Page 32 of Redamancy (Fated Fixation #2)

And really—look where I got him.

I went to his apartment that night, fully knowing that Adrian had become a dangerous, unpredictable variable.

I chose to put his life at risk for the benefit of my own, and it killed him.

It killed him under my care.

I slept peacefully on the couch while he died alone, scared and probably gasping for help—

Guilt strikes me between the ribs, and I lean forward on the bench, cradling my head in my hands.

What if I’d woken up twenty minutes earlier? Or ten? Or even—

Adrian’s footsteps echo closer, and I tense, raising my head just far enough to shake it.

The footsteps halt.

I don’t want your comfort. Not about this.

Silence blankets the cell. Adrian’s long, elegant fingers curl and uncurl at his sides several times before he finally asks, “What emotion are you feeling?” And not in the way most people would ask that question—as a warm, compassionate segue to prompt more emotional vulnerability.

Adrian asks, brow furrowed, with genuine confusion attached. Because he doesn’t know. He only mirrors guilt—he doesn’t actually feel it.

Not about Tom.

Not about framing me.

Not about anything.

Another shake of my head. “I’m fine.”

I rise to my feet. “True or false—” I turn and stand directly in front of him, my face stony. “Tom would still be alive if I hadn’t chosen to go to his apartment last night.”

One blink is all the deliberation he needs. “False.”

My eyes widen. “False?”

“I still think I would’ve killed him,” he admits openly. “Even if you’d chosen to go somewhere else. Even if you’d never contacted him again. Even if his death wasn’t useful to me. Even if it was just to prove a point.”

Horror and confusion wash over me in equal measures and I stammer out: “But why? He did nothing wrong.”

“Not intentionally.” There’s no warmth in his piercing gaze—but there’s heat. Something feral and dark barely leashed under the surface. “But he still thought he could take something that wasn’t his. He was a dead man walking the day he laid eyes on you.” A pause. “Like the others.”

“The others?” My body turns as stony as my expression. “Like the other names on the list? The men I’ve—you’ve killed them?”

“Only some,” he answers.

I blink.

Only some.

“Only some,” I repeat.

Like I’d asked him to quantify the number of potato chips he’d eaten out of the bag, and not a very specific number of human lives.

His stare sharpens to a knifepoint. “Was I supposed to leave them alive? Knowing they’d seen you? Touched you?”

Possessiveness, raw and unfiltered, gleams in his eyes—and I ignore the momentary twist of heat in my belly.

No, this—this is not a turn-on.

This is fucked up.

This is crazy.

This is—

I take a step back. I card my fingers through my hair.

And I take a couple of deep breaths until I’m sure I’ve got a better handle on my composure before I ask my next question.

“True or false? For the past several weeks, and clearly longer than that, all our interactions have been a lie. Every innocuous excuse you’ve made about moving to New York for work, all the times you’ve just ‘happened’ to be in the same places I am—it’s all been a ruse designed to lure me in so I lower my guard. ”

True, I think.

“False,” he says. “Yes, I lied, but it wasn’t only to lure you in.” His expression softens with sincerity. “Those moments of connection, of vulnerability we had with each other—I didn’t manufacture those.”

My expression flattens. “Well, that makes me feel so much better,” I drawl sarcastically.

“I’m going to really cherish all those ‘moments of connection’ that seemed to happen right before you stole or planted evidence to frame me for murder.

I’ll have so many of them to think about while I’m in prison. ”

Adrian rolls his eyes. “Well, now you’re just being dramatic.”

I go slack-jawed. “I’m being—”

“Obviously,” he interjects. “I’m not going to actually send you to prison.”

Confusion sparks before any relief can, and my eyebrows shoot toward my hairline.

“What do you mean, obviously?” I take another step back, arms crossed.

“Is that not the endgame here?” I tilt my chin toward the steel mesh bars.

“Some sort of final punishment for leaving you all those years ago? You wait an entire decade to make me think you’ve moved on—only to swoop in, last quarter, to snatch it all away? ” I pace around the cell.

“No.” He doesn’t move from his spot, but his gaze follows my movements. “Not at all. I didn’t frame you to punish you for leaving me.” A pause. “It was for the best that you did. It’s why I let you go in the first place.”

That stops me in my tracks. “What?”

“Don’t get me wrong,” he continues. “I was heartbroken when you left out of the blue. I’d never—” He pauses, his face twitching like he’s tasted something bitter. “I didn’t know I could feel that way.”

“Feel what?”

His eyes find mine. “Abandoned.”

Something stirs in my chest, and I shift on my feet, uncomfortable with the feeling. “It’s not like I was hiding, you know. I’ve been in the same place all these years.”

“Trust me,” he smiles, but there’s a cynical edge to it. “It was not a lack of desire that kept me away.”

I can’t help it—my traitorous heart lurches.

If not desire, then…?

Unfortunately, his answer is frustratingly vague.

“There have been…other factors. Namely my family, who’d certainly use a vulnerability like you against me,” he tells me.

“Just loose ends I thought I’d be able to get rid of before I brought you back into my life, but it has not worked out that way.

” A flicker of frustration follows—but then it transforms into something lighter. Gentler. “But I’m done waiting.”

My brain latches onto the last part of that sentence only— home.

I eye him warily. “And where is home ?”

“With me, of course,” he answers like it’s the obvious conclusion.

“With you…at your apartment on the Upper East Side?”

“For now,” he nods. “But we can live anywhere you’d like. We could get a Brownstone in Brooklyn. Or somewhere on Park Avenue. Or in Chelsea, where you can be close to the art galleries. Or somewhere out of the city entirely—it’s up to you, my love.”

I offer him a skeptical look. “You’re not serious.”

“I am very serious.” He steps toward me, hands folded in front of him, and his expression is still unusually warm under the harsh lighting.

