Chapter 12 #2
Claude shrugs, all easy and free. “I did not expect the good side to pay better than the bad. Look at me as Switzerland. But I have a feeling you are all going to need me even more now.”
“Why?” Hayden levels a glare at Claude. “What do you know that we don’t?”
“Well… I assume you will not be stopping what you have been doing, and I also assume you will be going after the Wagner family now, yes?”
Hayden’s grin is cruel and cunning, sending a shiver down my spine. “Yes. You assume correctly, Carver.”
The grins they exchange are terrifying in their cruelty.
Claude disappears outside again, leaving us all a little anxious and waiting with bated breath.
I wrap my arm around Mason’s shoulders and tug him to me, needing the weight of his body against mine to steady the fraught nature of the moment.
He tangles his fingers in the shirt at the small of my back as he glides his lips over the edge of my jaw.
In that moment, I realize how far we’ve both come, but still how much farther we have left to go.
Claude returns for the third time, a wide grin on his face.
“Well, boys, we are officially in business. When do we go after the Wagners? And not to spill the beans—that’s the phrase, right?
Regardless, there is a sector of boys like you in every large metropolitan city in the continental United States. Did you know?”
Everyone, including me, looks to Hayden in question. But Hayden just looks confused as hell, and also a little hurt.
“What?” Hayden whispers in disbelief.
“Yes. That is why I was sent to torture blond psycho, to see if we could infiltrate the spiderweb.”
“It’s just us,” Hayden says, almost as if trying to reassure himself.
Claude shakes his head firmly. “No, children, there are hundreds of you. But we will tackle that at another time. Now, we must get the other one of you out of jail. I will tell that beautiful small attorney the deal.”
Claude disappears again. Reid makes a disgusted noise, and I drag my attention to him. I thought maybe it was about me and Mason all cuddled up in front of him, but Reid’s gaze is stuck on the front door.
“I don’t trust him,” Reid says with an attitude. “Plus, I don’t forgive him for making my stomach a slab of hamburger.”
“We’re stuck with him for now.” Dante wraps his fingers around Reid’s neck and squeezes gently, making Reid go from tense and annoyed to relaxed. “He won’t touch you again, I promise.”
“He won’t touch you either,” I promise Mason.
Mason grins up at me. “I know. You give off the scariest touch-him-and-die energy. I’m safe when you’re around.”
Hayden makes a disgusted sound. “Surrounded by fucking couples. Fuck off.”
Instead of Claude returning once more, Alexis throws the door open. She doesn’t step inside, just puts her hand on her hip and stares us all down in obvious contempt.
“Well, let’s go get Jacob,” Alexis says with a small, delighted smile.
“Yeah?” Hayden jumps up from his seat in a flash. “Really?”
“Yeah, come on, crazy, let’s go get him.”
We all don’t need to be told twice.
Alexis heads to her car, with no Claude in sight, and we all pile into my car to head to the local jail.
Mason sits in the passenger seat, his usual spot now, and Dante and Hayden flank Reid, who sits in the middle.
The ride is quiet and tense; all I can think about is Jacob.
I feel like getting him out is the start of something I’m not sure we’re all ready for at all.
What is it going to be like between Jacob and Hayden now that Hayden knows the truth?
By the time we pull up in front of the jail, parking in a spot beside Alexis, Hayden looks like he’s going to barf.
The sky is cloudy, almost with the promise of snow, and it fits the mood that’s hanging over us all.
We all climb out of the car in silence and follow Alexis and her confident stride toward the jail.
She holds her hand up when we get close. “Stay out here. I’ll go inside. He was fast-tracked, so he should be done with processing out any minute now. But the last thing I need is the five of you inside a jail where the cops can sniff your crimes out.”
Dante leans down to sniff himself. “We smell like crimes?”
Alexis sneers. “Just stay out here.”
“Dude,” I say to Dante with a laugh.
“What? I’m curious… I don’t want to smell like a criminal. I want to smell like expensive cologne that they keep behind the counter at Macy’s.”
“You smell like expensive cologne, buddy. It was a metaphor.”
Dante blinks, then smiles. “Good.”
Mason and Reid talk amongst themselves in whispers, while Hayden, Dante, and I stand around awkwardly waiting for Jacob to be released.
The past almost day without Jacob was hell and just reaffirms to me that we have to finish what we’ve started so that we can all be free.
I never want to worry about Jacob in jail again.
I don’t want to worry about him being somewhere that I can’t protect him.
After all, I was born with him beside me, and I don’t want to go through a moment of life without him close enough for me to punch him.
After twenty minutes of tense waiting, the jail door opens to reveal Alexis grinning and a disheveled, tired-looking Jacob plodding along behind her.
Hayden gasps beside me but doesn’t move a muscle, but the rest of us do.
Jacob is in my arms before I can even blink.
His hug is tight, and I hug him tighter so that he knows it’s real, that we’re here and he’s coming home.
“You smell like shit,” I whisper into his ear.
Jacob’s chuckle is laced with exhaustion. “I feel like shit too. The cops weren’t exactly nice either.”
I pull away to inspect him, noticing for the first time the black eye and cut lip. When I run my hands down his arms, he winces when I get to his wrists. They’re bruised from the cuffs, and rage threatens to overtake me. But Mason appears at my back, calming me enough to keep my wits about me.
“You’re coming home. Everything’s okay now.”
Jacob winces and glances at something over my shoulder. “Is it?”
I turn around to find Hayden looking anywhere but at Jacob, a fraught look on his face, blooms of red high up on his cheeks. Before any of us can say a thing, Hayden stomps back toward the car, and Reid chases after him.
Jacob turns back to me. “What happened to his arm? What the fuck, Parker? You couldn’t keep him safe for twenty-four hours?”
I narrow my gaze at him. “First off, fuck you, and second, he punched a wall twice when he found out your entire role as fall guy.”
All the color bleeds from Jacob’s face. “What?”
“He didn’t know! I thought he knew.”
Jacob squeezes his eyes shut tight and goes silent. Dante slaps a hand on Jacob’s shoulder, squeezing tightly in reassurance. “Come on, let’s go home. You can get a shower and then we can figure everything else out.”
Despite his personality dictating he argue, Jacob swallows his arguments and pride and lets us steer him back to the car.
We all pile in, and in a strange turn of events, Hayden rides with Alexis back to the house.
The car is even more tense and silent now, with Jacob staring forlornly out the window like he’s in a sad music video.
Mason and I just shrug at each other and make our way home.
Hayden hops out of Alexis’ car with a wave over his shoulder, disappearing into the house after keying the code that only I know in. Little shit.
When we walk inside, Jacob freezes at the sight of Claude sitting at the kitchen table eating a Granny Smith apple.
Unease prickles under my skin at the fact Claude is smart enough to get through alarm systems, into the house, and act like it means nothing at all if the apple and easy grin is anything to go by.
“What the fuck?” Jacob says the moment his eyes land on Claude.
Claude just grins cheerily around said apple. “Welcome back, brother. We are team now!”
Oh, fuck me.