Page 15 of Beyond Hate (Beyond #3)

Otto

M y entire body tingled with the knowledge of what I’d just done. I’d gone to London’s apartment to set things straight—maybe to figure myself out. I’d gone to get answers.

I hadn’t gone there to fuck his throat.

I hadn’t gone there to watch him fall apart when I gave him the softest touch after, the smallest little utterance of praise. I hadn’t gone there to make him feel good , but watching pleasure blossom across his face had been so addictive, so new .

He was so hungry for me, so attuned to my body and needs. It was…

Impossible. Because what he was now wouldn’t have been what I needed when we’d been alive before.

But he was the perfect pretty little victim for the monster I’d become—the monster he’d made me. He was the sweet rabbit to my wolf, and he was ready to let me spill his blood across the snow as long as I licked the wound after.

It made no sense… and I wondered… I truly wondered exactly how much of my life was left up to my own design, and how much shit like fate really determined.

It left me restless when I turned my back on his apartment and went to the place I’d rented nearby.

The month I’d spent watching London fall back into the life I’d taken him from, I’d also used to go through the data I’d taken from Nathaniel West’s facility.

I’d looked at it on a surface level before, but I had nothing but time now that I was free from his grasp—time and curiosity and the beginnings of a theory that I wasn’t really in control of anything at all.

Because the files…

The files had everything. The other experiments, the failures. The successes. The enemies Nathaniel had made along the way. I was pretty sure he’d brought me back in an attempt to keep himself safe from those people.

It hadn’t done him a damn bit of good in the end, but that didn’t matter. Axel had been right—I’d played a good dog on a leash, but in the end I wasn’t there to be chained.

Not when it would have cost me…

“Fuck,” I murmured. Even then, I knew why I’d actually rebelled. I knew why I hadn’t sided with the man who was ultra rich and capable of giving me literally anything I wanted.

It was because there were some things that money couldn’t provide… there were some things that were living and breathing.

Things that I wanted.

Things that were mine.

He never would have let me keep London as London.

As soon as I spread the files out on the bed around me, I frowned. I’d only noticed the victim pattern of the body I was in before in passing, but now that I was really examining it, it had more implications.

Every man looked exactly like London—blue eyes, dark hair, a sweet expression—there was no rhyme or reason to it other than that. They’d been rich, poor. A kid in foster care. The brother of a cop. A college kid working at a coffee shop. No one was off limits.

No one was safe, because the instincts of this body—even when it hadn’t known why—wanted revenge. It wanted Nikki.

And now that I was in the position to have everything I desired…

I swiped the pictures to the side with a grunt and sat down, picking up the folder marked prior experiments instead.

Nathaniel had spoken about things going upside down at his other facility.

About a killer named Kade and some unfortunate bastard named Jayce who gave his body up to bring him into the world. Kade and a boy named Seth…

And he talked about how the two of them had gone rogue.

Fallen in love.

Because they knew each other in a prior life. Because they’d known each other in this life. He’d been excited, babbling about bringing back past loves, past obsessions. The money it could make, reuniting soulmates.

Was it really possible?

My mind drifted back to what had happened. To Axel, to the reincarnated man who’d stormed the building to save him even though it was almost a suicide mission.

My brows snapped together. Once upon a time, I hadn’t been a monster. I’d been good at killing, clever and quiet… but I’d hated it. Once upon a time, I’d been so sure Nikki was the beginning and end of my world.

How could it have ended so wrong in that life… but in this one…

Shit. Fucking shit. I didn’t believe in fate, so I wasn’t going to think that maybe it had just accidentally gotten things wrong and now it was fixing its timeline.

I was a killer. I was in the body of a man who had no feelings—a true psychopath. I could feel the urges to hurt, to maim, to destroy, trapped just beneath my skin like a vicious pulse with claws.

And London…

London was the perfect victim.

London was the only victim that really mattered.

And I…

I dropped the files and lay back on the bed, closing my eyes and throwing my arm over my face.

I was confused, and it only made me want to hurt Nikki even more. He wouldn’t give me a moment’s peace, even though he was dead. Even though…

My eyes flicked back to the pile beside me, to the little vials I’d taken from the facility.

There was a way for me to set this all right.

