It was adorable.
“Why do you keep calling Rex that?” Aneski demanded.
“Why’d you involve him and make him ask all of the questions for you? Kind of cowardly.”
“You don’t get to lecture me, Flix. Not anymore.”
“Not sure I ever did.” He lifted the knife slightly, fiddling with the tip of the blade.
“Cut me again and you’ll regret it,” Ani stated.
“At least tell me what Popcorn said when he found you chained to the wall in my place. I wanted to ask before, but it slipped my mind.” Flix had purposefully chosen the largest plug in Aneski’s arsenal. “Did he have to help you take the toy out? What about the cock cage? Do that one yourself?”
“Since you brought it up,” he growled, “where the fuck did you put the keys?”
“Oh, those?” He pretended to think it over and then said, “I tossed them into the forest on my way home.”
On the hotwired hoverbike while he shot off power into the woods.
Recalling how close of a call that’d actually been, for the both of them, Flix sobered.
“After the other day, I’ll call it even for that time I hurt your feelings, but this is the only out I’m giving you, Ani. There can’t be a next time. And tell Popcorn to keep his mouth shut. If this gets out, my friends won’t be as kind.”
“You think you’re being kind?”
“I could have killed you,” Flix pointed out. “You would have had it coming. But I didn’t.”
“Don’t act like this is all my fault when we both know it isn’t. You also could have answered my questions at any given time. You’re the one who chose not to. I lost the only family member I had left, and you can’t even tell me why. What the hell is wrong with you?”
“What’s wrong with me?” he asked, snorting. “Tiny Terror, you literally held me captive for weeks and got off on watching me come myself. Look in a mirror.” He angled his head to the left. “Bathroom is that way.”
“So you can stab me in the back?” Aneski shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
Flix sighed. “Did you come all this way and put on that show just to tick me off?”
“You used me and then abandoned me,” he snarled. “Again.”
“When you held me captive, all you did was fool around with me, so I returned the favor. And I kept it brief. I left because I was done with you, Ani. I am done with you.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Ani—”
“Why won’t you just tell me?” he cut him off. “Why won’t you tell me what happened that day between you and Russ?”
“There’s nothing to tell.”
“Someone saw the two of you together, arguing. When the fire broke out, you two were apparently the only ones left in the room. You got out safely, but my brother…There wasn’t even a full body left I could identify him by.”
He’d thought about it the whole drive home, what he would do once Aneski came for him again. After three years, he really didn’t think he owed Russ anything, and clearly, this was eating Ani up inside. He’d tell him and then—
“They never discovered the cause of the fire,” Aneski said, eyeing him closely. “You told me you didn’t kill him, and I don’tknow why, but I believe you. But…Did you do it? The fire? Was that you?”
Flix reassured himself that it was for good reason that he’d be the number one suspect. He was called Firebug amongst the people who knew him best for his specific proclivities. Though, truthfully, he wasn’t a pyromaniac. That was just what he needed the world to believe.
“Before you outright deny it, the footage I was filming of us for Seaside was destroyed, and my cameras are fried,” Aneski continued.
“We both said too much for that sex tape to be used at the Seaside,” Flix replied. “Maybe if you’re nice to me, I’ll agree to film another with you. No restraints this time.”
