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We did. Maybe he knew just as much as I did that we needed to talk, and we didn’t really have the time to do it.
“We’ll be fine,” I murmured and took his fingers in mine. After a second, he squeezed them, rattled off his address, then fell quiet.
He stayed that way until we got to his apartment. Rhys climbed out of the car with us, and my eyes widened when he handed me the keys.
“What are you going to do?”
“I have a buddy a few blocks from here. I think you’ll need the car more than I do — you can take it back to that bed and breakfast you were renting and get your stuff. I already disabled the tracker and reprogrammed the plates. You should be good to go.”
Rhys looked me up and down for just a second, and held his hand out to me. It wasn’t a question when I took his arm and drew him into a hug, and it felt good when he gave my shoulder a squeeze before he pulled back and handed me a phone.
“Take this. I have another one, and it’s not traceable. Call the first number in there if you need anything. And Jayce,” he’d already started to walk away, but he flashed me a broad smile over his shoulder. “I always knew you were better than anything that family could give you, kid.”
I was quiet for a second as I watched him disappear around the corner, but Clay’s hand on my arm brought my attention back to him as he led me into his apartment.
“I have some money, weapons… medication…” He started listing things off the second he closed the door behind us. I took three quick steps and caught him by his wrist — Clay froze beneath my touch. “I don’t know if I have an explanation, though. I don’t know if I can make you understand that I —”
“I don’t care.”
That wasn’t what I’d meant to say. I wanted to know. I wanted to know everything — I wanted to know why he’d gone with me, if he meant any of it. I wanted to know if he’d ever meant to take me in, but the tremor still rocking through his shoulders stole my resolve.
“What? You have to care. Jayce, they sent me to kill your family. They wanted me to bring you in.” He still hadn’t turned to look at me.
“But you weren’t going to, were you? You meant it when you said you wanted us to leave.” I understood now — the desperation in his tone, the complete shift in how he’d acted. He was trying to protect me.
He left to protect me.
“I…” He turned, but his eyes were on my chest. “They didn’t tell me to bring you in until today.”
“Were you going to do it?”
He turned fully in my arms and pressed his fingertips to my chest, then slowly smoothed his hand until his palm rested over the soft thump of my heart. “No. I couldn’t.”
My fingers tickled along his arm, swept his injured shoulder, and mirrored his position. His heart was a violent, thundering beat beneath my hand. “Why?”
Clay looked up at me, his hazel eyes bright and confused. “I don’t know. I just knew I couldn’t do it… I… fuck.” His fingers clenched in my shirt. “I know you, too. Just here,” he pressed his fist against my chest and stepped into me so our hands touched. “And here. I don’t know how, but I know you.”
My heartbeat did speed up then. My lips parted just as the door behind us opened — a man in a clean-cut suit stood there with a gun in his hand and his head tilted.
“What the fuck are you doing here, John.” Clay’s voice was calm, but his pulse under my hand sped further.
“Well, isn’t it obvious? I’ve come to collect you. You did your job, after all. Daddy’s so proud. You’ll probably get a promotion, Clay.” The man had dark hair and the most cliché pair of sunglasses I’d ever seen covering his face.
“You sold me out.”
“You were fine, weren’t you? We had to see if it was worth it. Besides, it got the job done — you killed Marcus Holden and you have Jayce right here, ready for us to —” It took me a second to realize the sunglasses on John’s face breaking were from a bullet wound. It took another second to realize Clay was completely shivering where he pressed against me, and a gun was in his hand.
It took less than that for John to fall to the ground, the silenced shot so quiet I knew no one would have heard what happened. Clay turned without a word and headed into his room. I took a few seconds to pull the body into the apartment and throw it into the closet before I stalked after him.
“Clay, what the fuck?” My eyes were wide when I found him injecting himself with the same medication he’d used on me. The bullet wound on his side already looked like it was healing, and the one on his shoulder seemed shallow in the stark light of the apartment. My gaze darted from his neck to his face when he blew out a shaking breath.
“I’m fucking sick of it. Fuck both of our families, right?” He dropped the needle and walked to me. Clay had to come up on tiptoe to press his mouth to mine. “I just want this. I’m done with everything else. I just want us, Jayce. Can I have that, please?”
I couldn’t tell him no — my arms shifted beneath his hips and I lifted him. Clay moved automatically, his legs wrapping around my waist as I led him back to the shower. We needed to get cleaned up, we needed to get packed.
We needed to leave.
But more than all of that — impractically, maybe — I needed him.
