Chapter Seventeen Jace
We leave the farmhouse before dawn.
Briar takes point in a black SUV with Landon beside him.
Jinx drives the second vehicle, a nondescript sedan that blends with civilian traffic.
“For protection.” He said. I believe he just wanted more time in the chaos before going back to the Ministry.
I sit in the back with Elliot, who sleeps against my shoulder with the boneless exhaustion of someone whose body has finally accepted safety.
The drive to the private airstrip takes nine hours.
We switch vehicles twice, doubling back on ourselves, taking routes that add hours to the journey but make tracking nearly impossible. Standard evasion protocol. The kind of paranoid tradecraft I've employed on dozens of operations.
This time, it matters in ways it never did before.
Every time Elliot shifts in his sleep, every small sound he makes, I’m watching. His breathing is steady. His color is better than yesterday. The bruises on his wrists have darkened to purple, but the edges are already yellowing—his body healing faster than I expected.
He's resilient. I knew that intellectually, from his file, from the fact that he survived Moore for eighteen months. But watching him pull himself back from the edge of collapse, watching him demand partnership instead of protection—that's something different.
Something I don't know how to do.
At a rest stop near the border, Jinx brings back coffee and sandwiches. Elliot wakes long enough to eat half of his, then drifts off again, crumbs still on his lip.
I brush them away without thinking.
Jinx catches the gesture in the rearview mirror. His eyes flick away, but not before I see something complicated in his expression.
"What?" I ask, rolling my eyes.
"Nothing." A pause. "It's just strange, watching you do normal human things. Like you downloaded a software update overnight."
"I don't know what I'm doing."
"That's obvious." His tone isn't unkind. "But you're trying. That's more than I expected."
"What did you expect?"
"Honestly? I expected you to get him out, stash him somewhere safe, and go back to doing what you've always done. Mission first. Asset second." He shrugs. "Instead you're wiping crumbs off his face like some kind of boyfriend. It's weird."
"Is that a problem?"
"No." Jinx is quiet for a moment, navigating around a slow-moving truck. "It's good, actually. It means maybe there's hope for the rest of us too."
I don't ask what he means by that. I'm not sure I want to know.
Once we’re at the airstrip, we board and fly. It feels like forever, but the meals are worth taking a flight ten times longer.
Eventually we land, hail a cab and follow Briar’s car towards his place.
The road climbs into the mountains as afternoon fades to evening. Pine forests give way to exposed rock faces, then snow-covered slopes that stretch toward peaks I can't see in the gathering dark.
The radio crackles. Briar's voice, encrypted channel.
"We're clear. No tails, no surveillance pings. You can relax."
Relax. The word feels foreign in my mouth, like a phrase from a language I don't speak.
Elliot stirs as we make the final turn onto the gravel drive.
"Where are we?"
"Switzerland. Briar's property." I watch his face as the cottage comes into view, warm light spilling from the windows. "We'll be safe here. At least for a while."
"It's beautiful."
It is. Even I can recognize that—the stone walls, the slate roof, the smoke curling from the chimney against the darkening sky. Something about it feels almost peaceful.
Beauty has never been a category I found useful.
But Elliot's face softens when he looks at it, and that makes it worth noting.
The cottage is warmer than I remember.
Briar has stocked it well: food in the kitchen, medical supplies in the bathroom, clean sheets on the beds. A fire crackles in the hearth, filling the main room with the scent of burning pine.
Landon immediately commandeers the kitchen, pulling out ingredients I don't recognize and muttering about proper nutrition and recovery diets. Jinx disappears upstairs to set up surveillance equipment on the perimeter.
Briar pulls me aside while Elliot settles onto the couch by the fire.
"Jagger sent an update," he says quietly. "Webb's story is holding, but barely. Helena Cross has been asking questions. She suspects something's off."
"Cross is Design. Your territory."
"Former territory. But yes, I still have contacts there." Briar glances toward Elliot, then back to me. "She's not our enemy. She never liked Webb's methods. If we can bring her in—"
"Later." I cut him off, not harshly. "Right now, I need to focus on him."
Briar studies me for a moment. Whatever he sees makes him nod.
"He needs rest," he says. "Real rest. Not the half-conscious dozing he's been doing in the car."
"I know."
"There's a bathtub. Hot water. Clean clothes in the dresser." He pauses. "Take care of him, Jace. Everything else can wait."
