My Fake Billionaire Damaged Boyfriend
Chapter 20

Izzy

I’m escorted to a small little cell in the corner of the compound, but it’s not that bad. They took the cuffs off of me, thankfully, but they have yet to do the same to Dimitri. His hands are still bound behind his back as he sits on the floor of his cell, his eyes darkened past recognition. He stares at the floor, a hate in his aura that was never there before.

They undo the bar door between us, and I give the agent escorting me a cold look.

“Can’t you take those off? It’s not necessary.”

He hesitates, Dimitri still wildly out of breath like he destroyed a small city or something. The agent finally gives in, undoing his cuffs and locking us in this little cell together. I’m happy for the moment we get to have alone, the two of us curled on the floor next to one another while the agents walk out of the space shortly after.

The silence is deafening.

“Are you alright?” I ask, my voice a bit raw since we last spoke.

He gives me a flicker of a look that I can read all too well. “No, not at all. My arch-enemy murdered my father. How could I ever be okay again?”

I swallow hard, my heart in the base of my throat now. “Yeah, I guess I should have assumed that.”

His eyes soften as he looks sideways, his hand taking the leap from his lap to mine. I instantly lean into his side, the sensation so damn natural that I can’t help it. He falls right in line as well, kissing my temple tenderly while he snakes his arm around my h**s.

“I’m glad you’re here. I’m sorry I got upset with you,” he whispers.

I shake my head, my hands curled into fists in his tee shirt. “It’s not your fault, Dimitri. You were upset, and I wasn’t sure what else to do, so I hid it from you. I didn’t want you to be hurt but I know that’s not really my place.”

“It is your place,” he gusts simply, without a second thought. “This is your place; beside me, always.”

I perk up with a spread of warmth rushing through me. “Really?”

He nods solemnly, pulling me in so tight that I nearly gasp alive at the feeling of his tight, strong arm around me. His eyes steady on mine, and his lips purse a little bit, either on impulse or on the idea of kissing me. I’d be lying if I said I’m not thinking the same thing.

I want him so deeply that it hurts, and I think he knows that.

I want him to know everything, though.

“Hey, stop that,” he says softly.

My brows pinch. “Stop what?”

“You’re disappearing into your head, sweetheart. I don’t want that. I just want you to be here, with me. You can leave all that extra stuff to the side, just like what I’m doing right now.”

I give him a skeptical look. “You shouldn’t push that stuff aside, Dimitri. It’s okay to be upset. Your father… what Alek has done if that claim is true…”

“I know, but we don’t know anything for sure. Not yet. And having you here reminds me of what is really important. You and I are in this together, right?”

“Always,” I claim.

His smile finally lifts. “Good, Kitten. That’s good.”

I snuggle closer, nearly ready to confess how I feel about this man to his face, but the moment comes and goes, and it’s too late again. My body shivers as footsteps come around the corner of the wall before us, and the agents on the other side of the bars unlock the cell door.

“Alright, Mr. Wilde, you’re with me. Izzy, they need you back by the monitors.”

I grumble slightly, wanting us to stay together, and I guess Dimitri feels the same way. He stands first, helping me to my feet next with his hand clasping over mine.

“We’re staying together,” he says firmly.

The agent looks more than annoyed. “Sir, we have orders for you two—”

“We’re staying together,” I repeat this time, not budging on that stance.

Eventually, they give in, and we head down the hall together toward the room full of monitors. Mccoy is already in there, holding open a manilla file folder that looks like it’s come from a stack of many that are strewn over the desk. I want to know what’s in it, but I don’t ask, watching him assess the sight of us so purposefully defying his orders.

He doesn’t argue with us this time, looking at Dimitri with a sorrowful twinge to his otherwise sharp, unbothered expression. “So, we’ve checked out this claim, and it looks like it might be true. There were trace amounts of sodium that were found in your father’s toxicology reports at death.”

“How did he die?” I ask in a whisper.

