Page 88 of Filthy Little Fix

Dmitry hangs up the phone. He pulls a short stack of documents from the corner of the desk. "The first wave of attacks was successful. The Malakovs are trying to move their funds," he says.

I nod. I push myself off the wall and cross the bland rug in the center of the room. I was only here to listen to the update, hoping that, somehow, impersonal financial attacks could give us any hint of where Nyx is.

Millions of dollars in damages, blood from various hierarchical positions, the ashes of their control points, and we still have nothing. No one knows anything, no one says anything relevant.

I need to keep searching.

"Dante," Dmitry calls out before I reach the door. "Wait."

And I know where this is going.

Dmitry always softens his voice before hetries.

I turn around. I don't have the patience to play house right now, not with Nyx loose and away from me out there.

"What Sveta said earlier..." he continues, hesitant, "...about you and the boy. Is it true?"

What she said. Her words flash in my mind.This stopped being about an asset a long time ago.

Dmitry knowssomethingis going on. He knows me, as much as I hate it, but he wasn't as close as Svetlana was at the mansion. He didn't address Nyx, didn't see him, and spent the same period that Svetlana was yelling at me to stay away fromNyx consuming reports from guards who aren't permitted to mention any of the Volkovs' personal matters.

I prefer it this way. I prefer that Dmitry doesn't know. A part of me fears he could unravel whatever the fuck exists between me and Nyx, that he could witness the monstrosity that Nyx pulls out of me. I can handle Svetlana's confusion. But it shames me for my siblings to witness, with clarity, that Iusethat sick boy as a lightning rod for all the shit I've inherited—that unloading that hatred onto him is the only thing that makes the noise stop. The impulse. The violence. Even if only for a second.

And that, from somewhere inside me, Ilikedoing it.Unloading. That's the sickest part of it all. Nyx welcomes this despicable monster, and it grows quiet.

Svetlana fears the shadow. I can control that. But Dmitry couldunderstandthis disgusting symbiosis. And what a shame that would be.

"Sveta sees what she chooses to see," I say. I seek cover in her stubbornness, which we both know all too well.

"I don't know," he insists. "She works with evidence. She said the boy...livesfor you? That sounds... intimate."

It irritates me how calm he always is. Svetlana, at least, would be armed with a passive-aggressiveness that would give me something to aim at.

Dmitry only gives me this: an unperturbed patience.

He fiddles with the contract sheets. Aligns them on the desk. Says, into my silence, "Have you slept? Since the attack."

I clench my jaw. He's cornering me—the lie that dies in my throat gives me away.

"Vinny needed surgery. You broke his wrist in three places," he continues. I clench my fist tighter. "You've always had a firm hand. I respect that. But I saw the reports. I need to know... the size of the risk."

A firm hand. That's what my father used to crush Mikhail Malakov's first attempt to expand to our side of the river, twenty years ago. A war that lasted two years and filled the East River with their bodies. Mikhail's sons never forgave. Neither did we. This isn't a new war. It's just the next chapter of the same carnage.

"What are you implying?" I say through gritted teeth. The threatening tone is automatic, instinctive. Dmitry is unaffected by it.

"Sleep with whoever you want. But I can't quantify this if I don't know what's really happening. Is he a weakness?"

Weakness is an intrusive word in this context. A skinny boy with a death wish—aweakness. It's almost an insult.

"You don't understand," I say, looking away from him. I can feel his eyes on me.

"Try me."

I don't want to say it. I can't evenvocalizethe effect Nyx has on me.

"Not evenIunderstand it," I say. My voice comes out low, refusing to admit the truth.

He looks at me. And, somehow, this answer, this declared defeat, is enough for him.