I grit down, pissed beyond belief. He’s throwing his entire firm in the shitter. For what? For me? For my feelings? What about everything he’s ever worked for? I take a step like I mean to walk away, but I swing back to him and growl out, “Don’t do this, Akara. Not for me.”
“Why not for you?”
I want to throttle him.
He wants to throttle me.
We’re glaring, and Akara breathes, “I did it. It’s already done.”
Torment explodes in me, and I push Akara hard. Like he saw it coming, he grips my suit jacket, and we wrench and pull with the same raw frustration embedded in our wrenching-and-pulling words. And we crash into a snowman. Cold rips through me, and we land hard, wrestling underneath the mound of snow and a top hat and carrot. I don’t want him to fall on a sword for me.
He doesn’t want me to take the sword for his company. Our crossroads are met with fists and sweat, and we pass blows. Knuckles in jaws, in abs, and he’s a better grappler, pinning me down beneath his body, even though I weigh more.
“KITS!” Sulli yells. “BANKS! STOP! FUCKING STOP!”
I barely hear her over my own frenzied pulse. Barely see anything but Akara and the snow. We grip and pull and wrench and pull. “Why can’t you care about yourself?!” He screams at me through held-back tears.
Those words throttle me in the gut.
I don’t know why.
I’m second best.
I’m dispensable.
I should have been the one who died.
All those things I know aren’t true but have been scarred onto bone buried under flesh. Because for most of my life, I’ve lived for the short time. Not for the long time or the everlasting time. But the briefest moment and second in time.
Because I never thought about myself like he’s thinking about me. Like she’s thinking about me.
Through glassed and searing eyes, I yell back, “You need him!”
“Not more than I need you,” he sneers before crawling off my body, and though every sore muscle in my body is screaming at me to collapse on the snow, I can’t.
He can’t.
Tunnel vision expands, and we notice the chaos we resurrected. Teenyboppers aim phones at us, recording our brawl into deceased Frosty the Snowman, and Maximoff has his arms around Sulli while she tries to run towards us.
“Let me stop them, Moffy! I can fucking stop them, please!”
Quickly, we scramble to our feet, just as Farrow wedges himself between us and extends his arms. “See, what we’re doing is not this. Not here.” Heat drills his glare onto me, then Akara. “Whatever’s going on—”
“Oh my God, they were fighting over Sulli!” a girl cuts him off and shrieks like it’s the cutest thing in the fuckin’ world. We did kinda fight over her. But not tonight. She has that wrong. I can’t see her among the crowd near Xander.
Oscar jogs over to us, and I notice Charlie Cobalt has joined Maximoff and Jane who speak to Sulli. Fuck Charlie.
That’s crossed my mind more than once. Every time I see him—being real here.
He called my girlfriend weak.
Sulli told us.
We’re all constantly looking from our clients to the crowds to the temps.
“Everyone’s saying you two broke out in a fight,” Oscar motions to me and Akara. “They’re wrong?” He sees Farrow’s knife-cutting gaze and then says, “Fuck me, they’re not wrong?” Oscar stares at Akara like he’s never seen him before.
“It’s over,” Akara says and glances at the crumpled snowman with remorse. To Farrow, he adds, “I’m sorry. I want to apologize to Maximoff too—there’s no excuse for what just happened.”
Farrow frowns, disappointment in his face. Akara is supposed to be the best of us, the example we follow, and the one he leads by.
Here I am, just wanting Akara to put Kitsuwon Securities first, and now I’ve fucked up his standing with SFO. How they see him. How they respect him—I know that means somethin’ more to him than I’ll ever know.
“It’s on me too,” I cut in.
“No,” Akara shakes his head. “I’m your boss. I knew better.” He pries out his earpiece for a second. “Banks.”
“Yeah?”
“We have a two months’ pay-cut and mandatory weekly therapy.”
Farrow almost smiles.
Oscar is grinning.
Respect isn’t all lost, thank the Lord.
I nod to Akara, accepting whatever punishment he gives me.
“Welcome to the club,” Oscar pats Akara and me on the shoulders. When the Oliveira brothers threw punches at the Charity Golf Tournament, Akara let them off with the same penalty.
“Not a club I wanted to join,” Akara says with a slight smile that vanishes too fast. He’s eagle-eyed on something.
We all rotate to look. Near a lit tree, several Triple Shield bodyguards are snickering at us like we’re a bunch of jokes. Like we’re the rookies. Hell, I’ve worked with those same bodyguards who laugh now, and they’re not perfect. When push comes to shove, I’d still have their backs.