the knowledge that I might not walk away.
“I stepped between you and those shadows knowing full well what would happen. I felt them tear through me. I felt my own blood pouring out while you tried to hold it inside me.”
Her eyes widened slightly, something shifting in her expression.
“I died for you, Annie. I fucking died.” I leaned closer, close enough to see the flecks of darker blue in her irises.
“So don’t you dare stand there and tell me I was willing to let you die.
I would burn this whole goddamn world to the ground—I would literally die—before I’d let anything happen to you. ”
Annie’s eyes hardened, her jaw tightening as she stared back at me.
“You have the fucking audacity to stand there and pretend what we had was about something more than just trying to get your dick wet?”
“Are you serious right now? You think I let myself get impaled for a fuck?” Heat crawled up my neck, my hands clenching into fists so tight I felt my knuckles crack.
“You think I did that for sex?” I slammed my palm against the wall beside her head. “I could get my dick wet anywhere. I wouldn’t bleed out for it.”
My fury was a living thing now, demanding release. I slammed my other hand against the wall, caging her between my arms. “If I was just looking for a cunt to fuck, there are plenty out there that would be less complicated to obtain than you. No rules, no boundaries, no constant moral crisis.”
I knew the words would hurt her. I wanted them to.
“Women throw themselves at me every day, as Cipher and as Thomas—all of them easier than dealing with your fucking baggage.”
Her went still.
“My baggage?” Her voice was eerily quiet as she straightened. The transformation was unsettling. From raging fury to this fucking coldness in seconds.
“You know what’s funny, Cipher? I actually believed you when you said you loved me. But now I understand. You don’t know what love is.” She shook her head, almost pitying. “You only know possession. Control.”
I should have stayed silent. Should have let her think she’d won this round.
“And you loved every second of it,” I said instead.
“I loved a lie.” Her voice broke. “I loved a man who never existed. Just a mask you wore to get what you wanted.” She leaned forward, her voice dropping to a whisper. “And that’s all you’ll ever have, Cipher. Masks and lies.”
Her whisper sliced between my ribs and twisted. I loved her with a desperate, consuming hunger. I just had no idea how to translate that into a reality that wouldn’t smother her. My version of love was total possession.