Page 77 of Oblivion
“This side,” Atlas said as he passed next to me, going left. “This house is much bigger than the last one, but I like it. I think you will too.”
Yeah, I already liked it. That wasn’t the problem. The problem was that it wasn’t my home. It never would be.
True to his word, Atlas showed me the rest of the house, taking me through the enormous living room that was empty at this time of the day, kitchen, the bar area, avoiding the part of the house meant for gatherings.
But I didn’t exactly give a shit about any of those. I just wanted to see Kaiser.
Atlas led me to the backyard that I saw previously from my window and to what looked like a garage, where Kaiser’s angry barks were coming from.
“Why am I not surprised that you got yourself a rottweiler,” Atlas said, unlocking the door of the garage.
“What, did you think I would get a shih-tzu or chihuahua?”
“Oh, I can imagine you, carrying those designer bags with the dog inside.”
“Atlas,” I growled. “Shut up and open the door.”
“Fine, but if he tries attacking Indigo again, please let him. That man deserves it.”
“Hmmm, and why is that?”
Atlas’s shoulders stiffened, his hand resting on the doorknob of the garage, but I wasn’t going to skirt around the issue anymore. Something happened between them, and we were going to talk about it.
“Atlas?”
“Let’s not talk about it?”
“Yeah, absolutely.” I smiled, looking at the shocked expression on his face as he turned toward me.
“Really?”
“Absolutely not, dude. We’re going to talk and we’re doing it today.”
His groan would have been funny, but I knew he was avoiding the topic of Indigo, and whatever happened was bad enough to make him feel like this.
“I’m the queen of avoidance, Atlas, and we both know that it never did any good for me. The only thing it brought was more pain, regrets, and anger from the other party, so we do need to talk. I don’t want to see you like this, moody, grumpy and sad.”
“And what if I don’t want to talk?”
“Then I have appropriate torture methods that have proven quite useful, and trust me, you will beg to talk if I start using all of them.”
“Fine, fine,” he relented. “We will talk. But you can’t meddle and you have to promise me that you won’t try to maim and torture him.”
“Ah, so we are getting somewhere.” As if I didn’t know that all of this was connected to Indigo. “But I can’t promise you that I won’t try to hit him if he fucked you over.”
“How do you even know who I am talking about?”
“Dude, seriously?” I asked. “There’s only one person you couldn’t keep your eyes off, and that person lives in this house. So unless you’re trying to tell me that there’s another man out there who made you look like a lovesick puppy, you can’t stand there and pretend that I don’t know who you’re talking about.”
“Maybe it’s a girl.” He chuckled. “You’ve been away for a month.”
“You’ve been having a pity party for one for more than a month. So, cut the crap and open the door. Kaiser is waiting.”
Atlas started laughing. “Yes, boss. One angry rottweiler coming right up.”
“He wouldn’t be angry if you guys allowed him to sleep with me. He’s not used to this anymore.”
I closed the distance between Atlas and me, and pushed him aside, opening the door myself.
