Chapter 44 Jonah - Present
forty-four
Jonah - Present
A WHOLE FUCKING CAKE.
“We’re out of cash,” Harper told me, wallet open and tipped upside down as if he were trying to shake loose money hidden in its seams.
I hadn’t found a job since Hollow Creek. Our hotel room was paid for two more nights, but that was it. We didn’t have money for food or anything else. Even if I found a job today, I doubted they’d pay me upfront.
“Shit.” An understatement, but all I had to offer.
“We’re out of cash,” Harper repeated, his face even paler than usual. “Jack. We’re out of cash.”
“I know. I’m thinking.”
“I’ve never been out of cash. What do people do when they’re out of cash? How do they get more?” His tone was tinged with panic.
“I started this without any cash, Harp. We’ll find a way. There’s always a way.”
“How?”
“We’ll find a job. We’ll find something.”
“I’ve never had a job. How am I supposed to get one?” More panic. “Maybe if I just use my card, and then—”
“No. That can be tracked, Harper.”
“But how are we supposed to eat?”
“We steal.”
Bright blue eyes blinked at me. “What? I’ve… I’ve never stolen anything… have you?”
I stared at him for a long moment, wondering just what kind of life he’d lived before now that theft hadn’t even crossed his mind.
Of course I’d stolen things before. When I’d first gone on the run with nothing but my car and the clothes on my back, I’d had to steal everything.
I’d eventually found work and had built a tiny amount of emergency cash.
Cash that had been left behind between the pages of a Bible back in Hollow Creek for someone to stumble onto and call it a fucking blessing.
“I’ll do it. You can wait here.”
“No.” Harper stood to his feet, determination replacing the panic. “I want to help. Let me help.”
This was probably a bad idea.
“Confidence is key. Don’t act shifty or they’ll pay more attention to you. Act normal. Acknowledge the people around you. If you act like you’re supposed to be doing what you’re doing, people don’t even question it,” I told Harper at the front of the grocery store.
He was buzzing with nervous energy, but also seemed weirdly excited by the prospect of committing a crime.
“Okay. Cool. I’ll follow your lead.”
“No. Just pretend you don’t know me. Then we have double the chances. Just… don’t make it obvious. And if anything goes wrong… run.”
Harper nodded quickly.
Well, here goes nothing.
We walked into the store, Harper already looking around way too obviously.
I sighed and pushed forward, headed to the first aisle we needed and grabbed a few protein bars, slipping them into my jacket pocket and keeping my head held high as I looked at something else.
When I pulled my hands out of my pockets again, they were empty.
I grabbed a box of cereal to stare at the words on the back before putting it back where I’d found it and continuing onward.
When I ran out of pockets to fill, I carried a couple of essentials in my hands, just like anyone else, except when I was done, I walked briskly toward the entrance rather than the registers.
“Hey!” a voice called behind me, and I was about to run as fast as my fucking limp would carry me before another voice halted my escape.
“Let go of me!”
Fuck. I turned to see Harper, arms full of items, wrist captured by a security guard.
There was only a moment to consider how to play this.
The door was only a few long strides away, close enough that the breeze beckoned me, offering me freedom each time it opened.
I had what I came for. I could walk out right now, and no one would even notice me.
The security guard was reaching for his radio, his focus on Harper alone.
What would happen to him if they called the police?
Fear told me to leave him behind.
I moved, my legs acting before my mind could think it through fully. My body slammed into a much bulkier body, knocking the security guard to the ground. “Run!”
Plastic packages slipped from Harper’s hoard, but we were moving, leaving them abandoned as we bolted out the entrance. Curses were being shouted behind us.
We weaved around buildings and alleys, taking an unpredictable path until we were far from the store and certain nobody was following us.
My leg ached and had slowed me down, but Harper had kept pace with me this time.
He hadn’t left me behind either, and as we both panted against a brick wall, I was suddenly so fucking grateful for that.
I hadn’t had to watch the distance between us growing like I knew it could have, like it had before when he was running from Benny.
Harper was faster than me, but he’d stayed by my side anyway.
He still had his arms full of items—snacks, bright-colored packages, and things that weren’t at all essential. I could have smacked him, but I found myself laughing.
Real genuine laughter pulled from the depths of me, and a moment later he followed, laughing just as loud.
We would have looked foolish to anyone who peered down the alley and spotted us, but it didn’t fucking matter.
I couldn’t remember the last time I’d laughed like this, and fuck, it felt so good.
“Is—” I could hardly breathe. “Is that a whole fucking cake?”