I huff. “What? Just like that? I walk out of here with you, and we… mesh our lives together like none of this ever happened?”

“As our lives should be,” he murmurs, reaching a hand out to cradle my face.

“Do you understand how hard it’s been this past decade?

To know that you’re out there, existing, but not with me?

To have no control? To know only what exists on the outside and on paper—but nothing else?

” He stares down at me, his expression wound with anxiety.

“It’s why I threw myself into my schooling and career so heavily.

I was afraid I’d do something drastic if left to my own devices. ”

He does not elaborate as to who would be on the receiving end of this drastic action—me, the world, or maybe himself—but my heart stutters all the same.

“I don’t want to ever be apart from you ever again.” His thumb grazes my cheek. “Come home with me.”

I lean into his touch, basking in the pleasant warmth that settles over me. His thumb continues to stroke circles down my cheek, and I know that I could stay like this forever, but—

“No.”

His hand stills.

My eyes flit to his. “I’m not going home with you.”

His expression doesn’t change, but there’s a slight tightening of his fingers around my jaw. “You have nowhere else to go. Your roommate and her boyfriend will think you're a murderer."

I smile faintly. “Well, I don’t need to go anywhere.”

His eyes narrow—and then widen slightly with realization. “You would rather stay here? In this bacteria-ridden cell all night than come home with me?”

I blink up at him, unfazed. “Well, it’s not that bad, is it? I’ve got the place all to myself—minus the cockroaches—and hard surfaces are supposed to be good for your back, right?”

His expression sharpens with irritation. “You don’t mean that. You’re just trying to rile me up.”

“I’m not,” I deny, and then tilt my head to the side. “I’m a murderer, remember? This is where I belong. I’ve even got my arraignment hearing in the morning.”

His thumb strokes down my cheek, past my jaw, and hovers right over my pulse point. “You’re not staying here.”

I hold my ground. “You can’t make me leave. I’m under investigation for murder. I’m custody of the NYPD.”

“For now,” he corrects. “But I make one call, and these charges disappear. They won’t have anything to hold you on.”

I hum in agreement—and then I smile. “Unless I just confess to it.”

I revel in the flash of uncertainty in his eyes. “You’re not going to confess to a murder you didn’t commit.”

“Why not? You framed me for one I didn’t commit,” I shoot back.

His eyes narrow. “A frame job I can undo whenever I’d like. You cannot seriously stand here and tell me you’d rather spend your days in prison than with me.”

“Rather? No.” I shake my head, genuine frustration leaking into my voice.

“But all you’ve done for weeks is gaslight me into thinking your motives in New York were one thing—just so you could pull the rug out from under me when it suited you.

Am I supposed to trust you after that? To take you at your word?

” I take a step back, and his hand falls away. “Prison, at least, has security.”

No part of me wants to confess to a murder I didn’t commit, but Adrian has already blown up most of my life—if I have to blast the rest to smithereens just to prove a point, I’ll do it.

I swear I will.

Trembling, I ready myself for whatever verbal sparring comes next.

But Adrian doesn’t argue with me.

“You’re right,” he says quietly, and he averts his gaze. “You shouldn’t take me at my word.”

I blink, almost positive I must’ve heard that wrong.

He’s conceding?

The twinge of victory is soured almost immediately by disappointment, though.

…just like that?

He’s not even going to try?

“In fact, that’s always been our problem, hasn’t it?” His right hand dips into the deep pocket of his slacks. “Security—or lack thereof. You’re always waiting for the other shoe to drop. For the day I wake up and decide you’re no longer what I want.”

I shift, uncomfortable with the way he’s seen straight through me.

“And you’re so convinced it’s going to happen,” he continues. “You won’t even stick around to find out. You’ll just run.”

“It’s not like I want to,” I defend myself. “But—”

“It’s self-preservation,” he interjects, and he turns back to face me, eyes shining with something unreadable.

“Which is, ironically, one of my favorite qualities about you. Your ability to look after yourself no matter who or what gets in the way.” He takes a step toward me.

“And it’s understandable. You’ve had to look after yourself because nobody else ever would. ”

Well, you’ve met my mother, I think.

“Even now,” he continues. “Your life here in the city. Always financially struggling. Always grasping for stability. Always scrambling for every inch you get. It must be—”

“Fine,” I say, crossing my arms over my chest. “My life is fine. It’s—”

“Not what you truly want,” he cuts in, his gaze piercing. “It never has been. You want security. You want comfort. You want all the things you were never afforded on your own.”

I hate that I can’t deny it, so I shake my head.

“Even if I did,” I say. “You wouldn’t be able to give them to me. Comfort, yes. But security? Emotional security?” I swallow. “We were in a full-blown relationship, and you couldn’t even tell me you loved me.”

I expect anger or defensiveness, but Adrian glances away. “That’s true. I couldn’t,” he admits. “I’d never received it.” A pause, and then he adds, “Before you.”

The air snags in my lungs.

Is he—

“But I understand now.” He turns back to me, and I go utterly still.

There’s no facade, no mask, no guarded calculation lurking in his eyes.

Just him.

Bare and vulnerable.

“It’s not that I can’t feel love,” he explains.

“It’s just the expression that’s different.

My version of love is a type of obsession.

It’s consuming. It’s control. It’s fixation to the extreme.

And even if I were capable of choosing the object of my affection, most people wouldn’t want this, let alone survive it…

but you—for all your desire for self-preservation—you do. ”

A pause.

“And I love you.”

I gasp quietly.

His eyes root me to the spot as he confidently strides forward.

“You asked me what my endgame was earlier.” Adrian stops directly in front of me.

His eyes flick down to his hands, and when my gaze follows—

Holy shit.

“Marry me,” he prompts. “And you’ll have all the security in the world.”