Page 99 of Map of Pain
Love requires sacrifice...
Nick
Aphantom sound hit him first—the soft metallic jingle of a belt buckle, Owen’s belt buckle, from all those times those fingers gripped the back of his neck and forced him to his knees. The memory tried to drag him down, tried to make his body remember the position, the compliance, the broken gratitude for scraps of approval.
No.
The hunter rose in his mind, but it wasn’t a fractured, angry thing like before.
Owen first,the hunter whispered, and Nick agreed.Fast strikes.Use the space.Stay mobile.
Owen’s mouth curved into that familiar predatory smile from the hospital.“There’s my boy. I was wondering when you’d—”
Nick moved, backing up towards the living room as Owen stepped toward him.
He grabbed the coffee table’s edge and flipped it toward Owen in one fluid motion, sending loose papers flying. Owensidestepped, but Nick was already moving again, using the distraction to close distance. His knife—Luka’s knife—appeared in his hand as he drove toward Owen’s center mass.
Owen caught his wrist, twisting hard. Nick let the momentum carry him, spinning away before Owen could complete a joint lock. The apartment was too small for proper evasion, but it also meant Owen was just as constrained.
“Still fast, I see,”Owen mused, circling.“But you’re fighting the wrong battle, Nick. You know how this ends. You know what you are.”
Nick stayed silent. Words were Owen’s backup weapons—psychological pressure designed to crack his resolve. Instead, Nick feinted left, then dove right, coming up with a ceramic shard from his shattered coffee mug. He slashed across Owen’s forearm, opening a line of red through the sleeve.
The predatory confidence in Owen’s features faltered.“Not talking? That’s new.”
Behind Owen, chaos erupted. Luka moved like liquid violence through the operatives positioned by the windows. Nick caught glimpses in his peripheral vision—a man’s scream cutting offabruptly, the wet sound of something tearing. One operative stumbled backward, clutching where his jaw used to be, blood streaming between his fingers.
“Jesus Christ!”another operative shouted over the carnage.“Owen, just use the trigger phrase and end this! Call him a good—”
Luka’s hand closed around the man’s throat, cutting off his words with a sickening crunch.
Two operatives broke off from window duty, moving to flank Nick. Owen’s predatory confidence returned, his features settling into vicious triumph.
“Three on one, Nick. Just like old times, but you’re overdressed.”
The first operative moved from Nick’s left, tactical knife leading. Nick grabbed the lamp from the side table and swung it like a club, the ceramic base connecting with the man’s temple. The operative dropped, but the second was already coming from the right.
Nick spun, driving his elbow into the second operative’s solar plexus, then brought his knee up as the man doubled over. The satisfying crunch of cartilage told him he’d broken the man’s nose, but it wasn’t enough to drop him.
Owen used the distraction to close in, landing a brutal kidney punch that sent fire through Nick’s side. Nick gasped, stumbling forward, and Owen followed up with a knee toward his ribs.
Nick twisted away from the worst of it, but the blow still connected, driving the air from his lungs. He rolled with the impact, coming up near the kitchen counter where one of Luka’s tea mugs sat abandoned.
The operative with the broken nose was shaking his head clear, reaching for his sidearm. Nick grabbed the ceramic mug and hurled it with deadly accuracy. It caught the man square in the forehead, and he went down hard, skull cracking against the hardwood.
Owen’s vicious triumph shifted to irritation.“You always were too clever for your own good.”
Nick wiped blood from his split lip, knife still ready in his hand. Around them, Luka’s savage efficiency had reduced the window team to broken bodies and spreading pools of crimson. The vampire moved toward them through the carnage, eyes black, fangs extended, looking like every nightmare the Society had ever painted about his kind.
Except he was Nick’s nightmare. Nick’s protector. Nick’s love.
Owen’s hand moved to his belt, but not for the radio. A gun appeared in his grip with practiced speed, muzzle aimed at Nick’s forehead.
“Enough,”Owen said, his voice cutting through the chaos with sharp authority.“Stop resisting, Nicholas.Now.”
The change was immediate. Luka froze mid-step, his predatory advance halting as his eyes fixed on the gun pressed against Nick’s head. In that moment of hesitation, the two remaining operatives moved with coordinated precision, grabbing Luka’s arms from either side.
“Don’t move,”one of them panted through his mask.“One twitch and your boyfriend’s brains paint the wall.”
