Page 35 of Beyond Hate

There was the sound of metal sliding against metal… and the door swung inward.

Fuck, he really didn’t have any survival instincts, did he? He didn’t even try to keep himself safe by keeping the chain lock in place. He just took a step back with his arms wrapped around his waist and looked up at me with a haunted, broken expression.

Those eyes… Even if everything else about him had changed, his eyes were still the same. Full of depths, oceans… stars. An entire universe where I’d thought we’d escape, where we’d find a way to be free from our mother’s hold.

A world that had burned to the ground when he’d looked at me as she’d raised a gun and put a bullet in my head.

I…

“You could have told them about me, London.” The words came out before I could stop them, and I stepped into the apartment before someone had a chance to see me loitering there in the hallway.

He only hesitated for a second before he closed the door behind me, pressing his back against the wood as he turned that gaze to me again.

“I know.”

“I’m not saying they would have been able to catch me, but you had a chance to get away. You had a chance to do something to save yourself.”

London pressed his lips together like he wasn’t sure he wanted to say anything, and his eyes dropped when he answered me again. “I know.”

Just those two words, nothing else.

It wasn’t enough for me. I wasn’t passive or patient; I wasn’t the kind of person who went for cryptic. I took a few quick steps toward him and tangled my fingers into the blond strands of his hair, yanking his head up so he was looking at me.

His eyes were wide, just a little wet. Just a little afraid.

A little hot.

“Why didn’t you tell them about me?”

He swallowed hard enough that I watched his Adam’s apple bounce, and whimpered when I tightened my grip in his hair as he tried to look away.

“I…”

“Why, London?” I hissed his name like it burned my tongue, as if saying it was admitting that my little quest for vengeance was pointless because the man I was looking for wasn’t home.Someone else had moved in—someone soft and sweet and broken and—

“I didn’t want them to hurt you,” he whispered. It was barely audible, so soft I wasn’t sure I’d made out the words right, so unsure it was like he was trying to convince himself of the honesty just as much as me.

It wasn’t…

This wasn’t…

“Why?”

Was that the only damn question I could ask?

At least he didn’t try to look away again when he answered. He just fixed me with a helpless, almost pleading expression, like he was hoping I’d have the answer for him. “I don’t know. I just… I couldn’t do it. I’m notNikki,Otto.”

He said my name like it was a curse, like it was the reason he looked so lost and confused. And maybe it was—maybe I was. But I knew one thing… I’d known it before we left the facility, and I couldn’t ignore it anymore.

The man in my arms wasn’t Nikki… and I wanted him even more. I didn’t give him an answer; I didn’t have one to give. Instead, I tangled my fingers tighter in his hair and pulled him up on tiptoe so I could crash my mouth against his. It was almost intoxicating, feeling the way his breath came out in a trembling gasp to feed me all the insecurity and fear he felt. It was bliss—saccharine and dangerous all at once, because I knew if I let myself, I could get addicted to this.

I could get addicted to him.

I could want him more than I wanted my revenge, more than I wanted to keep myself safe.

And that…

Well, shit, that was how I’d died before, wasn’t it? And maybe things were different now—maybe I was different now—but I had to remember what had gotten me here.

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