Crunch.

A faceted glass shatters on the floor. Thin gloved fingers tighten their grip on the cane with its expressive knob. Well, it was clearly not an accident. Just the consequences of jealousy.

Few would say that Dirty Hands knows how to be jealous. Angry, revenge, that's fine, but jealousy? Even the man himself thought it was stupid. And especially to whom? One of his crows, the only person he let too close to him and had already regretted it a hundred times.

You never lacked male attention. Every time he saw you in a bar, there was either a crowd of people around you or someone specific who interested you that evening. And that's not surprising. You were young, beautiful and simply wonderful. You could get whoever you wanted. And that made him angry.

Kaz, as he thought, did not need people. Attachment, and especially love, only made you stupid and weak. He was stupid and weak. The man resigned himself to the eternal desire to have you only for himself, but it was much worse that he could not do it. Every time he touched someone, water came to his feet, nausea rose to his throat, and Georgie's voice reminded him how insignificant he was if he could not cope with such a trifle. It was because of this that he once closed himself off, and it was this that he blamed now.

The feeling of the warmth of your body and soft skin made everything else recede into the background. Not completely freeing him from anxiety, but allowing him to feel what he was losing. You had always been a tactile person, he was not going to blame you, but of course he was angry seeing you with that idiot. Not at you, at himself.

"To my office, now," Kaz said, passing by your desk, without even stopping. His usual hoarse voice seemed to have become even lower. You knew very well when he was irritated. The steady knocks continued for a few minutes as he climbed the stairs, only later dying down behind the noise of the crowd.