I don't know how to respond to the gentleness in his voice. It feels foreign, like a language I never learned.
"Thank you," I say finally. "For all of this."
"Thank me when we've won." He claps a hand on my shoulder and moves toward the kitchen, leaving me alone with Elliot.
He's standing by the fire, hands extended toward the flames, face painted in warm light. The bruises stand out against his pale skin. His borrowed clothes hang loose on a frame that's lost too much weight.
He looks fragile. Breakable.
But his spine is straight, and when he turns to face me, his eyes are clear.
"I want a bath," he says. "A real one. With hot water and soap that doesn't smell like a hospital."
"I can arrange that."
"Will you stay? While I—" He stops. Swallows. "I don't want to be alone. Not yet."
The vulnerability in his voice cuts through every defense I have.
"I'll stay," I say. "As long as you need."
I run the water hot, testing it with my fingers until the temperature is right. Steam fills the room, fogging the mirror, softening the harsh edges of the tile.
Elliot stands in the doorway.
"Come on. Get naked. Let’s get you clean.”
He considers this. Then he crosses the threshold, closes the door behind him, and starts to undress.
I've seen his body before. I've loved every inch of it, mapped the scars and marks and imperfections. But watching him peel away the layers now, in the steam and the quiet, feels different.
More intimate.
He steps into the tub slowly, wincing as the hot water meets his skin. But once he's submerged to the shoulders, something in him unwinds. His eyes close. His head tips back against the rim.
"God," he breathes. "I forgot what this feels like."
I kneel beside the tub, roll up my sleeves. There's a cloth on the edge, a bar of soap that smells like pine and cedar. I wet the cloth, work up a lather, and start to clean him.
He tenses at first. But I keep my movements slow, predictable, and gradually he relaxes into it.
I wash his arms, careful around the bandaged wrists. His shoulders, knotted with tension that I work at until the muscles soften. His chest, tracing the lines of his ribs, avoiding the bruised places.
"Turn," I say, and he does, presenting his back.
More scars here. Old ones, faded to silver. Newer ones, still pink at the edges. Violence I didn't inflict but that I now feel responsible for somehow.
"Jace." His voice is rough.
"Yes?"
"Why are you doing this?"
"Because you needed it."
"That's not an answer."
I pause, cloth resting against the small of his back.
"I don't have a better one," I admit. "When I see you hurting, something in me wants to fix it. Not because it serves a purpose. Not because it advances an objective. Just because the idea of you suffering is..."
"Unacceptable?"
"Intolerable."
He turns his head, looks at me over his shoulder. Water drips from his hair, runs down his jaw.
"That sounds a lot like caring," he says.
"Maybe it is."
"You said you didn't know how to care."
"I didn't." I set down the cloth, rest my hand on his shoulder. "You're teaching me."
His breath catches. For a moment, neither of us moves.
Then he reaches up, covers my hand with his, and squeezes.
"Stay with me tonight," he says. "In the bed. Not for—I'm not ready for—but I need you close. I need to wake up and know you're there."
"I'll be there," I say. "I'm not going anywhere."
The water cools eventually.
I help him out of the tub, wrap him in a towel that's warmer than anything he's touched in days. He leans against me while I dry him, trusting me with his weight in a way that makes something shift in my chest.
I find clothes in the dresser. Soft cotton, too big for him, but clean and warm. I help him into them, button the shirt when his fingers fumble, smooth the fabric over his shoulders.
"You're good at this," he murmurs.
"At what?"
"Taking care of someone. You said I was teaching you, but that would mean you’re the world’s fastest learner." He looks up at me, a cheeky smirk on his face. "Did they teach you this at the Foundry?"
"No. This is—" I search for the right word. "Improvisation."
His mouth curves. The first real smile I've seen since before Webb took him.
"You're a good improviser."
"Mhmm."
We return to the main room, where Landon has laid out food on the table—soup, bread, cheese, fruit. Simple fare, but more appetizing than anything I've seen Elliot look at in days.
He sits at the table and stares at the spread.
"I don't know if I can eat," he admits.
"Try," Landon says, hovering nearby with an anxious energy that reminds me of a mother hen. "Your body needs fuel to heal. Even if you can only manage a few bites."
Elliot picks up a spoon. His anxiety is spiked, but he is going to eat, one way or the other. He looks at me and I nod. His shoulders relax as he brings the spoon to his mouth. Swallows.
"It's good," he says, surprised.