A way for me to bring back the man I actually wanted to kill and get the answers I still didn’t have.

The why that was like a driving pulse just beneath my skin.

The why that could tell me how it had all gone so wrong before, even though it felt so right now.

But I wasn’t done playing with London… and until I could convince myself to admit it was more than that, or come to terms with the fact that nothing was different—nothing could be different…

I was properly and truly fucked.

I had the case of vials in my hand when I made my way back to London’s apartment the next day.

I wasn’t sure if I was going to use them, but it was better to have them with me.

If he looked up at me with those wet, wrecked eyes again, it would be better if I did use them.

It would be better than letting that look break me down.

Again.

Better than wanting to touch him.

Better than wondering if London existing was Nikki’s way of making up for all the ways he’d betrayed me.

That was ridiculous. Nikki hadn’t been good in the end. He’d broken me. He’d—

“Fuck, London. I’m tired of this shit. I know you ran off to get attention.

I was even patient with you after because you were pretending to be traumatized.

But I’m done. Dead bodies at the whorehouse you work at?

Fucking police officers calling here? What the fuck do you think you’re doing?

” The harsh voice that spilled through the open window of the apartment made my insides turn to frost. It was a mixture of the unfeeling psychopath whose lack of emotions still ruled me and the training I’d had in my past life.

The man talked like he controlled London—like he had every right to speak to him however he wanted, to demand everything from him because he owned him.

And London’s voice when he answered was small. Hurt. Tired.

“I wasn’t lying about it, Hudson. I told you someone was following me. You didn’t listen. Do you get it now? I’ve been telling you the truth.”

The sound of something in the room crashing made me step forward.

If I didn’t have to, I wasn’t going to reveal myself when there were people milling around, neighbors letting their kids play in the grass by the courtyard…

but I’d seen London’s split lip before. I’d patched it up in the facility.

That was the first time he’d leaned into me, given himself over to my touch.

It was the first time I saw how starved he was for hands he actually belonged to.

And now I was seeing the exact asshole who’d hurt him to begin with in action. Tall and broad, blond, with dark eyes and an arrogant expression.

That cold feeling spread, dancing beneath my skin and tipping my fingers in frost that longed to thaw in the heat of blood, in the feel of someone’s life spilling out around me. I wouldn’t be careful with him. I wouldn’t worry about leaving evidence, I would…

“I don’t know what actually happened, but you’re full of shit, London. Some desperate asshole getting killed at your job doesn’t mean anything. No one would take you. No one wants someone like you.”

“Otto does .” London hissed it out in a snarl, and then his eyes widened like he realized what he’d said.

His hand actually clapped over his mouth, and the color drained from his face.

He glanced around like he was trying to make sure he hadn’t just made a deal with the devil, but he didn’t realize the devil had heard every word.

Otto does.

He knew. Maybe he thought I wanted him just to hurt… and I still wasn’t sure what I wanted from him. But hearing him say it, hearing the longing in his voice when he did…

London wanted me there with him. He didn’t understand it anymore than I did, and the word fate played in my head again like a taunt.

Whatever the reason, he wanted me. While this asshole was telling him how worthless he was, London wanted me in the room to show him he was wrong.

Whether that was through pain, through blood, through death, or by sticking my cock down his throat again, I wasn’t sure.

I just knew that the vials in my hand suddenly felt like they were burning my palm, and I nearly threw them on the ground.

I stuffed them into my pocket instead—after all, people would pay their souls to get a hold of something like this drug.

I knew it, because I’d seen some of the military offers Nathaniel had gotten.

And some of the private offers—people who had lost loved ones.

People who had lost obsessions.

And I—

“Get the fuck over here right now. I’m going to fuck the taste of that name out of your mouth.”

My body froze again, my fingers going for the knife I had concealed at my side. Maybe I wasn’t going to bring Nikki back, but I sure as shit could end the asshole in the room with London right now.

Before I could move to do it, London was already darting around him—he’d grabbed a knife from the block on the kitchen counter and was holding it between them with trembling hands.

“No. No, Hudson. It’s not happening. I’m done.” He swallowed hard. “I’m not yours anymore. I never was. I’m—” He cut himself off, but I knew the answer.

And he knew it too.

He was mine.