Jaden (Jaded #3)(16)

He nodded, sipping his wine and narrowing his eyes briefly at me. “Are you worried about Corrigan or whoever’s framing you?”

Both. “Corrigan. Duh.” I grinned and lifted one shoulder in a shrug.

He continued to watch me, then the corner of his mouth curved up into a slight grin. “Liar.” He sounded sad.

I started to shrug, but no. I couldn’t even lie to myself. Instead, I reached for the wine glass again and drank the rest of the contents. “I don’t want to talk about the other stuff, not right now.”

He dipped his head forward. “You’re going to have to, you know?”

“I know.” My hand tightened around the stem of the glass. “Let’s get back to the city and go from there.”

“I talked to Denton today.”

“Yeah?”

He took another sip of his wine. “Yeah, whenever Corrigan gets back and does his thing, Denton’s ready to go. We can stay with him.”

“At his house?” My mouth was suddenly dry. The idea of staying at my old neighbor’s house, so close to my old home had my stomach churning. “Bryce,” I stopped. My hand went to the table, and my fingers curled around, holding onto it tightly. Marcus had been in that house. He stabbed Corrigan there; I closed my eyes as I remembered that night. Bryce turned the video off, and I raised my gun. I’d been ready. “Bryce, god.”

“Hey.” He leaned forward. One of his hands rested over mine. “Look at me.”

I did, but it didn’t help. Seeing the mirrored anguish and haunted expression in his eyes had my stomach churning at a faster rate.

He said, his hand tightening over mine, “It’s time we faced it and faced him. I know. Sheldon, I know.” The haunted look doubled, overtaking everything in his gaze. “Trust me. I remember that night too, but it happened and we did it together.”

I shook my head, pulling my hand away. “No, you didn’t. You—”

“You provoked him, but I told you, too. I turned the video off.”

“You didn’t pull the trigger,” I whispered, letting my other hand fall from the table and to my lap. My hands wrapped around each other. “I did. I killed him. You didn’t.”

“That’s bullshit. I’m a part of it. You weren’t going to do it. You only did because I told you. I gave you permission to do it.”

I shook my head. I was going to anyway. I went down there for that purpose, but saying those words aloud felt like I was confessing to the real murder I committed. I hadn’t killed Grace, but I had murdered someone else. “No, Bryce. All you did was turn off the monitor. That’s all. You weren’t in that room with us.” It would’ve been different if he had been. I knew that with certainty. Bryce would’ve tackled him, maybe punched him so he was unconscious. Marcus wouldn’t have been dead now, but I couldn’t do any of that. I had one weapon. It was the only way I could’ve fought back, and I chose to use it in a lethal way.

Marcus’ death was on my hands, not his.

“Fuck that. His blood is on my hands, too.”

I looked up, shocked. It was like he read my thoughts, but he hadn’t. His hand was clenched around his glass, and he was looking out into the backyard. His jaw clenched as he whispered again, “We’ve both been running from that. It’s time we stopped.” He swung those piercing eyes my way again. “Being away from you, watching you cling to Corrigan when we were in Spain, I know all of it was because of what we both did. You didn’t want to talk about Marcus, about how we’re both to blame for killing him, but it’s here now. You’re going to be on trial for a different murder. We can’t run anymore.”

I shook my head. “I’m not.” With those two words, my stomach stopped churning. All the emotions that were racing inside me calmed and settled to the bottom again. He was right. No more running. No more lying.

We shared a look.

It was time to deal with everything.

That was when the first explosion went off.

“What the—”

It was a loud boom, and within seconds, the ground shook. Bryce jumped out of his chair, but I grabbed hold of the table. I wasn’t going to fall over, but it was surprising. “Holy shit.”

Bryce held a hand out to me, not to help me up, just to check on me. “You okay?”

“Yeah.”

He headed farther off the patio and was gazing into the forest. “It came from out there.”

Was it . . . “Corrigan?”

He turned back to me and shook his head. “Who knows? If it was, he should be running here soon.”

The second explosion went off then, and this time the table started to slide over the floor. It didn’t go far, just a few inches, but I lurched forward anyway. Stopping it, I stood up from my chair and started for the door. No matter who it was, I wanted to grab our bags.

“Where are you going?”

I threw open the door. “I packed bags for us.”

“No, Sheldon.” Bryce raced for me and grabbed my arm. “Think about it. If this is anything serious, we need to get out of here.”

“Yes, but—”

Then all hell broke loose.

“SHELDON!”

It was my dad, and turning, I saw him race from the hallway, holding onto Beth’s hand. They were both in robes, but while Neil’s was tied with pajama pants sticking out underneath, Beth was trying to hold hers closed with her free hand. It wasn’t working. She had a silk nightgown on underneath, and she stumbled, crying out. Neil stopped, grabbed her arm, and hoisted her up in one movement. It happened so fast, if I hadn’t been watching, I wouldn’t have caught it. Her slipper fell off, and muttering a quick curse, Neil stooped down and swept it up, shoving it into his robe’s pocket. He was to the door by then.