Page 95 of Playing with Fire

"And what about me?" The question burst from somewhere deep and raw, a place I hadn't known existed until Xavier had crashed into my life. "What happens to me if you don't come back? I saw Maxime today. I saw what happened when he thought he'd lost Algerone. That hollow look in his eyes, that rage mixed with despair..." My voice caught, the image of Maxime's shattered composure still vivid in my mind. "I can't become that person, Xavier. I won't. So don't make me."

His eyes widened, genuine shock flickering across his features before his control reasserted itself. "I always come back." The certainty in his voice would have been convincing if I hadn't seen the shadow of doubt behind it.

"Not this time." I shook my head, hands clenching into fists at my sides to keep from grabbing him, shaking him, making him understand. "This is different. Phoenix has been planning this for years. Studying you. Learning your patterns. He knows exactly how you think because he thinks the same way."

Xavier's expression darkened. "Which is exactly why I have to go. Because I'm the only one who can predict what he'll do next."

"Then let me come with you."

"Absolutely not." The words cut like steel, his entire posture shifting to something more predatory, more aggressive. The Xavier who hunted, who burned, who exacted vengeance with cold precision. "Felix specified the terms. Me alone, or Algerone dies."

"And you believe him?" I fought to keep my voice steady despite the panic clawing up my throat. "You think he'll just let Algerone go once he has you? That he'll honor any agreement after everything he's done?"

"Of course not." Xavier's laugh was sharp, mirthless. "But I don't have a choice. I need to play this out, to get close enough to end him."

The cold calculation in his voice sent ice through my veins. This wasn't just Xavier the protector, the vigilante with a moral code. This was something darker, something willing to sacrifice anything—even himself—for vengeance.

"There's always a choice." I stepped closer still, refusing to be intimidated by the danger radiating from him. "We find another way. Together."

"There is no other way." His voice softened slightly, fingers reaching up to brush my cheek in an unexpected gesture of tenderness. "This ends with Felix or me. It always has. He knew it when he targeted you. I knew it the moment I saw that trailer burning."

"You're walking into a trap," I repeated, desperate to make him understand.

"Yes, but it's a trap I'm setting, too."

I stared at him. "You already have a plan."

A ghost of a smile touched his lips. "I always have a plan, Leo."

"Tell me."

"No." He shook his head, expression hardening once more. "The less you know, the safer you'll be if this goes wrong."

Fear gave way to frustration, then anger. "That's bullshit, Xavier. After everything we've been through, everything we've shared… You still don't trust me?"

"This isn't about trust." His hands settled on my shoulders, grip just firm enough to underscore his point. "This is about protection. If Phoenix suspects you know anything, you become a target, too."

"I already am a target!" The words echoed in the empty corridor, loud enough to make both of us flinch. I lowered my voice, struggling to regain control. "I've been a target since the moment he burned down my trailer. Since the moment he realized you cared about me."

Something shifted in Xavier's expression, a flash of vulnerability quickly masked. "That's exactly my point. He knows what you mean to me. If I fail..."

"If you fail, I'm dead anyway." The brutal honesty seemed to catch him off guard. "Phoenix won't stop with you. He'll come for all of us. Me, your brothers, everyone you've ever cared about. This isn't just about you anymore."

Xavier stepped back, running a hand through his blue-streaked hair. For once, he seemed at a loss, the weight of responsibility visibly settling on his shoulders.

"I need you to understand what you are to me," I said, voice dropping to just above a whisper. The words I'd been holding back for days, maybe years, pushing against my ribs like living things fighting for release. "I love you, Xavier."

His head snapped up, eyes wide with a shock I'd rarely seen on his face. Not "te amo" whispered in Spanish against his sleeping body, but the English words, stark and unavoidable.

"Not just as a friend, or a partner, or whatever label we've been dancing around." Once started, the words wouldn't stop, pouring out like blood from a wound too long compressed. "I love you in ways I don't even have language for. In ways that terrify me. And if you walk into that meeting alone, if you don't come back to me..." My voice broke, the possibility too painful to articulate fully.

Xavier's expression transformed, shock melting into something fierce and possessive and tender all at once. He took my face in his hands. "I love you too. I don't know what that means, not really. I don't know how to do this right. But I know I love you in a way I've never loved anyone. And that's exactly why I have to go. Why I have to end this. So we have a chance."

His lips met mine in a kiss unlike any we'd shared before. It was a promise and a plea wrapped together. When he pulled back, his expression had shifted to something I'd never seen before, a softness that made him look younger, more vulnerable than I'd thought possible.

"If I don't go, if I don't face him, he'll never stop hunting us," Xavier continued, his thumbs tracing gentle patterns on my cheekbones. "You know that. You've seen what he's capable of."

I nodded, the fight draining out of me as quickly as it had come. Of course I knew. Felix Burns wasn't going to stop until either he or Xavier was dead. It was the inevitable conclusion to the cycle of vengeance that had begun years ago with Richard Thackery's death.

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