The DJ.
Headphones slung around his neck, cigarette dangling from his lips.
“Noir,” Dagger mutters without even looking, voice tight with irritation. Like the name alone gives him a fucking headache.
A beat later, he finally turns his head, eyes narrowed, jaw flexing. “Don’t you have a booth to babysit?”
The drawl is lazy, but every word drips with territorial bite.
Noir exhales a slow drag of smoke, leaning back against the nearest brick wall like he’s got nowhere to be and all night to piss Dagger off. “Don’t you have a gutter to crawl back into? Or are you too busy handing out poison to people dumb enough to swallow it?”
The air thickens.
They’re facing off now. Two storms on a collision course, and I’m the damn lightning rod between them.
I glance between them, and for a second, everything slows.
Dagger, still pressed close, heat radiating off him like a fucking furnace, his hand still curled possessively on my hip. Noir, cool and unreadable, smoke curling around his fingers, eyes like ink but locked on me.
Both of them watching. Both of themclaiming, even if neither says it.
I feel like a track they’re fighting over who gets to drop first. Like a fucking prize.
My pulse kicks, and then the world shifts. Too fast and hot. The concrete tilts. My knees buckle slightly and I blink hard, gripping the wall to stay upright.
Noir straightens from the wall. “You good?”
But before I can say a word?—
“She’s fine,” Dagger snaps, sharp and immediate, like it personally offends him that someone else dared to ask.
Noir lifts a brow. Doesn’t say anything. Just looks at me again, longer this time, like he’s not buying it, and for good reason.
Because my head’s spinning. My lips are swollen. And Cyanide is still chewing through my brain like acid.
The heat. The tension. The way they’re both still watching me like I’m some dangerous little secret they just uncovered…
I need a fucking drink. Or an exorcism.
Maybe both.
Noir doesn’t smirk. Doesn’t blink. Just steps forward, gaze flicking over me as he shoves Dagger to the side. “You’re burning up.”
I open my mouth to protest but realize he’s right. My skin’s on fire. Sweat slicks every inch of me.
“I think I need a drink,” I mutter, louder than I mean to.
Noir takes that as a cue. His hand wraps around my wrist—not rough, but firm, and he pulls me away from Dagger and back inside.
I don’t resist.
Shit—I couldn’t even if I wanted to. Not with the way I’m floating. Slipping through sound, skin and sweat like I’m made of smoke.
The crowd swallows us whole again, neon slicing through the fog as Noir pulls me along like he owns the place and me. He doesn’t say a word, doesn’t look back, just cuts through the bodies like he’s got a mission and I’m the center of it.
We hit the hallway and I know where we’re going before he even reaches the door.
The bathroom.
