Chapter 14 Roderick
The sound of the coffee brewing finally stops, and I pull myself from my thoughts to grab a mug and make myself a cup to take back up to the office.
Before I can get my coffee made, the sharp sound of the front gate security system rings out.
Leaving my cup abandoned on the counter, I race into the living room and down the short hall to our surveillance room.
Our house has some of the best security money can buy, with cameras all over the grounds, a panic room, and lots of hidden places for guns and protection.
In extreme circumstances, it also has the capability to completely lock down.
We’ve never needed it before, but it’s always better to be safe just in case.
Looking at the screen with the feed from the gate, I half expect to find Zander. It wouldn’t be the first time he went out on a mission and couldn’t remember the code, but who I find instead is not who I expected at all.
I watch as Kratos jumps down from the top of our twelve-foot gate. He lands as if it’s no big deal before he jogs towards the house.
We gave him the damn code, and instead of using it or calling to ask to be let in, he would rather climb the gate. I shake my head in disbelief.
How very Kratos.
Rolling my eyes, I head back out of the surveillance room, only stopping in the living room to disable the alarms before Kratos can get here and set everything off. I head back to the kitchen to finish making my coffee.
I’ll be damned if I have to handle Kratos on a rampage before I have any caffeine in my system.
I make my coffee and down it pretty quickly. The time it took me to check the cameras let it cool enough that it was actually the perfect temperature to chug. Before I can even get to the sink to deposit my cup, the front door is flung open so hard I hear it bounce off the wall.
It should piss me off. Usually, it would, but in the time we have known Kratos, I’ve hardly ever seen him lose his head.
He’s usually the guy with all the answers.
His plans have plans, and he never does anything half-assed or without reason.
When he goes overboard, there’s a damn good reason.
Thinking back on those few times, I also realized that many of them were when innocent lives were on the line or had to do with the rings.
I’d bet that most of those had to do with Jade.
Even if we weren't aware of her back then, Kratos has been working to save her for longer than we’ve even been around.
I can’t say I blame him, though. Spencer was a wreck last night, and he doesn’t even like Jade.
Hearing his retelling of what happened didn’t sit well with me, either.
So I can only imagine how Kratos must have felt about it.
I’m not stupid enough to believe he didn't have Dom watching out for Jade last night at Hopper’s. If I were Kratos, I would have done the same. But it doesn’t matter whether he watched her closely or from far away. Last night was a fucking shitshow, and I’m sure he wants to see her for himself.
I would… I do.
Kratos comes through the living room and into the kitchen in a rush. He’s not exactly running, but he’s on a mission.
I shake myself from my thoughts of Jade and focus on him. I shouldn’t be thinking of her in any way that isn’t strictly professional anyway, though that seems to be easier said than done.
“Where is she?” Kratos growls at me without so much as a greeting, and I can't say I didn’t expect that either. As I said, he’s a man on a mission right now.
I shrug before looking at my watch. It’s only eight-thirty in the morning.
“The rest of the house usually sleeps in on Sundays. After last night, I would assume she did the same, especially because the coffee pot was empty when I got down here. We both know she can’t function without caffeine.”
He just looks at me for a moment, and I don’t understand why that is until I replay what I just said over in my head.
Fuck.
“Don’t look at me like that. We both require coffee first thing in the morning,” I say in way of explanation, but it sounds lame even to me, and when his pierced brow lifts in question, I know he’s not buying it either.
It’s not like I mean to pay attention to her habits, but she’s here, and it’s our job to keep her safe. I can’t exactly ignore her.
“What about Spencer and Zander?” he asks, still standing in the doorway to the kitchen.
“Zan didn’t come home last night, so I assume he’s still out for intel, and who knows with Spence, he could be anywhere by now, or he could be asleep,” I tell him with a wave of my hand to encompass the house and all the places he could be.
His lip lifts in a smirk that, until recently, I didn’t even know he was capable of. Just a few weeks with Jade showed us all that this freaking rock-hard, emotionless man does, in fact, have emotions. He just never cared to show them before, as if they were for her alone.
Something in my stomach knots as I think about how true that might be for more than just him. I quickly push that thought down in favor of following Kratos as he turns from the kitchen and walks away.
