Leo was not happy when I pointed this out in the team meeting with Dru and North. He gave me one of those mildly scathing looks I've come to associate with his more delicate sensibilities being prodded with a sharp stick by me.
"Agents," North greets perfunctorily. "How was the mission?"
"Fuck off," I answer, earning me a sharp elbow in the ribs from Leo.
He's so oddly respectful towards North. I don't know if it's because he's Damon's father, or if Leo genuinely thinks the light shines out of North's arse, like so many other junior agents seem to.
"What?" I growl at both of them, irritated by their heartfelt dedication to professionalism and protocol. "He knows how it went. Fucking badly is how. Sathe wasn't there, and we almost got old school court-martialled, and I didn't even get to firebomb anything. Total waste of a break-in."
North is completely unruffled by my outburst, which is typical of him. I'm starting to want to find something that will get him all puffed up and annoyed with me for real. Dan would have made a hobby out of trying to piss off our new handler. He was just that kind of arsehole.
"We knew it was a long shot," North says amiably, like we were sent out to see if we could find organic vegetables at a corner shop. "Since this was our last go at the known OI facilities on our list, we'll need to begin expanding our net of possible avenues for gathering actionable intel."
"You have a specific cast in mind?" Leo asks, brows furrowing in inquiry.
"Yes," North answers, nodding like he was waiting to be asked so he could begin a briefing. "We've made contact with someone who has deep ties to Obsidian Inc., and who’s made it clear in the past that he would be willing to sell what he knows about their movements and plans to us for the right price."
I shift my body sideways, leaning against a beam that stands between the living room and kitchen, crossing my arms and mentally preparing for whatever bullshit I can tell this is about to become.
Leo doesn't look any more enthused by North's vague suggestion. If it were a good lead, we would have found out about it way before now. Snow had likely been leaving it as a last resort, which means whoever it is we're going to be dealing with must be a right piece of work.
"Who is it that we would be paying for information?"
North hesitates for a moment, his eyes skittering over to me and therefore racheting up my sense of impending dread. If it's someone from my past, then this can only be terrible because I don't know anyone influential from my past who isn't a mass murderer, a corrupt government official, a tycoon criminal in some capacity, or a mixture of all three.
"He's an infamous arms dealer. Goes by the name 'Titanus Bullet.’ He works mostly out of Southeast Asia, based currently in a small country that sits somewhere between Malaysia and Indonesia, called Senjatas.”
Oh, fuck no. As in, a big fuck no. The biggest fuckingfuck noyou can mentally picture in your head, then doubled.
Leo must notice the look of furious dismay on my face because he comes to my side and goes to touch my arm, to offer comfort. It's his usual instinct where I—or pretty much anyone else—is concerned. He stops himself at the last second, remembering we're not alone.
Since having sex that one time, Leo and I have been careful not to be at all physically demonstrative with our, for lack of a better term,affectionfor one another. We don't want North, or God forbid, Snow, to realise the depth of our shared intimacy. I would rather not have to deal with whatever those two judgemental pricks would have to say about it.
We haven't slept together since, so it's not like there's anything to analyse and get all worked up over. Leo hasn't tried to bring it up once, which I appreciate even if it makes me feel confused about how to handle him, what to do when he treats me with casual warmth and displays a caring for me that goes beyond the professional.
Leo is my partner at FISA, so workwise, I get where we stand and what some of the rules are. But when it comes to our personal relationship, if that's something we can claim to have at this point, I've got no clue what Leo expects from me. If we were fucking on the regular, I would tweak my understanding of our expanded partnership to include stringless sex, but that's not how things are between us.
We aren't exactly friends either, because I don't know how to be anyone's friend. But I feel responsible for him, and I want to keep him alive because he's the only person who matters to me. I don't think Leo would like to imagine me being so cold and isolated, but there's not much I can do about it, especially as I have no desire to form connections with other people even as a pretence.
I don't want anyone else. Taking care of one person is hard enough, and I fucked it up the first time. I won't let that happen with Leo. I've decided that no matter what form our relationship takes, I need to be by Leo's side to protect him. I want to make sure he gets to keep all that light he has inside him, to stop anyone from snuffing it out.
"What's wrong?" Leo asks me, drawing all my attention to the concerned quirk of his full mouth.
I remember taking that mouth and Leo allowing it to be taken by me. By something like me. It seems almost immoral, somehow, to have defiled him with my touch, my lips and spit and cum. I filled him up with my very essence, pressed dark bruises into his skin, and wanted desperately to keep him locked in against me for the rest of our days.
It scares me, a bit, how much I craved him then, and how that feeling hasn't abated since. I had him once, and whatever pull we felt towards one another should be done with.
It doesn't feel anything close to done.
"I know Titanus Bullet," I say, addressing both Leo and North. "Trust me, you don't want to work with him."
"Why not?" Leo frowns, searching my face for information he won't find.
"Apart from the fact he's a piece-of-shit war-profiting arms dealer?" I sneer, unable to hold in a scoff of disgust. "Okay. He's also a lying bastard. Whatever he told you he wants from us in exchange for intel, I guarantee you that won't be the extent of it. He'll want more. He always does."
I met Titanus Bullet numerous times during my tenure with Obsidian Inc. They buy weapons from him as well as trade in secrets, political and otherwise.
"Do you think he would lie about knowing where Rohan Sathe is being kept by OI?" North asks, detached curiosity on his face.
