I Fell For My Nemesis

Avery was getting closer and closer to her breaking point. It had been stupid to let herself get caught on camera. If she had noticed earlier Angelo would have been able to do something about it. Unfortunately, neither of them caught onto what happened until it had already circulated widely around the internet and the damage had been done. 

She was supposed to keep a low profile. No one knew who she was but what if Hunsacher had seen it and connected that blurry picture to reports of the person who kept blowing up his buildings? 

She had been chewed out for that, Christian kept nagging her about taking better care of herself, and the whole grandchildren thing was stressing her out too even though Nancy hadn't said anything after that one time. She was probably still thinking about it. 

That was NOT an option right now—or possibly ever at the rate things were going—and thinking about the future she wanted but wasn't sure she could have only served to drive her crazier. She was getting sloppy as she had feared. 

Being stressed about that didn't help her any. The more stressed she got the more likely she was going to screw up again. 

Avery couldn't do that. She needed to stay completely under the radar. She straight up had to cancel a mission on Angelo because she was so stressed she caught a nasty virus and was knocked flat for two weeks. 

Christian gave her an even harder time about not taking care of herself after that though he diligently played nursemaid until he caught her virus. His body was in better shape than hers though so he recovered in less than a week. He wasn't falling apart like she was. 

She held onto her sanity by a thread. How much longer would she be able to push herself like this? 

She wasn't sure but when she started throwing up again less than a month after recovering from her illness she was seriously annoyed. She went back to the doctor for a note because she was out of sick days and was horrified when they smilingly told her she was pregnant. 

"I'm what?!" she screeched. 

The doctor raised an eyebrow. "Is that a problem?"

"Yeah, that's a problem! I was on birth control! How did this happen?"

"What kind of birth control do you use?"

"The pills."

"And have you been taking them regularly?"

Avery moaned when it hit her. When she was sick she forgot to renew her prescription on time. There was a two-day window when this could have happened once she was better. How had she managed to mess up something so important? 

"I'm an idiot. I missed two days because I didn't refill it in time. This is what I get for not being on top of things once," she lamented. 

The doctor frowned. "Avery…are you going to want to terminate this pregnancy?"

The answer should have been an unequivocal yes. The timing was absolutely horrible and she might miscarry anyway having to jump around and fight the way she did. Wouldn't it be better to get that out of the way? 

This was no time to be pregnant! She hadn't stopped Hunsacher yet and Christian absolutely would not let her run free the way he had been if he knew she was pregnant with his child. 

But the baby hadn't done anything wrong. She didn't want to be like her own mother, who had abandoned her for the sake of her career. Could she really kill her own child on purpose just because it chose to arrive at an inconvenient time? There were so many other things weighing on her conscience already!

"I don't know," she said in anguish, burying her face in her hands. 

What was she supposed to do? She couldn't even talk to anyone about this because they wouldn't understand or they would purposely push her toward one decision or the other. 

Vanessa wouldn't be able to fathom why a married woman would want to get rid of a child. Angelo would want her to do it immediately since he hadn't even wanted her to get married. Christian would obviously want her to keep it and raise it together like they talked about doing someday. 

Someday being the operative word. It wasn't supposed to happen this soon when she was in the middle of trying to overthrow a shadow tyrant!

"You don't have to decide right now…but you do need to decide soon. The sooner it's done the better for your body," the doctor said sympathetically. "I want you to think about your options and come back to see me in a week."

A week? She had to stew in all of this for a whole week?

Avery nodded numbly and headed out. A week. She couldn't talk to anyone and had to decide on her own in such a short amount of time. How could she possibly make a decision like that so quickly?

The worst part of this was that she had to act like everything was normal both at home and on the mission front. She was supposed to do another mission inside Hunsacher headquarters this weekend and she didn't know how she could possibly do it knowing what she did now. 

But since she couldn't talk to anyone about it she had to carry on. Carrying on was all she could do. 

She was pretending to be out of town overnight like on her insulin runs so she would have the chance to sleep it off but all of that jumping around made her nervous. She tried to be as careful as she could since she hadn't made a decision one way or the other yet. 

Avery's job tonight was planting a virus on Nolan Hunsacher's office computer that would give Angelo full access to all of the information stored on it, including more banking information. 

They were trying to cripple him financially so he would be forced to break up some of his monopolies. The other accounts they had used were ones Leah knew about and that was the only reason they had been able to access them. But had a lot more than just those out there. 

This was an important mission. One only Avery could do. 

She couldn't lose focus just because she had a monumentally large decision to make on her own. She needed to see this through. Once it was over she could go back to worrying. 

The office suddenly filled with smoke and she frantically looked around for the filtration button in the display but she had never had to use it before so she couldn't remember where to find it. She was out cold before she managed to locate it and men in gas masks entered the office to drag her away. 

When Avery woke up she was disoriented for a moment and tried to move her hands before realizing they were shackled with thick metal cuffs. Too thick to break through from the angle she was at. 

She cursed. They got her! Four years of being Nox and she had to get caught now?!

What was she supposed to do? She couldn't break free and there wasn't anyone she could call for either. Nobody she knew of could break her out of shackles like this. She didn't have anyone with superstrength or laser vision on speed dial. 

The only hero she knew personally who owed her a favor was her husband. Could she really call him in the middle of the night as Nox and expect him to come even if she did use her knowledge of his secret identity as leverage? It wasn't like Angelo could do anything to help her if she called him. 

Avery cursed. This sucked. Completely and totally sucked. Her phone was hooked up to the suit and calling as herself wasn't an option. 

She would have to temporarily block her number to call him but the chances of him answering an unknown number in the middle of the night were practically zero. And modify the voice changing feature of her suit temporarily so it worked internally rather than just externally. 

She cursed again. If this didn't work she was going to have to try Angelo though she doubted he would be able to get her out of this. If she didn't come home when she was supposed to tomorrow she would be in even bigger trouble with Christian. 

Setting up for the call was simple enough. Getting him to answer and actually cooperate was the real gamble. 

It was about 11 PM now. Would he even be awake? 

Christian didn't answer on the first try. Or the second. By the third Avery was about to give up when he answered at the last possible second and snapped, "What? Who is this? Why are you calling so late?"

"Mercury, I need help," Avery admitted. "I did save your life so can you get me out of this one?" 

"Nox?!"

"Yeah. I don't have anyone else to call. I'm currently being held captive and can't get out of the shackles. I need you to come and break them for me. I know you don't have superstrength but I'm sure you can figure something out." 

Christian made a disbelieving noise. "Why on earth would I help you?!"

"Because you're only alive right now because of me?"

"That doesn't mean I have to help you! I'm RETIRED. And I don't save villains. Find somebody else."

Avery's frustration mounted. This stubborn idiot wouldn't be so quick to say no if he knew who was asking but she wasn't about to risk her secret identity for this. She had to come up with another tactic. Appeal to his humanity somehow. 

She took a deep breath before blurting out part of the terrible truth. "I'm pregnant! I need to get out of here before something bad happens to my baby. Please. You wouldn't seriously leave a pregnant woman shackled to a chair, would you? Even if you don't like me my baby has done nothing wrong."

"WHAT?!" Christian screeched into the phone so loudly she winced. "You seriously expect me to believe that? You're a guy!" 

"My voice changer might sound like it but I'm not! It was the perfect cover. Who would ever guess such a deep robotic voice belonged to a woman? You certainly didn't and I interacted with you most." 

"I don't believe you!"