Bane is between them. I can hear it in the positioning of the voices—one on the left, one on the right, one in the middle. Trying to hold the space. Trying to keep them apart.
I move down the hallway. Sock feet on carpet. Silent. My body protests every step—the ache in my joints, the lingering soreness between my legs that hasn't fully faded, the headache that's become a permanent resident behind my eyes.
Atlas's office door is closed. I stop three feet from it.
Now I can hear them.
"—don't owe you an explanation." Zero. Harsh. Jagged. Each word bitten off like he's tearing them from something.
"The hell you don't." Atlas. Cold. So cold it burns. "You've been circling him for weeks. Watching him. And now you disappear for an entire day while he can barely—"
"While he can barely what?" Zero cuts him off. Mocking. Defensive. "Be normal? Maybe you should ask Bane about that. He's not exactly been rolling out the welcome mat either."
A pause. Then Bane's voice, lower, harder than I've heard it: "I never touched him."
"No, you just made him feel like garbage every time he walked into a room. Real noble, Bane. At least I—"
"At least you what?" Atlas again. The temperature dropping with every word. "Finish that sentence."
Zero doesn't.
"Bane came to me because he saw Max in the kitchen this morning." Atlas's voice is measured now. Deliberate. The calm before something breaks. "Said he was moving like someonewho'd been hurt. Couldn't sit down without wincing. Wouldn't make eye contact."
"So?"
"So—" The word cracks like a whip. "—you've been gone all day. You have a bruise on your jaw the size of his fist. And he flinches every time someone mentions your name. You want to tell me that's a coincidence?"
Silence. Heavy. Loaded.
"We're not stupid, Zero." Bane's voice now. Quieter than Atlas but just as sharp. "Something happened. Last night—I heard you come up the stairs. Heard his door close after."
"You don't know what you're talking about."
"Then explain it." Atlas. "Explain why our stepbrother—who's clearly going through something, withdrawal or god knows what—can barely function today. Explain why you look like someone punched you in the face. Explain why you've been avoiding this house like it's on fire."
More silence. I press closer to the door. My heart is pounding so hard I'm afraid they'll hear it.
When Zero speaks again, his voice is different. Lower. Rougher. The bravado cracking at the edges.
"He came to me." Almost a whisper. "He came downstairs. I didn't drag him there. He showed up at my door smelling like—" He stops. Starts again. "You don't know what it was like. Having him right there. Wanting it. Wanting me. You don't know what his scent—"
"But I didn't." Each word is a blade. "Because he's vulnerable. Because he's scared. Because he didn't ask for any of this, and the fact that our bodies want him doesn't give us the right to take him."
"Don't act like you're better than me." Zero's voice is rising again. The desperation underneath turning to venom. "Don't stand there with your self-righteous bullshit and pretendyou wouldn't have done the same thing if you'd been alone with him when his scent—"
"I know exactly what his scent does." Atlas's voice drops into something dangerous. Intimate. "I've been sleeping in sheets that smell like him for two days. Standing outside his door at night fighting every instinct telling me to go in. You think you're the only one affected?"
"Then you know." Zero's voice rises. Desperate now. "You know what it's like. You know I couldn't—"
"I know you could have." Atlas cuts him off. Cold. Final. "I was alone with him too. He was unconscious in my bed. Burning up. Completely helpless. And I kept my hands to myself because that's what he needed. Not what I wanted. What he needed."
"Don't." Zero's voice is cracking now. Actually cracking. "Don't act like you're better than—"
"Did you even ask him?" Atlas's voice goes quiet. Quieter than the shouting. Worse than the shouting. "Before you—whatever you did down there. Did you stop and ask if he actually wanted it? Or did you just take what you wanted and tell yourself his body meant yes?"
The silence that follows is suffocating. I can feel it through the door. Heavy. Crushing. A held breath.
"He didn't say no." Zero. Barely audible. Wrecked. "He didn't—he wanted—"
