Page 114 of Jayson
I don’t trust myself that much.
My thumb strokes idly along her stomach, just beneath the hem of her top. She makes a small, broken sigh in her sleep, the kind that carves me in half. Her pain seeps in through the cracksin the walls I built around her. A whimper. A twitch. The way she sometimes curls in on herself when she thinks I’m not looking.
I want to fight her demons for her. Slaughter every last one. But some of them wear my face. Some of them were born the day I dragged her from the world she knew and chained her to mine.
She stirs again, murmurs something I can’t catch. I nuzzle the back of her neck, whispering, ‘I’ve got you’, and she settles.
And just when I think I can finally let the weight behind my eyes pull me under—the world breaks apart in an instant.
One second, I’m lying beside her—her warmth a balm I don’t deserve—and the next, the alert flares red across the security panel by the bed. Multiple breaches at the perimeter. Not one or two. Multiple.
Fuck.
I don’t think. I move.
Sheets fly. My feet hit the floor soundless and sharp. I’m already reaching beneath the dresser for the Glock and my hunting knife. My thumb flicks the safety of the gun before I tuck the knife into the hem of my pants.
Behind me, Keira stirs, her breath catching in that half-sleep panic that knows something is wrong.
“Jayson?” Her voice is hoarse, terrified.
“Shh.” I glance back, only for a second. Her eyes are wide, pupils blown. She looks so small in my bed, in my world. So damn breakable. “You need to listen to me, baby. Don’t be scared, but you have to follow my instructions. Right now.”
She’s already sitting up, wrapping the sheet around her like armor. “What’s happening?”
“The ground’s have been breached.” I say it too fast, too calm. My voice has gone cold. Detached. The killer part of me is taking over.
Keira’s already shaking her head, panic rising. “Then I’m not leaving you?—”
“You are,” I growl, crossing the room in three strides and grabbing her by the waist. She tries to fight, shoving at my chest, but she’s shaking. “Keira. I am not fucking asking. You want to help me? You want to survive this? Then do as I say.”
She stills at the edge in my voice. The lethal urgency.
“Where am I going?” she whispers.
“The basement.” I throw on a black thermal, no time for gear. My blood’s running faster than my breath. “There’s a trapdoor behind the breaker panel. No one knows it’s there but me. Even if they come for you, they won’t find you.”
“Who, Jayson? If whocomes for me?”
“You stay in there. You don’t come out until I get you. Not if you hear gunfire. Not if you hear screaming. You don’t come out for anything.”
She hesitates. And that hesitation? It could get her killed. So I scoop her into my arms—light as breath, fragile as hope—and carry her.
She clutches my shoulders, nails biting into my skin. “Jayson?—”
“I’ve got you,” I hiss, already descending the stairs. Every shadow outside the windows moves like a threat. Every camera’s gone dark and I may as well be flying blind.
She buries her face in my neck as I take the service passag that leads to the basement. My bare feet are silent on the old wood. My heart is a war drum in my throat.
She feels like silk in my arms. Warm. Real. A reminder of what I stand to lose. I could count the times I’ve held someone like this on one bloodstained hand, and I don’t intend to lose her.
We reach the basement. The hum of the backup generator inthe corner buzzes against my eardrums like static as I set her down.
I kick the breaker box. It swings open.
“Holy shit,” Keira breathes as I twist the latch and lift the false floor panel. It’s small, padded, lightproof. A coffin for the living.
“Get in,” I say.
