Chapter Six #3
Corruption had a way of amplifying rage until it was clawing at his skin to get free.
He leaned his head back, resting it against the door, and closed his eyes. He just needed to get enough control over his anger
to be sure he didn’t flip the neighborhood from HOA to MMA. Even he could handle that.
His phone chimed.
Don’t look do NOT look whatever that is it’s not going help you calm down—
Too late. Reece had already pulled out his phone.
“You have got to be fucking kidding me.”
The words burst from him out loud as he stared at the picture Grayson had just sent: a photo clearly taken in the parking
garage where Reece had sublet Liam’s studio apartment, of the studio’s assigned parking spot. And parked in that spot was
Reece’s Smart car, the hatch up and the tailgate down so that the engine was clearly visible—the new engine, which took up a sizeable chunk of the back of the car and had the word Hayabusa clearly stamped across it.
A text accompanied the picture.
Grayson: Since my rental is out of commission I got a new ride. What do you think?
Reece ground his teeth together and smashed out his response onto the keyboard.
Reece: What the FUCK have you done?
Two minutes went by, Reece’s blood pressure ticking up point by point as he stared at his car. Then another text popped up.
Grayson: Just a little upgrade.
Reece’s fingers flew over the keys.
Reece: You put one of the world’s fastest motorcycle engines in a SMART CAR. That is a mod people do because they CAN not because
you SHOULD.
And I KNOW you didn’t think to upgrade the stock brakes along with it. Meaning you turned my car into a 300+ horsepower DEATH
TRAP.
His phone chimed again immediately.
Grayson: Remind me: whose fault is it I had to replace my rental?
Grayson: And she’s MY car now.
Reece’s fingers tightened on the phone. Grayson was baiting him.
That’s all this was. Reece had stolen his truck and incapacitated his rental, so he’d retaliated by stealing Reece’s Smart car and putting an outrageous upgrade on it.
He was trying to make Reece say or do something stupid, but Reece was smarter than that.
Reece was in control. Reece was going to put the phone away and go back to the kitchen to plot large-scale revenge with Alex and Cora.
Except he was already typing back.
Reece: WHY do you have MY car at MY apartment?
A minute went by.
Then another picture lit Reece’s screen, this time a selfie of just Grayson, lying on top of what was obviously Reece’s rumpled
comforter.
Grayson: Maybe you’re too chicken to text me your location unless you’ve sabotaged my car, but I’m not scared of you.
Grayson: So come on over, sugar. You know where to find me now.
Son of a bitch.
Reece stared at the picture.
Grayson was in his apartment.
Grayson was in his bed.
In the photo, Grayson’s head was tilted against Reece’s pillow, his normally flawless hair now unwashed and messy. He was
wearing some Washington tourist T-shirt that he must have grabbed on the road, too small for his broad shoulders and fitted
too tight to his chest and biceps. His hazel eyes were bloodshot, and the stubble on his jaw was too thick to be stylish,
bordering on a scraggly beard.
Gone was the perfectly groomed and photo-ready Dead Man. In his place was something much more raw: Evan the Unedited Hot Mess.
And Reece couldn’t tear his eyes away. There was nothing posed or staged about the picture. It obviously hadn’t been sent
to turn anyone on. Nothing more than a quick photo captured with the sole intention of trying to piss Reece off.
And it had. Reece was furious.
But it wasn’t fury alone coursing through Reece with the power of a freight train. Nothing could have possibly looked hotter
to his empath brain than this unfiltered and starkly honest picture of Grayson sprawled out in Reece’s bed.
And there was no way Reece was going to keep control of his emotional projections now.
“I have to get the fuck out of here.”
Reece was already scrambling to his feet. He shoved his phone in his pocket and grabbed the truck keys.
Two minutes later, he was on the road, tearing up the street but still seeing the mirage of Grayson everywhere he looked.
Come on over, sugar.
Reece had to get control. He had to.
Maybe if he fed the corruption, the black lightning would get bright enough that he wouldn’t see memories anymore.
He slammed on the gas, like he could somehow outpace the storm inside him, and headed for the highway, to drive anywhere that
Grayson wasn’t.
The building staff at Stone Solutions had their own break room on the ground floor, a windowless space with two round Formica
tables, a few plastic chairs and an old refrigerator next to an even older kitchen counter. Nothing like the break rooms on
the higher floors, with their sweeping views, comfortable furniture and daily fresh fruit delivery, but they had their own
coffee maker on the ground floor, and Wayne Smith wasn’t much of a fruit guy anyway.
He picked a plastic pod of coffee from the basket and fit it into the machine, the scent filling the small space as it brewed into his mug.
Warren poked his head around the door. “Doing a perimeter check with Hank.”
Smith grunted in acknowledgment. New safety protocols: no one alone and frequent check-ins. Management had promised the containment
issue in R in fact, they’d all received an extra two weeks’ pay—conditional upon signing an NDA agreeing not to talk to the press.
Smith had signed. They all had, because groceries didn’t buy themselves. But it had been a weird night. And it felt weird
to insist on safety protocols following a lab leak, and the sudden panic at the American Minds Intact store had been weird
as hell.
Everything about empaths was fucking weird. Maybe it was time for Smith to find another job.
The coffee finished with a loud hiss. Just as Smith reached for it, he heard a sound beyond the door, like soft shoes on the
linoleum of the hall.
Smith paused. “Warren?” he called. “Hank?”
There was no answer.
Smith reached for his mug again, more slowly. He was used to a plethora of odd noises at night, bulbs flickering, machines
beeping, the building settling. Except he’d put in fifteen years as night shift security. That had sounded like footsteps.
But then, he was a little jumpy from the other night. Maybe it was just the pipes, or Hank and Warren heading out for their
perimeter check.
He picked up his mug and strode down the hall to his security room. He settled in his big leather chair, gaze on his many monitors and the camera feeds around the building, and sipped from his mug.
The soft and measured patter came again, tap-tap-tap from the hall.
Smith whipped his head around. “Who’s there?”
No response. Nothing but the low hum of computer equipment surrounding him.
He stared at the door he’d left open behind him for a long moment, then shook himself. “Fucking paranoia,” he muttered to
himself. And ugh, he’d sloshed his coffee when he jerked, droplets now speckling his khakis.
He set the coffee mug down on the desk and looked around for a napkin or paper towel.
“It’s Smith, isn’t it?”
Smith’s head shot up, his eyes going straight to the doorway. A brown-haired white man he didn’t recognize was standing in
the frame, studying Smith with pale blue eyes behind glasses. He wore a white lab coat over his clothes, like a doctor, and
was holding something in his hands, small and knit, by the looks of it, maybe a winter hat.
“No visitors,” Smith snapped out, his pounding heart making him extra sharp.
The man only rolled his eyes. He gestured at something out of sight down the hall. Then three more men were coming into the
room, two large and brawny, the third holding a syringe.
Smith was out of his chair instantly. “What’s going on?” he said, pulse skyrocketing, his eyes widening.
“I’m afraid you’re being asked to expand your services to the company,” said the blue-eyed man in the lab coat as the other
men approached. “Rather permanently.”