He coughed painfully, blood running down his chin. He pressed into the wall for balance, face twisted in pain.
"How shitty is this...?" His half-open eyes pinned on us. "Bested by two women. This puts a stain on my reputation."
I still couldn’t believe we got him like this. Athena was mostly the wild card who started this chaos; I just happened to lend a hand, yet here we are... him on the ground.
Shitty... indeed.
Athena pressed the muzzle of the gun against his forehead. "Who fucking sent you? I suggest you start speaking when I’m asking nicely..." She grinned. "The Devil won’t... especially when he finds out you hurt his wife and sister. I can only imagine his rage. He rarely shows it, and when he does, words don’t matter to him, only action."
For once, a flicker of fear drowned the man’s eyes. The title of the Devil was what got him alarmed in the first place. It made me wonder what that name truly meant... in the Underworld.
"Then you better pull the fucking trigger. Kill me now before the Devil gets me. DO IT!" He pressed his forehead into the muzzle, closing his eyes.
I have never seen someone so eager for death, especially for someone like him.
I glanced at Athena, hoping she wasn’t serious about killing him, but I rethought everything when I saw how bloodthirsty she looked.
"A-Athena..." I began.
"Don’t worry, Cat, I won’t do the honors of killing this piece of lackadaisical shit."
The door was kicked open, grabbing our attention. Nico and Tori rushed in.
"Holy shit!" she exclaimed, taking in everything with broad eyes. "What the fuck happened?!"
Nico whistled. "Did you two cat-fight with a highly trained killer? I’ll be damned."
"A highly trained what now? Cat, what’s going on because I need someone to explain why there’s blood everywhere and why you look like that! Is that... Is that a gun?"
"Tori, calm down."
"Calm down?! Look at you! Are you hurt, that b-blood, is it yours?"
I shook my head. "No, don’t worry."
Nico took out his phone from his suit and dialed a number, pressing his phone into his ear. "Boss, we have a problem. And we found the motherfucker."
The man moved, and we all got alerted, but he grabbed a piece of broken wood and jammed it in his own throat.
Tori’s scream filled my ears, but the churning in my stomach was louder. I rushed to one of the toilets and hurled up everything.
~☆~
Tori pressed a pack of ice into the back of my neck.
"Thanks..." I mumbled.
My whole body was aching, and submerging in a tub full of ice would be needed right now.
"Why aren’t the cops here?" Tori whispered to me, eyes passing around the men in suits who arrived after Nico’s call.
"I don’t think there will be cops."
Tori eyed me with a stern expression. "You’re kidding, right? There’s a dead body in the toilet; they should be swamping right now. I mean..."
She peeked at Athena sitting on the table, legs crossed, a coat draped over her shoulders, going through her phone like it was a normal Tuesday.
"You and Athena clearly fought in self-defense. I wanna say that, but I don’t know what the fuck happened in there."
"He tried to kill me..." I confessed.
Tori’s hand covered my mouth.
"Athena came in just at that minute, and she went full crazy on him, and I did too... I don’t remember most of it because it happened so fast and..."
I heard footsteps, and I turned, pushing to my feet when Ares came in. Athena waved, and when he set his eyes on me, he released a heavy breath.
As he came close to me, he took off his coat and draped it on my shoulders. "Are you alright?" His thumb wiped the bloodstain on my face, as if checking if it was mine.
"I’ll live..." I mumbled.
"I’m gonna stick around for a while, get Cat home," Athena said.
Tori hugged me. "Take care."
"I don’t wanna leave you..." I said.
"I’ll be fine... but you..." She rubbed my arms. "You need rest."
I nodded before parting away from her, and I left with Ares.
When I got in the car, I could feel everything swaying. I didn’t even register when Ares pulled me to his lap, assessing my face for any wounds.
"It’s not my blood..." I said, burying my face in his neck, feeling comforted by his scent, and it’s hard to imagine that after spending the entire day apart, I still wind up in his arms.
For once... I welcome Ares’ silence with open arms because I wasn’t in the mood for talks. I just want to...!
Ares pulled me closer, and I melted against him, feeling an unusual ease. This was strange, but it wasn’t entirely foreign because he had held me like this months ago after I woke up in the hospital.
This was Deja vu. I’m curled up in his arms, and it feels like the safest place on the planet. I wrapped my arms tightly around his neck, my nose taking a whiff of his delicious scent.
When the car came to a stop, I thought about getting off, but I was internally happy when he carried me all the way.
I didn’t want this to end.
I don’t know how long it’d last to see this side of Ares, but I wanna savor it as much as I can.
The spell was broken when Ares set me down on my feet, pushing the coat to fall off my shoulders.
"I’d like some alone time..." I didn’t wait for a reply as I walked to the bathroom for a cold shower, stripping as I went.
The cold water dropped on me heavily, washing off the blood and dirt. I spent close to an hour under, my mind playing the event of today.
This checks off my list, and the funny thing was... I wasn’t as panicked. Catherine Lane from years ago would have gone into a mental breakdown after clashing with a hitman with a load of crazy by her side.
With all the shits happening around me, this seems to become a normal thing.
My life has taken a drastic twist, and this time it wasn’t about having a devil Boss, trying to hold onto a failing relationship, or covering up endless debts, and waking up to another day of holding on to keep from breaking, for you knew there wasn’t an option for it.
How did it get this far?
I signed a contract, sold my soul, and maybe my sanity too.
I flinched when I felt cold hands gliding down my waist.