A text came in.
Grayson: You better feel guilty enough about taking off that you’re gonna tell me exactly where you are.
Reece winced.
Reece: Truck.
His gaze lingered on his phone, his new background with the hot gym picture Grayson had sent from Vermont; the flush to Grayson’s skin, the sweat-dampened hair, the warm hazel shade of his eyes.
Footsteps were already approaching, big feet moving rapidly. And here he was, making giant metaphorical heart-eyes over Grayson’s selfie.
Reece quickly stuck his phone in his hoodie pocket just as Grayson appeared on the other side of the tailgate. “What is it with you and running off behind my back?” He folded his arms on the top of the tailgate. “You couldn’t wait thirty seconds to tell me you’re going?”
Grayson’s eyes were so much harder to look at in person, with their missing emotions, but Reece could meet them for longer now, could take in the shades of gold and warm brown against the winter day’s endless steel.
“I’m sorry,” he said, and meant. “I opened that drawer, and Waller had pictures of me, but not just me—Jamey and Liam too.”
“Oh.” Grayson leaned forward on his folded arms on the top of the tailgate. “That pissed you off.”
It wasn’t really a question, more of an understanding. Reece nodded anyway. “I was—reallymad,” he admitted. And after last night, I just—rage and weapons didn’t seem like a great combination, and I thought I better get some distance from other people. Fast.”
“So you came here?”
“Yeah.” Reece hunched his shoulders. “I wasn’t really wandering off. I was just coming to wait for you.”
Grayson nodded slowly. “You still feeling on edge?”
Reece took a slow breath, in and out, trying to parse out his feelings. Grayson’s arrival had helped him calm down, but anger was still simmering, ready to rise up. “Probably safest if I’m not around anyone else for a while,” he finally admitted. “Except you, obviously. I still want to be around you, you’re the only one that makes me feel—the only one I want to—maybe it can be just the two of us for a bit?”
He winced. “Wow. I can’t believe I topped your terrible pickup line, buthey, baby, call me if there’s dangerisn’t half as bad ashey, baby, let’s be alone so I don’t accidentally send strangers into fits of rage.”
“Hey now,” said Grayson. “You don’t know what kind of lines work on me. Maybe I’m into it.”
Reece huffed a surprised laugh that eased the anger even more, a small smile on his lips as he looked up at Grayson.
Grayson stepped back, and then the tailgate was coming down. “Come on.” He extended a hand. “We can bicker over who has worse lines in the truck. It’s freezing out.”
Reece started to move his hand, then felt something cold in his pocket—feltthe cold, because that was the edge of his phone against his bare skin.
Shit. “Are we going somewhere?” Reece said, stalling as his mind raced. Why had he taken off hisglove?
“Those gloves we found gave me an idea,” Grayson said. “Not sure what you’re gonna think, though.”
There was a chime. Grayson dropped his hand, turning slightly to the side as he checked his watch. Reece took advantage of the moment and hurriedly slid down the bed until he was perched on the edge of the open tailgate, his legs hanging off the end, tucking his hands out of sight under his thighs just as Grayson turned back to him.
“What idea?” Reece said, in the most normal tone he could manage.
“I happen to know that the president of Stone Solutions Canada, Vivian Marist, is here in Seattle at least through tomorrow, giving a keynote speech at an AMI conference in place of Cedrick Stone,” Grayson said. “That box in Mr. Waller’s office held real empath gloves and they were shipped from BC. I think I need to do some undercover searching at Stone Solutions Canada. You want to come to Vancouver?”
Reece blinked.
“Drive’s only a few hours,” Grayson said. “We can stop by your place, grab my stuff and anything you need.”
“You want to run away to Canada with me?” Reece’s heart didn’t skip a beat. Definitely no beat-skipping, heart-fluttering here.
“It’s a lot closer than Texas,” Grayson said. “And the safe house is in BC. If we need to get you there, it’ll be closer still.”
Reece was panicking outside clubs and losing his temper in airsoft courses. Had to worry he might accidentally project those emotions onto other people. Had taken off his glove. Inpublic.
