Until You (Off-Limits)

Noah closes Aria’s bedroom door and leans against it. He looks devastated and it’s obvious he’s feeling Aria’s pain as though it’s his own. He straightens and clenches his jaw, his expression shifting from pain to angry determination. He turns resolutely and heads toward the stairs, and I fall into step with him.

“You’re a doctor,” I remind him. “Your hands are precious. Do you really want to damage them? Those hands should be used to save lives.”

He glances at me and clenches his jaw. “She’s my sister. I haven’t seen her cry like that in over a decade. I don’t give a fuck about my hands, Gray. I’m burying that douchebag.”

He reaches the door and bends down to put on his shoes. I sigh. I get it. I want to beat Brad up just as much as he does, but will it help?

“All right. I guess I’ll have to bail you out for aggravated assault, then. How much do you think it’ll cost me? Do you think they’ll still let you work in a hospital if you have a criminal record? I’m not sure, you know.”

Noah freezes and looks down at his shoes. He looks defeated and helpless, feelings I understand all too well. “What do you want me to do, Gray? I can’t just let this slide. He broke her heart. He made her cry.”

I nod and lean against the front door, blocking his exit. “What I want you to do is leave this to me. I’m here, aren’t I? Beating him up might put him in the hospital, but he’ll recover. He’ll get over it, and in a month, it’ll be like it never happened. We can’t have that. Aria is my family too, Noah. I won’t let him get away with what he did. I’ll ruin his fucking life. Trust me, okay?”

Noah looks into my eyes, as though he’s wondering whether to put his faith in me. He nods hesitantly, and I breathe a sigh of relief.

“I want him to pay for using her, Gray. I want him to regret hurting her the way he has.”

I smile at him smugly and cross my arms. “Noah, I’ll make him regret ever approaching her.”

Noah nods and I tip my head toward the living room. “Come on,” I tell him. “Let’s make this son of a bitch pay.”

I lead him to the dining table where I’ve been working this week and start up my laptop as we both sit down. Noah is restless as he watches me type line after line of code, and I sigh, forcing myself to talk him through what I’m doing, even if it’s just to ease his worries.

“Aria said she helped him with software, didn’t she? If not for her, he’d never have a working project. I’ve just gained access to both his work computer and his laptop, and I’m corrupting all his files and back-ups. Not in an obvious way, though. That’d be too easy. I’m altering the code,” I say, pointing out specific lines of code that likely mean nothing to Noah, but he nods nonetheless. “This makes it so that every piece of software he’s worked on starts to act more and more buggy over the next few days, and every day, the issues will get worse. He won’t realize until the software has already been delivered to his clients, and by then, it’ll be too late for him to fix it.”

Noah grins and looks at me with wide eyes. “You can do that?”

I nod as my fingers fly over the keyboard. “This will ruin his reputation in the industry. He’ll lose his job, but more importantly, he’ll never be able to work as a software engineer again. Not after the mess he’ll be left with. Issues this big will result in a big investigation, and they’ll trace it all back to him.”

Noah crosses his arms and frowns. “He won’t know?”

I shake my head. “It’s quite obvious which parts of his software were coded by him, and which were crafted by someone else. Aria, I assume. His coding is a fucking mess, using ten lines where he could use one. He’s never going to figure it out, and I’ve made sure all issues point back to him.”

The short, tight lines of code look familiar to me. There are patterns I recognize, but I can’t quite place where I’ve seen them before.

Noah sits with me and stares at my screen intently as I finish writing the amendments that will ruin Brad’s life before removing every trace of my presence.

I sit back and sigh in relief when it’s done, but I don’t feel much better. It’s not enough. The damage I’ve done is extensive, but it doesn’t ease my anger.

“All done,” I tell Noah.

“Thank you, Gray. If you hadn’t been here, I might actually have ruined my career in a fit of rage. Aria would blame herself if that happened, and that’s the last thing I want to do to her. I don’t know, man. Just… thank you.”

I nod awkwardly. I’ve known Noah for over a decade, but I still don’t know what to say to stuff like this. He smiles knowingly and rises from his seat.

He claps me on the back and walks toward the stairs as I turn my laptop off. I watch him walk away, looking far more relaxed than he did an hour ago. I’m glad I was able to stop him from potentially ruining his career. He’s right. Aria wouldn’t have forgiven herself, and they’d both end up heartbroken. Noah’s career means the world to him. It’s all he’s ever dreamed about, and he’s only just finally finished his residency. I can’t let him risk it all now.

I’m restless as I walk to the guest room. Even though I know I did some irreversible damage to Brad, it doesn’t feel like enough. I can’t shake the image of Aria standing in front of me, tears streaming down her face. She felt so cold in my arms, and the way she was shaking… she didn’t even have her home keys — she had nothing but her phone on her. Aria must have rushed out of her apartment in a state of despair.

I sit down on my bed and run a hand through my hair. It’s not enough. Ruining his career isn’t enough.

I rise to my feet without a second thought and slip out of my room. Noah has too much to lose, but I don’t.

I grab Noah’s car keys on the way out, and twenty minutes later, I’m standing in front of Aria’s apartment. I raise my hand to the doorbell, barely able to restrain my anger.

Brad opens up almost immediately. “Aria?” he says, his voice tinged with mock concern.

His expression drops when he sees me standing in front of him, and I smile as I pull my arm back and punch him square in the jaw. He stumbles back and loses his footing, falling to the floor. A rush of satisfaction overcomes me, and the feeling is almost… thrilling. I’ve felt this way only once before when I put my former foster father in the hospital. This feeling… it’s addictive. It’s dangerous.

“That’s the last time you’ll ever say her name,” I tell Brad.

I lean in and pull him back up by his collar before punching him again, enjoying the loud crack upon impact. Brad falls back to the floor, blood trickling from his lip. The expression on his face tells me he knows exactly what he’s done — and that Aria knows. I’m tempted to do to him what I did to my foster father, breaking as many bones as I can, leaving him paralyzed. I struggle to push down my need for vengeance, my need to make him pay the ultimate price for his betrayal.

“Don’t try to contact her. Don’t appear in front of her. If I catch you anywhere near her, I’ll do far worse than I did today.”

Brad laughs mockingly, but I hear the desperation underneath it. “You won’t get away with this,” he tells me. “I’ll sue you. This is assault, and you can more than afford to settle, can’t you?”

I smile and look down at my fist. I hit him so hard that my knuckles are red. I sigh and look back at him. “Do you really think I’ll appear on any of your building’s security cameras? Noah’s home cameras will show me walking in a few hours ago, and they won’t capture me leaving again until tomorrow morning.”

I take a step back and shake my head. “Spread any rumors, and I’ll sue you for defamation. But that’s not all I’ll do. Watch your back.”

I want to say more, but I can’t have him suspect that I messed with his software. I doubt he’ll be able to find my little alterations to his code, but just in case, I don’t want to hint at it. I’m tense as I walk out of the building, my hands shaking with suppressed violence. This anger, this inability to accept injustice… it runs through my veins like a compulsion. I can’t give in to it again. I wanted to do so much worse to Brad, and I barely restrained myself. I should have put him in the hospital for what he did to Aria — but this will do.

It’ll do, for now.