“Heart failure,” Dimitri says, looking back to Mccoy. “My father was very keen on his allergies. He would have never accidentally consumed something that would trigger a reaction.”

“Yeah, that’s what the claim states on the monitor. This person seems to know the substance that was added to the sodium and masked in the toxicology report. We have enough already documented today to arrest him for the murder, but we want to wait.”

The room goes stiff, and everyone looks at me.

I swallow hard and ask, “You want me to break in still, don’t you?”

Mccoy nods. “Yeah, it’s imperative that you do. The more proof we have, the more charges we can pin him on, the longer he’s in prison. It’s best for everyone that you figure out how to get into the back door, that way we have it on our side in the trial.”

I shiver slightly, but nod. Dimitri seems to be the only confident one, his lips coming to my forehead before they lower to my mouth. I inhale his scent and his pressuring k**s at once, finally settling my pulse long enough to sit down and appear calm.

I’m not calm. Not even close.

“You got this, Kitten. You’re the best at coding, okay? I know you can do this,” he hums into my warm cheek. “You just do what you do best.”

I look around quickly, still settling on his eyes that seem to calm me the most. “What if I can’t?”

“There isn’t a way that you can’t,” he says. “I believe in you, Izzy. You got this. Just do what you do best.” He pulls me forward once more, his lips settled on my forehead for a long, extended peck. I can’t help but relax in a fizz of relief.

“Okay, I can do this.”

I don’t believe it, but he does. That’s all the reinforcement that I need.

Sitting down, my fingers fall on the keys like it’s second nature. I back out of the conversation Gwen brought to the forefront, and I wonder if she’s still in here, tinkering from the inside out. I manage to type out a question, just in case she is still around, but nothing comes up.

“She must have been kicked out of the system,” I breathe. “Not supposed to type in here. I bet the antivirus walls shut her out.”

Everyone nods along as I work through the bleak code, trying every algorithm that I know exists. It’s complicated work, and it’s not fun typically, but for once I’m enjoying myself again. Dimitri is by my side they way we started this whole deal, and it’s grown from there. I’m just happy he’s beside me, his hand on my knee, while I fight through the interworking of his worst enemy’s prized possession.

“Okay, let’s see here,” I whisper, typing in the most complex breaker code that I know. It’s like algebra and calculus, the algorithm so damn complicated that I can hardly stand it. My heart falls into my stomach and I mutter to myself, seeing the long line of code and being too afraid to finish it.

What if I’m wrong? What if they abandon me when this fails because they don’t think I can do it?

I don’t want to mess up. I don’t want to be the reason I’m left behind.

Dimitri squeezes my knee, his chair practically up against mine. Everyone else looks on with dismissal, like this archaic plan of code isn’t going to work, and I consider just clearing it from the screen and forgetting it was ever an option.

I can’t humiliate myself here, not with Dimitri’s father’s death in question. They need someone stronger, someone smarter, and I back away from the keyboard at once, knowing that I can’t go through with this.

“Hey, you got this,” Dimitri says, his voice soothing to me on so many levels. “You’re okay. You can do it. You’re just trying out everything that could work.”

“What if it doesn’t?”

He shakes his head, smiling gently. “You are just trying to avoid failure, and that’s not the woman I know. The Izzy that I met is bold and smart, and she knows what she’s doing. If you think this could work, then you need to try it. Don’t let doubt keep you from trying. You will do fine.”

I drop my head slightly, feeling like everyone is watching me with an edge of humiliating laughter. They don’t think I can do this, and I’m starting to think the same. They know this code is old, outdated, and it would never work with the new technology they have!

I’m wasting their time and they hate me for it.

I hate me for it.

“You’re the person for the job,” Dimitri says sternly. “Only you can do this, Izzy. Okay? You know what you’re doing. Keep doing it.”

I look up, a hint of mist in my eyelids. “I don’t want to fail.”

“I don’t think you will,” he says, his voice reaffirming that claim. “I think you’re going to do just fine, Kitten. You are already on your way to cracking this whole case. The FBI couldn’t do it without you. That means something. You might not see your value, but we do. I see your value every day.”

