“Thank you, sir. I appreciate it.”
Jesse left Hadler’s office with his head held high. All an act. Inside he felt like a million tiny claws were scratching up his insides, but there was no way for Hadler to tell he was lying about taking the time off. He grabbed his messenger bag from his desk.
“Heading out?” Milton asked.
“Taking a few days off,” Jesse replied. “Finally get around to unpacking my apartment.”
“Sounds like a smart decision.”
Jesse faked a smile and headed toward the door. Lying was getting easier and easier, but if he was going to deal with bureaucrats far stronger and more powerful than him, then he would have to get used to more than a little counter-espionage.
Stan Lawson didn’t havea social media profile, or a local phone number. Or any trace online. Jesse had spent far too much time that afternoon trying to prove the man existed only to come up with nothing. Zilch. Either Lawson had scrubbed himself from the internet, or the DWO had done it.
Which made Jesse wonder what the DWO did with their prisoners. Uncle Ephraim hadn’t encountered many, and he referenced a facility out of state, but there were no accounts of him visiting the place. Jesse was hoping the place was real and not some myth, like parents telling their kids that pets went to live on some farm in another part of the state. Of course, finding evidence of a secret government facility wasn’t easy. Even with his less reputable resources, Jesse was having a hard time finding mention of the DWO, let alone where they might house mentally unstable patients or criminal suspects.
In a way, his focus on Lawson helped preoccupy his mind from two things: the strange black book he’d stolen from Lawson’s apartment, and his growing annoyance at Bryce for telling his boss about the search. Last night—hell, that morning—Bryce sounded like he wanted him to be part of the team. Then he turned around and stabbed him in the back. No wonder he hadn’t heard anything from Bryce all day.
Come to think of it, he hadn’t heard anything from anyone. That wasn’t entirely unusual on his days off. His friends in Manhattan had figured out he was thousands of miles away, so inviting him out was hard and complaining about city life made more sense for a Twitter post than a text message.
Damn, he needed to make some local friends.
By sundown, he was frustrated and exhausted, and hopped up on too much caffeine. He drained the last of his most recent mug and put it in the sink with the others.
The sink was close to full. He’d been putting off cleaning, though he had a dishwasher. They could wait another night. The work was too important to stop now. He turned back toward his computer.
The little black book sat on the coffee table. Jesse had cleared the space off around it. Despite finding it under a pile of papers, he couldn’t help feeling like the book would somehow infect everything around it. In the margins, and across a few pages, Lawson had sketched the tentacle man more than a few times.
Jesse swore if he stared at it long enough, the words might make sense after all. He just wasn’t sure he wanted to know what the rest of the world would look like at that point.
Better that he focus on the dishes and try to think of something else.
Like how nice falling asleep in Bryce’s arms had been, or how gently he’d touched him at the apartment.
No, he was pissed at Bryce.
He was also lonely. It was an ache in his bones that he hadn’t realized had grown so rampant until there was a chance it would go away. They hadn’t spent much time together, but Bryce was caring. Last night proved that. He’d helped Jesse feel safe after he started sliding down the rabbit hole of conspiracies.
Jesse just couldn’t figure out why Bryce had promised to plead his case and then turned him in for the search. Bryce could be overprotective, but that kind of betrayal didn’t make sense.
The intercom next to his door buzzed and startled Jesse badly enough he dropped a mug on the floor. It broke. Fan-fucking-tastic.
“Jesse?” came Bryce’s voice through the intercom.
Jesse made his way over to the intercom and pressed the button to talk. “I’m buzzing you in.”
Jesse cleaned up the broken mug in the time it took Bryce to reach his door. He was prepared to make his argument for inclusion in the investigation, to berate Bryce for getting him in trouble.
But then he opened the door.
Bryce was in casual clothes for a change. Jeans and a T-shirt suited him. His black hair stuck out at a few odd angles, and Jesse couldn’t decide if that was intentional or not. He had a six pack in one hand, and he dangled it closer to Jesse’s line of sight. “Figured you might need to unwind. I know I do.”
He wasn’t even going to mention what happened at the office. Jesse clenched his jaw and debated shutting the door in his face.
Butfuck, Bryce was hot. And his apartment would feel like a tomb without him.
Bryce raised an eyebrow, and then frowned when Jesse’s expression didn’t change. “What’s got you so pissed off?”
“Like you don’t know,” Jesse snapped. He took the beers from Bryce and stalked toward his kitchen.