“So you have no idea where your two best friends are, but you have a pretty good idea that Jade is still asleep?” he asks me without even looking back to make sure I’m following him. I’m not sure if he can sense me or if he’s just cocky enough to know I would, but I guess it doesn’t matter much.
He’s my boss. They both are.
“You literally asked us to watch out for her,” I tell him, my tone flat, so he knows just how unamused I am with this conversation. “I don’t recall you ever asking me to watch them.”
He nods as he takes the stairs two at a time, and I follow after him.
He stops at the top of the stairs, and I realize he’s waiting for me to show him which rooms she’s in.
I have no doubt that if I had stayed in the kitchen, he would have just checked them all, but since I’m here, I head down the hall to her door.
I stop beside it, and he tests the knob. Though I expect it to be locked, it turns, and Kratos goes in without hesitation. I debate standing in the hall to give them privacy, but when I hear Kratos call out Jade’s name, my feet move into the room of their own accord.
The first thing I notice is her bed.
It's made, and it appears no one has used it for quite some time. I catch a glimpse of Kratos as he walks into her bathroom, flicking the light on as he goes, but I can almost guarantee she’s not in there.
I doubt she would sit with the light off, but beyond that, the whole room feels untouched.
If I had to guess, I would say she hadn’t been here in hours, possibly not all night.
Kratos comes out of the bathroom. His eyes find mine across the room, and I can see that he’s come to the same conclusion.
“Where else could she be?” he asks as he starts back toward her bedroom door and out into the hall. I follow him, not bothering to close her door as I rack my brain.
“She could be anywhere. It’s not like we monitor the inside of the house,” I tell him as I think. He huffs a sigh, his nostrils flaring in a clear sign of irritation.
Join the fucking club. I’m not thrilled about it either.
“The alarm was set when you came through this morning. I disarmed it when I saw you on the cameras.” He nods, and I try to think about where she would most likely be in the house.
“So she’s probably still here,” he says, and I open my mouth to agree before his words really sink in.
He said probably still here, which means he thinks she can get past our security.
I highly doubt that, but it’s not something I want to press with him in his current mood.
Besides, the longer I think about it, the more I wonder if maybe he’s right.
He knows her better than we do.
“She could be in Zander’s room,” I suggest, but he’s shaking his head even before I finish my sentence.
“No, you said he didn’t come home last night.”
“Yes, I did, and he didn’t, but she spends a lot of time with him, so maybe she crawled into his bed to wait,” I explain, but he still looks skeptical. “They sleep in each other's rooms all the time, so it wouldn’t be that crazy.”
The need to defend my opinion outweighed my brain for a moment, and I wish I could take the words back the moment I say them.
I was simply stating a fact, but it wasn’t something for me to tell him.
That’s their business, and the way I worded it may have made it sound like something that I’m not sure it is.
I expect him to be upset. Everyone with eyes can see he looks at Jade like she hung the fucking moon, and honestly, I’m not sure if he’s in love with her or just worships her for saving him all those years ago.
Hell, it could be both, but I don’t really want to make him angrier if he thinks that Zander and Jade have been sleeping together.
I watch him for a moment, expecting him to boil over, but he doesn’t. Instead, he stands deep in thought, as if I hadn’t spoken.
Well, okay then.
“Where is Spencer’s room?” he asks, and it takes my brain a moment to understand his simple question. I don’t understand what that has to do with anything.
My moment of silence is enough to have him turning his attention back to me, annoyance written all over his face.
“Well?” he presses, and this time I turn to point down the hall to the room across from my own, near my study.
Before I can say or do anything, he’s striding forward down the hall, toward the room I just pointed out.
“I don’t understand what Spencer has to do with this,” I trail off as I think aloud. “Unless you're going to ask him to help look for her.”
“No,” he says in response, not bothering to elaborate.
Okay, well, I guess I’ll find out in a minute. No matter how much it's annoying me not knowing what’s going on.
“Let me run to the office and grab his room key. I’ll be right back.” He throws his arm out, damn near clotheslining me, before I can move past him.
“No need,” he says as I stumble back a step.