I sit up straighter, something about that affirmation making me run warm again. How could he say that and not mean it? He has to mean it! This has to mean something, and I can’t pretend that it doesn’t. Not anymore. I have to accept that Dimitri and the FBI all need me, and for the first time in my life, I can’t let down someone who needs me because I’m afraid of being left behind if I fail.

I have to let that go.

So, I release the tension with my parents, with my childhood, and with the fears I have of losing this loving man. It all means something to me, and I know that I’m safe here. I’m finally safe with someone and I won’t lose that to anything.

I nod, turn back to the monitor, and stifle a long inhale that fills my chest.

Finishing off the extra detailed line of code, the room gets tense, and I enter the equation right into the middle of the backdoor sheet that had been given to Dimitri when he bought my information off the auction. It’s like watching my life implode right before my eyes, and I couldn’t be happier about it.

The monitor rips into a flash of color and code, the sheet ripped from view while the screen flickers with light, coming to a new screen made up of red text, and black background. My heart is pumping out of my chest at this point, each line of words starting to make more and more sense as we all lean forward. It looks like chaos at first, the realization brushing through the room like a summer breeze.

“It’s—it’s all—” Dimitri says, cutting himself short in awe.

“It’s names of the people he’s stolen from,” I whisper, scrolling down to show a few green names mixed into the code, as if displaying who he has yet to steal from, and who he has already stolen from. “Look at all of those names… there’s… there’s millions.”

“This can’t be,” Mccoy gusts, moving in to point out names as he goes down, some of them bordered in gold lettering and sticking out from the others. “These names in gold are people with money, or people with governmental power. It’s like he’s selling their names for more profit than anyone else’s.”

“He’s going to sell profiles that have government ties,” I whisper. “This is… insane.”

“It’s amazing,” Dimitri blurs, looking to me. “You’re amazing, Izzy. I can’t believe you’ve done this. You’re better than you thought possible. It’s amazing.”

I smile wide, my entire body lighter than I’ve ever felt it. I leap forward, his arms catching me as I cheer in celebration of this new discovery. The agents all high-five and cheer with us, like it’s finally done. And it is done. We were fighting this fight for so long and now it’s over.

Alek is going to be taken down and we’re finally going to be done with his misuse of technology.

I wipe my eyes, feeling the tears that come out of relief and ecstasy. We’ve finally beaten him, and the work we’ve done up to this point hasn’t been in vain.

He spins me around once, wanting to k**s me, but before either of us can lean in and make that move, our voices collide like a train meets a large boulder.

“I love you.”

I hardly hear my voice, and I doubt he hears his, but I can hear his words clear as day. It brings light to the windowless room, and a coolness that is unmatched by this hot, stuffy space. It’s like we’re in an open field with nothing but the sun and the wildflowers surrounding us.

In reality, we’re in a tiny office surrounded by coding machines and intricate computers, but it’s fitting for us. It’s just the place we’ve fallen in love with one another, surrounded by chaos and code.

And I think that’s what makes this so great.

He sets me down, and I’m beaming ear to ear as the agents scatter.

“Thank you, we are going to move on this now,” Mccoy says, brushing past us both as he orders other agents to get ready for the biggest arrest in this city. He stops in the doorway, looking between our rather dismissive reaction, both of us more focused on the happiness between us. “Are you two coming? It’s going to be good to watch.”

Dimitri looks to me curiously, his eyes wide and brighter than I’ve ever seen. “What do you say, Kitten? Want to go see him get arrested?”

I smile slightly, leaning into his solid chest. “That depends. Does this count as a first date?”

He barks a laugh and nods, his hands on my face and tucking my hair back behind my ears. “You know what? Yeah. It is our first date. And when it’s done, I know a great little bar we can go to afterward for drinks.”

“Sounds perfect to me,” I gleam. “I love you, Dimitri Wilde.”

His face is full of nothing but pure adoration. “I love you too, Izzy. So much.”

The End.