CHAPTER 195: CHAPTER 195: THE NIBBLING STAGE

The car purred through the sleeping city, headlights carving clean lines through the mist. Glass towers loomed on either side, their windows glittering like cold stars, Numen City’s heart after midnight. Connor drove fast enough that the engine growled, one hand steady on the wheel, the other tapping restlessly against the console.

He could feel Uno watching him. The god hadn’t moved, still lounging in the passenger seat with the same infuriating calm, blowing a lazy bubble with his gum before letting it pop. It was almost obscene how human he looked like this, like any man catching a ride with a friend, except for the air around him, the faint pulse of something too vast to belong in a body.

Connor glanced sideways at him once, jaw tight. "You could have warned me you were tagging along."

"You didn’t ask."

Connor’s laugh was sharp and humorless. "I didn’t think I had to. Most people don’t assume divine interference when they go for a drive."

Uno smiled faintly, eyes glinting under the dashboard light. "Most people aren’t worth interfering with."

Connor gritted his teeth and pressed harder on the accelerator. "Lucky me."

He didn’t know why he was still driving toward Marco Salvador’s office—habit, anger, or maybe both. The bastard had printed that poisonous piece on Elias last month, the one that still clung to search engines like a stain. Victor had handled the corporate side of the damage quietly, but Connor... Connor wanted to handle it personally.

He was tired of being the reasonable one, the polished board member of Numen Corp, the man who smoothed edges and signed contracts with a smile. Beneath it all, there was still a human core, sharp and bitter and entirely too alive. And now that danger itself was sitting beside him, smirking like sin in a leather seat, that part of him stirred.

"You’re enjoying this," he muttered.

Uno looked delighted. "Immensely."

"Of course you are," Connor said under his breath, turning into the narrow street that led to The Argus, Marco Salvador’s glossy little empire of gossip and scandal. The building was dark except for the light on the third floor, Salvador’s office, always open too late, like he didn’t want to give his conscience time to catch up.

Connor parked in front of the building, engine humming low. "If you’re going to follow me in there, don’t start any biblical plagues."

Uno stretched, the sound of his joints cracking strangely human. "No promises."

Connor ran a hand through his hair and stepped out, slamming the car door harder than necessary. The night air bit cold against his face, snapping his thoughts into focus. He wasn’t sure what he wanted to do yet: yell, threaten, or maybe just look at Marco until the man remembered fear, but it would feel good to do something.

Behind him, Uno slid out of the car, unhurried, the faint scent of something impossible drifting in the air. "You look alive again," he said. "I like it."

Connor shot him a glare over his shoulder. "Don’t. You’re already on thin ice."

Uno smiled, teeth glinting faintly in the streetlight. "Then don’t make me melt it."

Connor muttered something unholy under his breath and started up the steps. He wasn’t sure what was more dangerous tonight, the god walking behind him or the part of himself that finally wanted to stop being civilized.

—

The elevator doors opened with a tired chime. The floor smelled faintly of stale coffee and printer ink, the scent of deadlines long past their due. The Argus’s editorial office was dim except for the light burning from Marco Salvador’s glass-walled cubicle.

Connor didn’t bother knocking.

Marco jerked upright, the glow of his monitor throwing sharp shadows across his face. "Mr. Woods?" His voice squeaked on the name. "It’s... past midnight."

"I noticed," Connor said, closing the door behind him with a soft click. "We’ll make it quick."

Marco blinked, glancing behind him as if expecting security. "If this is about the Numen story..."

"It is," Connor said, his tone even, civilized, so civilized it was dangerous. He moved closer, immaculate in his tailored coat, the kind of man who could gut reputations with a phone call but preferred to do it in person when the insult was personal. "You’re going to tell me what was in Anna Clarke Adler’s mind, because I can’t, for the life of me, comprehend why you’d want to provoke Victor Numen."

Marco’s throat bobbed. "It wasn’t about him."

Connor’s eyebrow arched, his voice still soft. "Everything is about him. That’s the first rule of survival in this city. So I’ll ask again... why?"

The journalist hesitated, eyes darting between Connor and the dark shape perched casually on the corner of his desk. Uno had already made himself at home, legs crossed, blue eyes glinting with mirth.

"I have a debt to her..." Marco began, voice cracking just slightly. "She saved my brother from the dissidents when he infiltrated their headquarters. Without her, Adrian would be dead."

He let out a shaky breath, knuckles whitening around his pen. "She provided proof that Elias Clarke killed Matteo Weller. Well..." He licked his cracked lips.

Connor didn’t move. The silence stretched thin. He wasn’t foul; he never had been. The kind of man who could smile in boardrooms while carving business apart. But his stillness was sharper than any rage. He knew Marco was hiding something.

"Well?" Connor asked at last, voice low, almost conversational.

Marco’s eyes flicked toward Uno and back again. "It was staged," he blurted. "Or partly. I don’t know. She said the footage came from a private archive, Numen property from symphsion Elias and Victor, but it looked wrong, like it had been edited over another recording. I didn’t dig too deep."

"Convenient," Connor murmured. He took one step closer, the muted scent of expensive cologne and steel following him. "So you owed her, and you published her lies to repay that debt. Tell me, Salvador... how much of that was guilt, and how much was self-interest?"

Marco flinched. "You don’t understand... she said if I didn’t, she’d expose me. The dissident files, Adrian’s fake passport, all of it. She had leverage."

Connor’s mouth curved faintly. "So you traded Elias for your brother’s freedom. Emotional, truly."

Uno made a soft noise from the corner, something between a hum and a laugh. "Mortals and their bargains. Always confusing debt for devotion."

Marco turned to him, eyes wide. "What is he?"

Uno leaned forward, elbows on his knees, expression bright with delight. "Everything you’re afraid of and a little more. Tell me, Marco, when she came to you... did she already look frayed at the edges? Did her eyes flicker like someone else was trying to see through them?"

Marco blinked, trembling. "I don’t know, maybe? I was talking with her on the phone. You know how people like her act."

"People like her?" Uno repeated softly, his tone bright but the smile not quite reaching his eyes. "Paranoid? Possessed? Half-consumed by what they created?"

Connor didn’t look at him. "Ignore him," he said, voice even, eyes fixed on Marco. "You said you spoke to her. When was the last call?"

"Three weeks ago." Marco’s fingers fidgeted with the pen in his hand, turning it over and over until it clicked against the desk. "She was ranting by then. Said her child wasn’t sleeping. That she could feel it... breathing through her. Said its heartbeat wasn’t in her chest anymore."

Uno’s grin widened like a cat catching the scent of blood. "Ah. The nibbling stage."

Marco’s face went pale. "The... what?"