Darling Wildfire (Red Rabbit #2)

47

ATLAS

A few days later, I woke up abruptly and lay in the darkness wondering why. Then I heard sounds coming from the bathroom and saw Nyx’s bed was empty. I walked over and stood in the doorway watching as he punched the tiled wall, methodically, his knuckles already bleeding. I reached out a hand and touched his shoulder. He rounded on me, his hand going to my throat and he pushed me hard up against the wall with a snarl.

“Don’t fucking touch me,”

he hissed.

My hands stayed by my sides even though the impact jarred my shoulder something terrible. My jaw tightened at the jolt of pain and his eyes immediately dipped to the bandaged wound. He cursed and instantly let me go. He turned and ran both hands through his hair, making it stand up on end. I hated seeing him like this, leaning heavily over the sink with both hands flat on the tile and his head bowed between his shoulders. He was usually the one with all the quips, the dark humor and the shadows in his eyes that just begged to come out and wreak havoc. I hated to see him hurting and knowing there wasn’t anything I could do to help.

“Nyx,” I said.

He looked at me in the mirror. The moon’s weak beams filtered through the skylight above us, flashing briefly in the blackness of his eyes.

“Talk to me, Nyx,”

I whispered.

He bared his teeth in annoyance and shook his head as he looked away. “Fuck off. I said I don’t want to talk about it.”

“I know but—how can I help you?”

He rounded on me again but didn’t lash out this time.

“You can’t help me—it’s all up here,”

Nyx hissed, pointing to his head. “That fucker dug himself under my skin and I can’t—I can’t get him out. I’m too weak—”

“You’re not fucking weak,”

I snarled, taking a step towards him as my own anger flared. “I see you, I know you and I would never use that word anywhere close to you.”

He shook his head again as though I didn’t understand. “I can deal with pain, Atlas,”

Nyx said. “But he—he drugged me and then touched me. He broke through every wall, associating touch and pleasure with something so vile I can’t even bear to think about it now!”

My blood ran cold then hot as fury flooded me so fiercely I couldn’t breathe. Thinking something like that had happened and actually hearing it from Nyx’s mouth were two very different things.

“You know, I think I even could have handled the abuse if it had just been purely sexual,”

Nyx rasped, his voice heavy with annoyance and pain. “But he used that pain drug on me again and he talked the entire time. He knew things—things about my past, about people I loved, and he used it all against me.”

He leaned back heavily against the counter and dug his hands into his hair.

“We’re his obsession,”

Nyx said flatly. “He gets off on everything. All of it. Watching us—controlling us.”

I bared my teeth and took another step towards him, horrified by his words but also pissed the fuck off.

“No, he is not in control,”

I growled.

“But he is, Atlas.”

Nyx looked up at me and I saw something that scared me more than anything he’d just said.

I saw defeat.

I grabbed him by the front of his shirt and shoved him hard against the counter.

“You do not give in to him,”

I said viciously.

“You weren’t there,”

he snapped. “You don’t know what it was like.”

He shoved at my chest but I didn’t budge.

“Unfortunately, I know all too well what you just went through.”

My voice was ice even as my blood boiled with my own repressed memories of trauma I hadn’t unpacked in years. “When I was ten, a family member raped me—repeatedly—using psychological manipulation by threatening my family.”

Nyx went still.

“I’m not telling you for any other reason than to help you hold this. North was right; Vetticus will break us, I know its coming, but he will regret every touch, every word and every fucking bit of what he’s put us through when all of this is said and done.”

Both of our chests were heaving with emotion and I realized through my anger, I still had a death grip on the front of his shirt. I released him and took a step back.

“I’m sorry that happened to you,” Nyx said.

“And I’m sorry too, Nyx. But don’t you dare pity me—I didn’t once pity you during all this so don’t you fucking dare turn it on me now.”

“Never,”

he whispered.

We stared at each other for a long moment and then I took a hold of his hand and examined his bruised and bleeding knuckles.

“Did it help?” I asked.

“No,”

Nyx said in a tone that was finally close to his usual dry humor.

I looked up and flashed him a quick smirk.

“You know what will?”

I grabbed a paper towel and ran the water. I dabbed gently against the cuts before looking back up into that black abyss I was in danger of getting lost in. “Winning. Planning our escape. And getting the fuck out of here.”

I took his other hand and put it over the paper towel before I turned to head back to bed.

“Atlas,”

Nyx said. I looked over my shoulder. “Thank you.”

One step brought me back in front of him and I bravely brought my hand up, gripping the back of his neck.

“You matter—to us, to me—we can do this.”

He nodded, and I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw the defeated look was nowhere to be found. Instead, the deadly look of resolve was back, and I knew he was eventually going to be okay.

“Together right?”

He said quietly.

His hand rose to match mine and his fingers curled around the back of my neck sending something hot and visceral flashing through my blood.

“You better fucking believe it.”

We pressed our foreheads together, the closest we’d ever been. I longed to step over the line and explore this feeling rising up through our friendship and connection, but not here, not now. Not in this place where our demons were fighting for control, threatening to consume our humanity.

I gave him one last look before heading back to bed. As I lay down and closed my eyes, I wondered if we’d be able to stay sane through this—to stay human.

If we did manage to escape, would there even be anything left to save?