Harper clutched the box closer, the package warped from holding onto it so tightly, its contents undoubtedly shaken into a complete mess. “I wanted cake.”
“Maybe I should have clarified. People usually just go for the essentials when they can’t afford them.”
“Where’s the fun in that?” he laughed, but then his smile turned. The edges of his lips dropped, the creases in the corners of his eyes smoothed out. “I thought I was fucked there for a moment. You saved me… again.”
“Yeah… well, we’re in this together, right?”
I expected the words to comfort him, but they seemed to have the opposite effect. His aura turned somber. “Why, though?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, you helped me now, but also back in Hollow Creek… when Benny… You tried to follow us then too… tried to help. And then you brought me with you.”
“No offense, Harp, but you wouldn’t make it out here on your own.”
“Right,” he answered, sounding distant.
I’d been aiming for teasing, but it seemed like I’d struck a nerve. “Hey, I’m sorry. I’m just messing around. You just… you needed someone. So did I. And now we have each other, right?”
“Right.” He held his items closer to his chest, packages crinkling as he squished them.
“Let’s go back to the motel… have some of that cake. Okay?”
He nodded, and we started on our way back, keeping a lookout for police or security or anyone who might be after us.
Harper was quiet the whole way back, deep in thought even as we closed the motel room door and sealed ourselves away from the rest of the world. I started unloading the items from my pockets onto the table, and he did the same, dumping his crumpled boxes and packets of snacks in a heap.
Something was still bothering him. I understood it—the weight of being cared for, of being helped, how uncomfortable it could feel.
I’d spent so long not caring about anyone but myself, but I cared about him, and it didn’t feel like a burden.
It felt like purpose. Like hope. The weight of running lessened because we shared it.
I was going to tell him as much, but he spoke first.
“I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, Jonah. I really mean that.”
It took a second.
His words felt like comfort until they didn’t. Until I realized he’d said my name. My real name. Not Jack. He’d said Jonah.
Silence rang in my ears as I looked at him, his eyes cast downward, brow furrowed.
He knew my name.
I’d wanted to tell him so badly. I’d ached for it.
Ached to connect with him in a way that was real and true and honest. Ached to hear someone say my name.
And finally, someone had. But I hadn’t told it to him.
Instead of relief, instead of belonging, I felt the icy claws of dread unleashing in my gut, clawing their way up from the depths of me.
“What… what name did you say?”
I’d misheard him. I must have. I needed to have misheard him.
Harper was quiet, his expression doing something complicated before he smiled sweetly again, a mask sliding into place. “I said Jack.”
“No.” I stood up so fast the chair I’d been sitting in tumbled over onto the floor. “No, you didn’t.”
“What else would I have said?” He still smiled, and it looked like it always did when he smiled, but it felt wrong. It felt like a lie.
“Who are you?” My hand dipped into my pocket, trembling fingers seeking the switchblade. Pale eyes tracked the movement.
“Let’s not do anything hasty.”
“Who the fuck are you?” I shouted, pulling it free but not clicking it open. I was scared, but I didn’t want to hurt him. But what else was I supposed to do when it felt like the walls were closing in and crushing me?
Harper’s eyes were fixed on my hand. “I told you who I am.”
I shook my head, taking a step back, a step closer to the door. “No. You’re lying.”
I could see the exact moment when he decided to drop the pretenses. His whole face shifted. His eyes were cold, and the way he stared had me wanting to take another step back. I was bigger than him, by a decent amount, but there was something about him that reeked of predator.
“Fine.” Even his voice seemed colder.
“Who are you?” I asked again.
“I told you who I am. That part wasn’t a lie.”
“So what parts were?”
“Oh, you know… just… everything else.”
I couldn’t swallow past the lump in my throat. It felt like the ground was opening up beneath me, and I didn’t know which way was up anymore. What was real?
“Are you really running from Benny?”
Harper laughed, and it was nothing like the sound I’d heard in the alley. Which one was real?
“My man would cut off his own hands before he ever harmed me with them. No, this—” He gestured at the fading bruise. “This was all your man.”
Bile rose up my throat. Dex. He’d found me. The what-ifs, the fears, the doubts, the questions that ran through my head over and over at any moment in time. Is he alive? I finally had an answer. He was alive, and he was closing in. Through Harper he had me in his grasp.
“You’re a Stray.” My voice sounded distant.
His smile widened. “Now you’ve got it. They call me—”
“Little Snake Prince.”
Harper winked.
And I ran.