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But Pax was too stubborn. Roman supposed he got that from him.
He came closer.
And took out a set of keys.
“Pax,” Roman bit out, wincing as the muscles in his back spasmed again. “Don’t tell me you stole those. Please don’t tell me you stole those.”
“I didn’t steal them.”
“Don’t lie to me.”
“I’m not. I didn’t steal them.” Paxton backed up, craning his neck and squinting to see the shackles. “I need to grow a few feet.”
“Pax, I need you to go.” Roman’s heart sprinted with fresh fear. “I need you to take those back. If Dad finds out you took them…” He swallowed bile and blood. “Please, just go.”
Paxton’s eyes shone in the dark. “Look at your face,” he croaked.
“I’m fine. I don’t need you crying over me, okay? This is bad enough.” He shut his eyes tight. Tried not to cry himself. “Please, Pax, just go. You’d be doing me a favor.” He added in a quieter whisper, “Please.”
“Fine,” Paxton sighed, “I’ll go. You can stay.”
Had Roman been in a better mood, he would’ve laughed. His brother was always cracking ridiculous jokes, some of them not even funny, but he loved him for it. “Very funny, you lippy little shit.”
Silence.
“Pax?” Roman opened his eyes.
Standing in his place was Shayla Cousens, and drifting toward the stairs on silent feet was Pax, who shrugged and said, “I let her in.”
“Shay,” Roman breathed.
She smiled, though her mouth wobbled, her pale green eyes gleaming with tears. “Hello, Prince of Shadows.”
Shay snuck Roman and Paxton out of the House of Black and into her tiny apartment in the district of Zima.
She helped Roman into the shower, helped him out of his bloody clothes, even kneeling to shimmy off his jeans.
“You don’t have to do this,” he said, bracing a hand against the bathroom counter as he lifted one leg at a time, every movement careful.
“You’d do it for me,” Shay said, tugging his pant-leg and sock over his left foot. She peeked up at him. “Wouldn’t you?”
His throat shifted, his blood-crusted, gold eyes darting toward the running shower. “This is embarrassing.”
“What’s embarrassing is that your dad gets off on beating his sons,” Shay said softly, helping him lift the other foot. “He’s the embarrassment. Not you.”
She stood, scooping up his filthy clothes, and placed them on the counter. She’d do laundry tonight. Bleach the blood out of them, erase every trace of Donovan and his awful men.
Roman stepped toward the shower. Every movement made him wince, pained breaths drawn through his teeth. Dried blood streaked his cheeks like tears, his ears full of blood, too.
Shay couldn’t decide if she wanted to scream or cry, but she knew one thing for certain.
She wanted to kill Donovan. Make him suffer for hurting Roman. Pax. There was no excuse for this nightmare.
Donovan Slade was a monster.
Once Roman was in the shower, Shay left so she could make a bed for Paxton on the couch. The apartment was small, only one bedroom, but she had enough spare blankets and pillows to turn Pax’s little area into a fort.
“Do you have everything you need?” Shay asked him as she flicked off the kitchen light. Pax was snuggled up under piles of blankets on the couch, his eyes fixed on the television, an empty cup of hot chocolate on the coffee table. Shay had used a spare sheet to create a canopy above the couch, draping the sheet across the end of it like a curtain—a door for his blanket fort.
